SimOpenSpace

[sparky]

I would run things much as the NPS does now, only instead of tax money, it is funded by farming on the fresno side.

[gdurkee]

HST Park -- that's it!
g.

[Bad Man From Bodie]

Ok, guess Ill bite.

The old slogan of the USFS land is “land of many uses”. Not sure if this holds true today, but that was the goal. I was taught in school that the idea behind land management in this country is to conduct management in an effort to conserve our land and its resources for the benefit, enjoyment, and future of the citizens of the United States. The opinions to how we should conduct land management are widespread as indicted in this thread. Commonality between opinions are based around the enjoyment part and not the benefit part from our natural resources. Most rational folks can all agree we need to extract materials from the earth so we can provide infrastructure and a decent comfort in living (ie we drive cars and not ride horses). We can all agree that we need agriculture to grow food and make clothing. We can all agree we need open space and wild places. We can’t all agree on how to balance this endeavor given the human condition. Wandering Daisy and I both agree we are not doing all that bad right now.
But times are changing as generation after generation are removed from the fact that veggies come from the earth and not the grocery store, and the metal in your car comes from a mine and not a car lot. The balance observed for many years in land management has shifted to a more emotional stance verses practical and the value of the natural resource is now measured in what personal enjoyment or fulfillment one gets from their “wilderness” experience. With so many emotions out there it has to be impossible for land managers on the federal level to please everyone or accomplish a task. We have to account for the emotions the general public has when it comes to conservation issues because it is written in our constitution (ie, we all have the right to pursuit of happiness).

It appears to me we are just protecting our own individual rights to pursuit of happiness. Well, no one will be happy if they have no food to eat or roof over their head. For me the question regarding open space verses development should be decided by necessity. I think you can have both. We have a lot of mining in Nevada and more open space than any other state except Alaska, mainly because no one wants to live in Nevada. For a lot of people, Nevada is ugly, dry, and undesirable to live in, which makes it a perfect place for mining and open space. So I chose to live in Nevada because of these reasons. I can make a good living as an enviromental hydrogeologist working in the mining industry and I don’t have to deal with a lot of folks and opinions from California (yet). Its all a matter of preference and opinion and not always what is good for the earth (and yes that includes us humans – we are part of this earth cycle thing).

In respect to who should manage our open space and land use… other than HST..…well here is a concept that may be a bit foreign…..Mother nature should manage the land and not a bureaucracy. Before Europeans showed up on the east coast, there were Native Americans (Indians). The Indians had no concept of land ownership but they sure in the heck had a good knowledge of land management, because back then, humans were part of mother nature. It was when the US government got involved and decided that they owned the land and therefore were in-charge of management of the land and its resources. They started with whipping out the buffalo and are wrapping up the last 10 years by allowing industry to operate without measures that could have prevented the billions of gallons of crude to be discharged into the Gulf,. Threfore, I am not a fan of the government managing out natural resources, rather, I trust private enterpise and land owners. Afterall, the National Parrks were origionaly privately funded.

[rlown]

so, with the stipulation that we have 1 mile from the edges for wilderness, the mine entrance could be put in that region, depending on where the gold is. It appears we could dump the tailings around Yucca Mtn, if the mine was on the east side.

I completely agree with Bad Man, about necessity, but in the region suggested, there's not a lot other than granite, unless you know where to look and dig.

I'd agree with "let nature do it's thing", if we could agree upon the non-native species like trout. With no native trout, I guess i wouldn't visit much.

Not sure there's a lot of timber in the region that is harvest-able. There's always helo harvesting..