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Shovel Scuttlebutt
The County is embroiled in a political and legal controversy with the Federal Government relating to the reopening of a washed out narrow dirt road in the remote town of Jarbidge, Nevada. No one disagrees that the road has been there a very, very long time. Even before it was a road, it was a trail used by settlers, prospectors, ranchers, sheepherders and miners. Before that - it was used by the Shoshone Indians for travel. Many years ago, but long after the road was constructed, the Jarbidge area was given Forest status. The area is now administered by the US Forest Service. The problem is a few small sections of the canyon road washed out a few years ago. At first, the County was just going in and repair the few hundreds of yards of road at their own expense. Then the Forest Service said, no - wait, we are here to help you. Then, a very activist local head ranger, now gone- but not forgotten, together with Trout Unlimited got together and said a native fish - the Bull Trout - was endangered and they would not permit the reopening of the road. Well, not really endangered, but as I recollect, the southern-most occurrence of this fish. Idaho appears to be loaded with them. One thing lead to another, the County said it's our road we'll just go up and fix it without their help - like we always have done in the past. They went up there with a grader and all h--- broke loose. The Feds, determined to be in-charge, stopped the work (a bit more than a few passes with a blade). They, the Forest Service, then spent an amount of our money to, using their style of rhetoric, to 'reclaim' the 'devastation' caused by the 'recklessness' and 'irresponsibility' of the County. They then blocked the road with a rather large dirt berm with big rocks to discourage anyone trying to drive on it. From then on its been a fight with lawyers, politicians, local citizens, 'environmentalists', a bunch of people from Montana, a group of women with brooms and anyone either side can get to support their position. Well, to cut it short, it's a mess, in the end, whenever that is, a number of lawyers and hired consultants will have nicely stocked up their 401K, the winning politicians will look good and the losers will never eat crow. Us locals will either be saddled with astronomical Federal fines or if we're lucky just have a lot less neat stuff, because our tax money was gleefully handed over to the legal and environmental 'experts' on both sides. As I see it, there are two bottom lines: The fact is, the fish have been there a long time, maybe since the last ice age, at least. The canyon the stream runs through got there some how. It got that way by billions and billions of tons of silt washing down this creek through time - especially every spring when the snow melts. Heavy summer downpours have their effect, too. The rivers here naturally run brown in the spring. The fish have seemed to take that in stride ok. The infinitesimal amount of dirt caused by the road construction and eventual use has been blown out of proportion - a hundred thousand times over. The rhetoric and spin is way out of control - on both sides. But folks, unfamiliar with the project, just listening to one side's presentation, get all worked up into a lather. Now, I'm an environmentalist at heart. But I believe the county is right in this case. Putt'n the small road back in, that has been there for many, many years just ain't gonna cause no environmental disaster or even a flutter in the force. Second, My gut feel'n is the county, through morally right may be fiscally wrong. They have had an attitude toward the Forest Service. They have not drifted toward common ground. They have drawn the hard line and appear not to want to consider a compromise. An all or nothing attitude. Well, that's admirable, but it's costing us a lot of bucks for a game of chicken. Money that could be used for a lot of neat useful stuff. Let's face it, political convictions and fiscal responsibility are not the same. The symbol of the County's cause has been the shovel - to be used to reopen the road on July 4, 2000 - which they did. Thousands of shovels have been sent to the County as a symbol of 'solidarity' - they estimate 10,000. Well, last January, long about Cowboy Poetry time, in Elko - the roses had been ordered but the County hadn't provided written authorization to start the rose garden. I wrote the following poem and gave it to them - gentle persuasion is sometimes good for the soul. The garden was approved, the next day, but I was told later they weren't thrilled with my poetic theme. Anyway here it is for posterity.
