Cedar Mountain Wilderness -- Photo by Lawson LeGate
The National Utah Wilderness Team’s primary goal is to continue support of America’s Red Rock Wilderness Act (ARRWA). ARRWA would protect over 8 million acres of wilderness in Utah through Congressional wilderness designation.
Our team’s goal is to maintain current cosponsors and increase co-sponsorships for ARRWA in the House and Senate for the 119th congress to at least 25 senators and 100 representatives for 2025.
Protecting these lands is essential for conservation goals for the entire country. Our goal is to raise awareness and take actions to protect these important lands and the environment. We will work with all parties concerned to sustain Utah’s unique beauty for all generations to come.
Our core team members reside across the United States, allowing us to engage with our elected representatives in multiple states.
Tell Congress: Protect the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument!
Congress could soon vote to undermine protections for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. This would overturn the current Grand Staircase-Escalante Monument Management Plan, and constitutes a serious threat with implications for all national monuments and their respective management plans.
Designated in 1996, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument protects nearly 1.9 million acres of extraordinary landscapes in southern Utah -- home to towering stone arches, winding slot canyons, dinosaur fossils, and cultural and archaeological sites of deep importance to Native American Tribes. It is a sanctuary for wildlife, a place of dark skies and quiet, and is enjoyed by around a million visitors each year.
Today, the monument is guided by a comprehensive management plan shaped through years of public input from Tribal nations, local and state leaders, ranchers, recreationists, and conservation groups. This plan prioritizes protecting the monument's ecological integrity and cultural heritage while supporting traditional uses and sustainable visitation.
Lawmakers are attempting to use the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to revoke the monument's management plan--a dangerous and unprecedented move. This Congress has already begun using the CRA to overturn Bureau of Land Management resource plans and to attempt to allow toxic mining in the watershed of Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. This would be the first-ever use of the CRA to attack a national monument -- setting a troubling precedent for public lands across the country.
Call your member of the U.S. House of Representatives urging them to vote NO on this reckless resolution and defend Grand Staircase-Escalante.
SAMPLE CALL SCRIPT
Phone calls are consistently ranked as a top way to persuade a member of Congress who hasn’t come to a firm position. Staffers count these calls and make reports on how many they receive.
Dial (202) 224-3121 to be connected to your representative.
- Identify yourself as a constituent.
- “Hi, my name is ______ and I live in ______, my zip code is ______.”
- Be specific.
- “I join the vast majority of Americans who love public lands and waters. That is why I was extremely disappointed to see Representative ________’s recent vote to strip protections from the watershed of the Boundary Waters wilderness. As a member of the Public Lands Caucus, Representative ________ must support protection of cherished places so that future generations can continue to enjoy them as we do today. I urge Representative ________ to change course and vote NO on the resolution to overturn the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument management plan.”
- Be personal.
- “I love visiting public lands because…”
- “Giving away public lands to corporate polluters concerns me because…”
- “Supporting the protection of public lands is important to me because…”
- Follow the ABCs
- Be accurate, be brief, and be courteous.
From the Salt Lake Tribune - Opinion: A Utah monument is under attack — again
From the Salt Lake Tribune - Opinion: The strike on Grand Staircase is a strike on my culture...
Why Mike Lee Is Waging War Against America’s Public Lands
Protect the San Rafael Swell
Protect San Rafael Swell
Join us on a Zoom call, Wednesday, May 27 at 6pm MT to learn about the latest attacks on San Rafael Swell and how to make a comment.
Trump’s administration is once again reducing protections for pristine areas. Here is your chance to fight back.
You are invited to a Zoom meeting.
When: May 27, 2026 08:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada), 7pm Central, 6pm MT, and 5 pm Pacific
Register in advance for this meeting:
https://sierraclub.zoom.us/meeting/register/G8YfK8bDT8uJGkZlSsY7qg
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Sponsored by SUWA, Utah Sierra Club, Utah National Wilderness team, CSWU, and Stewardship Utah
Join SUWA and partners to learn how the latest Trump BLM proposals would open hundreds of miles of new ORV routes across two of Utah's most treasured landscapes and how to fight back before the deadline. We'll highlight specific routes so you can write a substantive comment that goes beyond the pre-written form!
PUBLIC COMMENT DEADLINE: JUNE 8th, 2026
What's at stake:
San Rafael Desert
- BLM wants to undo 120 miles of route closures won through SUWA's federal court settlement in 2022
- The original 2020 plan already more than doubled motorized trails—from 300 to 765+ miles
- Closed routes were reclaimed, redundant, or non-existent on the ground
San Rafael Swell
- The BLM finalized a travel plan in 2024 that already heavily favored motorized use
- Now the agency proposes 220 additional miles of ORV routes—going even further
- Driven by requests from Utah and motorized groups seeking to transform wild places into ORV playgrounds
In part, BLM’s RMP amendments:
- Remove over 12,000 acres of natural areas —wilderness quality lands managed to protect their wilderness values—located outside of designated wilderness to allow increased development and off-road vehicle use.
