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Supporters and wilderness advocates like you play a critical role in the protection of Utah’s spectacular wild places.
Join our email list to stay informed about Utah wilderness.
Supporters and wilderness advocates like you play a critical role in the protection of Utah’s spectacular wild places.
Donations of $35 or more automatically include a year’s membership in SUWA.
If you are within six weeks of your annual renewal date or if your membership has lapsed, any gift you make of $35 or more will be processed as a membership renewal.
*Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance is a 501(c)3 nonprofit. All contributions are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
SUWA is pleased to announce that on Friday April 29th, at their 117th annual convention, lay and clergy delegates of the Episcopal Diocese of Utah passed a Resolution in Support of America’s Red Rock Wilderness Act and for the Perpetual Protection and Management of Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears National Monuments.
The 155-year-old Episcopal Church in Utah officially supports the campaigns to protect these special places, and it will actively work for congressional passage of America’s Redrock Wilderness Act. These efforts benefit future generations of Americans and show respect for Indigenous people with ties to the land. The church’s support strengthens the America the Beautiful effort to protect 30% of U.S. lands and waters by 2030, and it furthers action to combat climate change and stem the global loss of biodiversity by protecting habitat for all living beings. The strong support demonstrated by the Episcopal Diocese of Utah is greatly appreciated.
Our e-newsletter with the latest on redrock wilderness news and events.
Since its inception a few years back, SUWA’s Stewardship Program has aimed to foster a stewardship ethic and promote service as recreation in Utah through opportunities to work directly and actively to preserve and enhance the wilderness character of Utah’s public lands.
So what does all of that mean– for volunteers, and for the redrock wilderness?
Tune in to find out! You’ll be transported to a recent stewardship project in the Canyon Rims area (featuring voices from a couple inspiring University of Utah Alternative Break students) while hearing all about SUWA’s stewardship philosophy from one incredibly dynamic duo: Stewardship Director Jeremy Lynch and Stewardship Coordinator Jack Hanley.
Sign up to stay in the know about future Stewardship Projects this season and beyond!
Check out the SUWA Stewardship Project Calendar here!
Wild Utah is made possible by the contributing members of SUWA. Thank you for your support!
Become a SUWA member today and support the Wild Utah Podcast
A special thank you for this episode also goes to the U of U Alternative Break crew who joined us for a one-day project that helped to create the in-the-field audio you hear on this episode.
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Theme music is by Haley Noel Austin, with interlude music by Larry Pattis.
Dave Pacheco is the host of Wild Utah.
Post studio production and editing is by Laura Borichevsky.
A transcript of this episode can be found here.
More than a year ago, President Biden directed the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to pause all new oil and gas leasing on public lands while the agency conducted a comprehensive review of its outdated oil and gas program. The leasing pause was part of a broader executive order meant to address the climate crisis and represented a much needed pivot away from the prior administration’s relentless assault on our public lands.
Immediately after the president ordered the leasing pause, the state of Utah and pro-drilling groups such as the Western Energy Alliance launched an aggressive campaign claiming the pause would have devastating effects on Utah’s rural economy. These doomsday predictions were wildly inaccurate.
Now, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the calls for more public land leasing and development have grown louder. But the clamor for more extraction is a thinly a veiled attempt by fossil fuel interests to profit from the ongoing conflict. It is also based on a false premise: that more public land leasing will lead to more drilling and production, which in turn will lower the price of oil and natural gas.
Not so.
Most oil and gas drilling in Utah and across the United States takes place on state and private lands, not public lands. And on public lands, operators have stockpiled millions of acres of unused leases and more than 9,000 unused (but approved) drilling permits (see our recent blog post for more on this).
The war in Ukraine has made it clear that the world needs to become significantly less, not more, reliant on fossil fuels. Meanwhile, climate scientists are speaking in one unified voice and telling us in no uncertain terms that if we continue drilling, transporting, and burning fossil fuels we are risking everything.
For far too long the BLM has wrongly elevated oil and gas leasing and development as the primary use of our nation’s public lands, threatening our climate, wild places, cultural heritage, and the continued existence of thousands of species. This unbalanced approach must stop now. Our wild places—and the climate crisis—demand no less.
Our e-newsletter with the latest on redrock wilderness news and events.