PHOENIX - To celebrate this year's 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act, Arizona Highways magazine is organizing a series of wilderness hikes this summer in some of the state's most spectacular protected lands. According to editor-in-chief Robert Stieve, hikers will be joined by representatives of the U.S. Forest Service and BLM, among other agencies, along with members of the Arizona Wilderness Coalition.

"It's a unique opportunity, bringing together a lot of different experts and having them on the trail, and what better way to learn about the vegetation in the White Mountains than to be spending six or seven hours out on the trail with the people who write the books about those things?", he asked.

Hikes are planned for Mt. Baldy Wilderness in the White Mountains, the Bell Trail near Sedona, and Humphrey's Peak outside Flagstaff.

Stieve said the purpose of the hikes is to raise awareness and encourage people to enjoy the natural beauty of Arizona's 90 different wilderness areas.

"Most of these areas are free," he pointed out. "They're primarily on National Forest lands or BLM land and it doesn't cost anything to actually go out there. So, we really try to encourage families and get kids out there and let them see what's out there and have an experience that's a little different. Get 'em off the couch is kind of what we're shooting for."

Stieve said protecting additional wilderness becomes increasingly important as the state's urban areas continue to expand into previously untouched wildlands.

"These wilderness acres belong to the people of Arizona and the people around the world that might want to come here," he declared. "And as other areas do get developed, it makes these areas that much more important."

Hikers and horses are allowed in wilderness areas but roads and even mountain bikes are prohibited.

Stieve said the areas are especially valuable for teaching children about the natural world.

"If you want to go out and hike in an environment that probably looks a lot like it did two, three, four, five hundred years ago, the wilderness areas are the best bet."

He noted that wilderness also has economic value, by drawing visitors to dozens of Arizona's smaller communities that rely heavily on tourism. The Arizona Highways hikes are free of charge.

Arizona Highways photographers also will be along to provide photo tips.

More information is to be found at AZWild50th.org. Detailed information on hikes, and sign-ups, will be available in a couple of weeks.




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Conservation groups are rejoicing over the decision Friday by the Biden administration to reject a proposed mining road in Alaska.

The 211-mile Ambler Road would have sliced through the Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, severing the migration route for a Western Arctic Caribou herd.

Alex Johnson, interior Alaska director for the National Parks Conservation Association, said it was important for the feds to take a stand in Alaska so mining interests do not start eyeing other national parks.

"This is a very expensive, destructive and just highly speculative project that does not in any way support our clean energy goals as a country," Johnson contended. "And ultimately would permanently threaten the health and well-being of local communities and the tribes."

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski slammed the decision, warning it could limit jobs and tax revenues for Alaska by preventing exploration for minerals she said are important to national security, like copper, cobalt, gallium and germanium.

Jayme Dittmar, a photographer and filmmaker from Fairbanks, said the road would have been very disruptive to the 66 Native American villages along the proposed route.

"That'd be 168 trucks passing through close vicinity to the villages," Dittmar pointed out. "There would be hundreds of bridges built. It would dismantle a subsistence livelihood that's been in place for thousands and thousands of years."

The road was seen as a negative for tourism to the Brooks Range area. According to the Alaska Travel Industry Association, Californians make up 9% of visitors to Alaska.

Arizona conservation groups and sportsmen alike say they're pleased the Bureau of Land Management will now recognize conservation as an integral part of public lands management.

The agency's new rule puts protecting the environment on par with other land-use priorities.

Scott Garlid, executive director of the Arizona Wildlife Federation, said historically the BLM has done what he termed a "pretty good job," not only managing about 12 million acres of public lands in Arizona, but also protecting natural resources.

"They've got a tough job," Garlid acknowledged. "I think this rule helps make their job a little bit easier because it gives them some tools to balance those different demands on the 12 million acres that they manage."

Garlid predicted the rule will raise what he terms "harder-to-quantify conservation values" to the same level of importance as more extractive land uses like oil and gas exploration and mining. He thinks most Arizonans will recognize the new rule as a positive. A solid majority of Arizona voters across party lines say they are conservationists and use public lands for recreation.

To Garlid, the rule makes it clear the BLM is recognizing certain parts of federal lands, in Arizona and around the West, have been degraded. He contended restoration leases will be a good tool, allowing the BLM to lease acres to groups specifically to improve the conditions on a given landscape. He noted opponents of the new rule might see the leases as a way to "lock up" land but he argued it is not true.

"One example could be a nonprofit, like the Arizona Wildlife Federation," Garlid pointed out. "We could get a conservation lease from the Bureau of Land Management to do riparian restoration work, or work to remove invasive species along a creek bank."

According to the BLM, while a restoration or mitigation lease is in place, casual uses of the leased lands like recreation, hunting, fishing and research activities would generally continue.

Support for this reporting was provided by The Pew Charitable Trusts.

State and federal agencies are collaborating to increase the use of prescribed fires in the Northwest.

Prescribed fire is the controlled use of burns to minimize the larger risks of wildfires and smoke. It is seen as an increasingly important strategy as wildfire seasons pose greater threats to the Northwest.

Casey Sixkiller, Northwest regional administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, said authorities want to work together to maintain forest habitats.

"Prescribed burn is one of the best tools we have for making our forests more resilient against catastrophic wildfires and they help to manage and target hazardous fuels and make for healthier forests," Sixkiller explained.

Sixkiller pointed out the EPA is involved because wildfire smoke poses risks to people's health. The collaboration is between federal agencies, departments in Oregon and Washington, and tribal governments.

Sixkiller noted the collaboration needed a formal agreement to move forward.

"That is what we've been able to do here with this agreement," Sixkiller emphasized. "To get federal land managers and states and us all in the same room, making sure that we're all on the same page about what success looks like."

Sixkiller added the collaboration has another advantage: It helps drive engagement with communities potentially in the path of prescribed burns.

"They have the confidence that the effort that's gone into planning that activity has been thought out from soup to nuts," Sixkiller acknowledged. "And that they have a seat at the table and are being engaged and their concerns are being addressed as we go forward with that activity."


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