Salt Lake City, Utah -- On Earth Day, thirty people, including students, gathered outside of the Utah School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration (SITLA) to urge SITLA to transform its practices to ensure a healthy future and great education for Utah and its students. The protest, organized by Utah Youth Environmental Solutions (UYES), continues Utah students’ momentum and commitment to stress concerns about climate change and its threat to Utah-- particularly its effect on young and future generations.
“We are the generation that will inherit this Earth and everything on it. While we are grateful to receive funding for our schools programs from SITLA, we are concerned about their practices SITLA -- particularly ongoing oil and gas extraction, land swaps near national parks, and other environmentally- damaging projects,” said Mishka Banuri, a Senior at West High. “We want to make sure that the funding for our schools comes from an ethical source that doesn’t endanger and capitalize on the current climate crisis.”
At the Earth Day rally, students spoke to the reforms and steps they want SITLA to make to ensure a healthy future for now, and forever. They emboldened the opportunities in light of the existential crisis of climate change, and participated in a die-in to signify the inevitable future if we do not make firm commitments to move away from fossil fuels and if we continue to prioritize short-term gains.
“We have heard from SITLA on their plans for creating a more robust renewable portfolio and appreciate their willingness to meet with us, but we want to see more substantial steps taken to secure a healthy future,” said Andie Madsen a Junior at West High. “We want a firmer commitment that they will limit their revenue dependency on the oil and gas industry. Trusts are designed to endure and provide benefits generation after generation without a foreseeable end. Time is on the side of the trust. They have time to innovate; time to strategize, and time to manage their lands to enhance the inalienable rights of its beneficiaries to a clean and healthful environment and an excellent education.”
“We want to see a repeal of the public petition exemption so that citizens can formally petition SITLA to make rules to promote the better management of the lands, and we want to see policy reform that alters the state trusts mandate to emphasize long-term stewardship over, and rather than revenue generation,” said Meridian Wappett Logan High student. “Utah is a leader and we hope those in power will wield that power to lead in managing our lands without facilitating a deeper dependence on fossil fuels that are suffocating our planet and our futures.”
Background:
The State of Utah School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration (SITLA) is an organization that regulates Utah trust lands. Trust lands are parcels of land throughout our state that were granted by Congress to Utah at the time of statehood. Trust lands were explicitly allocated to generate revenue to support designated state institutions -- including public schools, hospitals, teaching colleges, and universities. The oil and gas industry generates the majority of the revenue that comes from the management of trust lands. As beneficiaries, students are demanding alternative land uses, and a firmer commitment to building a better Utah for generations to come.
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About the Utah Youth Environment Solutions Network
The Utah Youth Environmental Solutions Network (otherwise known as UYES) is a group of students who take a special interest in the environment and our role to protect it. Our mission is simple: to empower youth to engage with their community by taking action on local environmental issues in Utah. Last legislative session we aided in passing HCR7, otherwise known as the Utah Climate Resolution. This resolution made Utah the first conservative state to recognize climate change and promise to take further action on it. Today, we are focused on gathering members from across the state and getting them involved in environmental activism, especially our SITLA campaign.
About the Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 3.5 million members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.