The real bad result of this controversy (besides wasting our tax dollars for two different braches of our government suing each other) is that there are real environmental concerns in our world. This ain't one. But it jades a lot of people against thinking about environmental issues that really are of importance. The 'I ain't no tree hugger' attitude. For example, why is it that we cannot live more in harmony with nature. Why is it that we have a need to blacktop, cement and gravel over our cities and countryside. Is the automobile our masters and we its slave. God gave us dominion over the earth. I don't think he had in mind that we should be like an uncaring spoiled child who breaks his toys rather than enjoy and treasure them. I don't fully understand why we are so willing to pay such a high price to be able to drive around in a car - keeping in mind that I own two. We have literally 'paved over paradise', polluted our air, polluted our waters with oil leakage and spills, slaughtered hundreds of thousands of people in wars to control oil reserves, slaughtered and maimed millions in auto accidents, individually indebted ourselves for car payments, insurance payments, gasoline, maintenance and repair bills, road construction taxes and now even an incredibly costly lawsuit over a few hundreds of yards of road in a remote part of a sparsely populated state. Have we sold our soul or just lost our collective minds. Ponder this aerial photo of Elko's downtown area, that I got from a postcard
Mountain West Prints ©2000 Great Mountain West Supply, S.L.C., Ut 84115 purchased at Ray's Chevron Station on east Idaho Street. Why have we left nature's beauty out of our city, especially the downtown area. Is the black tar covered look that much more desirable to us. Why did we choose to exclude the wondrous beauties of nature? We are not alone, of course, look at nearly all of our cities, they are purposely excluding the beauty of nature. Why are we not better custodians of the gift God gave us? Here is a very recent irony. Occasionally, in the cool mornings of summer, I walk to work through the city park. Just recently, the city put a winding concrete sidewalk through the park with a huge concrete ring around the Horizon Hospice Rose Garden. Why did we do this? Was the grass in the park to difficult for us to walk through? Are we so disoriented that we need a concrete path to find our way from the park to the museum? We, as a society, must be utterly enamored with concrete and tar. I must admit, though, for a sidewalk, it looks pretty darn nice. Much improved over the asphalt that was previously around the garden. But why? [ It is now the 10th of October, 2000. This page was written some months ago. In fairness and with sincerity, I must add that this particular sidewalk is growing on me. It has a charming, unhurried, personality. The two wooden 'mini-bridges' are thoughtful as well. The truth comes out slowly, and I am warming a bit - in this case. Oscar Wilde once wrote, paraphrasing from memory, 'that it is conceited to admire things that are useful, but things that are totally useless should be admired intensely'. I must admit that most of this web-site, and perhaps this sidewalk, may fit well into the latter category. But, I would like to think they are both uniquely interesting, in their own way.] Several years ago, when the current Federal administration took over, it was politically correct to beat up the local mines as major sources of pollution - it still is for that matter. At the time, I remember, them referring to the mine oil spills and their devastating impact on our environment. I worked in the mines as an engineer for about 15 years. An oil leak from a truck or piece of equipment, now and then, may happen. It is cleaned up at the time. And, frankly, it isn't an event to become melodramatic about. I bet that more oil is leaked in a single Wal-Mart, K-Mart or other store parking lot or on the city streets than all of Elko County's mines combined. And it isn't cleaned up, it just washes down into the Humboldt river. But it is always easier, as a politician to blame the mines, so they look environmentally conscientious in the eye of the voter rather than to take on the very real difficult tasks - such as the destruction of our environment by our expanding cities. Ironically, the news story following the above mine commentary was of a big snow removal problem, due to a large storm, in New York City. It showed city crews dumping truckloads of black, I assume oil and dirt laden, snow into the river, to get rid of it. No mention of oil pollution was given in this story. The problem is not the mines, not the isolated stretches of idle roads. It is the 'us', our cities, roads and parking lots. Our cars. Our wasting of recyclable resources. Let's spend our money on this, instead of giving it to men in suits with great looking ties. It is always hard to get off the soap box once you have a roll going. But I will stop with one final question. Why are we destroying the beauty of nature in our cities and in our countryside and replacing it with concrete and tar? Why? There has got to be a better, more sensible way to go. Let's get over the trifles of a few hundreds of yards of road in a nearly deserted part of Nevada and put some thought, money and time into the big picture. Let's get our cities to be more environmentally sound and live in more harmony with nature. I don't mean get up tomorrow and tear up the roads. We, as a world society, will eventually need to get rid of our love affair with the automobile. It is killing us. For now, lets try to be in more harmony with nature. The costs can in some cases be very small. Plant some trees. Leave some more green spots and belts. Look how nice our Train Park looks, in the mile long tarmac parking corridor. Couldn't we continue to do a little better job. Plant some more trees, have some more flowers and gardens. Have a little less tar. On the plus side, we as a city are actually beginning to reclaim our river area, moving it from a place to dump old cars and trash to walking and riding paths. This makes my heart glad. The rewards are great. And as a free gift, you bring back the birds, the butterflies and ladybugs. You bring back harmony. Maybe, we would even get a smile from God in Heaven, as he watches us being good stewards of the land and its wildlife.
© 2000 - Elko Rose Garden Association |
Bloomin' Shovels
