Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) may ask President Obama to create two national monuments in California’s Mojave Desert, including one that includes a stretch of Route 66, reported the Los Angeles Times.
Feinstein said Monday she wants to break a logjam of interests that stalled two previous bills to create the two protected zones, the largest of which is Mojave Trails National Monument on 921,000 acres of federal land and former railroad company property along a 105-mile stretch of old Route 66, between Ludlow and Needles. […]
The bills, introduced by Feinstein, have been held up by Republicans and by conflicts among environmentalists, off-roaders, hunters and renewable-energy interests.
Feinstein said she would ask Obama to use his authority to create monuments without congressional approval “if we find that by this time next year we cannot find momentum on our bill. That is exactly what we will do.”
Last month, Obama declared much of the Angeles National Forest as a national monument. And such authority by the president goes back more than 100 years, starting with Teddy Roosevelt bypassing the Congress in designating millions of acres of western forest. (Author Timothy Egan detailed Roosevelt’s gleeful action in this book. TR wasn’t lacking in audacity.)
If approved, the Mojave Trails National Monument would be managed by the Bureau of Land Management, which already manages some sites in the area, including Amboy Crater off Route 66 near Amboy, California.
Such efforts to protect that area of the Mojave Desert have dated back more than five years. A national monument would prevent new development in the area save for “authorized exceptions.” Current property owners wouldn’t be affected. A national monument also would call for the construction of a visitors center.
(Scene near Amboy Crater in March 2008 by Steve Berardi via Flickr)
As one who grew up in the Amboy area, this would be super fragilistic great!!!!!!!!!!!!