Last week, America’s outdoor recreation industry pushed back against Utah Governor Gary Herbert, whose radical land grab policies threaten to carve up and sell off Utah’s spectacular public lands.
Please add your voice by telling the governor to stop his Utah land grab now. Copy the sample letter text below and then click here to send your message.
In a recent meeting with the governor, Frank Hugelmeyer, president and CEO of the Outdoor Industry Association (OIA), expressed his frustration over Utah’s public land policies and read a strongly worded statement from the trade group’s board of directors:
“Of greatest concern,” the group wrote, “is the governor’s lawsuit challenging the federal government over jurisdiction of the federal public lands and some road claims within national parks, monuments and wilderness areas. We have not and will not sit silently on threats to the nation’s recreation infrastructure.”
Adding your voice to the outdoor industry’s letter could make Herbert listen this time. The OIA’s twice-annual Outdoor Retailer convention is the largest in the state, drawing more than 46,000 visitors and pumping $42.5 million into Utah’s economy each year.
In a recent editorial, the Salt Lake Tribune pointed out that “Republican lawmakers consistently bend over for the extraction industries, despite the economic roller-coaster they bring to areas of the state long plagued by boom-bust cycles; the negative effect on land, water, wildlife habitat and air; and the fact that outdoor recreation, which brings clean jobs and sustainable dollars from tourism, is more important to the state’s future.”
Please contact Governor Herbert today and tell him you share the Outdoor Industry’s sense of outrage over his anti-wilderness land grab (see sample text below).
Sample text to Governor Herbert:
I urge you to listen to the concerns of the Outdoor Industry Association and citizens across the nation who want to see Utah’s spectacular public lands protected, not carved up by roads, leased to developers, or sold to the highest bidder. Please drop your land grab!
