Not 1 More
Acre!
PO Box 773
Trinidad,
Colorado 81082
www.not1moreacre.net
news@not1moreacre.net
From Not 1
More Acre!
For immediate
release
November 5,
2009
For more information
or to arrange
interviews,
contact:
Jean Aguerre,
719-252-5145
Documents
available: www.not1moreacre.net/docs
The Nature
Conservancy tied to military expansion at Piņon Canyon
Opponents
demand full disclosure of documents on hidden land deals
TRINIDAD,
Colorado (Thursday, November 5): Opponents of Pentagon plans to expand the Piņon Canyon Maneuver Site in southeastern Colorado
are challenging efforts by the Army to conceal documents linking The Nature Conservancy to the expansion plan and to the Department
of Defense's biomedical, biological and chemical warfare research center at Fort Detrick in Maryland.
Expansion
opposition group Not 1 More Acre! today filed a Freedom of Information Act Appeal to the denial of records by Fort Carson,
Colorado, and the Medical Research and Acquisition Activity (USAMRAA), a $9.5 billion research center at Fort Detrick, regarding
a contract with The Nature Conservancy for the acquisition of property to facilitate a massive military expansion that would
devastate the last intact shortgrass prairie in the American Great Plains and displace tens of thousands of residents..
The records
being sought relate to The Nature Conservancy's September 2002 Cooperative Agreement with Fort Carson and Fort Detrick, authorizing
and funding encumbrances of property to expand the Piņon Canyon Maneuver Site (PCMS).
"It appears
that since 2002 The Nature Conservancy has been serving as a 'straw man' for the Department of Army's acquisition of property
to expand Piņon Canyon while circumventing disclosure of their activities," said Not 1 More Acre! board member Jim Herrell
said. "That The Nature Conservancy has been saying what good friends they are while all the time working with the Department
of Defense brings shame to the whole organization."
When The Nature
Conservancy signed the 2002 agreement, the PCMS was being used less than twice a year and on a fraction of the 238,000-acre
site. Residents of the region were unaware of any expansion plans at Piņon Canyon. Yet the agreement (Section 1.3) states
that encumbering lands surrounding PCMS will "lessen land-use restrictions on Fort Carson and PCMS training lands" and will
"help sustain military training at Fort Carson and PCMS." It continues, "[a]pproximately 400,000 acres and 50 miles of lands
bordering Fort Carson and PCMS facilities" present encumbrance opportunities. The "Initial Priority List for Encumbrance Acquisition"
attached to the agreement identifies properties adjacent to or near the PCMS as primary properties to encumber.
In December
2006, Not 1 More Acre! began seeking information through Freedom of Information Act requests about The Nature Conservancy's
partnership with the Army to expand the PCMS, which was established in 1982 largely through condemnation of generational ranchlands.
After that bitter takeover, the Army promised it would never return to expand the site.
On January
12, 2006, the Army produced a document called "Piņon Vision 05-18," a detailed roadmap to phased expansion that encompasses
all of southeastern Colorado. The document reveals that the first properties targeted for acquisition are for a so-called
"Conservation Zone." "Piņon Vision 05-18 (B-1-1 to B-1-2)" describes the phased acquisition of 1,142,838 acres to follow establishment
of the 80,057-acre "Conservation Zone."
According
to the limited records produced so far by the Medical Research Acquisition Activity, The Nature Conservancy is empowered through
the agreement to enter into deals obligating the federal government to pay millions of dollars to private individuals and
corporations for conservation easements, conservation leases, fee-simple title to property and other property interests on
and surrounding the PCMS.
The "Piņon
Vision 05-18" document candidly admits that the Army is using public funds to "buy" support for the massive expansion from
"eco-groups" by funneling millions of dollars to one private, powerful land trust organization. Under the 2002 agreement,
The Nature Conservancy is operating as a federal contractor, receiving federal funds to carry out federal programs at the
direction of the Department of Defense under contracts administered by the Medical Research Acquisition Activity at Fort Detrick.
Properties
threatened by the massive expansion plan include fragile lands that have been conserved by ranching families for generations,
the Comanche National Grasslands, the Apishapa Wildlife Refuge and the Picketwire Canyonlands. These lands represent globally
significant biodiversity, archaeology, paleontology and riparian systems. For the past three years, the US Congress, Colorado's
General Assembly and its counties and rural towns have overwhelmingly adopted policies and legislation designed to prohibit
expansion at Piņon Canyon. Earlier this year, the federal court ruled against the Army's inadequate Environmental Impact Statement,
which concealed the expansion plans from the public.
"If the Department
of Defense, an agency of the executive branch of government subject to the control of Congress and the President, seeks to
spend taxpayer dollars for the purpose of shifting the balance of public policy prohibiting expansion at Piņon Canyon Maneuver
Site, Colorado, Not 1 More Acre! demands the details of such payments be made public for every citizen and taxpayer to see,"
board member Mack Louden said.
Not 1 More
Acre!
Purgatoire,
Apishapa & Comanche Grassland Trust
PO Box 773
Trinidad,
Colorado 81082
Sister organizations
working for the people, wildlife and places of southeastern Colorado and northern New Mexico.
Yesterday,
at the 11th hour, a political decision was made, but not claimed, to file an appeal of the federal court decision we won in
September after years of hard work.
They are betting
that another two years of judicial wrangling will sap our resolve and deplete our resources to the point where we will just
give up.
We will do
no such thing.
Not only did
we successfully press our case in federal court, we have seen every level of democracy vote over and over to end military
expansion at Piņon Canyon.
Common sense
and common decency have prevailed time and again.
Together we
will prevail again to end military expansion at Piņon Canyon.
With your
help, we will use each day to move forward joining more and more voices together in common sense.
Fire up and
expand your email lists, continue to reach out to others across our nation to join us, send any financial support you can,
stay the course with us.
More than
ever, we need your continued contributions of reason, voice and pocket.
Onward!
***********************
Army appeals
Pinon Canyon court ruling
Federal court
rejected the Army's environmental study of the effects of training on Pinon Canyon.
By PETER ROPER
THE PUEBLO
CHIEFTAIN
November 10,
2009
The Army is
appealing a federal district court ruling in September that rejected its environmental study of the impact of training more
soldiers at the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site.
The appeal
was filed Monday with the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver.
In September,
U.S. District Court Judge Richard Matsch ruled a 2007 environmental study the Army did as a prerequisite to building more
infrastructure at the 238,000-acre training range was insufficient.
As a result,
Matsch vacated the Army's formal decision to increase the training schedule at Pinon Canyon.
The lawsuit
was brought by the Not 1 More Acre! group of ranchers, which is opposed to the Army's planned expansion of Pinon Canyon.
Matsch sided
with the ranchers' argument that the Army's owns records showed past training exercises had done extensive environmental damage
to the training range.
Matsch ruled
the Army's claim that it could increase the training schedule and numbers of soldiers training at Pinon Canyon without doing
more harm was "irreconcilable" with its own records.
The district
court ruling puts the Army in the position of reconsidering how it could put more troops and more training on the same training
range without increasing environmental damage.
In his decision,
Matsch said the Army's argument showed it would need more land at Pinon Canyon to mitigate environmental damage from a heavier
training schedule, but the 2007 study before the court did not evaluate that.
proper@chieftain.com
Not 1 More
Acre!
Purgatoire,
Apishapa & Comanche Grassland Trust
PO Box 773
Trinidad,
Colorado 81082
Sister organizations
working for the people, wildlife and places of southeastern Colorado and northern New Mexico.
