The Roan Plateau is topping the list of environmental turnarounds the state conservation community is pleading the incoming Obama administration to consider.
Environmentalists said they are approaching President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team to reconsider a number of policies of the Bush administration with direct impacts on local areas. In addition to seeking more protections for the Roan Plateau, they’re hoping for a revamped policy to protect roadless areas, a more cautious approach to gas drilling and a slower approach to developing oil shale.
“At the national level, we’re hoping for a complete sea change,” said Peter Hart, conservation analyst for the Wilderness Workshop. “The conservation community has endured eight years of hell.”
Environmentalists hope the Obama administration will bring a renewed emphasis on public lands conservation. Hopes aren’t just pinned on Obama. Conservationists are also looking for new wilderness initiatives from a more Democratic Congress. At the top of the list for Colorado is a proposal for more wilderness in the White River National Forest. Democrats have gained at least six seats in the Senate, to reach 57, and they gained 24 House seats.
The November elections bring some key changes to legislators at both the state and federal level.
“I just think the votes line up in favor of a lot of conservation-oriented issues, including wilderness,” said Lisa Moreno, wilderness campaign coordinator for the Wilderness Workshop, which is championing a 600,000-acre Hidden Gems wilderness proposal in and around the White River National Forest.
State environmentalists are drafting requests for the incoming Obama administration to consider. Among them is a request to revisit the gas leases on the top of the Roan Plateau, above Rifle. Conservationists championed the landmark, prime habitat for deer and elk and for native cutthroat trout, as a place that should be kept from gas wells.
They won support from Sen. Ken Salazar and Gov. Bill Ritter, both of whom recommended more protections for the plateau, but the Bureau of Land Management leased the top of the plateau, with some safeguards meant to limit the impact of gas wells.
“When Obama was out in Colorado, he mentioned the Roan Plateau as being an issue of concern, so we see that as a potential opening,” said Clare Bastable, conservation director for the Colorado Mountain Club.
“The transition team is receiving a lot of letters right now,” she said. “Obviously, folks are looking to get their issues considered right away by transition team members, so by the time the new administration is in place, the issues that are of most concern to our community are teed up to be given a close look by the new administration.”
Obama’s advisors have reportedly compiled a list of about 200 Bush administrative actions and executive orders that could be undone quickly. Among them are plans to drill on sensitive lands in Utah.
Although the Roan Plateau has already been leased, Bastable said she’s hopeful that it can be reversed, either by the federal government buying back the leases or by finding that the leases were inappropriately allowed.
Environmentalists are also hopeful the Obama administration will craft a new plan to protect roadless areas, and that Ritter will rescind his roadless plan, which they consider weaker than a previous rule that is caught up in federal court. Ritter’s rule includes loopholes that would allow roads to reach oil and gas holdings, mostly in the White River National Forest.
Environmentalists also are looking to Congress to pass more wilderness protections. Only one new wilderness area in Colorado has been approved since 2001. The Colorado Mountain Club is pressing for wilderness in western Colorado’s Dominguez Canyon and the Hidden Gems proposal.
For environmentalists, the legislative landscape in changing. The election of Mark Udall give Colorado two Democratic senators, both with records supporting wilderness. Salazar’s name has surfaced on a list of possible Interior secretary candidates.
Changes are also taking place at the state level, where two Western Slope legislators have received leadership positions, on both sides of the aisle. State Rep. Kathleen Curry, D-Gunnison, was named House speaker pro tem. State Sen. Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction, was named Senate minority leader.
From the Ritter administration, environmentalists are awaiting new rules on oil and gas drilling and implantation plans for the Clean Air Act that will involve more air quality monitoring.
dfrey@aspendailynews.com