LARAMIE – In an overwhelming outpouring of public sentiment, citizens demanded the protection of one of the last remnants of the wild country in the Red Desert at a Laramie public hearing last night. A steady stream of residents, mostly from Laramie and Cheyenne, gathered at the Albany County Library to voice their views on the controversial Jack Morrow Hills plan, which covers 620,000 acres of public land, including potential wilderness and sensitive wildlife habitat coveted by the oil and gas industry. The hearing was held to gather public comments on the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM’s) Jack Morrow Hills land management plan, and was sponsored by Friends of the Red Desert, a coalition of Wyoming conservation groups.

Of the 48 citizens who spoke at the hearing, 47 favored protection for the area, while one speaker voiced no opinion on whether the area should be drilled or protected, but criticized the BLM’s environmental analysis as inadequate. Not a single speaker favored oil and gas drilling in the Jack Morrow Hills area. A total of about 100 people attended the hearing.

"I have visited the Red Desert and I was truly awed by the experience, and uplifted by its pristine beauty," said Cerrina Smith, a trainer at F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne. "We need a hermitage, a refuge. We need it for wildlife, we need it for us."

"Developing [oil and gas] resources is in everyone’s interest," said State Senator Mike Massie (D-Laramie). "But also, the Bureau of Land Management needs to understand that there are some areas that have higher value than what we can pump out of the ground, and I think that’s clearly the case with the Jack Morrow Hills."

"The preferred alternative for management needs much stronger protection for wildlife, wilderness, and historic places," added Laramie resident Ken Cramer.

Sitting empty throughout the hearing were two chairs reserved for BLM officials. The BLM originally committed to attending the hearing, but failed to show up. Earlier the agency ignored several petitions to host public hearings in Laramie. "Federal law requires the BLM to listen to public comments, and yet the Rock Springs BLM has repeatedly shown that it doesn’t want to hear what the residents of Laramie and Cheyenne have to say," said Jeff Kessler of Laramie-based Biodiversity Conservation Alliance. "But local residents care deeply about what happens to the Red Desert, and we’re going to make sure that their voices are heard."

The tenor of the Laramie hearing echoed similar public calls for protecting the Red Desert at hearings held in Rock Springs and Lander. The Jack Morrow Hills plan is one of several major long-term plans across Wyoming that the Bush Administration has put on the fast track for oil and gas drilling.

"Citizens all across Wyoming have overwhelmingly spoken in favor of protecting this fragile corner of the Red Desert," said Kessler. "Now we’ll see whether the Bush Administration heeds the wishes of the public, or chooses to give these public lands away to out-of-state oil and gas interests."

Additional Quotes from the Public

"It’s a place of incredible beauty and vast spiritual innate powers and I can’t imagine not having that place…We need more than cheap oil and gas; we really need vast expanses of wild lands." – Michele Barlow, Laramie resident.

"Please let’s protect the Oregon, California, Mormon Pioneer and Pony Express National Historic trails because we owe them to the generations that come after us." – Lesley Wischmann, Laramie resident.

"I’m increasingly concerned about where the pressures [for development] come from. The don’t come from the average guy on the street; they come from big business, big money, big politics." - Dick Naumann, Laramie resident.

"This is our state, this is our home. We have the right to preserve our lands in this area." – Brandon Drake, Laramie resident.

"The most precious resource we have on public land, and the most precious resource we’ll have in the future, is undeveloped land." - Dr. Deb Paulson, Professor of Geography, University of Wyoming.

"I don’t want the Red Desert to look like the Powder River Basin, with all the development there. The BLM owes it to Wyoming citizens to protect the Jack Morrow Hills." – Melissa Bartley, Laramie resident.

"The Red Desert is an especially important place to my family. It is a gorgeous place. I want to keep it that way forever and be able to take our son there. I want him to appreciate wild places." – Whitney Nichols, Laramie resident.