Landscapes

Written by Ti Hays

Mount Taylor (Photo: US Forest Service)

Last Wednesday, the National Trust’s Law Department filed an amicus brief in support of the New Mexico Cultural Properties Review Committee’s decision to list Mount Taylor—included on our 2009 11 Most Endangered Historic Places list—in the State Register of Cultural Properties (“State Register”). The filing was opposed by the plaintiffs, who include several mining companies and New Mexico’s public lands commissioner. However, following a hearing in Lovington, New Mexico on September 13th, state district court judge William Shoobridge allowed the National Trust and several of its partners—the All Indian Pueblo Council, American Anthropological Association, Association on American Indian Affairs, Sierra Club and Society for American Archaeology—to file the brief.

The plaintiffs have challenged Mount Taylor’s State Register listing on a variety of constitutional and procedural grounds, two of which we addressed in our brief. First, plaintiffs have argued that the decision lacks a “valid secular purpose” under the New Mexico Constitution’s Establishment Clause and was made solely to advance the religions of the pueblos and tribes (Acoma, Laguna, Zuni, Hopi and Navajo) that nominated Mount Taylor to the State Register. Like its federal counterpart, the state’s Establishment Clause requires government action in the area of religion to have one or more such purposes. However, as our brief explains, the nomination has several “valid secular purposes,” including protecting Mount Taylor’s archaeological, cultural and historic features, which number in the hundreds of thousands and are documented throughout the nomination.

Second, plaintiffs have claimed that Mount Taylor is not significant primarily for “historical” reasons, as the applicable regulations require for cultural properties that are “used for religious purposes.” In response to that argument, our brief cites the extensive “ethnohistoric” documentation prepared by each of the five tribes with the assistance of professional anthropologists and included in the nomination. Additionally, our brief points the court to the U.S. Forest Service’s 2008 determination, which the tribes also included in the nomination, that Mount Taylor is chiefly significant for “historical” reasons.

The court has tentatively scheduled oral argument in this case for December. In addition to the Committee, the Pueblo of Acoma will also argue in support of the listing decision, as the pueblo has successfully intervened in the case as a defendant.

Ti Hays is the public lands counsel for the Law Department of the Trust for Historic Preservation.

National Trust for Historic Preservation

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a privately funded non-profit organization, works to save America's historic places.

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Written by Ti Hays

Released last week, the final plan for natural gas drilling in Utah’s Nine Mile Canyon ultimately means less oil and gas traffic.

Last Friday, the Bureau of Land Management released its final plan for a controversial natural gas project near Utah’s Nine Mile Canyon. This is the same plan that, when proposed in 2008, was criticized by many – including the National Trust for Historic Preservation – for its anticipated impacts on the canyon’s world-renown collection of rock art.

However, the final plan departs dramatically from the 2008 proposal in ways that are beneficial to the cultural resources both in the canyon and on the nearby West Tavaputs Plateau. First, the scope of the project has been reduced dramatically. The Bill Barrett Corporation will drill over 150 fewer wells on the plateau than originally proposed – 626 rather than over 800. This means less than one-fourth as many new roads will be built. And because the Bill Barrett Corporation has agreed to broaden its use of “directional drilling” – a practice that utilizes a single well pad for multiple wells – there will be over 75% fewer well pads. Collectively, these commitments will reduce the project’s area of long-term disturbance from 1,864 acres to 685 acres.

Second, the Bill Barrett Corporation has agreed to change how it will conduct business on the ground. Major access roads on the plateau will now be gated, thus making it more difficult for vandals and looters to reach archaeological sites nestled in the remote canyons of the Tavaputs. The final plan also restricts drilling activity within the Desolation Canyon National Historic Landmark during the height of the recreation season. This means boaters on the Green River will continue to experience Desolation Canyon much as John Wesley Powell did during his historic journey of 1869, which the National Historic Landmark designation honors.

Credit for the revised plan belongs largely to a surprising duo: the Bill Barrett Corporation and its historic foil, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. On more than one occasion, these two groups have clashed over oil and gas proposals in the Tavaputs region, oftentimes over the question of whether areas that possess “wilderness” values should or should not be developed. However, the two sides were able to put aside their differences to reach the terms now reflected in the final plan that allow development to proceed but with higher regard for the cultural and natural values of the Tavaputs.

As for Nine Mile, the final plan ultimately means less oil and gas traffic in the canyon. This is a good thing for the rock art, especially when considered with the programmatic agreement signed by the Bill Barrett Corporation, the Bureau of Land Management, the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, the National Trust, and others in February. This agreement requires the Bill Barrett Corporation and the Bureau of Land Management to implement a broad dust control and mitigation program in the canyon.

Of course, the impacts of this project on the canyon cannot entirely be avoided, even with the very laudable changes to the plan and the measures set forth in the programmatic agreement. However, thanks to the efforts of all of the groups that have advocated so tirelessly for the canyon, it is in a much better position today than it was two years ago when the project was first proposed.

Ti Hays is public lands counsel for the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Post updated August 20, 2010.

National Trust for Historic Preservation

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a privately funded non-profit organization, works to save America's historic places.

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