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Opinion editorials Handling of Pit Appeal Calls for a Time-Out |
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opinion editorialsThis editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by editorial page staff and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers
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Monday, April 13, 2009
Keep All Options Alive To Save Valles Caldera
When the spectacular, 89,000-acre Valles Caldera National Preserve was established by Congress in 2000, the enabling legislation specified that it make its way in the world as a working ranch. Nine years later, that's not working.
Annual revenue from cattle grazing has been as light as the grass cover in the Jemez Mountains, bringing in only $5,800 in 2007. Sales from T-shirts, hats and other merchandise generated $42,513.
As the Valles Caldera Trust searches for ways to make the preserve financially self-sufficient by 2015, as required by Congress, the concept of a "working ranch" is clearly going to have to be expanded.
Many of today's ranches are capitalizing on public interest in hunting, fishing and camping. Faced with the termination of about $3.5 million in annual federal funding in 2015, the Valles trustees are clearly going to have to do more than that. A new study the trustees commissioned from an environmental consulting firm based in Vancouver, Wash., suggests some dramatic — and controversial — options:
A nearly $12 million, 100-room lodge and restaurant with a nightly rate of about $150, and a second $11.9 million luxury lodge with 20 rooms costing $550 to $730 a night.
"Glamping" — glamorous, upscale camping in semi-permanent tents complete with furniture and catered meals, safari-style.
Horseback and van tours, canoeing on ponds created by damming streams, high-dollar auctions of elk permits and film production.
"Green burials," environmentally friendly burials in the scenic preserve that could generate as much as 20 percent of annual revenues.
No sooner were many of these possibilities raised than they were yanked off the table. Native American objections have made green burials a nonstarter. Two advocacy groups would like to do the same with the lodging proposals, which they see as commercialization.
Anyone who has visited Yellowstone or Yosemite knows better than that. The handsome, rough-hewn lodges are part of the appeal of our great national parks. As long as rooms are offered at a range of prices and the architecture is appropriate, lodges provide access and comfort to people who can't hoist a 45-pound pack and trek in on foot.
From its inception, the Valles Caldera has been viewed as an experiment in public land management. If the experiment is to succeed, creative ideas must be welcomed at the table — not rejected out-of-hand.
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