Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt has presented to President Bill Clinton a proposal to create four new national monuments, including Canyons of the Ancients in southwestern Colorado. Babbitt said the proposal contained "no surprises."

"Protection of several of these areas, in one form or another, has been discussed for years, but no action has been taken," Babbitt said. "We may not have another chance before they are lost, so I am urging the president to protect these unique landscapes now for future generations of Americans."

In a phone call to Montezuma County commissioners Kelly Wilson and Kent Lindsay at Lindsay’s El Grande Cafe Wednesday afternoon, Babbitt said his request to the president was consistent with the management philosophy that a local stakeholders’ group had agreed upon last year.

Grazing and carbon-dioxide extraction will continue to be among the multiple uses allowed within the monument, Babbitt promised. Lindsay said, however, that mining would be restricted under the proposed proclamation. The secretary did not discuss any additional restrictions that might be included in the document. Prohibition or reduction of motorized vehicle traffic has concerned ranchers, who utilize undesignated "roads" to gain access to their livestock.

When asked about supervisory responsibility for the new monument, which will remain under the auspices of the Bureau of Land Management, Babbitt assured the commissioners that management would be "done internally," Wilson said. "My guess is that it would be someone within the local agency, not from Denver or Washington."

The BLM has set up a National Landscape Monuments System to manage such lands, and already has a strong preservation presence with the Anasazi Heritage Center near Dolores. Until recently, federal land that was deemed particularly valuable was placed under the management of the National Park Service. Babbitt, who has often battled with the BLM over what he considers its pro-mining and logging policies, said the new responsibility will give the agency a purpose that it has lacked.

Until a long-term management plan is established and implemented, Babbitt told the commissioners that a standard interim management protocol would govern activity within the monument. Wilson said that certain details remain to be negotiated.

Babbitt said that Clinton’s proclamation would include a memorandum specifying local representation on an advisory board responsible for developing the permanent management plan for the new monument. That process could take up to four years. The local advisory council would include representatives from the Montezuma and Dolores county commissions as well as the chairman of the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe. Babbitt did not mention whether users’ groups would have additional representation.

"Setting up the advisory board language as a memorandum allows us to have a lot of input into the management plan," Wilson said. "A federal advisory-type appointment that is written into the proclamation is more set and wouldn’t necessarily call for local appointments, so we avoided that."

Lindsay said that Babbitt had assured local officials that sufficient funding would be available for the monument. Opponents of proposed and recently designated monuments have expressed fear that Congress, antagonized by what some legislators consider the Clinton Administration’s overuse of the federal Antiquities Act of 1906 to "seize public lands," would block funding. The Antiquities Act allows presidents — without congressional approval — to safeguard objects of historic and scientific interest.

"I’ve always thought that the best protection for these lands is anonymity," Lindsay said. "But if we must have a monument, then this is probably one of the best ways to get one."

"I think this will increase tourist traffic even more, which has a good and a bad side," said Lindsay. "There will be more motel rooms rented, more meals sold, more taxes collected. But the roads in that area aren’t really good, so it’ll impact the roads. It will take more sheriff’s deputies to monitor the roads."

Babbitt had long voiced his intent to provide additional protection for the 164,000-acre parcel, currently managed for multiple use by the Bureau of Land Management. Legislation sponsored earlier this year by U.S. Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell and U.S. Rep. Scott McInnis would have created a national conservation area, a designation that backers hoped would allow for a stronger local voice in managing the land. That plan failed when Campbell withdrew his support for such a measure after being angered by vigorous opposition from both environmentalists, who wanted stricter protections, and traditional land-users, who lobbied for no change in management status.

Campbell spokesman Chris Changery said Wednesday that although the senator did not yet know all of the details, he is still opposed to any Clinton Administration plan that overrides public participation.

"Here we have the last days of the administration and the president and Secretary Babbitt are treating public lands like they’re treating their offices — they’re turning off the lights, locking the doors and leaving," Changery said.

Campbell is a cosponsor of the National Monument Public Participation Act, which would establish a formal period of public and congressional comment before any new national monument could be designated.

"We knew it was coming, so now is the time to be positive and see what we can do to make the best out of it," said Wilson, who acknowledged that compromise would be required in developing the management plan.

Wilson said that adjustments need to be made on the legal description of the monument. As it currently stands, some private lands lie inside the perimeter of the monument.

"I know one guy who’s got 500 acres that lies within the monument, and he is really worried, so it needs some fine tuning," Wilson said. Babbitt has consistently said, however, that no private property will be acquired for inclusion in the monument. He also told the commissioners Wednesday that no buffer zone would be established around Canyon of the Ancients.

"Babbitt said that there would be no surprises and that everything we asked for was in the proclamation," said Wilson.

Babbitt had promised the commissioners that he would contact them before they read about the proclamation in the newspaper. He told the commissioners he expected the president to make a formal proclamation within 10 days to two weeks, but added that Clinton would not personally visit the region to make the announcement.

The other three monuments Babbitt proposed to Clinton were a 51-mile stretch of the Columbia River, known as Hanford Reach, Ironwood Forest in Arizona, and the Cascade Siskiyou area in southwestern Oregon.