The Bush administration has quietly implemented a long-dead Civil War-era law (Revised Statute 2477 or RS 2477). RS 2477 was repealed in 1976 when a modern method of determining reasonable access was enacted with the Federal Land Policy Management Act, but was recently re-enacted by the Bush administration, as part of their continued catering to commercial interests. RS 2477 grants states, counties, and even individuals "the right-of-way for construction of highways across public lands not otherwise reserved for public purposes." This legislation has the potential to open millions of acres of land in national parks and federally designated wilderness areas to motorized transportation. The new rule removes public comment and judicial review from the process and gives the Bureau of Land Management sole authority to validate right-of-way claims. By providing access to isolated holdings, it could also open remote country to drilling for oil and gas and other commercial development.

In many cases, what authorities are claiming as "roads" amount to little more than wagon tracks, livestock paths, and even dogsled routes in Alaska. But with muscular, four-wheel-drive vehicles, even the most primitive routes can allow access to untrammeled places. Park and wilderness advocates fear it will disrupt wildlife habitat, turning 19th century wagon ruts into paved roadways, allowing cars and their pollution into unspoiled places. In fact, the National Park Service evaluated potential RS 2477 claims ten years ago and found that if the roads were allowed, the impact would be devastating. The report noted that the claims could cross many miles of undisturbed fish and wildlife habitat, historical and archeological resources, and sensitive wetlands.

Nationally, some of the most celebrated public landscape could be affected. Alaska has asserted claims over 22,000 waterways and 2,700 miles of roads in 13 national parks and preserves, including Denali National Park and the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve. In California, San Bernardino County has indicated its intent to claim nearly 5,000 miles of rights-of-way -- more than twice the total mileage of maintained roads in the entire county. In Utah, many of the rights-of-way crisscross southern Utah's spectacular red rock country -- where local officials contend that the cluster of half a dozen national parks and proposed wilderness areas stand in the way of access to cattle grazing, minerals, and oil and gas deposits.

Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton recently entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the State of Utah. The MOU has the potential to open up millions of acres of America's wildest lands to commercial interests, like logging, mining, and energy companies. The MOU between the Department of the Interior (DOI) and Utah is the result of two years of back-door negotiations, free from the scrutiny provided by public knowledge of and comment on such matters. Most importantly, the MOU removes the public and Congress from the input process regarding these environmental protections. Unfortunately, the DOI encourages other states to adopt this MOU as the template for their interactions with the DOI regarding RS 2477 claims, potentially paving the way for a weakening of wilderness protection across the nation.

A recent legal settlement between the DOI and the State of Utah further degrades wilderness protections in Utah. The settlement abolishes the Bureau of Land Management's (BLM) Wilderness Inventory Handbook, stripping the BLM of its authority to conduct wilderness reviews and designate Wilderness Study Areas (WSA). Designating lands as WSAs provides interim protection until Congress decides the land's permanent designation. WSAs must be managed to maintain their wilderness character, and this settlement, in preventing such designation, precludes these lands from the interim protection necessary to survive as wilderness lands. Once they have been tarnished, they are no longer considered and can never be designated wilderness.

Secretary Norton also sent a letter to Alaska's elected officials, essentially informing them that Alaska's BLM lands would never again be studied for wilderness designation. As with the MOU and settlement, this action removes from the BLM an effective land management tool and precludes the citizens of this country from participating in the planning process for the nation's public lands.

Ran 2/17/03, 7/7/03