A lame law: Land act should die with the 109th Congress

Tribune Editorial
Salt Lake Tribune

Article Last Updated:11/15/2006 07:52:50 PM MST

One of the things that should be swept out along with the Republican-controlled 109th Congress is the Washington County Growth and Conservation Act.
    Unfortunately, this lamest of lame-duck legislative bodies is going ahead with consideration of the bill that would force the ill-considered sale of more than 20,000 acres of public land in the area around St. George and Zion National Park, foolishly pre-empting the public Vision Dixie planning process that is just getting on its feet.
    A hearing on the bill, sponsored by Utah's Republican Sen. Bob Bennett and Democratic Rep. Jim Matheson, is set for today before the Senate's Public Lands and Forests Subcommittee. But that may be mere political Kabuki, because Bennett has made no secret of the fact that he's ready, willing and able to attach the measure to whatever after-midnight, must-pass Trojan horse appropriations bill he can find.
    His ability to do such things is one that Bennett takes pride in. It is also one of the things that cause people to mistrust Congress.
    Bennett and Matheson want to pass the bill now because they know that, come the changing of the guard in January, the Democratic-controlled 110th Congress is unlikely to let the bill take even one baby step forward.
    The bill is being sold by its supporters in Congress and in Washington County government as a way to permanently preserve some land - although much of the land it marks for wilderness designation is already within the protected boundaries of Zion National Park - while freeing other tracts to help absorb the rapid population growth of the St. George area.
    But even St. George's mushrooming population will take years to fill the privately owned acres already available for development. Adding still more land to that pool, prior to any real planning process, will encourage greater urban sprawl, the kind that is painful anywhere but downright destructive in an area as beautiful, arid and environmentally fragile as southwest Utah.
    The more that is known about this measure, and how it stands to enrich a handful of land developers at the expense of the true wealth of the people's land, the worse it looks.
    It is time for the people of Utah to speak out, even as they have to go around their own misguided representatives, and warn Congress away from this destructive land bill.