DEPUY!
Last month I traveled to New Mexico to visit John and Isabel Depuy and their 16 month old daughter Noelle. John gave me explicit directions to his desert stronghold, some 50 miles south of Taos, and I never became lost once. But had it not been for Isabel’s red balloon tied to the cattle gate, I might still be wandering about.
The Depuys truly live at the edge of the world. Their unobstructed view across fifty miles of desert and table lands is indescribable. They live in an eight-sided cabin, hogan-style, with a photo-voltaic panel for power and a roof-top water collection system that just barely manages to stave off thirst. They are literally at the end of the road.
Depuy arises an hour before dawn with all the vigor and enthusiasm of a man half his 78 years. He brought me Earl Grey tea at 6 am and was ready to attack another canvas by seven.
On this day, however, I made him set his paints and brushes aside for a few hours, so he could tell me the story of, or at least a small excerpt from, his remarkable life, including his 30 year friendship with Edward Abbey.
If being a friend of Abbey’s has been a disadvantage of any kind, it might be the way his enormous personality and talent dwarfed the rest of us. Some of us have become better known as "a friend of Abbey" than the sum of our own accomplishments.
That certainly cannot be said of Depuy. Beyond his extraordinary gifts as a great artist, he is a man without equal. No one on this planet is anything like John Depuy. I’m sure Ed Abbey recognized that unique quality the first time they met, albeit in a drunken stupor. And it is why they stayed closer than brothers until Abbey’s death in 1989.
But DEPUY! lives on...he claims he’ll reach 105 and beyond and I believe him. He’s even promised to pour a good bottle of Scotch, first filtered through his kidneys, on my own grave. When that time comes. I’m counting on Depuy to be there.
THE WASHINGTON COUNTY GROWTH BILL...
AND THE LAKE POWELL PIPELINE
St. George, Utah was a hamlet of about 7000 people when I first saw it on a very cold winter morning 30 years ago. My friend Tynes and I had decided to tour the Rocky Mountain West in the dead of winter in my stylish MGB convertible. There were times, at Bondurant, Wyoming for example, when the outside temperature hovered near 35 below zero while the MG’s "heater" kept the interior at a toasty 5 below. We were young and stupid.
So on that frigid January morning, we descended from Cedar City to the relative warmth of St. George. Neither of us could have imagined then, as we un-thawed at the local Denny’s—the only café open at 5am— that this little community might someday become Vegas East...a G-rated tinsel town. Demographers believe St. George may exceed 500,000 residents by mid-century.
Looking for room to grow, Senator Bob Bennett, a Republican, and Jim Matheson, Utah’s only congressional Democrat, have proposed legislation that will sell off 25,000 acres of BLM public land, about 40 square miles, to developers. It also cuts 200,000 acres of Utah Wilderness Coalition proposed wilderness and even whittles away at protections now in place for designated wilderness study areas.
According to Scott Groene at SUWA: "Washington County is one of the most spectacular and biologically diverse landscapes in the West. This ‘growth bill’ proposed by the county commissioners would irrevocably alter southwest Utah, while excluding the public from participating in important decisions about the future of Washington County. It would be a great mistake to push these half-baked ideas through Congress given the values at stake. This legislation needs involvement by all citizens and significant work."
He is absolutely right. The long-term effects of this legislation will be devastating, and not just to remaining wildlands—it will alter the face of Southwest Utah. Public participation in the process is vital.
This is also a golden opportunity, at a time when the public seems to be interested and energized, to discuss and debate the proposed Lake Powell to St. George Pipeline. The Washington County Water Conservancy District (WCWCD) and the Utah Division of Water Resources (DWR) think it’s a great idea. Despite the fact that St. George has one of the highest and most wasteful per capita usages of water in the arid Southwest, it wants to build a 130 mile pipeline from Lake Powell, near Page, Arizona to St. George. The preliminary cost of the pipeline is $400 million, which means, by the time it’s completed (if completed), the cost will double...that’s how public works projects usually go isn’t it?
And of the water removed from lake Powell, only 60,000 acre feet would reach Washington County. The remaining 10,000 acre feet would go to Kanab, Utah and to other proposed developments along the pipeline route. A proposed retirement city on Utah state lands, west of Page and near Big Water, would no doubt be one of those water recipients.
