Sen. Jake Garn, R-Utah, said Friday that the only way there will be a 5-million-acre addition to the wilderness preserve from Bureau of Land Management lands in Utah next year is over his dead body. The same, he said, goes for fellow Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah.
Furthermore, Garn labeled the proposal by Rep. Wayne Owens, D-Utah, "ridiculous."Owens has said a BLM wilderness measure, which would be exchanged for state-owned lands now blocked or unusable because of federal restrictions, is one of his top three priorities for 1989 - ranking right behind a new bill for the Central Utah Project and project BOLD.
"If Owens and Ted Wilson want to put 5 million acres in wilderness they are ridiculous," Garn said. "It would be a killer to the Utah economy."
Hatch added "they want to lock up too much of our state."