ANILCA - Village at Wolf Creek's Trump Card.

A message for concerned citizens:

“... Regardless of any legal action, the Wolf Creek Village plan will require many more years of planning, with the developer needing a permit from the Colorado Department of Transportation to access U.S. 160 and permits from Mineral County. 

“There are a lot of opportunities for public participation on upcoming decisions that will probably stretch out for quite a long time,” Mark Pearson (with the San Juan Citizens Alliance) said. “There are enormous physical and structural limitations for a village up there. Is there enough water to support the city they are proposing to build? How are they going to get power up there? All this will require some significant planning and public scrutiny.”          ( reported by Jason Blevins )

This post is a collection of information regarding ANILCA (the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act,), and it will be updated as new information becomes available.  

It’s important because a controversial section of that Act has become LMJV’s trump card in forcing the USDA-USFS into supporting their development wishes, rather than pursuing a strategy of ecological caution and getting Alberta Park returned to the RGNF.

As for ANILCA §3210(a), basically when vast tracks of Alaska lands became part of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976, this provision was added to the follow up ANILCA Act of 1980.  The intention was to guarantee private land owners (that now found themselves landlocked within the newly established federally owned lands) road access.

Whereas at Alberta Park, RGNF, is a situation where the parcel of land was torn away from the Rio Grande National Forest by some heavy handed '80 style Washington DC political wheeling and dealing, that had USDA rejecting their own Rocky Mtn. Region USDA-USFS experts' considered facts and reversing their decision to reject Red McComb original devious land swap offer.  

The Alberta Park parcel, in the middle of Wolf Creek watershed should never have been removed from the Rio Grande National Forest to begin with.  It was and is a mistake that I believe deserves being reversed in light of contemporary Rio Grande River Basin water issues, and ecological common sense.

ANILCA §3210. Access by owner to nonfederally owned land

For the sake of the Rio Grande River, NO Village at Wolf Creek.

 

AmericanRivers.org/rio-grande river

Because river systems are so critical to human thriving and commerce it makes sense to focus on protecting and nurturing those systems to guarantee our children will enjoy their benefits.  Toward this end I think John Wesley Powell had a great idea when he advocated for western state lines to be drawn along river drainage basin boundary lines. 

See, John Wesley Powell’s Report on the Lands of the Arid Regions of the United States (1878)

It’s too late for that, still, the importance of clean healthy rivers to downstream stakeholders, remains as crucial as ever.  Especially as water levels drop.

Alberta Park sits below the Great Divide mountain slopes of the Wolf Creek snowshed, located within the Rio Grande National Forest.  Its meltwater feeds through Alberta Park on the way to the Rio Grande River, and that gets way too little attention in this controversy were it sometimes feels like legalities and tossing papers at each other is the only thing that matters.  

This posting is dedicated to the Rio Grande River and is basically a collection of articles, a bibliographic resource for learning some important background.

Alberta Park at Wolf Creek needs advocates to start lobbying the USDA-USFS powers-that-be to begin making every effort possible to reconsider going forward with this 1980’s speculative luxury retreat.  Why?  This is 2024, not the go-go ‘80s, environmentally and sociologically (read stakeholders) - the realities of the Rio Grande River Basin have become way more challenging.  

I’m no expert, but I do know enough to seek out experts and get my facts from them.  That’s what this bibliographic collection is all about, sharing important information with the friends of Wolf Creek & Alberta Park.

We The People should be able to expect the USDA-USFS to start incorporating the Rio Grande River and the greater good, along with science and climate realities.  It’s time to get serious about prioritizing the health of the Rio Grande River system, as paramount over some developer’s glory pipe dream.

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GETTING TO KNOW THE RIO GRANDE RIVER

Texas Water Resources Institute - by Kerry Halladay - email - 2024

 HYDROLOGY OF THE WOLF CREEK PASS AREA

MountainStudies.org - Dr. November 7, 2014 - Project Leader: Mark Williams (University of Colorado)

A RIVER STRETCH BEYOND ITS MEANS

Wild Earth guardians.org - email - 2024

A DRYING RIVER - The Rio Grande is in peril, and the consequences have already manifested

Erick S. Albarran - medium.com - Environmental Issue Profiles 2021

CLIMATE-SMART CONSERVATION ALONG THE RIO GRANDE RIVER

Janessa Price - WorldWildlife.org - 

RIO GRANDE IN HIGH DEMAND

American rivers.org

ABOUT THE RIO GRANDE RIVER

Rio Grande International Study Center - 

THE RIO GRANDE WATERSHED IS AT ITS ECOLOGICAL BREAKING POINT. 

