Utah's redrock country is one of this nation's most magnificent wild landscapes, a land of spectacular beauty dominated by towering buttes, red sandstone plateaus and deep, winding canyons. Unfortunately this land is at great risk from oil and gas exploration, which has intensified with the Bush administration's push for more drilling on public lands in the Rocky Mountains, and rampant abuse by off-road-vehicles.
America's Redrock Wilderness Act
The Sierra Club's Utah Wildlands Campaign is building congressional support for the passage of America's Redrock Wilderness
Act . The Act would give wilderness designation to more than 9 million acres of federal public land in southern Utah, protecting
them forever. An interim goal is to protect Utah's remaining wildlands from development and bad legislation that would damage
the wilderness characteristics of the land and render it ineligible for the highest form of protection.
A major new threat developed in January 2003 when the Bush administration issued a final rule that would allow the Department of Interior to recognize thousands of bogus road claims on federal public land, based on an archaic provision referred to as RS 2477, which was part of an 1866 mining law. If this rule is allowed to stand, counties and private industry could bulldoze roads across National Parks and other public lands in Utah and many other western states areas with no regard for the land's wilderness characteristics.
The Sierra Club Utah Wilderness Task Force educates Sierra Club members and the public about the need to protect Utah's
wildlands and encourages them to participate in this effort.
One Man's Work to Protect Utah Wilderness
There are many people across America
who volunteer to help protect the red rock canyonlands. Rich Csenge is one
of them.
Rich
has
spoken
from
the
heart
to hundreds of people in Maine and helped to start a festival in Utah celebrating
public lands. Watch this five-minute film of Rich’s story,
set to the music of a symphony commissioned to celebrate “America’s
Red Rock Wilderness Act,” or click
here to see it on YouTube.
The National Utah Wilderness Task Force works to protect the special places within the Utah Wilderness Coalition's "Citizens' Proposal" for wilderness on Bureau of Land Management lands in the state of Utah by encouraging Sierra Club members to become actively involved in the campaign to achieve protection for Utah's wild lands. The Task Force oversees the Sierra Club’s participation in the national campaign beyond the boundaries of the state of Utah. It has a coordinating committee of eight members, support from Sierra Club National Field and Public Lands Team staff, and active participation from volunteers across the country. To learn how you can help, contact Task Force Chair Bob Jordan (below).
For more information, contact Bob Jordan, Chair, Sierra Club Utah Wilderness Task Force; Lawson LeGate, Sierra Club Salt Lake City Field Office; Myke Bybee, Public Lands and Wilderness staffer.
Utah Wilderness Coalition: Learn the amazing history of America's Redrock Wilderness Act and how a citizen survey revealed that millions of acres of land in Utah qualified for wilderness protection.
Utah's redrock country is one of this nation's most magnificent wild landscapes, a land of spectacular beauty dominated by towering buttes, red sandstone plateaus and deep, winding canyons. Unfortunately this land is at great risk from oil and gas exploration, which has intensified with the Bush administration's push for more drilling on public lands in the Rocky Mountains, and rampant abuse by off-road-vehicles.
