Colorado environmental groups, along with Cortez-based Osprey Packs, is urging Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-Colorado) and Rep. Scott McInnis (R-Grand Junction) to include some Wilderness Areas in a bill that would designate 164,000 acres in Montezuma County as a National Conservation Area.

The Colorado Environmental Coalition and the Sierra Club are proposing that 33,000 acres of undeveloped natural lands in Cross, Papoose, and Squaw canyons be protected as Wilderness Areas within the NCA in order to overcome criticism that the current proposal does not offer enough protection for the ruins-rich region.

The fear, says CEC member Jeff Widen, is that if the bill does not pass congressional muster this session, President Clinton will likely proclaim the region a national monument, an unpopular option that is more restrictive for multiple-use and puts sensitive land-management issues out of the hands of local communities they directly affect.

"We are in agreement with the local sentiment that a national monument is not wanted, but if we present a bare-bones bill like this that lacks adequate protection then I think (U.S. Interior Secretary) Bruce Babbitt and Clinton will see through that and designate it as a monument," Widen said. "We’re looking at something between the two, but more towards what the county is thinking."

Babbitt has been adamant about further protecting hundreds of Anasazi ruins spread throughout the McElmo Dome area, and has said that no-change in status is not an option.

The Sierra Club and the Colorado Environmental Coalition said in a February 10 news release that Campbell and McInnis’s NCA bill "implies protection for the area’s resources, (but) a closer look reveals that the bill will provide little, if any, real protection."

The pristine natural environment of Squaw, Cross and Papoose canyons have met the criteria for the designation as established under the Wilderness Act of 1964, and contain numerous archeological sites. The wildland characteristics consequently prompted the Bureau of Land Management to list the canyonlands as a wilderness study area, but they have not recommended it for Wilderness Area designation as of yet.

"This is a reasonable middle ground that beefs up and protects those untouched natural areas from further development but also allows for multiple use in the remaining 80 percent that would be the National Conservation Area," Widen said.