Water is the key to growth in any desert town and the pipeline is the key to Southwest Utah’s future. Will it grow responsibly within its means or will it follow the road other huge desert cities in the American Southwest have recklessly taken? So far, while environmental groups have loudly opposed the Bennett-Matheson Bill, most have been silent or seemingly indifferent to the proposed pipeline. It’s impossible to fight sprawl and ignore the WCWCD plan. While the fire is hot, I hope the UWC and other involved organizations like the Grand Canyon Trust will loudly shout its opposition to the pipeline. Now is the time to rally the citizenry and stop this boondoggle in its tracks.
MORE EGO STUFF...
PRIMAL QUEST COMES TO MOAB
Primal Quest came here last month, calling itself the largest extreme adventure race of its kind and proclaimed Moab to be the place they’ve always been looking for. Environmentalists were shocked! Shocked I tell you!
Here’s what happened. First a self-description from the PQ people.
"HQ will be in that haven for adventure-seekers of all types known as Moab, Utah. Situated on the banks of the Colorado River, Moab has been an outpost for thrill-seekers and an oasis for adrenaline junkies for decades. Every imaginable type of adventure activity awaits travelers to this small desert community. From world-class mountain biking to heart-pounding whitewater, Moab has it all, and the town is happy to share."
Almost 500 participants gathered at Colin Fryer’s Red Cliffs Lodge along with, according to PQ, "a mountain of gear. 36,000 pounds of it, to be (relatively) precise. What results is an aggregation of ultra-light, cutting-edge equipment that would bust the seams of the average outdoor store and make a gear geek swoon."
I read about the race in the Times-Independent on June 1. It was a headline news story, on page B-2, with a 24 point banner, and was based solely on a press release from the BLM's Moab office. In the story it stated that the Environmental Assessment could be found on the local BLM web site under the heading: "Special Recreation Permit: USART Recreation Event." The press release said, "Participants would hike, canyoneer, rock climb, horseback ride, mountain bike, kayak and swim a 275 mile course..." Sounded like an adrenalin sucking extreme sports event to me.
All the web site information and links were provided. I had no trouble finding it and even with my antiquated dial-up, I was able to download the EA in a few minutes. In fact, at the time, there were only two EAs even listed on the BLM web bulletin board, so it's not as if the race was concealed in a pile of cyber bureaucratic trivia.
In its EA, the BLM identified a variety of possible impacts from the race course, including:
"a portion of Professor Creek (that) contains high quality cottonwood, willow and wetland resources along a perennial stream which is currently listed as Functioning at Risk."
"Portions of the route that travel through habitat for Mexican Spotted Owl and Southwest Willow Flycatcher. The route also travels through and adjacent to habitat for the following endangered fish: Colorado pikeminnow, bonytail chub, razorback sucker, and humpback chub.
"(a) portion of the route that traverses the Castleton Tower group and connects with Ida Gulch road (that) is known to contain Cycladenia humilis var. jonesii, a federally listed threatened plant, and Mentzelia shultziorum, a BLM special status species.
"Participants would travel by foot through Mineral and Hell Roaring Canyons east of the Green River. These canyons contain sensitive lambing ground for desert bighorn sheep. Desert bighorn sheep may be temporarily displaced during the course of the event by participants traveling through Mineral and Hell Roaring Canyons. However, impacts are not expected to affect longevity of the bighorn herd, result in any reductions of the herd, or deleteriously affect the lambing process."
When the comment period closed, on June 15, not one environmental group had protested the race or written a comment. And you'd think they'd be interested---while the race avoided wilderness study areas, according to the BLM, it did cross a unit in SUWA's own proposed Redrock Wilderness bill and skirted the boundary of four more.
Days after the comment period ended, local activist Bill Love and Liz Thomas of SUWA contacted BLM and accused them of covering up the event, despite the newspaper story and its easy access on the web site. SUWA claimed to have known nothing of the race at all. It was even suggested that part of the race course be closed.
Consider this...
What if BLM were accepting comments on an ATV race. Environmentalists send comments opposing it. Not a single proponent of ATVs sends a letter. As a result, BLM believes the race should not be allowed. Then and only then do ATVers get angry and demand that something be done to reinstate the event.
How would environmentalists feel about that? Sometimes it does help to wear the proverbial shoe on the other foot.
So...while I'm no booster of the BLM by any means, and their Environmental Assessment may have indeed been flawed, it's unfair to accuse them of being secretive. The areas of environmental concern were plainly stated in the EA. If there were "existing roads" that environmental groups don't acknowledge, or other problems that the EA didn’t adequately address, the time to debate was before June 15. All it would have taken for anyone to have known about the possible impacts and BLM's planned mitigating measures (flawed or not) was to read the EA.
