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Meetings:
Monday, July 16, 2007 (on M-22 south of Esch Rd and just north of Riverside Canoe Livery) |
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CAL Comments to
Newsletter # 1
We are disappointed with the:
The “Draft Purpose
and Significance Statements” are crucial, of course, as they set the
stage and provide justification for all management alternatives to be
proposed. We explain our concerns below, along with
comments/suggestions on other specific portions of the newsletter. |
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CAL COMMENTS ON NPS “DRAFT PURPOSE STATEMENT” We heartily concur that it is appropriate to state the Purpose of the Lakeshore in this planning document. However, we just as heartily object to any rewording, rephrasing, different ordering, new interpretation, or introduction of new words or phrases allegedly restating the Park’s purpose. CAL objects to any deviation, no matter how slight or seemingly innocuous, from the Purpose established in law. The 1970 enabling legislation established for all time the “purpose” of this Lakeshore, and there has been no legislation since that modified that purpose statement. We do not believe that any federal agency, even with good intentions, has any authority to reword or rephrase the “purpose” of any entity created by U.S. law. Newsletter 1’s implication seems to be that time and other statutes may have changed the original intent and purpose. But there has been no other statute changing the purpose of this Lakeshore. If time, usage, or events have created a need to change the purpose statement for this Lakeshore, or, if there is a need to restate or update Congressional “intent”, then such can only be done by Congress through legislation. As for Newsletter 1’s reference to the “many laws, regulations and policies that govern the national park system”, CAL does not believe there is any law that gives the National Park System authority to change or to publish any modification of the “purpose” established in legislation of any Park or area under its jurisdiction, whether through its own NPS regulations, policies, planning processes, or in its planning documents. The Lakeshore’s 1970 Enabling Legislation gives a clear and unequivocal statement of the “Purpose” for which the area was put under federal jurisdiction as a National Lakeshore:
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In contrast, reprinted below is the different “Purpose” proposed by the NPS in Newsletter 1: “Congress established the National Lakeshore to:
And then to:
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Comparison: As is clear, there are significant and substantive differences between the “purpose statement” of Congress and that of the Park Service Planning Team’s NPS Newsletter 1, including, but not limited to: · In the Statute, there is no sublimation of “public enjoyment” to “preservation” as Newsletter 1 performed by inserting the words: “And then to”.... Instead, the Statute is clear that the purpose of the “preservation” itself is FOR the “enjoyment of the public”, and not just the enjoyment of generations in the future, but the public as it existed then, exists now, and will exist in the future. In the Statute, neither purpose (enjoyment or preservation) is dependant on the other being accomplished first and neither are seen as incongruent with each other. It is clear that Congress believed and stated unequivocally that it saw both purposes are congruent, that both purposes must be accomplished jointly, and that both purposes do not impede, contradict nor negate each other, but rather, that each purpose supports the other. Indeed, the statute makes clear that UNLESS the Lakeshore is enjoyed by the public, there is NO purpose in preserving it – almost the opposite stance than that expressed in Newsletter 1. · In the NPS “Draft Purpose Statement”, there is no inclusion, by reference or quote, of the Statute’s emphatic wording conveying the following purpose: “In order to accomplish this purpose for the benefit, inspiration, education, recreation, and enjoyment of the public,...” (Source: 1970 Public Law 91-479, Oct. 21, 1970) CAL respectfully submits that the NPS “Draft Purpose Statement” resurrects the underlying question since the 2002 withdrawal of the earlier GMP: that is, whether or not the Park Service will administer and manage Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore: · Pursuant to the Lakeshore’s established purposes stated explicitly in statute; · Pursuant to Congressional and Presidential authority to legislatively determine matters of purpose and significance without being rewritten, ignored or overturned by an agency of the bureaucracy; Pursuant to the mission of the National Park Service to administer areas under its jurisdiction in accordance with the Park’s enabling statute and within the limits of its statutorily established authority.In Sum on “Purpose”: CAL supports the inclusion of a “Purpose Statement” in the GMP/Wilderness Study. However, until the Purpose Statement of the Lakeshore is stated in the GMP exactly as written in statute, the question above will simply not go away – it cannot. CAL hopes the Park Service Planning Team will make these questions go away in its next Newsletter by removing its “Draft Purpose Statement” and replacing it with the purpose enunciated in the Park’s enabling statute, whereby all questions about purpose were long ago settled legislatively. Ascribing different purposes to the Lakeshore than that provided in the enabling statute is beyond the scope of authority of the National Park Service. CAL cannot support any Purpose Statement that deviates in any manner from the Purpose Statement expressed in the enabling statute, but would fully support an accurate, unmodified transcription of the enabling Statute’s “purpose” statements. |
