The Buffalo Hills Wilderness Study Area, like many other WSAs in Washoe County, contains some of the highest-value sage grouse habitat in the Western United States. Washoe County is proposed to remove many of these lands from wilderness consideration. Credit: Brian Beffort
By Brian Beffort, Toiyabe Chapter Director
The Washoe County Commission is proposing legislation that would release more than 400,000 acres of Wilderness Study Areas, and sell off tens of thousands of acres around the Truckee Meadows for development. If you care about open space, clean water and air, habitat for our local wildlife, or quality of life, then you need to care about this bill.
Click here to see what's at stake. All the brown lands--your public lands--within the red line, are propsed to be sold off to the highest bidder.
Share your concerns with the county and your members of Congress.
Senator Catherine Cortez Masto: https://www.cortezmasto.senate.gov/contact/connect -- Click the "Share your opinion on legislation" link
Senator Dean Heller: https://www.deanheller.com/contact/
Congressman Mark Amodei: https://amodei.house.gov/email-me/
Unfortunately, here's the short answer: sprawl will win and conservation will lose
if Washoe County's proposal moves forward.
On April 11, Washoe County unveiled a new web page announcing legislation that will affect YOUR public lands in Washoe County.
Titled the Washoe County Economic Development and Conservation Act, the proposed Washoe County Economic Development and Conservation Act will bring too little long-term economic development or conservation to the people, wildlife or lands of Washoe County, because it misses the mark entirely in numerous ways:
Disposal of Land
The County’s proposed disposal boundary identifies approximately 80,000 acres to be offered for sale to the highest bidder. Many of these acres, especially to the north, are located far from any infrastructure or services. Developing these lands will only stretch already-strained resources even further, and force taxpayers to foot the bill.
Through similar legislation, Las Vegas has expanded its own disposal boundaries three times, and it’s now working on its fourth. We have the opportunity to stop such unwise development from growing in northern Nevada.
Where will the water come from?
In the driest state in the Union, facing an uncertain climate future, the development the County proposes will place extreme strain on already-limited water resources. The recently approved StoneGate development will require water to be piped from Honey Lake in California, despite the fact that Honey Lake was dry several years ago. Further development will increase the pressure to obtain water from even farther afield, unsustainable from a water-availability perspective.
How will we manage flood waters?
The County’s proposed development will only increase storm water runoff and decrease water quality because of the chemicals and excess nutrients on urban and residential properties. Much of this will flow into the Truckee River or other drinking water sources. The Truckee is the source of 85% of the region’s drinking water and home to endangered and threatened species (the cui cui and Lahontan cutthroat trout, respectively).
There is already ample private land to develop
The April 18 disposal map already shows thousands of acres of private land that can be developed but hasn’t been.
This proposed legislation provides no indication the County has paid attention to its own Master Plan
or its Open Space Plan, both of which identify important resources, such as habitat for sage grouse, pronghorn, mule deer, black bear, and other wildlife, as well as sensitive cultural resources, high ecosystem values, high recreation opportunities, storm water management and the protection of other open space for parks and other uses.
There's already a shortage of parks in the Truckee Meadows
The Trust for Public Lands has ranked Reno 72 out of the nation’s 100 largest cities. There is a current need to provide more open space and parks for the residents who live here (see map here).
This proposed legislation has potential to make a poor park situation even worse. We need more open space, not less in our urban core.
Washoe County needs to provide compelling reasons why and where the region needs to grow, not just vague claims that we need to grow. This proposed legislation is nothing more than a recipe for unsustained development and cumulating impacts on infrastructure, services, and taxpayers.
Yes, Washoe County’s population is growing, but some have questioned whether it is growing too fast.
We may need to grow, but we must do it more carefully than the County proposes.
Our region needs responsible, thoughtful, balanced, and sustainable growth that is integrated with parks, walking trails, open space, wildlife habitat and green infrastructure—none of this is proposed by the County in this proposed legislation.
Disposition of Proceeds
The proposed legislation language recommends a portion of the proceed go to, among other things, "The conduct of wildlife habitat conservation and restoration projects that benefit sage grouse and other wildlife projects in the County."
