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Tori Woodard's Nuke Notes

ESCALANTE  --  Relations between environmentalists and traditional rural Utahns has hit a new low in this remote southern Utah ranching community.

A pair of pro-environmental residents here say they have been the victims of vandalism, death threats, harassment and intimidating phone calls. And at a recent public hearing on wilderness in Escalante, a representative of the Utah Wilderness Coalition (UWC) was threatened by an angry crowd of locals, one of whom pulled a knife and slashed two stacks of UWC bumper stickers.

"Fevers are running high," said Larry Vensel, a U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) law enforcement officer who witnessed some of the harassment. The BLM has since ordered its rangers to be in uniform at the wilderness hearings, one of which will be held tonight in Salt Lake City.

Rural Utahns feel increasingly threatened by federal actions that could limit their ability to earn a living off the land. One such action is the recent delay of construction on a new reservoir proposed on BLM land in the upper Escalante River drainages.

Among the opponents of the reservoir are Patrick Diehl and Tori Woodard, who moved to Escalante from California last summer. In town meetings and letters to the editor in The Garfield County News, they have espoused land trusts, questioned rural residents' stewardship of the land and opposed a uranium mill near Ticaboo.

To Escalante residents, the final insult came on April 11, when Diehl suggested in a Salt Lake Tribune story that the town's farmers and ranchers want the new reservoir not for agriculture but ultimately for more lucrative residential development. Diehl also criticized the reservoir for its potential to harm the river ecosystem downstream, and he said the proposal needs more study.

The privately owned New Escalante Irrigation Co. (NEIC) already had arranged for the Utah National Guard to do preliminary construction on the reservoir bottom. Guard troops with heavy equipment were in town the week of April 12. Then, on April 15, the BLM informed the state and irrigation company that the project could not proceed, pending further study. The announcement infuriated many Escalante residents. That night, someone re-arranged an irrigation pipe on Diehl and Woodard's property, opening a valve so that water coursed into an excavation the couple had recently dug for a shop and studio.

An estimated 32,000 gallons flowed into the excavation until the next morning, when NEIC water master Pat Coughlin knocked on the couple's door. Coughlin informed Diehl and Woodard that they had an "open pipe" on their property, in violation of irrigation company rules. A week later, the NEIC board sent Diehl and Woodard a notice of violation, ordering them to pay a $1,150 fine. Diehl said the fine is unjust because he and Woodard were victims of vandalism, which will cost them about $500 to repair. Diehl blames pro-reservoir fervor for the irrigation-pipe vandalism.

Irrigation company board members, however, have implied Diehl and Woodard were responsible for the errant water, either through negligence or as a publicity stunt. They insist that fines of this type are common and that the board is not singling out Diehl and Woodard.

Garfield County Deputy Sheriff Monte Luker has sided with the couple. "I feel it was a vandalism and do not think [Diehl and Woodard] were involved," said Luker, who was a Salt Lake City police officer for 28 years. Escalante Police Chief Dennis Isheim declined to discuss the incident.

Diehl plans to appeal the fine to the board. Outraged at how Diehl has been treated in Escalante, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance plans to provide an attorney. Diehl will be in the unenviable position of pleading his case before a board composed of people who would have benefited from the reservoir proj-ect he opposed.

Among those people is board member Barry Barnson, a 31-year resident of Escalante who acknowledged leading the vocal fury against Diehl. "I'm a man of few words, and when I speak, they are real harsh," said Barnson. "The thing that got Patrick Diehl in trouble is he took the route that we're a bunch of idiots." Coughlin agreed there are many irrigation company shareholders upset at Diehl. "That reservoir is our lifeline. Our livelihood depends on our water storage."

The irrigation company currently draws water from the Wide Hollow Dam, whose reservoir has silted up during the past few years to the point where it can hold just 1,000 acre-feet of water (an acre-foot equals 325,851 gallons. It takes about 5 acre-feet of water to grow a season's worth of alfalfa on an acre of land in Escalante). By July or August, the irrigation company is usually out of water. The proposed new $7.5 million reservoir would provide an additional 6,100 acre-feet of water storage, allowing ranchers to grow alfalfa throughout the fall.

After the irrigation-pipe incident, Diehl and Woodard circulated a petition asking residents to support their First Amendment rights to debate public-policy issues without fear of retribution. Only a handful of people have signed it. On April 22, Woodard said, she received an anonymous phone call from a man who told her, "I wouldn't sleep too sound if I was you." Though police have advised Diehl and Woodard to tone down their public rhetoric, they refuse, saying they are fighting for their free-speech rights.

They are not getting a lot of sympathy from Escalante Mayor Lenza Wilson, who said he regrets Diehl and Woodard have been threatened, but noted they have brought it upon themselves. "The jury [of local public opinion] has returned a very strong verdict, and they are not welcome here," Wilson said. "They need a better grip on Escalante's background, customs and culture."

Diehl and Woodard are not the only ones feeling unwelcome in Escalante lately. On April 23, the BLM held a public open house at Escalante High School to discuss the agency's new plan for adding federal lands to the inventory of "wilderness study areas."

Representing the UWC at that meeting was Bob Walton of Salt Lake City. Walton displayed stacks of UWC literature and bumper stickers in the lobby. A man wearing a large hat grabbed the stickers, cut them in half with a large hunting knife then threw them in a garbage can. The man said words to the effect, "This is garbage. We won't have any of this here," Walton said. A short time later, Walton put out more UWC literature and stickers in the lobby. The same man returned and destroyed the materials in the same manner.

"Soon after that, a rather large group of folks began to gather around me, verbally harassing and threatening me," Walton wrote in a report to Escalante police. "One person said, `We ought to kill you.' "Walton then retreated into the BLM meeting and asked the BLM for an escort to his car. "It's a real shame. I feel I have to watch my back now in Escalante. That's disheartening because it's a place I love" said Walton, a sixth-generation Utahn.

Barnson said the threats should not be taken at face value but as the fallout of traditional residents feeling increasingly frustrated and powerless in the rapidly changing politics of federal land management. "Patrick Diehl's not going to be killed," Barnson said. "He's not going to be hung. But he's going to take his fair share of verbal abuse as long as he keeps insulting our intelligence."

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