{"id":7278,"date":"2009-10-05T10:08:32","date_gmt":"2009-10-05T16:08:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=7278"},"modified":"2009-10-05T10:09:01","modified_gmt":"2009-10-05T16:09:01","slug":"bingaman-to-hold-hearing-on-dona-ana-wilderness-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/10\/bingaman-to-hold-hearing-on-dona-ana-wilderness-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"Bingaman to hold hearing on Do\u00f1a Ana wilderness bill"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_5867\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-5867\" title=\"bingaman21-300x217\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/09\/bingaman21-300x217.jpg\" alt=\"Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M. (Photo by Heath Haussamen)\" width=\"300\" height=\"217\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M. (Photo by Heath Haussamen)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>U.S. Sen. <a href=\"http:\/\/bingaman.senate.gov\/\">Jeff Bingaman<\/a>, D-N.M., will hold a hearing this week on a bill that would protect more than 350,000 acres of land in Do\u00f1a Ana County, including the Organ Mountains.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/thomas.loc.gov\/cgi-bin\/bdquery\/z?d111:s.01689:\">Organ Mountains \u2013 Desert Peaks Wilderness Act<\/a>, which is sponsored by Bingaman and Sen. <a href=\"http:\/\/tomudall.senate.gov\/\">Tom Udall<\/a>, D-N.M., will be considered by a subcommittee of the <a href=\"http:\/\/energy.senate.gov\/public\/\">Energy and Natural Resources Committee<\/a>, which Bingaman chairs.<\/p>\n<p>The Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests\u2019 hearing will be held Thursday at 2:30 p.m. in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, Room 366, in Washington, according to a release from Bingaman\u2019s office. Among those testifying before the subcommittee will be Do\u00f1a Ana County Commission Vice Chairman <a href=\"http:\/\/www.co.dona-ana.nm.us\/commissioners\/district1\/\">Oscar V\u00e1squez Butler<\/a> and Jerry Schickedanz, chairman of <a href=\"http:\/\/peopleforwesternheritage.com\/\">People for Preserving Our Western Heritage<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Butler supports the legislation, while Schickedanz and his group oppose it.<\/p>\n<p>The senators introduced the legislation <a href=\"..\/2009\/09\/senators-introduce-dona-ana-county-wilderness-bill\/\">last month<\/a>. The bill would designate 259,000 acres as <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Wilderness#United_States\">wilderness<\/a> and 100,000 acres as <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/National_Conservation_Area\">national conservation areas<\/a>. In addition to the Organ Mountains, land on and around the Robledo, Do\u00f1a Ana and Potrillo mountains would be protected.<\/p>\n<p>The bill would also release 16,350 acres currently designated as a wilderness study area along the county\u2019s border with Mexico. That\u2019s intended to address concerns that law enforcement patrols are hampered by rules against motorized vehicles entering the protected area.<\/p>\n<p>The conservation legislation has been sought for years by the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.donaanawild.org\/\">Dona Ana County Wilderness Coalition<\/a>, which has been led by the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmwild.org\/\">New Mexico Wilderness Alliance<\/a> and includes <a href=\"http:\/\/www.donaanawild.org\/community-support.php\">a long list<\/a> of businesses, local governments and others.<\/p>\n<p>Schickedanz\u2019s organization, a smaller group that includes ranchers, four-wheelers and the Village of Hatch, has been a vocal opponent. The group wants no wilderness at all and has proposed new, less-restrictive designations for the land, in addition to requiring the sale of 65,000 acres owned by the Bureau of Land Management.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., will hold a hearing this week on a bill that would protect more than 350,000 acres of land in Do\u00f1a Ana County.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1],"tags":[115,147,116],"class_list":["post-7278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","category-uncategorized","tag-dona-ana-county","tag-environment","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7278\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}