Dear Editor
I’m glad the BLM has begun paying some attention to Mill Creek, especially considering the new impacts brought about by Internet exposure. New signs are a good sign, but they don’t begin to address the totality of changes that Powerhouse probably needs.
In May, I began campaigning for appropriate changes in Mill Creek. Hoping to enable a community effort, I put together a website, www.savemillcreek.org, providing information to interested parties and inviting them to learn about and discuss what might be done.
Among the documents posted on the site is the BLM’s 2002 Mill Creek Management plan. I do not find it very interesting or useful, although it is the authority for these new signs. However, something really interesting, also posted at the website, is the Slickrock Planning Committee report of 1992.
In 1990, the BLM reached out to the County and local Citizenry to devise a remedy for the abuses taking place on Sand Flats. The Slickrock Planning Committee report made some suggestions. Some were accepted, others rejected, then the deal got done.
One thing I found especially encouraging is that the entire process only took a few years, which is pretty fast when you’ve got various levels of government agency cooperating at something new and novel.
Working together, the BLM, the County, and concerned Citizens may be able to develop and implement, as they did on Sand Flats, a viable solution in fairly short order. But, sure as shootin’, this Letter to the Editor ain’t gonna git ‘er done. It’s the County and the BLM that have the power, the authority, and (hopefully) the interest to start the ball rolling. Will they?
Rory Tyler, Moab