By: Rio Grande Waterkeeper - March 21, 2019

RIO GRANDE WATER FUND

Protecting forests and water in northern New Mexico.

THE RIO GRANDE RIVER WATER

Pennsylvania State University - e-education course

RESTORING THE NATURAL FLOW OF THE RIO GRANDE-RIO BRAVO RIVER

Daniel Vernick, December 07, 2023 - Worldwildlife.org

THE RIO GRANDE ISN’T JUST A BORDER - IT’S A CRISIS!

By Vianey Rueda &  Drew Gronewold - October 23, 2023  - The Conversation Media Group

CLIMATE-SMART CONSERVATION ALONG THE RIO GRANDE 

World Wild Life Fund - Janessa Price - 2024

RIO GRANDE, A DRYING RIVER

Erick S. Albarran - March 21, 2021 - medium.com

THE RIO GRANDE RIVER - InTeGrate

Interdisciplinary Teaching about Earth for a Sustainable Future

Water Matter - THE RIO GRANDE AS AN INTERNATIONAL RIVER

By Margaret J. Vick, J.S.D. (2012) - Utton Transboundary Resources Center - University of New Mexico

PUBLIC REPORTS FROM WOLF CREEK SUMMIT  above Alberta Park, Colorado

Air & Water Database Public Reports 

CLIMATE OF THE SOUTHWEST UNITED STATES

EarthatHome.org/

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LMJV is Correct! Future of Village at Wolf Creek is NOT a Local Issue. It's a Rio Grande Stakeholders Issue.

 Click and behold, the LMJV's Alberta Park developers' pipe dream

Image by Alex Pullen

On the VWC webpage, they tell you that the friends of Alberta Park and Wolf Creek, "are NOT your local grass-roots coalition fighting against this project."  Well, I'm out here in my rural cabin, working on my own, occasionally communicating with others - and about as grass-roots as can be, I even have soil under my fingernails right now.  

Though, it is true that this is NOT a "local issue"!

The Rio Grande River is an endangered interstate, international river, and LMJV wants to mess with its precious source waters. 

That's personal for all Rio Grande River stakeholders!

I’ve been going through San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council’s VWC legal documents and came across a letter written by Christine Canaly, Director of the SLVEC, to the USFS’s NEPA Coordinator, just over twenty years ago.  

It seems like a perfect cautionary essay (based on solid study) to start with and share with friends, including LMJV developers and USDA/RGNF powers that be.  Two decades ago, a decision was made to focus exclusively on gaining access to Leavell McCombs Joint Venture’s Alberta Park inholding, while steadfastly ignoring the varied environmental (read physical reality) concerns raised in Christina’s appraisal.

Her thoughtful constructive advice was ignored by the governmental powers that be, and LMJV salesmen alike.  That has resulted in twenty-years of squandered time and treasure with LMJV right back where they started. 

Talk about throwing good money, after bad.  Now in 2024 LMJV appears poised for victory.  Yet, one way, or the other, it will be a pyrrhic victory since these issues haven't gone away.  

Not to mention that the general economic feasibility index for such a 1980's inspired go-go dream project, and profits driver, gets thinner with every massive infrastructure damaging, global warming driven, extreme weather event eating away at the luxury market bottomline.  

Why start this 2024 No-Village at Wolf Creek series?

Albert Park meadow

Here we are in 2024 and the epic struggle to save Alberta Park, in the hydrological heart of the Rio Grande National Forest, and the Wolf Creek watershed, which feeds into the Rio Grande river, slogs on.  

Since Ryan Bidwell’s 2009 presentation, LMJV continued pursuing their land trade strategy, but friends of Wolf Creek went to court again and again, ultimately their  land-trade proposal was rejected by the courts.  Nevertheless, the RGNF rushed an approval of the developer’s access road.  Which various Friends of Wolf Creek also successfully challenged.  

In October 2022 a federal judge invalidated the Forest Service’s approval. The Forest Service appealed that decision in April 2023, with Rocky Mountain Wild filing a response brief.  In January of this year oral arguments were heard, and a ruling is expected sometime this year.

