Tom Wharton on Utah's environmental myopia

It doesn't look like the Tribune published my letter to the editor (too brilliantly erudite? too crushingly scathing? too long? oh the pain), but Tom Wharton's recent column at least mentioned the travesty of the state government's short-sighted approach to land use management:

Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. wants to turn over management of thousands of acres of roadless U.S. Forest lands to county commissioners, who too often have displayed only a willingness to exploit land we all own for short-term booms at the expense of a long-term vision.

The Bureau of Land Management seems hell-bent on ignoring its multiple-use mandates in a mad dash to exploit every last drop of oil and natural gas.

In sprawling Washington County, Utah Sen. Bob Bennett and Rep. Jim Matheson want to fuel poorly planned growth by selling public lands.

Utah seems too willing to give up thousands of gallons of west desert water to Las Vegas without a thought as to how it might impact the Great Salt Lake or fragile basin and range ecosystems.

Now if only someone would take the fantastically-named "Public Lands Policy Coordination Office" to the mat. I'm still mostly convinced that the Governor has not closely examined this situation, but has instead relied on the PLPCO to divine policy. We'll see.