Mountain Accord Not Ready for EPA’s Evaluation

We received an email from a Friend of the Park Rag. The person had attended a National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA) Meeting that had discussion related to Mountain Accord. Here are the comments:

Lots of great info and conversations at Tuesday’s NEPA meeting. 

Federal Highway man Harold Peaks said the Mountain Accord is definitely NOT ready for NEPA. He said it needs to be much more precise and clear in it’s vision.

Forest service guys said they DO have the power to override city and county.

The clearer we can make our wishes and vision made NOW BEFORE NEPA the better the process proceeds and the better our chance of our vision being respected and included.

I brought up the Zion NP model of shuttle buses and restricted auto traffic. They said that is NOT represented in The Mountain Accord. They told me it needs to be proposed by me, and/or anyone else, to Mountain Accord, EIA, NEPA, etc… ALSO, If they went with the Zion NP model it might not even need NEPA if they just used the existing roadway.

What we wonder, given this, is the EPA doesn’t seem to have enough specifics to talk about environmental impacts…. Yet, how are we, as citizens, supposed to decide whether we want to continue with the process? It seems we as citizens have “donated” hundreds of thousands of dollars but the EPA says it needs to be much more precise and clear in the plan’s vision.

If the national government can’t be clear about it’s vision and specifics, how do we as Wasatch Mountains citizens have any confidence there is a specific plan. And if there is no specific plan, why do we keep giving it money?

Oh yeah, to have a seat at the table.