president@whitehouse.gov

 January 26, 2001 

 Dear President Bush: 

 I wish to extend a welcome to you as the President of the United States.  I have great expectations that you will live up to your pledge to be President to all Americans, and to be a uniter and not a divider.  To that extent, I wish to extend my support for your efforts to over turn the excessive number of regulations placed on the American people during the past eight years.  I support limiting federal government regulation and returning regulatory responsibility to the states.

Specifically, I encourage you to review the numerous national monuments and wilderness areas that were created by the Clinton Administration; without review by Congress; without consultation with local and state administrations; and without public review and comment periods.

I am writing to encourage you to seek full public and congressional review of these land use regulatory issues.  I attended several of the meetings hosted by the Forest Service and touted as "public meetings" during the Roadless Area Conservation Initiative process.  I have discussed meeting conduct with others that attended similar meetings in other regions.  Our conclusion was that no matter what was said, the decision was pre-ordained that the Roadless Area Conservation Initiative would be approved.

This "one-size-fits-all" policy does not make sense.  Speaker after speaker at the meetings voiced dissension.  The process has drawn opposition from Congressional representatives.  Numerous lawsuits citing failure of the process to adhere to public law have been filed.  These facts do not support environmental group claims that the initiative has "overwhelming public support".

On a personal note, these issues have impacted me.  Under the various land use initiatives implemented by the Clinton Administration, areas of the California desert where my family and I have camped, recreated and explored are now deemed "wilderness".  Roads I drove on 15 years ago that appear on US Geological Topographical Survey maps no longer exist.  These areas have been declared as "wilderness" despite the fact that they do not meet the definition of wilderness as defined in the Wilderness Act of 1964.

I am currently a member of the Society for the Conservation of Bighorn Sheep in California.  Within that capacity, I spend many hours maintaining desert springs and water sources for bighorn sheep and other desert wildlife.  The cumbersome regulations severely restrict our ability to maintain a viable water source for the threatened bighorn sheep and other desert wildlife, some endangered species.  Without man's intervention, these species will rapidly become extinct.  The regulations of the past eight years limit and in some cases prohibit man's intervention to keep threatened and endangered species alive.

It is my belief that the current environmental movement and actions by the Clinton Administration are creating an unnecessary threat to our natural wildlife and to the continued prosperity of the American economy.

I request that you submit all invocations of the Antiquities Act of 1906 by the Clinton Administration to a careful public review under the guidelines of the National Environmental Protection Act and final review by Congress.  Let the public provide comments on the merits of land management on lands that are being withdrawn from public use.  Require that the federal agencies responsible for public lands management develop those management plans outside the political pressure of special interest groups.

Please choose to let the states and the people be involved with land management decisions.


Sincerely,


Your name here.