According to SUWA's Latest News page, we've won this battle! THANKS FOR HELPING TO DEFEND THE BEAUTIFUL UTAH WILDERNESS--YOUR EFFORTS COUNTED!

The vote went our way 51-49. This is a great day for Utah wilderness! Even though the battle is far from over, this is a sweet and important victory.

Contents

• What happened
• Please thank Senators
• More on what happened

What happened

This morning the US Senate had a vote on the omnibus parks package. The vote was an attempt to break our filubuster of their bad Utah anti-wilderness bill. In spite of intense arm twisting, the Utah Senators couldn't force the Senate to swallow the bitter pill of their blatantly anti-wilderness bill. They needed 61 votes to stop us, and they missed by a mile.

We have had help from nearly every quarter. Just this morning the Washington Post ran an editorial against the Utah delegation's terrible bill. They said, "The Utah wilderness provision is so bad that senators from other states that would benefit from the parks bill are nonetheless filibustering against it...The wilderness bill doesn't protect all the land it should, the protection it offers isn't as strong as it should be, and the Interior Dept would be forbidden to manage any other federal lands in the states as if they might someday become wilderness areas."

Senator Bill Bradley is a true hero of the conservation movement. He sacrificed his own beloved Sterling Forest bill so he could lead a brilliant filibuster of the parks package, in effect giving up what he loves for what we all love--Utah wilderness. Folks, we have done the unthinkable. Even with the darling of the Alaskan oil companies, Frank Murkowski, spending all his chits, and wrapping the Utah anti-wilderness bill in a package of popular bills, even with both Utah Senators and their anti-wilderness allies working intensely against us, even in the face of the powerful lobbying by developers and their cronies, we raised such a ruckus, made so many telephone calls, sent so many FAX messages, visited so many congressional offices, wrote so many letters to senators, reps and newspapers, volunteered so many hours that we have won again! At this moment for a time, we have turned the tide!

In the past few weeks, the environmental community has lost votes on the Endangered Species Act, the salvage timber rider and the grazing bill. But not here! We have drawn a line in Utah's redrock canyons, and said in a loud and clear voice, "it stops HERE."

It may not be over; they may be back. But for now, today, spend a quiet moment. Sing a silent hymn. Howl at the canyon walls! Read some Mary Oliver and Terry Tempest Williams. Give thanks for this special thing we have have all done--together!

Please thank Senators

Thanking Senators who voted the right way is almost important as calling them before the vote. The following Republicans and swing Democrat voted for Utah Wilderness and deserve our warm thanks:

Pell (D-RI)
Cohen (R-ME)
Chafee (R-RI)
Roth (R-DE)
Spector (R-PA)

All other Republicans voted against Utah Wilderness, and all other Democrats voted for it (except Senators Heflin and Johnston). Please thank these Senators as well.

• Senators to email
• You can reach any Senator via the capitol switchboard phone numbers, which you no doubt have memorized by now. Here they are again: (202) 224-3121, (800) 972-3524, (800) 962-3524.

More on what happened

This supplementary report come courtesy of Bill Thompson:

At 10:30am EST this morning, a cloture vote was taken in the Senate to cut off debate on the Omnibus Parks Bill and bring that bill to a vote on the floor. 60 votes are required to invoke cloture. The vote for cloture was 51 to 49, meaning that the Omnibus Parks Bill is still stalled by a filibuster. It will probably be pulled from further consideration this session.

This is a huge victory for the preservation of Utah Wilderness!!! Everyone who helped out with phone calls, phone banking, letters, contributions, or whatever should feel very proud.

The Omnibus Parks Bill contained 33 separate provisions, one of which was the "Utah delegation" bill designating approximately 2 million acres of southern and western Utah as Federal Wilderness Areas. A total of 3.2 million acres are currently being managed as wilderness due to their status as Wilderness Study Areas. Thus, the delegation bill would have opened for development 1.2 million acres and failed to provide for protection of an additional 2.5 million acres of Utah lands which are fully deserving of Wilderness status. In addition, the delegation bill contained special language permitting many activities in the acreage it designated that are clearly incompatible with wilderness management.

Sen. Bill Bradley (D-NJ) initiated a filibuster of the Omnibus Parks Bill, arguing that the Utah Wilderness section, a separate provision giving away a large chuck of land around the Snowbasin Ski Area, and a third provision unrelated to Utah be stripped from the bill. Under Senate rules, no vote could be taken on the full bill as long as the filibuster was in progress. The situation got even more complicated yesterday afternoon when Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) attempted to attached a provision to the Omnibus Parks Bill raising the minimum wage.

Bob Dole (R-KS), who is against raising the minimum wage but does not want to go on record voting in opposition, was able to stop Kennedy's maneuvering. Meanwhile, the Republicans were able to muster enough signatures to force a cloture vote on cutting off the Bradley filibuster.

Debate on the cloture vote started at 10:00am EST this morning. Bradley spent 25 minutes making (what was for him) an eloquent defense of Utah wild lands and emphasizing that this was the most important floor vote regarding Federal land management since the Alaska Lands Bill almost 20 years ago. Orin Hatch (R-UT) spent 10 minutes in an angry and apoplectic rebuttal: "The Senator from New Jersey has no right to tell the citizens of Utah how to manage their lands." "This bill has the support of all Utahns." "Most of these environmental extremists haven't even seen the land they're talking about. I've been all over it. Into the San Rafael, up the sides of the Black Box, ..." [paraphrased quotes] The vote followed.

By this morning, both private nose counts and an article in the Washington Post suggested that we had the votes to block cloture. No one, however, expected us to win with an 8 vote margin.

For now, we're back to the status quo with 3.2 million acres of protected wild lands (and 2.5 million acres more at risk). Jim Hansen will almost certainly try to move the delation bill on the House side, hoping that a conference committee will include it in final legislation. Hatch and Bennett may try to bring up their bill on its own or attach it to another piece of legislation. The threat is not over yet, but at least for now the momentum is with our side.

That's all for now...

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General information for those who want more:

Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, D.C.: (202) 546-2215

Learn More

• Compare other bills about the Utah Wilderness and read the full text of each.
  

• See the SUWA pictorial Utah's Redrock Wilderness: A National Treasure Threatened.
  

• Find out what you can do to help protect the Utah Wilderness.
  

• Read the letter from the Executive Director of SUWA.