Campaign to Protect
Joshua Tree National Park

Date: Tue, 03 Feb 4 12:17:12 PST
From: Joshua Tree Chamber of Commerce
Subject: Save Joshua Tree National Park


----- Original Message -----
From: Z107.7 Radio
Sent: Wednesday, February 04, 2004 11:06 AM

Activists Launch Campaign to Protect Joshua Tree National Park, Local Landmarks "Give It Back!" Seeks to Return 30,000 Acres to Park

CONTACTS: Donna or Larry Charpied, Citizens for the Chuckwalla Valley, 760-392-4722, 760-574-1887

Penny Newman, Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice, 909-360-8451

Howard Gross, National Parks Conservation Association, 760-366-3035


Eagle Mountain, Calif. - A coalition of conservation organizations today announced the launch of a new campaign to return nearly 30,000 acres of land in the Eagle Mountain range to Joshua Tree National Park. The campaign, "Give it Back!" is spearheaded by the Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice and the Citizens for the Chuckwalla Valley, and is also working to designate the old Kaiser iron ore mine and town a National Historic Landmark in order to attract visitation to the region. More than 25 local and national organizations and numerous individuals support the campaign.

"This campaign is the answer to the economic blight the local community of Eagle Mountain and Desert Center have lived with since Kaiser Steel went bankrupt in 1983," said Donna Charpied, a long time dump foe. "The vision we have for our community is far different than the vision of our elected officials and developers. We look at the old mine and see a historical site. We look at the boarded up houses and see wilderness huts."

The campaign is petitioning members of Congress, and local and state legislators to authorize the 29,775 acres of land, once part of the park but set aside by Congress in the 1950s for mineral exploration, to be returned to the National Park Service. Activists are concerned that the development of the world's largest garbage dump, proposed on these lands, would be detrimental to the health of the community and the national park. The campaign proposes instead that the land be managed by the Park Service to attract tourism to the area.

Returning the land is not only important for protecting the park, it is called for by law. The first law, a Congressional Act of 1950, Public Law 837 ("PL 837"), omitted 265,340 acres from Joshua Tree National Monument for mineral extraction. Prior to omitting the land, the President of the United States ordered the land surveyed to "determine to what extent said area is more valuable for minerals than for National Monument purposes.". An explicit provision in PL 837 states if the land is not used for mineral purposes it should be returned to Joshua Tree.

A second law, passed in 1952, also supports returning this land to Joshua Tree. Through Private Law 790 ("PL 790"), Congress granted the Kaiser Steel Corporation rights-of-way and land in the Eagle Mountains for campsite and millsite purposes to "promote the development of steel in the West by facilitating the mining operations of the Kaiser Steel Corporation" (House Report 1853). When PL 790 was enacted, Congress explicitly stated ".said property shall revert in fee to the United States in the event that said property is not used for a continuous period of seven years as a camp site or mill site or for other incidental purposes in connection with mining operations of said corporation or its successors in interest" (emphasis added). Kaiser has not mined this property since 1983, and has leased the property to Mine Reclamation Corporation to develop the world's largest garbage dump, which is not related to mining. Thus, the "Give It Back" campaign seeks for the federal government to enforce PL 790 and alleviate Joshua Tree National Park from the threat of the Eagle Mountain dump.

"I certainly support the Eagle Mountain and Desert Center communities for wanting to develop a tourism industry as opposed to destructive polluting industries that are inappropriate when located in the shadow of a national park," said National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) desert representative Howard Gross. NPCA placed Joshua Tree National Park on its 2004 list of its Ten Most Endangered National Parks for proposed development around the park, including the world's largest garbage dump, Eagle Mountain."It is a win-win situation," Gross added. "The local community benefits from tourist dollars, and the resources of the park are not lost to Los Angeles' garbage."

NPCA released a report in 2003, which showed that California's national parks are a financial boon to local communities. Based on a conservative economic model developed by Michigan State University, the NPCA report showed that the 1.3 million visitors to Joshua Tree in 2001 contributed $46.3 million to local economies, supporting 1,115 jobs and $21.9 million in income and employee benefits in the region. "The acres of land omitted from Joshua Tree in 1950, including land slated for the dump, must be returned to the park or the results will be the death of one of our nation's premier parks and intolerable pollution to community residents," said Larry Charpied who owns and operates a certified organic jojoba farm on the outskirts of Eagle Mountain.

Glen Avon resident Penny Newman, executive director of the Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice, knows first hand the consequences of poor decision-making. The Glen Avon community has been negatively impacted from having the Stringfellow Acid Pits nearby. "If a project has the potential to cause harm to communities and the environment, vote it down," Newman said. "We are talking about a clean pristine aquifer and skies so clear the area has been designated a Class I air shed. We developed the 'Give It Back!' campaign to preclude the development of a superfund site outside one of our nation's most beloved national parks-and our communities."

For more info regarding "Give It Back!" campaign see:
http://www.ccaej.org/projects/desert_protection/action_alerts2.html

For more information about the Eagle Mountain garbage dump see:
http://www.ccaej.org/projects/desert_protection/desertprot.html

For information on NPCA's Ten Most Endangered National Parks see:
www.npca.org/endangeredparks


Gary Daigneault
Program/News Director, KCDZ, 107.7 FM, Joshua Tree
President, Board of Directors, Theatre 29
Voice: 760-366-8471 FAX 366-2976
www.kcdzfm.com