Hourglass Ticking to Save Monuments From Becoming Fossil Fuel 'Sacrifice Zones'

With the public comment period ending Monday, there are just hours left for the public to weigh in on President Donald Trump’s order that threatens protections of 27 national monuments designated since 1996.

“These monuments were protected by presidents from both parties for good reason,” said Randi Spivak, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s public lands program. “Their natural beauty and scientific and cultural importance is indisputable, but Trump and his corporate friends claim to know better. Sadly it’s just their greed talking.”

Trump’s executive order, issued in April, called for Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to conduct a review of designations or expansions made by the last three presidents using executive powers under the Antiquities Act of every monument larger than 100,00 acres “or where the Secretary determines that the designation or expansion was made without adequate public outreach and coordination with relevant stakeholders.”

Among the currently designated areas (pdf) under review are Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase-Escalante in Utah; the Mojave Trails in California; and Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument in Hawaii.

The order suggested that the review could open the possibility of fossil fuel drilling. It states: “Monument designations that result from a lack of public outreach and proper coordination with State, tribal, and local officials and other relevant stakeholders may also create barriers to achieving energy independence, restrict public access to and use of Federal lands, burden State, tribal, and local governments, and otherwise curtail economic growth.”

As such, Lukas Ross, climate and energy campaigner with Friends of the Earth, warned: “In his first hundred days in office Trump is determined to turn our public lands and waters into energy sacrifice zones.”