Enforce Vital Environmental Protections enacted late in Clinton Adm. 

WHEREAS the "roadless rule" protecting 58.5 million acres of wild roadless areas in our national forests was signed in the final days of the Clinton Administration, and it has been embroiled in court battles with the most recent decision upholding the law which was based not only on sound science, but on a few hundred public hearings and 1.5 million public comments about this policy which would protect these forests which are the source for most of America's water supply, as well as being vital for wildlife, recreation, and agriculture; and

WHEREAS President Clinton signed a proclamation in 2000 establishing the Giant Sequoia National Monument, but there has been poor management by the U.S. Forest Service which still insists on a sizable timber program even within the bounds of Giant Sequoia National Monument as well as in the giant sequoia groves themselves, despite being contrary to the letter and spirit of the Presidential proclamation signed regarding this area in the southern Sierras, and President Clinton also signed proclamations in 2000 and 2001 establishing the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument, the Carrizo Plain National Monument, and other national monuments around the country; and 

WHEREAS President Clinton signed a proclamation in 2000 establishing the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument just north of the Oregon border where an array of eco-regions converge toward the eastern part of the Klamath / Siskiyou area which is world-renowned for its biological diversity, yet the Bureau of Land Management has called for a management plan which would see more logging and grazing than would be the case if the spirit and letter of the Presidential proclamation establishing this monument was followed and enforced, and the monument should have extended about 9000 acres into California but this did not seem politically feasible at the time in Siskiyou County,  while in the waning days of the Clinton Administration, former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt withdrew about a million acres of federal land from mineral entry in the Siskiyou wild rivers area primarily in southwestern Oregon as a prelude to examining much of this area for more official protection after thorough hearings and research, but the Bush Administration succeeded in overturning that temporary halt on new mining claims;  

BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED that the California Democratic Council, meeting in convention in Los Angeles on August 10-12, 2007, shall send this resolution to all 2008 Democratic Presidential contenders calling upon them to include in their platforms their strong support for assuring that the "roadless rule" protecting roadless areas in our national forests is enforced, and in ensuring that national monuments established in 2000 and 2001 are managed by the letter and spirit of the Presidential proclamations rather than by pressure on the managing agencies by extractive industries which have resulted in management plans which are very questionable in terms of both legality and ecological integrity; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the California Democratic Council also calls upon our 2008 Presidential contenders to support the transfer of Giant Sequoia National Monument from the U.S. Forest Service to the National Park Service, calls for hearings and research into extending the Cascade - Siskiyou National Monument to include about 9000 acres in California, and calls for the re-institution of the overturned "withdrawal from mineral entry" for about a million acres of the Siskiyou wild rivers area to halt new mining claims while research and hearings proceed regarding further protection for this biologically diverse unprotected landscape.