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August 11, 2001
By Janelle Holden The upper Dolores River gravel pits and federal public-land issues dominated the questions local residents posed to U.S. Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.) on Thursday. Allard hosted a town meeting in Cortez at Empire Electric’s Calvin Denton room at noon, drawing several dozen residents to the event. "Let me tell you something about me. I like to work with your local elected officials," explained Allard. who said he supports a "bottom-up" political system instead of "top-down." "I’m not going to come in here and tell your local elected officials what to do." Only three local elected officials attended the event: Dolores Mayor Jim Moore, Re-1 school-board member Sue Baacke, and Montezuma County Sheriff Joey Chavez. But Allard’s support of local officials did not please some members of the crowd. "The county commissioners in this county nowhere near represent the people in this county," Dolores resident and gravel-pit opponent Marilyn Boynton told Allard. Neva Kindred agreed with Boynton — but for "different reasons," she said. Kindred and others urged Allard to support increased oil and gas production from federal lands.
"We have to have a policy where we’re not totally dependent on the rest of the world," said Kindred, who also said public lands should remain open for exploration, "instead of shutting it down to provide places for people to hike who don’t even work for a living." One man in the crowd said he had been in the oil and gas business for 51 years, and blamed the current energy crisis on environmentalists. "We can do a better job of balancing the environmental part of it and the economy," he said, adding that if drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge occurs, "it will look prettier and more pristine than it did before." County resident Phil Weiser asked Allard what he was going to do about international unratified oil and gas treaties. "Leave them unratified," answered Allard. "We cannot go into another country and tell them what to drill and not to drill. They’re a sovereign country." "I’m a strong supporter of private-property rights. Look at my voting record — I’m 100 percent," said Allard, who explained, "The U.N. can’t tell us how to manage our parks or our public lands." Allard, at the beginning of the meeting, explained that he supported increased energy production in the United States. "We’re becoming more and more dependent on foreign oil," said Allard, who estimated that 66 percent of the United State’s oil will come from outside sources in future years. "We’ve moved out of the energy crisis we had at the beginning of the year, but I think it’s going to come back." Chester Tozer, president of the Southwest Colorado Landowners Association, told Allard that the BLM promised not to cut back livestock-grazing and CO2 production on the new Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, but is now doing so, although official say it’s not because of the monument. Allard replied, "The Forest Service and BLM have been cutting grazing allotments since my grandfather had them." A woman asked if the monument status was ever going to be overturned. "Well, it’s an executive order. It could be reversed with another executive order," said Allard. Another woman asked why Allard supported wilderness designations, and Allard responded, "I work with local elected officials, and if they think that wilderness is beneficial to the local economy than we’ll work with you," said Allard, who introduced legislation in March to designate the Spanish Peaks in the San Isabel National Forest a wilderness area. Allard told residents concerned about the gravel pits that it was a state and county manner and that gravel pits "have to be treated on an individual basis." |
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Copyright © 2001 the Cortez Journal.
All rights reserved. |
