By David Grant Long

Another cook has volunteered to help stir the simmering controversy that’s being brewed up by politicians on whether 160,000 acres of BLM lands west of Cortez should be designated a national monument or national conservation area -- or be allowed to retain its current multiple-use status as an Area of Critical Environmental Concern.

In an Oct. 14 letter to Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, Greg Walcher, director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources, offered to involve his agency in what would seem to be only a re-enactment of a local process that was completed last summer. Walcher met with Babbitt in Denver earlier this month while the secretary was in Colorado to dedicate a greenbelt in Westminster.

"As you recall, we offered to facilitate a series of discussions directly with the local communities to determine whether some management changes are needed and could be made without such a politically difficult decision (designating a national monument, as Babbitt has hinted) having to be made," Walcher wrote.

"Our thought is that discussions between your office, or your designees, and the local governments, businesses and interest groups might be able to accomplish that."

After Babbitt visited the ACEC area briefly in May, he declared that the Anasazi ruins that dot the area needed more protection, and said one way of doing this would be to designate it a national monument, which can be done unilaterally through presidential powers; however, he agreed to take local input into serious consideration.

A working group made up of local interests was assembled by the BLM’s Regional Advisory Council to carry out this process and draft a report.

The consensus of the working group, which included representatives of environmental, archeological, ranching, gas, tourism and recreational interests, was that national-monument status was undesirable and might actually have an adverse effect on the area, since it would increase visitation and degradation of the sites, inevitably leading to more restrictions on the present multiple uses of the lands.

Increased funding for site preservation and enforcement of the current regulations with no further restrictions was suggested as a more acceptable alternative. Babbitt was presented that report in August and promised a response by fall, but so far nothing has been heard.

Walcher admitted yesterday he had not actually read the working group’s report and said he was only trying to further a solution.

"The problem is there’s a bunch of people who don’t think the status quo is good enough," he said, "and I have the impression Secretary Babbitt is among them."

"I think there’s a chance the recommendations in that report may be exactly the right solution," he added, "but for whatever reason, they’re not being considered very seriously just yet."

Walcher said Babbitt and he had been "talking about the politics of it."

"Basically there are all these national environmental organizations in Washington encouraging him to declare all of that to be a national monument," he said, "and a lot of local officials and Congressional members asking him not to.

"So he’s kind of feeling under pressure from both sides, and asking me if I had any thoughts about it," he added.

"I said, ‘Why don’t you let the state facilitate some meetings to see what kind of management scheme could satisfy both, rather than doing something autocratic like you did in Utah?’ " (President Clinton declared the Escalante/Grand Staircase area in southeast Utah a national monument three years ago with no local input, sparking a firestorm of criticism.)

Just last week, the Montezuma County Commission sent a letter to both Babbitt and three Colorado legislators -- Rep. Scott McInnis and senators Ben Nighthorse Campbell and Wayne Allard -- asking that they stop taking political potshots at one another and work together on a solution based on the working group’s report, but no response to that has been yet received. The letter also included a very tentative budget to accomplish the goals outlined in the working group’s report.

"I don’t know whether anything could be accomplished or not (by having more meetings," Walcher said. "I’m not suggesting another round of meetings to duplicate what’s already been done, that’s not the idea at all -- what I’m trying to do is say to the secretary, ‘If you think that the local people are unwilling to work with you, you’re wrong.’

"We’re just trying to figure out if there’s something we can do to help," he added, "because absent some action of some kind, I get a fairly strong feeling that (Babbitt) feels he has to do something -- he thinks the status quo is not good enough and someone’s going to have to blink."

Walcher said he’d been in contact with McInnis, Campbell and Allard and was unaware of any legislative alternative they might be initiating.

"Not that I know of," he said, adding that Babbitt "believes our congressional delegation is being intransigent on the issue, as he put it."