For better or worse, environmentalists have an adversarial relationship with government land agencies. BLM is not going to travel beyond the call of duty to keep us informed. They’re going to do what they’re required to do—they posted the EA on their web bulletin board, a requirement that enviros have praised. And I know that in the past, checking the web bulletin board was almost a ritual at SUWA.
But still, I'm encouraged to note, despite the delay, that a couple people from the professional environmental community have finally taken notice of the impacts from a non-motorized recreational event. I look forward to their increased participation in the future.
WELCOME TO MOAB, MR. BONDERMAN...
Moab is about to get a new neighbor. Not long ago, I was driving down Fourth North, past the hospital and was surprised to see a crew planting pine trees along the fence line. Not a couple of trees. Or ten. And not little seedlings either. These were mature thirty foot pines and there were hundreds of them. Later I learned the number of transplanted trees, including pines and fruit trees, was closer to a thousand and that the cost of moving them was about a million dollars. And since pines aren’t native to Moab and don’t exactly thrive in its blistering heat, a couple of local truck drivers now have almost permanent jobs hauling water to keep them alive.
The man with the trees is David Bonderman, one of the wealthiest men in America. Bonderman founded the Texas Pacific Group, a private equity firm based in Fort Worth. According to FORTUNE magazine, "through investment partnerships, TPG invests primarily in restructurings, recapitalizations and buyouts in the United States, Canada and Western Europe. TPG's affiliates make similar investments in Latin America, East Asia and Eastern Europe. The past and present portfolio of TPG and its principals include: Continental Airlines, America West Airlines, Beringer Wine Estates, J. Crew, Del Monte, Ducati Motorcycles, Globespan Technologies, and ON Semiconductor."
He recently acquired Burger King and Gate Gourmet, an airline catering company.
Bonderman’s worth is estimated at $6 billion.
FORTUNE claims that in the world of private equity firms, "David Bonderman is as dominant as they come. He has earned a reputation as a master dealmaker, a tornado of a man spinning equal parts brilliance, energy, and charm inside his ever-moving vortex...Bonderman's high-profile deals have given him a mystique. He's the man who can close the sale, and his secretive style only feeds his aura. People may not see how he does it, but they see the results. The stealth isn't just a matter of personal preference. Bonderman has learned it's much easier to conduct business far from the prying eyes of the media, stock analysts, and the public."
Bonderman lives the kind of life one might expect from a man worth $6 billion. His 14,000 square foot, 11 bedroom home in Aspen, Colorado sits on 900 acres, but he spends much of his time flying around the world at 30,000 feet in his Gulfstream GV jet.
When he turned 60, a couple years ago, Bonderman decided to do something nice for himself. He threw a party. He invited four or five hundred guests to the Bellagio and Hard Rock Café in Las Vegas. He hired John Mellencamp and Robin Williams at a cool million each to warm up the crowd and then brought in a little band called The Rolling Stones for the main event, for just $7 million more. The entire evening exceeded $10 million. According to Robert Trigaux of the St. Petersburg Times, "That’s chump change for Bonderman."
And according to a web site called www.iorr.org , Bonderman was concerned that his guests, as they moved from the concert hall to the VIP lounge, might be offended passing through the casino with the general public. So he built a special staircase to bypass the masses.
Bonderman is not exactly a beloved figure to the working class. Socialists hate him. When Texas Pacific Group bought the airline catering company Gate Gourmet in 2002, he hired former Enron vice president Cedric Burgher to tighten the operation. Fired workers released this Open Letter:
On Wednesday, August 10th, 2005, Gate Gourmet sacked 800 workers employed at Heathrow. Fellow workers reporting for duty on Thursday 11th August 2005 were faced with the ultimatum of signing a new contract which would slash pay and conditions or face the sack. As catering assistants we are paid just ££12,000 ($21,600 US) a year. As drivers we are paid less than ££16,000 ($28,800US) per year. These are very low wages by any standards, but especially in one of the most expensive cities in the world. Yet Gate Gourmet is seeking to push them even lower and us even closer to poverty. At the same time, the Gate Gourmet management team awarded themselves hefty pay rises.
According to SchNews, a liberal non-profit organization in Great Britain, dedicated to defending the working class, "Texas Pacific, (is) a US venture capitalist firm with a reputation for buying companies cheap when they’re on the skids, squeezing down costs, and flogging them on for a quick profit. How do you cut costs? By sacking workers, casualising jobs, increasing workload…… are you starting to see a theme here?"
Someone noted that the annual savings from the firing of those 800 low wage employees at Gate Gourmet was about what Bonderman’s birthday extravaganza cost.