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CAL COMMENTS ON NPS “DRAFT SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENTS” In 1970, the citizenry of the United States, with great involvement by the people and government of Michigan, determined for all time, through their elected officials, the “significance” of the Lakeshore and its features in legislation that acknowledged its “significance” and thereby began to remove the lands from private and state ownership and entrusted those lands to the administration of the National Park Service, pursuant to the purpose and significance of the enabling statute. It is neither the prerogative nor duty of any federal agency to redetermine the significance of any area under its jurisdiction. If there is need to establish new significance, such determination is to be made by the citizens of the U.S. through their elected officials in the legislative process, and the process is to amend the statute. The National Park Service does, indeed, have the duty to survey lands entrusted to its administration, and to inventory the area’s features, and, in the case of this Lakeshore, the Park Service has performed this administrative duty with excellence. But the determination of “significance” is a political decision made through legislation. The Planning Team has confused the duty to inventory with the legislative role of ascribing whatever “significance” the U.S. citizens wish to ascribe to an area or its features. The Statute’s determination of “significance” reads:
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In contrast, reprinted below is the different “Significance Statements” proposed by the NPS in Newsletter 1:
(Source: NPS January 2006 GMP Newsletter 1) |
| Comparison: Not content with the determination of
“significance” arrived at in the Park’s enabling Statute, the NPS
Planning Team ranges very far, ascribing: · ...“global importance” in the Lakeshore’s “relatively unimpacted state, the variety of features present, and their proximity to one another;” · ...“an unparalleled range of recreational, educational and inspirational opportunities”; · ...“of a size and quality unique on the Great Lakes and rare elsewhere on the United States coastline”.
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...“native plant and animal communities are of a scale
and quality rare on the Great Lakes shoreline. These relatively intact
communities afford an opportunity to allow the continuation of the
ecological processes
that have shaped them.”
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CAL wagers there
is not a single area in the vast federal lands under the Park Service’s
jurisdiction that the Park Service does not find similarly “globally
important”, and infused with “rare native” species and “intact
communities” where “ecological processes” that have shaped
them should continue under Park Service decisions about how to manage
such, despite evolutionary evidence that all life is continually
evolving and that attempting to stop the natural process to freeze
things in time is impossible, not to mention that the attempt is as
disruptive of natural ecology as the asphalting of a dirt road.
Newsletter 1’s “Draft Significance Statements” would terminally
date this GMP to the ideological terminology of the times and make it
appear rather silly a decade or two down the road. Such excess is not
flattering to the Park Service; the draft statements are shrill and
unnecessary. In the end, the earth is all one, and everything alive or
dead is of some sort of “global importance”. Exaggerating the
“significance” of this Lakeshore’s features demeans the real
significance of the Park, which is no more and no less than what
Congress already stated so well in the enabling legislation. It is not
necessary, nor appropriate, for a federal agency to attempt to create
for itself in this manner a mantle of moral authority for management
decisions it would base on claims of “significance” that were not
mentioned in the enabling statute. It goes without saying that
endangered species need protection, wherever found. It also goes
without saying that the rights of hunters and fishermen within the
Lakeshore, as prescribed by the State of Michigan and recognized by the
federal government, also need protection. But neither the Endangered
Species Act nor the laws governing fishing and hunting nor the myriad of
other laws, regulations and ordinances governing the Lakeshore have
anything to do with the Lakeshore’s “purpose” or
“significance” and should not be portrayed as such. Park Service
documents should bear no appearance of advocacy on political issues that
have been properly decided in the legislative arena. The Park Service
must remove itself from the ideological battleground where stakeholders
are engaged. It is beneath the dignity of the great institution of the
National Park Service to make statements bearing any ideological tint or
zealotry. Its role and mission is great; it demeans itself when it
assumes a role of stakeholder or spokesperson. It should have no bias;
it should be the objective administrator of the enabling Statute, no
more, no less. Its GMPs should reflect its intent to carry out its
administrative responsibilities, at which the Park Service excels.