When that decision comes down, the smoldering Alberta Park issue will reignite as LMJV start warming up their bulldozers in anticipation, and it will be time, once again, for the far flung Friends of Wolf Creek to remember: 

NO Pillage of a Village at Alberta Park, Wolf Creek, Rio Grande National Forest.  

But what to do?  Especially those of us without money or connections, can we make a difference?  If you consider yourself a “Friend of Wolf Creek” how can you make a stand that matters?

I’ve been thinking about the possibility of a good old fashioned mass letter writing campaign of persuasion.  Individuals reaching out with their own unique rational reasoning and bold requests.  

We could begin with questioning why the Rio Grande National Forest powers-that-be have so consistently avoided facing the reality of the environmental concerns, and the many unavoidable damaging impacts this project would guarantee.  An attitude that is reflected in USDA-RGNF’s decidedly pro-development decisions over these past decades?

A campaign of persuasion that reaches out to all relevant stakeholders, governmental representatives and agencies, along with private entities including the McCombs’ family itself.  (somewhere near the end of this series, I intend to post a list of relevant recipients) 

What message?  Perhaps something along the lines of . . .

1. Please recognize that Alberta Park is a near pristine, biologically productive, irreplaceable landscape - and the hydrological heart of that Wolf Creek watershed.
2. This snowshed and its melt-waters feed into the already stressed Rio Grande River and deserve to be considered a treasured natural resource.
3. Ask for help in proactively pushing for a resolution to this land speculators’ threat to the health of this precious wetlands, ancient fens resource, wildlife habitat and key migration corridor across the Great Divide.
4. Regarding Leavell McCombs Joint Venture’s pipe dream.  Demand that USDA-RGFS reverse its decidedly pro-development blind-sidedness - towards the irreversible damages this development promises for that landscape. 
5. Enlighten RGNF & people in general on the impracticality of a for-profit development scheme, being able to provide the large array of expensive municipal services that a viable small town requires.  For instance, who’s going to pay for and staff a high elevation medical clinic, considering the 10,300 foot elevation of this particular dream town of thousands?
6. Ask USDA-RGFS to redirect their focus on efforts towards accommodating a way of returning the control and protection of Alberta Park, to the Rio Grande National Forest (from whence it was snatched back in 1986.).
7. This started as a go-go 1986 strategic speculators' land-trade scheme that went bust because of greed and rampant dishonesty - Can we please strive to finish with another land-trade, one that allows LMJV to repair a grievous wrong against the National Public Trust, by returning Alberta Park in exchange for another more realistic parcel.  There’s nothing but bruised egos standing in the way of such a resolution.

I believe that We The People have a right to assert our claim upon this Alberta Park parcel of land.  Land that was underhandedly ripped away from the Rio Grande National Forest in 1986.  It deserves to be returned to the protection of the Rio Grande National Forest and our American legacy.  Let it continue being the pristine constructive biologically productive member of the RGNF and the Rio Grande River source waters landscape, that it has always been.  

For my part, I’m hoping to spend the next couple months, supporting my above assertions with a series of posts that will bring together the factual details and hopefully help inform some curious Friends of Wolf Creek, along with newbies to this issue.

Thank you,

Peter

PS. Please understand I am simply an individual off in rural Colorado, doing my thing and hoping it might be a constructive part of this effort to save Alberta Park, and ultimately get it back under protection.  If you want do something, please be sure to contact one of the organizations that have been doing all the heavy lifting.

• Friends of Wolf Creek
• 
  
• Rocky Mountain Wild
• 
  
• San Juan Citizens Alliance
• 
  
• San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council

INDEX of VWC-EIS ...

