Documentary: Strong views on Utah wilderness

Tom Wharton

Whether it's between riders of off-highway vehicles and hikers, preservationists and oil drillers or ranchers and wolf lovers, the debate over how best to manage Utah's wilderness is always intense.

Filmmaker John Howe shows the passion on both sides of this contentious issue in "Wilderness: The Great Debate." The well-balanced documentary, narrated by actor Peter Coyote, premieres at 7 p.m. Wednesday on KUED Channel 7.

The movie will introduce the wilderness debate to viewers who know little about the issue but also challenge the viewpoints of those at the forefront of the battle, said Howe, an executive producer at KUED who is best known for his national PBS films "The Last Cowboys" and "Arctic Wars."

"It is an honest discussion of wilderness," he said. "It is a dialogue."

Those who tune in will find that much of the debate centers around access and competition for public land.

"The discussion concerns how public land should be used," he said. Some people want to create national monuments, national wildlife refuges and parks. While others want energy development, off-road access and ranching.

And hanging over all those competing interests is government involvement.

"The role of government is questioned regarding federal versus local control," Howe said.

The movie was funded through the George S. and Dolores Doré Eccles Foundation, the Lawrence T. Dee-Janet T. Dee Foundation and KUED contributing members.

It includes breathtaking photos of Utah's famous wilderness areas coupled with some from Alaska, Yellowstone and the Amazon. The pictures make a strong case for preservation, something actor-environmentalist Robert Redford has argued for years.

"Is the West going to be reduced to just photos and films to show young people how it used to be?" asks Redford in the film. "Or are there going to be places where they can go and see the way it used to be, like wilderness and national parks?"

On the other side of the issue is Kane County Commissioner Mark Habbeshaw.

"This is a war for rural people, for state and local sovereignty, to protect what little sovereignty we have left as a rural people; to protect our traditions, our cultures, our ability to manage our lives with a diversified economy," countered Habbeshaw.

Other well-known Utahns make appearances in the film, including U.S. Sen. Bob Bennett, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance lawyer Heidi McIntosh, OHV advocate Mike Swenson and conservative Kanab state legislator Mike Noel. So does current U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar and former Interior heads Bruce Babbitt and Stewart Udall.

Howe also talked to everyday Utahns affected by the issues, from a trucker in Vernal to a timber mill owner in Bicknell to monkey-wrencher Tim DeCristopher, who faces jail time for bidding on oil leases he had no intention of buying. There also is footage from last year's Take Back Utah and Paria River protests.

Howe, who wrote, produced and directed the hour-long show, said while the issue is divisive, he did find common ground.

He pointed to the work of Sen. Bennett and William Meadows of The Wilderness Society. Together the men created the Washington County Lands Bill, a compromise that established Utah's first Wild and Scenic River but also allowed for some development of public lands.

It's an example of what future deals may look like.

"They realized that for wilderness to succeed, they had to have local buy-in and they worked pretty hard to get that," Howe said. "Those kind of things are the future."

One of Howe's biggest surprises came when he visited Gunnison Island on the Great Salt Lake, home of one of the largest nesting populations of American white pelicans. "It portrays the Great Salt Lake in a way people haven't seen in the past," he said. "It is a poetic vision out there." Howe said that footage, along with many others, represents a recurring theme in the film.

"Wilderness," he said, "is more of a state of mind rather than a legal definition."

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Source: http://www.sltrib.com/Features/ci_14303177

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