After a failed first attempt, the Park Service Planning Team has been
given a second chance to create a new General Management Plan for the
Park. It is crucial that the Team rid its next Newsletter of all
statements that bear even the appearance of ideological bias and
contempt for statutory determination of “purpose” and
“significance”. The Park Service has opportunity in its next
Newsletter to establish evidence it can be an unbiased, objective, just
administrator: for “purpose” and “significance”, nothing more nor less
than a direct quote of the lines above from the enabling Statute is
required. |
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In sum on “Significance”,
CAL supports the NPS desire to insert “Significance Statements”
into the GMP, but objects to any wording that does not conform exactly
to the “significance” statements already determined in the
enabling Statute by the citizens of the United States through their
elected representatives in the legislative process. CAL believes that
impugning greater or lesser significance to the Lakeshore than that
provided in the enabling Statute is beyond the scope of authority of the
Park Service. CAL cannot support any “Significance Statements”
that deviate in any manner from those in the enabling statute, but would
fully support an accurate, unmodified transcription of the enabling
Statute’s “significance” statements. |
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CAL Comments on “What Is a Wilderness Study” and “Wilderness at the National Lakeshore” CAL appreciates what we
believe to be a concise depiction of the issues and procedures regarding
the relationship of the 1964 Wilderness Act to this Lakeshore. However,
CAL believes that, for the Park Service’s efforts on a new Wilderness
Study to be considered sincere, the Park Service must include a
statement in its next GMP Newsletter and in the final GMP that the Park
Service will fully and actively support, within the scope of its
authority, the introduction and passage of the federal legislation that
will be necessary for a new Wilderness Recommendation to be implemented
at the Lakeshore. Without an up front statement of support by the Park
Service, provided a consensus of stakeholder support has been reached,
the Park Service’s
commitment to the results of new Wilderness Study will remain in doubt. |
| CAL Comments on The Planning Timetable: CAL
appreciates the publication of a very explicit timetable. |
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CAL Comments on “We Want to Hear From
You”: Pursuant to the Newsletter offer, CAL would appreciate
being notified of future documents by email, but we would prefer text
versions without photos unless the photos are substantive to the
message. Please send to the email address you have for CAL. We would
appreciate being kept on the hard copy mailing list as well. |
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CAL Additional Comments on “Preservation” and “Recreation” CAL has heard Park Service personnel frequently expound on the two themes of “preservation” and “recreation” or as if they are mutually exclusive, believing that one gains political ascendancy at one time and the other at another, as if a dichotomy exists that poses a never-ending dilemma for the Park Service. However, CAL believes the alleged dichotomy is non-existent in the law and unnecessary in the field: the law repeatedly makes the assertion that the purpose of preservation is for the enjoyment of the public, current and future. In the field at the Lakeshore, both purposes are certainly achievable: visitation at the Lakeshore simply is not destructive of the resources. CAL believes that in the mind of the citizen, there is no difficulty understanding that preservation is for the purpose of the enjoyment of the public and that no dichotomy exists between protection and visitation. Neither are to be sacrificed for the other; they support each other; there simply is no dichotomy and no dilemma.
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Concluding Remarks: CAL believes Newsletter 1 is an excellent, concise, descriptive depiction of how the Park Service intends to develop a new GMP/Wilderness Study. We are grateful for such candor and appreciate very much the effort being expended by the Park Service to show its desire to involve stakeholders. Newsletter 1 clearly demonstrates that citizen involvement to date has been influential. It will be the next Newsletter, however, that will demonstrate whether citizen input in this new GMP process counts. Newsletter 1’s “Draft Purpose and Significance Statements” raise the same questions that have plagued the Park Service since 2002. CAL is disappointed to be forced to re-articulate the same substantive concerns that so many citizens and organizations expressed in 2002 with the Planning Team’s attempt at an unauthorized revision of the statutorily determined “purpose” and “significance” of Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. CAL also expresses concern with the lack of a public statement of Park Service commitment to encourage and support Congressional action on the results of a new Wilderness Study, provided a consensus of stakeholder support is achieved. We thank the Park Service for encouraging citizens to make comments and we look forward to the next Newsletter.
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