Urban Open Spaces Initiative: My New Battle for Nature

In the past, I have been involved in open space protection issues centered around America's Red Rock Wilderness Act (ARRWA). This work has made me aware how important it is for citizens to speak out about how we wish to see our public lands used.

One of the problems faced by ARWWA is public land, by extension, means public use and, according to the mission of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), public use needs to be available for multiple uses. The murkiness in the mission comes when an apparent interpretation of multiple uses takes us from multiple human uses to human and business uses. I do not doubt that many people at

Coal mining in Nine Mile Canyon

the BLM have only the best of intentions in protecting public lands, but their obligation to business has allowed for all manner of sin (Ed Abbey's word). For example, cattle are allowed to crush the tender desert soil, spreading the seed, and thus the destruction, of invasive plants like Russian Thistle (or known lovingly to Road Runner as tumbleweed) and oil and gas extraction are allowed to dig deeply into once pristine wilderness. These, and many other uphill battles faced in the battle to preserve wilderness, has left we wondering why we have to work so hard to protect the "pretty". How is it my value system, where nature is something to be held in reverence, not extracted and sold to the highest bidder, so off?

Projection of Future Land Use for Salt Lake County

Perhaps this is why, when I learned  about the Open Space Trust Fund in Salt Lake County, I felt encouraged for  the first time about land-battles in Utah. A short history of how OSTF came about can be found here, so I won't go into too much detail. In short, some foward-thinking policy makers realized that Salt Lake County was on a path toward full suburban sprawl from the East Bench to the West Bench and from Draper to North Salt Lake in the matter of a couple decades. In order to make Salt Lake County the type of community people want to live in, they knew open spaces needed to be preserved or reclaimed as soon as possible. In 2006, a bond was put before the voters to aid Salt Lake County in buying these properties. It passed overwhelmingly. In the years that followed, Salt Lake County used all of the bond money to buy 18 remarkable pieces of property.

By buying these properties, they are preseved forever. They do not have to be multi-use with businesses, they are just allowed to be large pieces of nature anyone can go to. They will never have dams built on them, never have mining take place on their soil and never will cattle roam freely. Here is a link to the purchased lands.

I believe it is time for a new bond measure, so that the people of Salt Lake County can have more open spaces (and fewer strip malls). In the past week I have started contacting the powers that be at Salt Lake County (not including Justin) and am learning slowly how this process works. I believe I now have a County Councilman who will represent putting the bond on the ballot, but I will have to do a lot of the leg work. Turns out it can't go to the voters unless at least 5 people on the County Council say "yes". It is a Republican held Council, so this will be the first fight.

I will provide updates on the progress as this long  process continues.