- Eliminate the San Rafael Swell Special Recreation Management Area (SRMA) and instead designate four new Extensive Recreation Management Areas (ERMAs), a less meaningful designation where recreation is not the primary management focus but instead is integrated into other land uses such as grazing and mineral development.
- Eliminate commonsense recreation management and resource protection requirements to pack out human waste, use fire pans, and not collect firewood at dispersed campsites
- Reduce or eliminate Areas of Critical Environmental Concern (ACECs) outside of designated wilderness that will allow for increased development and associated impacts in those areas, even after noting in their scoping document that they would “prioritize the protection and designation of ACECs”
- Reduce protections for visual resources in some areas to allow development that conflicts with maintaining scenic viewsheds.
Previous comment: Muddy Creek Wilderness. Copyright Ray Bloxham/SUWA
Some management directives are clear, such as the preservation of wilderness values, and the prohibition of motorized use, mining, and oil and gas development in designated wilderness areas. Others are less clear, such as the amount of commercial recreation use allowed in the wilderness areas, as well as what activities can be allowed in the San Rafael Swell Recreation Area, along Wild and Scenic river sections, and on unprotected wilderness-quality lands. While these areas are not designated as wilderness, they are essential parts of America’s Red Rock Wilderness Act and play a crucial role in meeting the Biden administration’s goal of protecting 30 percent of America’s lands and waters by 2030.
FOr san rafael swell map
MAKE a comment to BLM- ask for name, email, message
Offices: https://www.blm.gov/office/national-office
ACCESS management planshttps://eplanning.blm.gov/Search/?search_bar=SAN+RAFAEL+SWELL&active=true
MAKE A COMMENT :https://eplanning.blm.gov/Project-Home/?id=809280b1-a7f2-f011-8407-001dd80c29f3
The Project description: Presidential Executive Orders 11644 and 11989, and regulations at 43 CFR § 8342.1, require that the BLM designate OHV routes in a manner that protects the resources of public lands, promotes the safety of all users of those public lands, and minimizes conflicts among the various users of those lands.
https://www.utvdriver.com/utv-news/blm-potential-utah-land-addition-for-ohv/
San Rafael Swell Reassessment
May 5, 2026: Bureau of Land Management (BLM) officials are reassessing the off-road vehicle (OHV) route designations within the San Rafael Swell Travel Management Area (TMA). In particular, BLM is reassessing whether certain routes currently designated as closed or limited to OHVs should be redesignated. The process has and will be informed by agency specialists, cooperating agencies, and the public — including a comment period as associated with San Rafael Swell reconsideration routes starting May 7th and ending June 8, 2026.
An interactive map of the San Rafael Swell TMA, including the routes identified in the reassessment, is available under Maps – Interactive Maps. BLM officials invite the public to submit further information on the routes currently designated OHV-limited and OHV-closed — including information about the routes’ purpose and need, and resource considerations. BLM requests that, where possible, commenters include specific route numbers in their comments.
Link: https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/4dcce5a9140d4fcda7a01cf7f5b77409
Comments must be submitted either on the relevant ePlanning page for either the San Rafael Swell TMP or the San Rafael Desert TMP, through email to BLM_UT_PR_comments@blm.gov, or by standard mail to: San Rafael TMP, 125 S 600 W, Price, UT 84501.
MAP of routes: https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/4dcce5a9140d4fcda7a01cf7f5b77409
2020
August 21, 2020 (Old Decision News Release
BLM reaches Decision for the san rafael desert travel management plan: reconsideration of routes as required by the settlement agreement
BLM committed to reconsider the OHV route designations for specific routes (which total approximately 195 miles) that the 2020 SRD TMP designated as available for public OHV use (the Settlement Routes).
The Decision is to amend the 2020 SRD TMP Decision Record by changing the designations of approximately 120 miles of Settlement Routes to OHV-closed. The specific route segments subject to a designation change, as well as the rationale for those changes, are documented in the Decision Record.
Final decision documents can be found under the documents tab labeled Reconsideration Decision.
Project Location
Location: United States.
Map style: road.
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©2026 OSM©2026 TomTom
Application Information
- Program
Other
Project Dates
- Start Date
10/16/2017 - FONSI Date
8/21/2020
Project Office Information
- Lead Office
Price Field Office - Offices
Price FO
Contacts
- Contact 1 Name
Stephanie Howard - Contact 1 Email
showard@blm.gov - Contact 1 Phone
(435) 781-4469
- Contact 2 Name
Daniel Kauffman - Contact 2 Email
dkauffman@blm.gov - Contact 2 Phone
(435) 781-4425