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Wilderness: Idaho's Special Gift

by REP President Martha Marks
delivered at the "Wild Idaho" conference, Redfish Lake, Idaho; May 19, 2002

You know, I really should call this talk "Trains, Planes and Automobiles," because I've been on the go an awful lot lately on behalf of Republicans for Environmental Protection. Last weekend I was in Dallas; the weekend before that I was in Honolulu; the weekend before that I was in New Mexico; and the weekend before that I was in both Asheville, North Carolina, and Orlando, Florida. Somehow in between, I managed to spend a little time with my husband.

However, I have to confess... I feel like a Denis Hayes groupie this week. He and I were in Shepherdstown, West Virginia last Tuesday and Wednesday for a retreat of the League of Conservation Voters' board, on which we both serve. Then we met again yesterday in the Denver airport, where we caught the same plane to Boise. And for a while we hung out together at the luggage carousel in Boise, before we made our separate ways up here to be with you this weekend. And now I get to follow him in speaking to you. Lucky me!

Speaking of luck, I can't tell you happy I am to come back for my second visit to your beautiful Wilderness State. None of those other states I mentioned, not even Hawaii, can hold a candle to the scenery I saw driving up here from Boise on Friday. And since it was the promise of wilderness and unspoiled scenery that lured my husband and me here as tourists several years ago, it seems appropriate that a wilderness conference should bring me back a second time.

Doing a little research for this talk, I turned up a few awe-inspiring factoids about Idaho…

• the most wilderness-rich state in the Lower 48
• home to the largest wilderness outside Alaska
• four million acres of designated wilderness… which is still only 7.5 % of the state
• eight million acres of de facto wilderness in the roadless areas of our national forests… all still unprotected
• another three million acres of de facto wilderness on BLM lands… all still unprotected
• over 83,000 square miles of public lands
• 80 mountain ranges
• more whitewater than any other state
• the most Republican of any state in the union!
  
  

Those few nuggets paint an astounding picture of a state that I absolutely must get to know even better. I enjoyed a leisurely drive up from Boise on Friday, and I'm looking forward to taking a different route back, seeing a bit more of your magnificant state before I fly home.

My travels for REP carry me far across this country, but take my word for it… the scenery elsewhere isn't anything like this good!

To wit…

Last weekend, as I mentioned, I was in Texas… giving a keynote at a conference called "Sustainable Dallas." People I met there kept joking that Republicans for Environmental Protection was just as funny an oxymoron as Sustainable Dallas. Yea, yea, yea… very funny!

Well, I can't say for sure about Sustainable Dallas, but I can tell you with total confidence that Republicans for Environmental Protection is not an oxymoron. As Denis pointed out in his speech yesterday, we Republicans have a long and proud history of natural resource conservation and environmental protection.

And there's no good reason why we don't continue that tradition today... certainly no good political reason. Both Republican and Democrat pollsters repeatedly report that some 80% of the American people consider themselves environmentalists, and they want their elected officials to be pro-environment, too. There's a crying need for bipartisanship in this good effort to protect the world we live in, because as long as one party ignores the pro-environment vote and the other party takes it for granted, things will continue to get worse. REP wants both parties to compete to be the "green" party... and I don't mean that "Green Party" of Ralph Nader.

That's why REP is working so hard around the country to restore the GOP's great conservation tradition. We want our party to embrace the mom-and-apple-pie values of conservation and environmental protection again, not drop those values like a pot of hot potatoes.

Speaking of potatoes… Idaho should be very proud— and very protective—of its wilderness areas, because that's absolutely the best thing you have to offer to the rest of the country. Wilderness is even better than potatoes! Wilderness is Idaho's great contribution to America. Much of the rest of the country didn't have the foresight to preserve its own wilderness areas, like Idaho did under great pro-conservation leaders like Frank Church, so we increasingly look to Idaho to show us the way.

We look to great Republican conservationists like Idaho's own Paul Fritz, who was one of REP's very first members. Paul joined REP in the fall of 1995— just a couple of months after we began this effort. And although I never had the privilege of meeting Paul, he and I spoke several times on the phone. His love of wilderness was palpable. Looking back on that time now, I believe those conversations with Paul were the main reason why my husband and I decided to vacation here in 1997.

I've heard of other GOP conservationists in Idaho, too. Names like Ernie Day and Senator Jim McClure come to mind. I remember that Senator McClure was very helpful in the effort to preserve Hell's Canyon. Although he came late to conservation, he left his finest legacy in the wilderness he saved there.

We at REP America are encouraging elected Republicans in Idaho and elsewhere to become "green Republicans" earlier in their careers. What more meaningful legacy could one hope to leave than a bounty of wild lands protected for future generations? And the sooner an elected official gets started, the greater the legacy he or she will be able to leave behind.

