New & improved Swamp

[Matey]

Public Land ... STAY OUT!

The California Desert Protection Act, sponsored by Senator Dianne Feinstein(D-CA), was signed into law on October 31,1994, after being blocked in committees for seven years. This landmark legislation designates two new national parks -- Death Valley and Joshua Tree -- and one national preserve -- the Mojave.

http://www.senate.gov/~feinstein/desert_protection_act.html

Having just been to Death Valley over the Thanksgiving holiday, let me explain what the Desert Protection Act did to .. I mean citizens.

It took 1.3 million acres of grabbed land and added it to the 1.8 million acres of Death Valley National Monument and declared the entire 3.1 million acres a National Park, largest in the lower 48. It then proceeded to declare 95% of that acreage "Wilderness", meaning that no vehicle traffic, including bicycles could travel on any areas called "wilderness". The long standing promise of maintaining "existing roads" in National Parks and in wilderness areas has steadily been broken as this year, like last, I found more and more mining and town site roads closed forever.

Not only is this a travesty of blocking access to public lands, but it restricts ANY visitation of these lands to only the hardy hiker and in my opinion, violates the Americans with Disability Act discriminating against those unable to hike much if any of the 2.945 million acres of public lands, OUR LANDS, no designated off limits! This is happening all over America, not just in California.

Wilderness, Land of NO use!