We the People

The American Land Council petitions for state land

by Morgan Pratt

 

The American Land Council petitions for state landby Morgan Pratt The American Land Council began gathering signatures for a petition regarding the transfer of public lands on Saturday, which is seeking to shift the control of federal public lands to the management of Utah. The petition is estimated to have at least 1,000 signatures.

 

Ken Ivory, a Utah House Representative, R-West Jordan, and the president of the American Lands Council, said the petition is a way to allow people to express their interest in the transfer of public lands.

 

“We are doing a resolution at the GOP state central committee that mirrors a resolution supporting the transfer of public lands that the Republican National Committee passed a couple months ago,” Ivory said. “As we were preparing the resolution, a number of people wanted to be added onto it as endorsing the resolution.”

 

He said the petition is important because there are tremendous amounts resources in Utah that are not being utilized.

 

“The U.S. Government Accountability Office tells us there is more recoverable oil in Utah, Colorado and Wyoming than the rest of the world combined,” Ivory said.

 

Money generated from oil in Utah’s trust lands help fund organizations across Utah, including public schools through the School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration. Public education receives about 97 percent of the funds generated.

 

Ivory said if the state could get more money from oil companies on trust lands, Utah could help fund more public schools.

 

“And we know we are $2.5 billion below average in per-pupil funding for education,” Ivory said. “And we know we are never going to tax our way out of that.”

 

Kim Christy, the Deputy Director of the Utah School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration, said SITLA has no official position on the American Lands Council or the Transfer of Public Lands Act.

 

"However, as the trust land manager and because of the trust’s land position largely within federal domain, results of a federal land transfer could influence the manner in which we administer trust lands, ability to develop natural resources, and generate revenue for our beneficiaries,” Christy said. “The administration is also often referenced for its business model that has generated $100 million annually over the past decade."

 

Mark Clemens, the manager of the Utah Chapter of the Sierra Club, said looking back on Ivory’s legislative dealings, it is apparent that his biggest concern is not for education for children but to pick a fight with the federal government over public lands.

 

“Rep. Ivory’s recollection and knowledge of the tax system is highly selective,” Clemens said. “There are all sorts of decisions that the Utah legislature has made in terms of taxing and spending that indicate that education is really not their highest priority.

 

Ivory said with public lands in the hands of the state, Utah’s environment would benefit because forests are being devastated along with the watershed and the state’s air quality.

 

“We have an opportunity with local control and management to have better environmental quality,” Ivory said.

 

Clemens said this argument is contradictory.

 

“Throughout this petition, they consistently complain about the various dirty fossil fuels that federal government is not exploiting currently,” he said. “And yet, they also make the claim that, ‘Western states already manage millions of acres of state lands generating more revenue with less expense and less environmental damage in general than federally managed public lands.’”

 

Clemens said the American Lands Council cannot have it both ways.

 

“They cannot turn our magnificent heritage of public lands into an open pit copper mine and an oil field and simultaneously maintain that they are going to be more environmentally sustainable in their management,” he said.

 

The likely result of turning all of this land over to the state is that the land would be privatized and sold off to the highest bidder, not given back to the state, Clemens said.

 

“Rep. Ivory is making a variety of specious arguments in order to advance his hidden agenda which is to privatize public lands into the hands of developers,” Clemens said.

 

Regardless, he said Utah relinquished its rights to additional public lands as a condition of statehood 1896.

 

“At statehood, Utah got a very generous grant of public lands from the United States of America,” Clemens said. “It amounted to all of the states that were not yet settled which was a little more than 10 percent of all the public lands that were given to Utah as a birthday present.”

 

Therefore, according to the Enabling Act of 1894, Clemens said Utah has no right to any additional public lands.

 

“The language of the Enabling Act, it is quite clear about Utah relinquishing any further claim to additional public lands owned by the United States,” Clemens said.