Rob Bishop

Earlier this year, HR146, the Omnibus Public lands package which was signed into law by President Obama, proved to be a much better way to protect our public lands including wilderness values.

Congressman Bishop wrote about this in an op-ed piece saying that it is in Article 4 of the United States Constitution.

This proposal turns that principle on its head.

It is wrong that this legislation turns a completely deaf ear to these most significant stakeholders.

The economic gains from wilderness recreation appear to be inconsequential and may likely be more than offset by losses associated with the decline in activities incompatible with wilderness.

This is not what we elected President Obama to do. Things in Washington, D.C., are seriously off track.

In fact, all of that money and all of that effort has produced exactly zero acres of new wilderness in Utah.

I would like to make a motion of unanimous consent that a letter from the Utah State Board of Education be inserted into the record, who is opposed to this proposal.

I appreciate that, and I also want to tell you, and I think I mentioned this briefly as we talked down there, just to reemphasize how much I appreciate the BLM personnel, the professional staff on the ground in Utah.

We now want to create nine million acres of wilderness. That means 18 percent of Utah has to support the rest of the state.

I am deeply troubled by legislation whose sponsors live far from the communities and districts whose legislation they are targeting.

The reason why I am Chairman of the Western Caucus, if for no other reason, is because all the colored land in there is land that is owned by the Federal government.

If my kids are going to have a decent education in Utah, my state has to have a balanced economy.

This particular bill is a relic from the past. It has not been successful since the Age of Disco and will not be successful now or in the future.

Successful and responsible conservation should and will be achieved when Americans who have the most at stake are listened to and respected and not treated as a nuisance and deemed irrelevant.

I have to be honest with you, I don't know the specifics of that piece of property, but I will tell you this...

There is a difference in the process in which we are going with this.

Our goal should be to empower people, not make mandatory solutions.

The special interest groups who are behind this bill have raised tens of millions of dollars over the years with the promise to their donors that the money would be spent to protect important tracts of beautiful red rock in Utah.

Whenever you do changes to public lands in Utah there will be collateral damage, and there will be collateral damage that hits kids.

When we come back for a markup on this bill, we will have a nice discussion on Utah's equalization formula for education.

That is just such a bizarre verb ever to be used.

I would be surprised if there were many Members of Congress who would not take at least some offense at a proposal to set aside a sixth of their state or district without their consultation or input.

However, the proposed Red Rock Wilderness bill targeting Utah devastates our local economies even more so during the economic recession.

We can and should protect America's great natural spaces, yet it should not be done in a dictatorial manner that freezes out and refuses to even consider the views of local citizens and local leaders that would be directly affected.