This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2007, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Some of Utah's most beautiful rivers and tributaries have a chance to earn the federal Wild and Scenic Rivers designation, which could protect them from dams and impacts from oil and gas drilling while preserving the scenery and outdoor recreation.

Whether they will, though, is another question entirely.

It has taken many years for the U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Bureau of Land Management to take the steps mandated by the 1968 Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. The Forest Service has completed a statewide assessment of more than 85 rivers and the BLM is working to finish a district-by-district evaluation of its waterways. Both agencies hope to finish their work within the next year and a half.

At the same time those efforts are moving forward, however, the state's rural counties are fighting hard to avoid the federal protections they say are unnecessary and would only interfere with grazing, livestock operations, water rights and energy development. The resistance could scuttle the entire effort, because county support is considered critical to necessary congressional approval.

In fact, one county's objections, voiced by a powerful anti-wilderness official, have been so strenuous that they prompted the feds to add significant limitations to the 40-year-old law that will affect any state's future attempts to name more wild and scenic rivers.

San Juan County Commissioner Lynn Stevens, formerly Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.'s public lands policy coordinator, takes credit for the muscle. And he insists that none of the rivers in his remote county - including those in the Dark Canyon Wilderness and Dark Canyon Primitive Area - ought to be considered wild and scenic.

"I do not think the public would be better served by these designations than they are served by these streams and streambeds as they are now," said Stevens. "I contend the public is being adequately served."

Utah is just one of nine states that don't have any wild and scenic rivers and just one of two Western states - Nevada is the other - whose free-flowing waters haven't been granted the special status.

Under federal law, to be eligible for wild and scenic protection a river or stream must be free-flowing and demonstrate at least one "outstandingly remarkable value" including scenic, recreational, wildlife, geological, historic or cultural. Segments of rivers can be considered. While the law was meant to limit dam-building, a river can have a dam upstream or downstream of a protected segment.

The rivers must also be free of "impoundments," but only under the "wild" designation must it remain essentially primitive. Minerals development may not occur within a quarter-mile of a wild river or stream's high-water line. However, scenic and recreational rivers would be readily accessible and may be developed for public use.

Stevens dismisses scenery as a reason for river protections. "There are very few places in Utah that don't have scenic value," he said.

But his biggest complaint is about waterways that don't always have water in them. Such intermittent or ephemeral streams are not proper candidates for protection.

State law backs Stevens' objections, and has resulted in a 2004 clarifying memo from the U.S. Department of Interior. Most significantly, the memo states that protection should be based on the outstandingly remarkable values that are in the river itself or on its immediate shore, that are crucial to the river ecosystem or owe their existence to the presence of the river.

Margaret Kelsey, who is overseeing the BLM river process as field offices revise their land use plans, said the memo resulted from counties' dislike of the whole process.

"We wanted to have policy clarified so we wouldn't make a mistake," she said. "The guidance went nationwide."

And it will restrict future evaluations of rivers for wild and scenic values, said Mark Danenhauer, spokesman for the Utah Rivers Council.

"It makes it harder to say, 'This geology is directly related to this river,' " he said. ''Is it related today? Or is it back in history? Is the geology today more related to wind erosion than to water? It makes it much harder to say a river has a value.''

During his term as San Juan County Commission chairman, Stevens also helped force changes to the Manti-La Sal National Forest's 2003 final eligibility study that declared 14 rivers and tributaries were possible wild and scenic candidates.

Back-room discussions whittled those considered eligible to six through a 2006 supplemental memo that wasn't released publicly until after the Utah Rivers Council found out about it this past spring.

Adding to the murk, an announcement about an upcoming open house in San Juan County - the first in the Forest Service's attempts to find which eligible Utah rivers are suitable for protection - lists four eligible waterways that previously disappeared from the list but none of those that survived the first purge; again without public explanation.

Manti-La Sal river specialist Ann King said "guidance" prompted a new look at the county's rivers. The BLM already had eliminated ephemeral streams from consideration in its wild and scenic evaluations, so the Forest Service followed suit, King said. But essentially, the 2003 eligibility list the Forest Service thought was final, wasn't.

"Words and meanings and definitions were very confusing. It could have been our lack of understanding," she said.

Ultimately, the Forest Service will decide which rivers are suitable for wild and scenic protection. At the same time, she said, "if the state were to violently oppose something, I'm not sure what kind of support it would get from the congressional delegation."

Stevens said the list revisions came after "professional, affable discussion" focused on a Utah law that says wild and scenic designations can only happen to rivers that have water in them all the time. To him, dry washes don't qualify.

Neither do intermittent streams that may feed larger rivers, he said. Nor should rivers or streams that flow in a wilderness area have added protection.

But the BLM's Kelsey said the wilderness designation generally doesn't include river protection.

Rivers Council spokesman Danenhauer said that what may seem like a dual designation actually is necessary to protect the rivers. "There have been instances in the past where dams have gone into wilderness areas," which wouldn't be allowed under wild and scenic law, he said.

Another objection from the counties is that once the Forest Service declares a waterway eligible, it must be managed as if it already has wild and scenic designation.

Former Assistant Attorney General Mark Ward, now representing the Utah Association of Counties, said that could affect ranchers' ability to divert water for crops or livestock. A stock pond might be considered an illegal impoundment.

In the Uinta Basin, Ward said, restrictions on the White River could inhibit or forbid oil and gas development along wide swaths of land next to the river.

Counties have indicated to UAC that only a segment of the Green River and perhaps part of the Colorado deserve wild and scenic designation.

This doesn't mean the counties are against protecting water quality or wildlife, Ward said. But they want nothing to do with hands-off wilderness-style rules.

"We're all about protection. We're all about conservation," Ward said. "We just don't agree on this model."

Danenhauer said Ward said the same thing to him.

"We know there's a lot of misunderstanding out there," he said. "We really are trying to educate people so they understand what [wild and scenic] means and what it doesn't mean, so they can make decisions based on facts rather than on fears."

* The U.S. Forest Service, which has completed a statewide inventory of potential Utah wild and scenic rivers, will hold an open house to inform the public about the suitability of the state's rivers for the federal designation. The open house will run from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the San Juan County Courthouse in Monticello.

* For more information, including maps and the history and application of the 1968 Wild and Scenic Rivers Act: http://www.fs.fed.us/r4/

rivers/overview act.shtml

* The U.S. Bureau of Land Management also is evaluating rivers for wild and scenic designation. For more information: http://www.ut.blm.gov/landuseplanning/index.htm