‘Crafting a compromise’: Idaho’s Boulder-White Clouds celebrate 10 years of wilderness protection
Some of the newest wilderness areas in America are celebrating their 10th anniversary this month thanks to a yearslong bipartisan public lands push that started in Idaho.
On Aug. 7. 2015, former President Barack Obama signed the Sawtooth National Recreation Area and Jerry Peak Wilderness Additions Act, which was sponsored by U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Idaho, into law.
The law designated three new wilderness areas for permanent protection in central Idaho:
- The Hemingway-Boulders Wilderness
- The White Clouds Wilderness, which has since been renamed the
- The
Together, the wilderness areas are often lumped together in conversation as the Boulder-White Clouds, for short.
In an opinion piece written last month, Simpson called the 2015 law “one of the most meaningful land management bills in Idaho’s history.”
“The Boulder-White Clouds, with their beautiful high peaks, spectacular alpine lakes, and breathtaking country ready for recreation, represent some of the very best of our great state,” Simpson wrote. “For decades, however, they were at the center of crafting a compromise over how best to preserve this area.”
Together, the three wilderness areas include more than 275,000 acres of public land in central Idaho, including high peaks, mountain lakes, wild rivers and diverse wildlife habitat.
A designation to the National Wilderness Preservation System offers the highest level of protection for federal lands in their natural, untrammeled condition. Wilderness protection generally prevents development and motorized use, limits human activities and emphasizes the natural character and preservation of the land.
Protecting the Boulder-White Clouds took years of effort and compromise
Protecting the Boulder-White Clouds was far from an overnight success.
Rick Johnson, who served as the Idaho Conservation League’s executive director for 24 years, pushed for more than 20 years to win protections for the Boulder-White Clouds.
To do so, Johnson said he totally rewrote the script for environmental action and conservation. He went from fighting against proposals and developments he viewed as detrimental to the environment to fighting for something even bigger.
“When you are fighting things all the time you can develop a mindset of defensiveness and even anger that is off-putting,” Johnson said. “But to protect wilderness, you have to proactively pass a law, which means going to Congress to get a majority vote out of Congress. … So to do it, to pass a wilderness bill, you have to do all kinds of things that are counter to being an angry, defensive, stereotypical environmentalist. You have to make new friends, you have got to get out of the office, you have to be going out and talking to people.”
Johnson and others knew the fight for the Boulder-White Clouds was worth it.
Before the wilderness designation, Johnson said it was the single biggest unprotected roadless area in the Lower 48. The area also already had established an important history of rallying Idahoans. In the late 1960s, conservationists and the public banded together to fight a proposed ASARCO mine at the base of Castle Peak, the highest point in the White Cloud Mountains.
To win support for the wilderness designation, Johnson found a champion for the cause in Congress in the form of Simpson. Johnson then set out across the state seeking to create a political environment where protecting the Boulder-White Clouds had so much public support it seemed almost inevitable.
Johnson spoke to 35 Rotary clubs and countless chambers of commerce.
He helped arrange for Simpson to be flown over the Boulder-White Clouds to get a bird’s eye view of the beautiful mountains and crystal clear lakes. Then Johnson accompanied Simpson on a hike to Castle Peak and learned how serious Simpson had become about the issue.
“It was very surprising that (Simpson) never gave up,” Johnson said. “He is a bona fide hero in this.”
Simpson could not be reached for comment.
Simpson’s first several proposals failed.
But eventually, Johnson got a phone call in 2015 telling him to get to the Oval Office to meet Obama and watch the Sawtooth National Recreation Area and Jerry Peak Wilderness Additions Act into law.
Conservationists believe Boulder-White Clouds lessons apply to today’s public lands fight
Johnson retired after leading the Idaho Conservation League from late 1994 to 2019. But he says the lessons learned during the decades of fighting to protect the Boulder-White Clouds are relevant to today.
Earlier this year, U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, led an unsuccessful effort in Congress to make millions of acres of public land, including in Idaho, available to be sold off.
“What I am thinking about now are the threats public lands face and some of the lessons of the Boulder-White Clouds are good things to be paying attention to right now,” Johnson said. “Public land protection and, frankly, a love of Idaho transcends partisan politics. When people are sufficiently motivated and organized and focused on protecting their backyard, they can do amazing things.”
Johnson said the way to move forward is being willing to work hard and work together regardless of personal political views, recognizing the value of fighting for something versus fighting against it and understanding the importance of telling a story about why specific places matter and need protection.
“Management of these lands can change based on what this government of the people, by the people and for the people determines,” Johnson said. “It is an incredibly inspiring thing to be a part of something where a bunch of people decided this place, with Castle Peak at its center, is sufficiently important that we are going to work our tails off and do something about it.”