The editorial boards of the Albuquerque Journal and the Santa Fe New Mexican, the two largest newspapers in New Mexico, both endorsed the Senate legislation that would transfer the Valles Caldera National Preserve to the National Park Service this week.
Under the headline “Valles Caldera Good Fit for Park Service,” the Journal editors stressed their preference for Park Service management of the Caldera. Click here to read the editorial (after clicking on this link, non-subscribers to the Journal must click on the “trial access pass” button in the lower left of the screen to read it).
The Journal editors stated the following:
Bingaman noted that while the trust has done its best to fulfill legislative directives, the current framework isn’t best suited for management.
The Park Service is the right agency to manage keen public interest in the area and the need to protect its unique cultural and geologic resources.
The first call to bring the Valles Caldera into the National Park Service came in 1899, so it’s more than past due.
The Santa Fe New Mexican, in an editorial headlined “Valles Caldera bill good idea, tough sell,” declared that “we’re delighted to see the creative approach of New Mexico’s senators toward making the Valles Caldera a more public-accessible piece of public land. Their bill, though, will have to be carefully crafted, and diplomatically guided, to get through a budgetary gun-shy Congress.” Click here to read the entire editorial. Below is part of the piece:
The preserve’s board of directors has done its best to achieve [former U.S. Senator Pete] Domenici’s goals — but there just isn’t enough money being generated. Meanwhile, entry to many parts of the property remains restricted.
Bingaman and Udall, who succeeded Domenici in the Senate, figure one way to allow America a better look at what we bought is to put it under National Park Service management; it still wouldn’t be a park per se, goes the pitch — but instead of having to sign up for semi-exclusive events allowing us into the place, New Mexicans and visitors from far and wide would just pay the kind of park-entrance fees we do at nearby Bandelier National Monument. In time, there might be a scenic road through it.
The New Mexican noted the conflicts between tourism and grazing inherent in the bill, as well as the price tags for building campgrounds and improving roads on the preserve, and concluded as such: “This will be a test of Bingaman’s congressional clout as chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee — and of Udall’s celebrated nature-conservation advocacy. We wish them both well.”