But David Bonderman will tell you that he is an environmentalist, if donating a relatively small portion of a $6 billion fortune can make anyone an environmentalist. He has served on the boards of the Grand Canyon Trust, the Wilderness Society and the World Wildlife Fund for years. Grand Canyon Trust president Charles Wilkinson told FORTUNE that, "He’s one of the country’s greatest conservationists right now."
Now in 2006, David Bonderman has come to Moab and unofficially, he has floated the possibility of providing land to the city at his cost, should it choose to increase the capacity of the city’s water treatment plant. The plant is adjacent to his property and increasing the capacity would possibly decrease the odor.. In other words, David Bonderman is the man who could allow Moab to grow even more, just to spare offending his nostrils. Just what Moab needs.
So welcome, Mr. Bonderman. A big Moab "Hello HOWDY!" There’s always room for one more simple man of the land, here in red rock country.
A living role model for all of us environmentalists.
ON THE OTHER HAND...
If there is an upside to Mr. Bonderman’s most recent acquisition, it’s the fact that he apparently has no intention of sub-dividing or developing his land, other than perhaps adding another 10,000 square foot palace to his domain and, of course, all those pine trees that only grow naturally above 8000 feet.
The land will look like a park, the traffic on 400 North will stay relatively quiet and adjacent land owners are surely breathing a collective sigh of relief to know they’ve dodged a condo bullet. If I actually lived near Bonderman’s property, I’d love the man.
Almost ten years ago, former Zephyr contributor Anne Wilson wrote a futuristic account of Grand County and how incredible wealth could save part of it. She fantasized that Bill Gates came to Robbie Levin’s lodge, fell madly in love with the gorgeous scenery and could not bear the thought of massive tourist and residential development. So Gates donated a large sum of money to Utah Open Lands to buy the Sorrel River Ranch development rights. According to Anne’s vision:
"His generosity did not end there, but radiated out to work a deal with the owner of the adjoining property....significant additional acreage in the Colorado River corridor was preserved from development. Gates of Heaven Preserve was born. Gates also set up a county endowment for the purchase of conservation and development easements from interested land owners throughout Grand County....The County rejoiced."
In 2006, very little green space survives in Moab itself. We used to take for granted all the small alfalfa fields and horse pastures and open space along the creek bottoms. Now they’re about gone and no one but the very wealthy can afford to buy them. So we can only hope that when someone with the financial means comes along, he/she considers leaving the land alone or perhaps donates it to the city as a park. That kind of generosity will be remembered far longer than yet another faux adobe subdivision.
Here’s hoping for another Jennifer Speers Miracle and from someone besides Jennifer...she’s done more than her share already.
GOODBYE TO MY HAND WAXER?
If all goes according to plan, and when has my life ever been anything but ‘by the book,’ this will be the last issue of The Zephyr to be assembled by hand. For 17 plus years, I have done layouts the old fashioned way. In truth, the old fashioned way was the standard way when I started, but since I cling hopelessly to the past, not only have I refused to switch to on-screen layouts, I didn’t even know it was an option.
Until last winter.
My friends at the Tooele Transcript asked if I might consider switching to something like InDesign—I was almost the last hand waxing holdout, they explained, and while they would continue to humor me for the foreseeable future, sooner or later they were sure I might want to embrace Reality.
I broke down and bought the InDesign software and for the last couple of months, have been trying to learn how to use the damn thing. Supposedly, I will take my headlong leap into cyber layouts with the October/November issue. Please be patient with me and let’s hope for the best.
FINALLY...et tu WAL-MART?
Rumors of an impending Wal-Mart deal were flying on all frequencies recently. According to news reports, the super retailer is talking to the State Institutional Trust Lands people about property in Spanish Valley, across the county line in neighboring San Juan. Grand County and Moab officials are freaking out because they see a potential massive drain of their tax base. The idea that they might have to court Wal-Mart, whether they want it or not, sounds like a distinct possibility.
But is Wal-Mart really serious or just posturing a bit? Most small town Wal-Marts need satellite communities to make their operation profitable. Monticelloites go to Cortez for their Wal-Mart fix. Green River folks head to Price. It means Wal-Mart has to depend on tourists and recently arrived Moab rich weasels to make it happen. But most of our wealthy class abhor Wal-Mart...they might order Italian marble for their new toilets in their showcase homes, but god help them if they’d be seen inside a Super Center.
So before we get too excited, let’s see what these people really have up their sleeves...and I might watch SITLA more closely than the Wal-Mart dealers.
Truth is, I’d watch BOTH with a very clear eye.
