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<br />Toppling Glen Canyon Dam would be fittfug ena>"
<br />
<br />PUIllNG the plug on Glen
<br />Canyon Dam and draining
<br />lake Powell is an imprac.
<br />tical, outlandish and unreason.
<br />able idea. And I love it.
<br />SupporterS of the idea - led
<br />by the Glen Canyon Institute
<br />and the, Sierra Qub - ugue the
<br />dam is W2Steful. It wastes water
<br />(by surface evaporation), it
<br />wastes federal doDars (by subsi-
<br />dies), it wastes species (by
<br />degrading water habitat) and it
<br />wastes scenery (by drowning
<br />il).And being a monUmental
<br />waste, supporters want to leave
<br />it, when drained. standing high
<br />and dry as a monument to
<br />human folly. Waste, yes; folly, yes;
<br />but let it stand? No!
<br />Glen Canyon Dam is a1ready a
<br />monument, and there's the rub.
<br />It's a monument to the era of
<br />big, cosily government, and to
<br />the hideous notion that the role
<br />of the state is to master both
<br />people and nature behind
<br />BerIin-1ike walls. That is what
<br />Glen Canyon Dam stands for
<br />and why its 5 million cubic
<br />yards of cement, towering 700
<br />feet above the Colorado River,
<br />should not be left standing.
<br />Putting the wrecking ball to
<br />Glen Canyon Dam would, S)'ttl.
<br />bolicaUy, put the kibosh on a
<br />century of bad ideas in the
<br />American West. It's no acddent
<br />that the lake formed by Glen
<br />Canyon Dam is named after
<br />John Wesley PoweI1, explorer of
<br />the Colorado River, founder of
<br />the U.S. Geological Survey, hero
<br />ofWa1Iace Stegner and Broce
<br />Babbitt, and prophet of a green-
<br />erWesL
<br />
<br />THE NEW WEST/ by Karl HessJr.
<br />
<br />Powell saw a
<br />West that one
<br />day would be , l
<br />covered with ,,'~
<br />, '
<br />"crystal waters", ',"""," "
<br />""""',
<br />green fields " ':~' ';';';:j
<br />and blooming ," !""
<br />ganiens" - all
<br />because of the power and
<br />promise of dams. 'Conqueted
<br />rivers; he touted, 'are better ser-
<br />vants than wild gouds." PoweI1
<br />was not kidding. At the 1889
<br />Montana constitutional conven-
<br />tion he advocated d.mming
<br />every river in Montana SO not
<br />one drop of water would
<br />escape the state or the grasp of
<br />irrigators. He even caUed for
<br />clear<utting the forests of the '.
<br />West to stop the waste of water
<br />by trees.
<br />PoweI1 was obsessed with
<br />waste, and in the name of stop-
<br />ping waste he pushed for feder-
<br />al control and consenation of
<br />public lands. His ideas hdped
<br />spark the Forest Service, the
<br />agency that gave us be1ow-cost
<br />timber sales; the Bu=u of Land
<br />Management, the agency that
<br />gave us a grazing program now
<br />costing taxpayers $250 million a
<br />year; and the Bureau of
<br />Reclamation, the agency that
<br />gave us what M:uc Reisner calls
<br />the 'Cadillac Desert."
<br />Dismantling Glen Canyon
<br />Dam would yidd a fitting tomb-
<br />stone to a century of topdown,
<br />centralizCd fet:Ieta1 management
<br />of the public land West. It
<br />would symbolize the passing of
<br />an era of unquestioned faith in
<br />government and its good wodts.
<br />Tearing down Glen Canyon
<br />
<br />
<br />Dam would send a clear mes-
<br />sage to the people of the West
<br />that the region's future need
<br />not lie in federal hands and
<br />handouts. Over the past 100
<br />years, federal doDars have built
<br />the West. Federal doDars buUt
<br />the dams that turned the central
<br />desert valleys of California and
<br />Arizona into vegetable gardens.
<br />Federal doDars built the massive
<br />research and weapons filcilities
<br />that spurred urban growth in
<br />places like New Mexico. And
<br />federal doDars bUilt the infra-
<br />structureS of ranching and tim-
<br />bering that now fuel the range
<br />wars between greens and ranch-
<br />ers and loggers;
<br />TIDIes are changing. The feder-
<br />al government'is too broke to
<br />lavish more cash on the West.
<br />Moreo~ the West is comitig of
<br />age. For the first time, a key
<br />western state like Colorado is
<br />paying more per capita in feder-
<br />al taxes than it is receiving in .
<br />federal transfer payments. Liitk
<br />that turnabout to a bulldozed
<br />Glen Canyon Dam, and one has
<br />a glimpse of a more responsible
<br />and more independent West.
<br />Monkey-wrenching Glen
<br />Canyon Dam, if done at the
<br />grassroots, Western level, could
<br />also advance the prospects of
<br />sovereignty in the West.
<br />Although the Sierra QIiI> is
<br />national in its scope, and out-
<br />spoken in Its opposition to,local
<br />control of public resources, the
<br />instigator of the dam's undoing
<br />- the Glen Canyon Iltstitute - is
<br />grassroots and Western to the .
<br />. core. MoteOver, ihe institote's
<br />leadership is shunning federal .
<br />
<br />rules in filvor of its own '
<br />'CitizenS Environmental
<br />Assessment".to assess the
<br />impact of tearing down the dam
<br />- a bottom-up move pooh-
<br />poohed by the top-down
<br />Ointon administration.
<br />It is precisely thisltind of non-
<br />federal, citizen initiative that
<br />promises to the West a growing
<br />say in itS own future. Local
<br />action reminds 0._ that ~
<br />things can happen close to
<br />hOme, evm without the federal
<br />purse and even without the wis-
<br />dom of government experts.
<br />And it tells us !bat if Glen
<br />Canyon Dam, and all that It
<br />stands fo!; is to topple, it will .
<br />only be because the people ",
<br />the West - not Qf the natiof .
<br />will have made up their ll1iIld5
<br />to do lL
<br />I can see entrepreneW'S and .
<br />Iatter~ Edward Abbeys.chip-
<br />ping away at the dam with C4 .
<br />and pickaxes, and I can see ven-
<br />dors selling certified chunks at
<br />$10 a shoLIlI buy a dozen.Who
<br />knows, we IJIight turn Glen
<br />Canyon Dam iJlto the second
<br />most lu~-rative demolition pro-
<br />ject in history, after the Berlin
<br />Wall, that is.
<br />We will lose a fme lake and an
<br />even finer motor-boatway. But
<br />we will, by doing the impracti-
<br />cal, outlandish, and unreason-
<br />able, recapture a prized parlof
<br />our Western heritage and
<br />redaim a vital part of our
<br />Western dtizenship.a
<br />Karl HessJr.Is .... ecologist
<br />and envil'OlJmelllal wrlter.U"..
<br />ing '" Boulder. HeCtUI fie
<br />reached alllbess4e.wL,
<br />
<br />~
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<br />8 NOVEMBER 30, 1997. :'be _ Post
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