Owyhee Canyonlands Monument: What Happened?
Barack Obama’s presidency has ended. In his final weeks in office, he designated several outstanding landscapes and historical sites as national monuments. But the Owyhee Canyonlands didn’t make the cut. Why?
The same thing happened in the final days of the Clinton administration when the president declared several new monuments. In his remarks Clinton mentioned other places that in the future would deserve similar protection; he specifically pointed to the Owyhee Canyonlands. At the time, Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt explained that there had been insufficient time to address the concerns of ranchers and OHV users. Ultimately the Owyhee Initiative resolved that problem for the Idaho portion of the Canyonlands. But in Oregon, sixteen years later, history appears to be reprising the narrative.
A couple of weeks ago, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported that Sen. Jeff Merkley in a telephone interview had revealed that President Obama would not designate the Owyhee Canyonlands as a national monument before leaving office. This surely was a disappointment to those hoping the impasse over protection for the Owyhee would be broken with an executive order under the authority of the Antiquities Act. Cattlemen are breathing a sigh of relief. Once again lip service has been paid to Owyhee protection, but not now.
Why not now? The answer to this question is found toward the end of the OPB report:
Merkley has said he didn’t necessarily oppose a national monument, but that it should only be undertaken after local concerns were addressed. In a telephone interview Friday, Merkley noted that never happened and that [Interior Secretary Sally] Jewell did not consider the Owyhee monument proposal “ripe for consideration.”
“Local concerns were never addressed”? Well, perhaps not entirely so. Local cattlemen, government leaders and business people have repeatedly expressed their concerns about loss of grazing rights and restrictions on mining. Several Malheur county residents have told me, sometimes rather vehemently, that monument designation would “devastate” cattlemen and the local economy. In response, others have likewise repeatedly described potential advantages of a monument declaration, describing economic benefits deriving from recreation and tourism being enjoyed in such places as Grand Teton and Staircase-Escalante. In an effort to assuage local concerns, they have pointed to protections provided under the Wilderness Act of 1964 for ongoing economic activities such as grazing and mining. These protections, they point out, have been incorporated in subsequent legislation creating specific wilderness areas.
What I and friends on both sides of the question have found dismaying is the lack of understanding and appreciation of many on each side for the other. Granted, this is a generalization, and there are many who do not fit this characterization. There are persons who though resolutely supporting one side, do try to see the other position and do evince respect for those holding it. But they seem too few and perhaps too reticent to influence the discourse. This is unfortunate, because it forestalls the possibility of productive discussion.
A few years ago at the UO Environmental Law Conference, I was chatting with someone from Western Watersheds Project and happened to mention the name of Mike Hanley, a Jordan Valley rancher-historian and leader of the 1970’s Sagebrush Rebellion. The response was “I’m sick and tired of hearing Mike Hanley talk about preserving ranching culture and the history all the time.” Then, just a few months ago I heard a former board member of another organization actively pushing protection disdainfully make virtually the same comment. But history and the local culture are extremely important to the people of the Jordan Valley area. Some families have ranched there for five, six and even seven generations. Their history constitutes the core of their identity and the source of their values. While one cannot argue that it is a culture as old and as deep as say the Native American cultures of the area, it nonetheless warrants an effort to understand why the residents of Jordan Valley feel threatened and to reassure them and work with them.
But this is not the failing of one side. I’ve listened to Malheur county residents excoriating “environmentalists” from the western part of the state for wanting to “destroy” their way of life and economy in order to preserve recreational opportunities for themselves. One Ontario businesswoman fairly screamed at me and even took down my name simply because I had asked whether she favored protection for the Owyhee Canyonlands. My hopes for a civil exchange of views promptly wilted before the blast. But the environmentalists’ concern with preserving the Canyonlands goes deeper than simply protecting recreation sites and viewscapes. Somehow the fundamental concern for preserving what Nature has given us because we–ranchers and environmentalists alike–will need it to survive is insufficiently appreciated. This, perhaps, is because the notion is too vague or–like “ranching culture”–too easily dismissed. Still, it is important to help Owyhee residents understand that there are threats to their way of life ultimately greater than those they fear from protection.
A respectful exchange between reasonable people should be possible. Recently Gabriel Howe of the Siskiyou Mountain Club, who describes himself as “bleeding heart conservationist” from a logging family, wrote eloquently in the Oregonian about the need for conservationists to listen to and engage rural communities. He admits this won’t be easy, and at times it will be demoralizing. My friends who have actively engaged the local community in Malheur county have attested to this. But as Howe writes, the effort can prove meaningful and rewarding. In the current context, the need to reach out across social and economic class and transcend political divide in all corners of the polity is critical, especially given the threat to public lands.
It must be recognized, however, that Howe’s injunction works both ways. Everyone in this debate needs to recognize that in a broad sense what we all want is the same. Without careful conservation, the potential ramifications for public lands in the Owyhee are dismaying. For a start, these lands could cease to be “public” without becoming the property of anyone now benefiting from them.
A few months back as I was passing through Jordan Valley, I stopped to see Mike. As we were chatting, he surprised me with the revelation that one of the people he most enjoyed chatting with is Western Watersheds Project founder Jon Marvel, someone who is anathema to most ranchers. “Jon loves history. He has an agenda, and we’re on completely opposite sides on many points. But if we avoid those, we can have a really good conversation.” It’s a start. There are some areas, such as feral horses and unrestricted ATV use, where cattlemen and environmentalists could work together. “They just won’t talk to one another,” Mike said.