Wilderness is what will continue to attract tourists like my husband and me to Idaho—and attract the dollars we spent during our three weeks in your state. Wilderness is a sustainable source of revenue, now and forever.

But there's more to its value than just a steady stream of money from nature-hungry urbanites like the Marks family. I believe the relationship between people and wilderness is reciprocal. If you protect it, it will protect you… your clean air and water, your wildlife, your hunting and fishing, your whitewater rafting, your property values, the quality of life of your fast-growing cities...

And I believe there's a more-subtle benefit for you as well. Idaho's enthusiastic protection of wilderness will go a long way toward erasing the less-than-flattering image that other Americans have of a state closely identified with……

I'm sorry, but there's no way I can say what I want to say any more delicately than this:

Idaho's enthusiastic protection of wilderness will go a long way toward erasing the less-than-flattering image that other Americans have of a state closely identified with:

• racist militia groups,
• black helicopters, and
• endangered-salmon barbeques.
  

Okay, having laid that statement out as bluntly as a guest you've invited to your state would ever dare…

I'd like to remind you of the time-honored truths about Republicans and wilderness.

1. Wilderness protection was originally a bi-partisan endeavor. The sponsors of the Wilderness Act of 1964 included Pennsylvania Representative John Saylor and several other prominent Republicans in Congressman.
   
   
2. There was no partisan split on the value of natural resource conservation and environmental protection until the 1980s, when the GOP began to go south on these issues. We at REP intend to make sure that the current trend is a temporary aberration.
   
   

I think it's important, too, for people in Idaho to take a broader national perspective when it comes to protecting natural land. So, if you'll indulge me for a moment, I'd like to tell you a little bit about the place where I live.

I'm a county commissioner in Lake County, Illinois, which lies just north of Chicago and just south of the Illinois-Wisconsin border. Our last remaining forests, wetlands, bogs and prairies—all the things that pass for "wilderness" in Lake County—are so precious that voters have approved three bond referenda totaling $160 million in the last nine years to allow us, their county government, to buy open space. That's just in one county … … and in an overwhelmingly Republican county, too.

And it's not just in my Lake County where this kind of thing happens. The other four collar counties around Chicago— five heavily Republican suburban counties— have all experienced the same results. In total, our Chicago-area counties have protected about 300,000 acres of natural land. That may not sounds like a whole lot to somebody who lives here, but remember, please… those 300,000 protected acres lie in one of the most heavily-urbanized areas in the country.

And it's not just in Chicago where this kind of thing happens. I understand that Boise's own self-described "TR Republican" mayor recently led the charge for a successful bond referendum that gave Boise the wherewithal to save its foothills from development. As TR himself undoubtedly would have said: Bully for Mayor Brent Coles! Bully for the far-sighted people of Boise!

And it's not just in Boise where this kind of thing happens. Truth to tell, this "please raise my taxes to buy open space" phenomenon occurs with predictable regularity in communities all around the country. From coast to coast, the American people have repeatedly shown they're willing to raise their own taxes to allow governments to buy natural land and preserve it. The American people are eager to save "wilderness" in whatever form they find it near them.

The residents of many states would trade almost anything to have Idaho's vast wild lands and the potential they offer for recreation and conservation. So I feel safe in saying that one of very last things the American people would ever want to see our country lose is wilderness… in Idaho. Utah. Oregon. New Mexico. North Carolina. Maine. Wherever.

It's clear that Americans believe wilderness adds great environmental, social and economic value to our country. So I'm going to ask you to think of what this could mean to Idaho. There is a great opportunity for Idaho—where so many wilderness areas remain unprotected—to emerge as a leader in this national passion for land conservation. What a boost that would give to Idaho's national reputation! But that will only happen if Idaho's political leaders are up to the task.

The members of REP fervently hope that Congress will soon designate some of the nationally-recognized Wilderness proposals… like Boulder-White Clouds — a half-million acres just across the highway from here — and the Owyhee Canyonlands. What a magnificent legacy that would be for Idaho's senators and congressmen to leave to the children of Idaho and the rest of America.

Why does this matter so much?

It matters because no wilderness has been designated in Idaho since 1980. And the flip side of that statement is… that since 1990 over a million acres of Idaho's wild lands have been lost. That's just in a dozen years.

It matters because politics are evolving, and wilderness is becoming popular everywhere.

It matters because urbanization is coming to Idaho. Boise has become a big, sprawling city, as I noticed when I flew in on Friday.



Before I close, I want to tell you a bit about REP's plans for your state. We're growing nicely throughout the country, but especially here in the West. REP America already has official chapters established in Oregon, Washington, New Mexico and Hawaii. That's in addition to several states in the East.

You can look forward to feisty new chapters one of these days in Alaska, Colorado, Arizona, Montana, Wyoming and… Idaho.

So, the best bit of advice I can give to you this morning is... Look out, Idaho! Here we come!