Hunting & Angling Opportunities at Risk by Sarah Luna, AZ Conservation Partnership

"Dwindling access to quality hunting and angling opportunities is a trend that slowly is pulling apart the American sporting tradition," Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. Hunters and anglers have reason to be very concerned about the continuing loss of hunting and fishing opportunity on public lands due to hard rock mining. Important legislation is pending in the U.S. Congress to reform the 135 year old law still governing mining today. Signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant, the 1872 Mining Law was intended to attract settlers and prospectors to the West. The 1872 law allows mining companies to take valuable hard rock minerals from federal lands without making any royalty payments. That costs the U.S. Treasury Ð all of us - an estimated $100 million a year and that tab keeps getting bigger. The 1872 Mining Law contains no requirements for protection of natural resources, such as water quality and wildlife habitat. According to the EPA, 12,000 miles of streams and 180,000 acres of lakes and reservoirs have been polluted by mine waste and at least 40 percent of the headwaters of western rivers and streams are degraded from mineral activities. There are more than 500,000 abandoned hard rock mines in the U.S. Taxpayers are left with the tab for an estimated $50 billion in cleanup costs while our water, land and wildlife suffer the consequences. Mining for gold, uranium and other metals on U.S. public lands has risen nearly 50% in the last five years and a mining claim rush is now underway in the West. Many new claims have been staked near the Grand Canyon and other Arizona treasures, near highly populated urban areas and tribal lands. Our national forests, critical watersheds, wildlife corridors and local communities are seriously threatened by the massive increase in claim filings. 135 years ago metal mining may have been "the highest and best use of public lands" but times have changed. Mining law needs to reflect today's priorities and the time is way past due for Congress to act to address the impact of hard rock mining on our nation's fish and wildlife and other natural resources. H.R. 2262 has been introduced in Congress to do just that. The legislation brings mining companies under environmental and cleanup standards like the Clean Water Act and toxic substances laws and it sets up a royalty system for the companies to pay the clean up costs related to mining and abandoned mines. H.R. 2262 requires hard rock mining to be conducted in a manner that recognizes the value of lands for other uses including recreation, wildlife habitat and water supply. It requires the Bureau of Land Management to balance competing resource values to ensure that the public lands are properly managed. And, the bill requires that "special places" are protected including Wilderness lands, Inventoried Roadless Areas, National Parks and Wildlife Refuges, Wild and Scenic Rivers and other areas where some of the best hunting and fishing opportunities in the U.S. can be found. Keep Public Lands in Public Hands "One of the most important reasons to reform the Mining Law of 1872 is to 'Keep Public Lands in Public Hands.' Public lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Forest Service harbor some of the most important fish and wildlife habitat and provide some of the finest hunting and angling opportunities in the countryÉpublic lands contain well more than 50 percent of the nation's blue-ribbon trout streams and are strongholds for imperiled trout and salmon in the western United States. More than 80 percent of the most critical habitat for elk is found on lands managed by the Forest Service and the BLM, alone. Antelope, sage grouse, mule deer, salmon, steelhead, and countless other fish and wildlife species, as well as the nation's hunters and anglers, are dependent on public lands. Trout Unlimited Previous efforts to update the General Mining Law of 1872 have failed and it won't be easy to enact legislation this year. The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, Trout Unlimited and the National Wildlife Federation recently launched "Sportsmen United for Sensible Mining" to underscore the importance of mining law reform to protecting quality hunting and angling opportunities. Please join them in this effort. WHAT YOU CAN DO Join the mining reform effort today. Call Representative Rick Renzi and ask him to co-sponsor H.R. 2262. Tell him you're a sportsman and you want the 1872 Mining Act overhauled to protect fish and wildlife habitats and insure that mining companies pay their fair share of royalties for our public resources. Call Representative Renzi today: Washington, D.C. 202-225-2315 Flagstaff 928-213-3434 Prescott 928-708-9120 Casa Grande 520-876-0929 The Arizona Conservation Partnership promotes greater local awareness of federal conservation policies. ACP recently partnered with Trout Unlimited, the Navajo Nation and NWF's Regional Representative for Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, and Utah to support the passage of national energy legislation. That legislation included key elements of the Sportsmen's Responsible Energy Agenda. Sarah Luna can be contacted at llsarah@msn.com