Contents 

Issue 1: The village proposal expands impacts of the federally permitted ski area development

Issue 2: Judicial orders preclude reliance on FEIS

Issue 3: The Forest Service has never made Leavell-McCombs Joint Venture’s proposal (ANILCA alternative) available for review by the public or other local, State, and Federal agencies with jurisdiction and control over the Wolf Creek Ski Area complex 

Issue 4: The purpose and need and designation of the NEPA “Federal Action” are invalid

Issue 5: The FEIS perpetuates the same structural flaws addressed by the previous injunction and settlement

Issue 6: The range of alternatives considered is inappropriately narrow

Issue 7: Alternatives involving mitigation measures and ANILCA terms and conditions were not analyzed

Issue 8: The no-action alternative is inappropriately dismissed

Issue 9: The Forest Service failed to incorporate the input of several key cooperating agencies

Issue 10: ANILCA and existing Forest Service regulations do not require enhanced road access be provided to the federally encumbered Leavell-McCombs Joint Venture parcels

Issue 11: New information and stale (dated) analysis requires new NEPA process

Issue 12: ANILCA as preferred alternative is not compared to other alternatives

Issue 13: The consideration of connected actions and indirect and cumulative impacts in the DEIS is inadequate

Issue 14: The property appraisal confirms adequate access and comparable properties exist

Issue 15: The effects on wetlands are inadequately analyzed

Issue 16: The ANILCA alternative would lead to a loss of Canada lynx habitat and reduced functioning of an important Canada lynx linkage

Issue 17: The proposed decision would violate standards, guidelines, and objectives for lynx conservation

Issue 18: Spruce bark beetle impacts on lynx habitat requires additional analysis

Issue 19: The proposed conservation measures would not be effective in reducing impacts to lynx nor promoting recovery to a full, viable population

Issue 20: The Lynx Conservation Strategy was developed without any public involvement, in violation of NEPA

Issue 21: Application of any conservation measures is at best uncertain

Issue 22: The action alternatives would harm other wildlife

Issue 23: The action alternatives would reduce water quality

Issue 24: Lack of mitigation measures

Issue 25: Water supply for either action alternative may not be sufficient or reliable

Issue 26: In violation of NEPA, the FEIS fails to analyze the feasibility of, and the possible impacts from, a grade separated interchange at the village access road with Highway 160

Issue 27: The FEIS fails to analyze the comparative impacts of expanding federal control via the scenic easement

Issue 28: Failure to reinitiate consultation for the yellow-billed cuckoo pursuant to Section 7 of the Endangered Species Act

Issue 29: Bias and proponent control of the third party NEPA contractor was built into the contract

Issue 30: Failure to consider new information

Issue 31: Failure to consider the best available scienceIssue 32: Failure to adhere to NEPA’s public involvement mandates

Issue 33: Reasonable use and enjoyment that minimizes environmental effects requires an analysis of the visual effects to the congressionally designated Continental Divide National Scenic Trail

VWC-EIS, Objection Issues and Responses. 

November 15, 2018

https://www.fs.usda.gov/project/?project=35945

VWC-EIS, Objection Issues and Responses #1, #2

United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service
Rocky Mountain Regional Office 

Response to Objections on the Village at Wolf Creek Access Project, Rio Grande National Forest 

November 2018 

Village at Wolf Creek Access Project Draft 11/15/18
Objection Issues and Responses 

Contents 

Issue 1: The village proposal expands impacts of the federally permitted ski area development

Issue 2: Judicial orders preclude reliance on FEIS

VWC-EIS, Objection Issues and Responses #3, #4, #5, #6

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2018

Index of VWC-EIS, Objection Issues and Responses. 33 issues addressed 

United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service

Rocky Mountain Regional Office 

Response to Objections on the Village at Wolf Creek Access Project, Rio Grande National Forest

My post of the "Index of the VWC-EIS, Objection Issues and Responses" has been amazingly well visited.  Ironically, I also put together a series of posts of highlights from those 33 responses.  Then I ran out of steam and it didn't seem important, and other matters were, and I was gone, now I'm thinking perhaps it's more important than I thought and that it would be good to post them after all.

___________________________________________________________________

United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service

Rocky Mountain Regional Office 

Response to Objections on the Village at Wolf Creek Access Project, Rio Grande National Forest 

November 2018 

Village at Wolf Creek Access Project Draft 11/15/18
Objection Issues and Responses 

Contents 

Issue 3: The Forest Service has never made Leavell-McCombs Joint Venture’s proposal (ANILCA alternative) available for review by the public or other local, State, and Federal agencies with jurisdiction and control over the Wolf Creek Ski Area complex

Issue 4: The purpose and need and designation of the NEPA “Federal Action” are invalid

Issue 5: The FEIS perpetuates the same structural flaws addressed by the previous injunction and settlement

Issue 6: The range of alternatives considered is inappropriately narrow