Field Trip Helps Focus Perceptions

Wed., Dec. 16, 1998

D.F. Oliveria For The Editorial

Jammed together in their concrete jungles, big-city Easterners wouldn’t know Idaho from Iowa - and are vaguely aware there’s another Washington.

That was apparent five years ago, when Manhattan Rep. Carolyn Maloney introduced legislation to designate an incredible 16 million acres in five western states as wilderness, including 4 million in the northern and central parts of former Rep. Larry LaRocco’s district.

When LaRocco balked, Maloney asked, “Does my bill impact your district?” Later, the Idaho Democrat earned style points, as well as headlines in New York newspapers, by proposing, tongue-in-cheek, to designate as wilderness Central Park and Maloney’s Upper East Side District.

Maloney’s bill didn’t get anywhere. But she did scare Westerners by lining up 50 co-sponsors. The bill underscored the need for vigilance to protect our lifestyle and natural resource industries. One important way to do that is to bring political heavyweights here to study western issues. Rep. Helen Chenoweth did just that last year when she arranged a four-day tour of forests, mines and ranches in four western states, attended by leading House Republicans, including former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Now, Sen. Larry Craig is working to establish a political action committee that would bring the top Republican presidential candidates to the West. “We need to help convince the next president of the United States that it ain’t a bad thing to cut down a tree, to have a cow chew on grass, or roll a rock,” Craig said.

Gingrich’s visit changed his outlook toward the West. Midway through the 1997 trip, he said: “Until you’ve been in states that are overwhelmingly owned by the federal government, you cannot appreciate how maddening bureaucracy can be.”

Wisely, Craig plans to include sessions with American Indians and environmentalists in his tour. Last year, a presentation by John McCarthy of the Idaho Conservation League impressed House Majority Whip Tom Delay. The tour, Delay said, allowed him to see firsthand “the wonderful things that are going on … people working together, making a living and still protecting the wildlife and the environment, and the natural resources of this area. It’s absolutely incredible.”

Craig has the right idea. It’s one Democrats ought to try, as well. Presidential contenders of both parties might make better policies if they’d leave the concrete canyons and visit some real ones.

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