Although this sounds good, it is inconsistent with the release of WSAs proposed by this same bill. As any wildlife biologist will tell you, the three most important things for wildlife are habitat, habitat and habitat. Most of the WSA acreage proposed for release is as environmentally sensitive as lands can be from a ecosystem and habitat perspective. The best way to protect these environmentally sensitive lands is to provide a designation that will protect their fragile resources from development, off-road vehicle impacts and other human actions. Restoring what is already damaged is far less effective than stopping that damage in the first place.
Wilderness Release
The County’s proposal to release more than 400,000 acres of Wilderness Study Areas (WSAs) from wilderness consideration is unacceptable.
These lands are among the last, best lands for wildlife habitat, solitude, wild beauty and primitive recreation that remain in the Western U.S. Protections for these areas need to continue, not be removed entirely.
All WSAs proposed for release (excepting the Fox Range and Pole Canyon) contain critical habitat for sage grouse. The integrity of these lands is one of the main reasons the sage grouse was not listed under the Endangered Species Act. Protecting them intact will be one of the main ways to avoid having the sage grouse listed as either threatened or endangered. What these lands need instead is designation to protect the quality of their habitats.
The Fox Range and Pole Canyon are the closest WSAs to the Reno-Sparks metropolitan area. Given the value of open spaces and access to recreational lands for urban residents, these WSAs should be designated as wilderness or national conservation area to protect their scenic, recreational, and wildlife habitat qualities.
Wall Canyon WSA. More than 20,000 acres in and around Wall Canyon WSA were acquired from a private owner by the BLM under the Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act (SNPLMA) because of their extreme ecological value. These parcels include numerous riparian and wetland sites; springs and wet meadows; the headwaters for Mountain View Creek, which is habitat for the Wall Canyon Sucker; and lands vital to a vast array of wildlife, including specially designated plant and animal species like sage grouse, Wall Canyon sucker, pika, pygmy rabbits and many plants. These lands were acquired to allow the BLM to manage the entire area as habitat for multiple mule deer and pronghorn herds, and an estimated 200 or more cultural sites that include 21 sites eligible for national register. These protections and the intent of the acquisitions will be harmed if the WSA is released. Wall Canyon WSA deserves full designation as either wilderness or national conservation area.
Poodle Mountain WSA. As with Wall Canyon WSA, the BLM acquired thousands of acres of “environmentally sensitive lands” within the Poodle Mountain WSA in 2008. The lands provide some of the richest, most diverse wildlife habitat in the state, hosting significant resident populations of sage grouse, California bighorn sheep, pronghorn, mule deer, chukar, wild horses, and numerous other animals. Almost every parcel contains a spring, stream corridor, or wet meadow, providing critical water resources for wildlife. These lands offer significant recreational resources for hunting, fishing, hiking, biking, and other activities.
The county's proposal for the Buffalo Hills complex is a confusing hodge-podge
that threatens the health and integrity of these important lands.
No Open Public Process
There have been no public meetings on this concept since November, 2016. Although there have been numerous “invite-only” meetings to develop these proposals. And now the County’s unveils this proposal in April 2018. What is the County’s timeline for an open, public process to review and revise these proposals? Does the County really want this bill introduced to Congress in May? Who has been behind this development in the meantime? Who and what are really driving this process?
Economic Development and Conservation Cannot be Separated
There is no such thing as economic growth on one hand and conservation on another. Humans are part of our environment, and we depend on the watersheds, soils, plant communities and wildlife habitats for our air, water, food, and peace of mind. Our economy cannot prosper without attending to these needs. We need a more thoughtful approach to developing landscapes while maintaining the natural systems on which we and our economy depend.
In sum, this act will do nothing to produce long-term, sustainable economic development, because it will strain the County’s infrastructure and services and destroy the quality of life that attracts businesses and people to the area. Nor will it conserve wildlife habitat, open space, access to recreation, or any other measure of quality of life we now enjoy.
Yes, Washoe County is growing. Maybe we need to grow, but we need to do so thoughtfully. We need to guard our community against unwise proposals to develop our precious open space, habitat and opportunities for recreation and quality of life.
Sign up here for updates regarding the Washoe County Public Lands Bill.
And please voice your thoughts and concerns directly to the county at their Open Washoe comment site.
More soon...
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