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"Republican environmental
advocacy requires challenging
false truths, often cloaked in the
 compelling but false rhetoric
of economic development.

But these battles are not new to
environmental Republicans.
Teddy Roosevelt faced down
enormous political pressure
in order to save the
Grand Canyon from development
and to set aside millions of acres
for the national forest system.

Indeed, Roosevelt's example
presents a good case of how
the "economy versus the
environment" argument is turned
upside down when considered
through the prism of true
conservative values—objective
 economic analysis and
abiding concern for future
generations.

After all, who could
 dispute the economic, much less
 aesthetic, wisdom of Roosevelt's
 actions 100 years ago?"

— from an op-ed published by
Colorado REP John Hereford
in the Denver Post
Click here to read the entire essay.

  

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Colorado Public Lands Legislation Enacted into Law with REP Support!

An omnibus public lands bill strongly supported by REP passed Congress with strong bipartisan majorities and was signed into law in 2009. The legislation includes significant conservation measures for Colorado, including:

  • Statutory permanence for the National Landscape Conservation System. The NLCS includes 26 million acres of BLM lands with special scenic, ecological, and cultural value. NLCS units in Colorado include the Gunnison Gorge and McInnis Canyons National Conservation Areas, Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, a section of the Continental Divide National Scenic Trail, and four wilderness areas: Black Ridge Canyons, Gunnison Gorge, Powderhorn, and Uncompahgre. Numerous wilderness study areas also are included in the NLCS.
  • Rocky Mountain National Park Wilderness and Indian Peaks Wilderness Expansion Act, originally introduced by former Senator Wayne Allard, R-CO, and former Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave, R-CO. Designates 250,000 acres, 94 percent of the park's acreage, as wilderness.
  • Dominguez-Escalante Canyon National Conservation Area and Dominguez Canyon Wilderness Area. Established 200,000-acre national conservation area on the Western Slope and designated 66,000 acres within as wilderness. The bill enjoyed the support of local officials, including Mesa County Commissioner and REP member Steve Acquafresca.
  • Designation of three national heritage areas: Sangre de Cristo, Cache La Poudre River, and South Park.

Never Summer Mountains in Rocky Mountain National Park. Omnibus lands legislation supported by REP designated 94 percent of the park as wilderness. The bill passed with strong bipartisan support. (Photo courtesy National Park Service)
Tower at Canyons of the Ancients National Monument. Omnibus lands legislation supported by REP gave statutory permanence to the National Landscape Conservation System, which includes Canyons of the Ancients. (Photo courtesy U.S. Bureau of Land Management.)

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