U.S. Senate Subcommittee Can Protect Public Landscapes Across 4 States

The Pew Charitable Trusts submitted a written statement to a July 12 legislative hearing of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on Public Lands, Forests, and Mining expressing strong support for four bills that would strengthen protections for public lands and rivers in four states. Together the measures would:

• Protect nearly 1 million acres and 600 river miles throughout California.
• Protect the Thompson Divide from future oil and gas leasing and mining, establish wildlife conservation areas along a critical migration corridor, and designate new wilderness areas near the recently proclaimed Camp Hale-Continental Divide National Monument in Colorado.
• Designate more than a million acres of Oregon’s Owyhee Canyonlands region as wilderness and transfer another 21,000 acres to the Burns Paiute Tribe.
• Safeguard 126,661 acres of wilderness and 19 wild and scenic rivers in the Wild Olympics area of Washington.

The bills are widely supported in the target states and communities and are backed by local elected officials, businesses, outdoor recreation groups, and other key stakeholders.