an opportunity to tell us what issues are important to you. That meeting will be in three weeks. That’s really all I wanted to say, but I hope that clears up some rumors. I’m sure some of you have questions, and Angie and I want to answer them.” Joe looked around the group.
A woman stepped forward, jaw quivering. She raised a hand and pointed at Joe. “Shame on you! Shame on you!” she said, loudly. Her eyes glared. “First you open the park to commercial logging, and now you want to let developers build roads all over the monument. Why can’t you just do your job? Why can’t you do what you’re supposed to do? Shame on you!”
Joe cocked his head, keeping an eye on the woman. It was a subtle sign of anger that only his staff knew how to read.
Jack looked around the crowd. The ranchers in the back shifted nervously, watching the woman, and watching Joe.
Morgan took in a deep breath, and the words came blurting out. “Ma’am, do you really think we’re just sitting around, thinking about the kinds of evil we can do on any given day?” His eyes rolled. “I don’t know who you’re talking to, but they’re feeding you a line of bull. First of all, there is no commercial logging going on in the park, only a project to thin an overgrown forest and reduce the chance of a catastrophic fire. Second, there have been no decisions made regarding the monument, especially about roads. Someone’s feeding you a line, and I would advise you to listen to someone who’s a little better informed.” Joe glared back at her.
She lowered her shoulders and melted into the crowd.
Joe looked around. “Other comments?”
No one responded. No one dared.
“Questions? Please.”
Finally, a woman stood up from a park bench. “I hope you’ll base your decisions on science, not politics or pressure. I am concerned about new roads.”
Morgan smiled, trying to reestablish his rapport with the group. “Yes, ma’am, I understand. To build a new road, we would need to have a specific public purpose, or a special piece of legislation to allow it. And information to support a decision, one way or the other.”
A young Anglo wearing jeans, boots and a baseball cap, stepped forward and said, “I was told you’d deny wanting to get rid of grazing in the monument. And, I was told you’ve already made up your mind to do it. What do you say to that?”
Morgan gave him a tired, sympathetic look. “Son, I hear those things myself. There’s not much I can do to disprove the myth, other than to prove to you, as we write this plan, that you and the other members of the public will influence the direction for managing this monument. I wish I could say, ‘just trust us’, and have it magically be so, but it doesn’t work that way. We’ll have to earn your trust. I’m confident we will.”
“I am appalled at the arrogance of the Park Service and the BLM, and all the federal government,” said a man standing behind the bench. He frowned and shifted his weight. “You come in here saying a few nice words. Words you don’t mean. But the fact that you’re even here is an insult. We don’t want your national monument. We don’t want no change. Things were fine the way they were.”
Talk started.
“You’re wrong, we do want the national monument,” said an older, mustachioed man.
“No, we don’t,” said the other. “We don’t need the feds coming in here and telling us what to do. And we don’t need you environmentalists doing it either.”
Joe raised his hands. “Folks…folks…the monument was created. What more can I say?”
The thought settled them.
“Well, just un-create it!”
“Not a chance!”
Joe crossed his arms. “Folks! I didn’t invite you here to argue. I invited you here to dispel some rumors and answer your questions.”
“Why should we believe you?” said a Hispanic fellow along the side. He looked like a rancher. “You’re part of the government. You want to make your bosses in Washington happy, not us. You’ve got your mind made up, and I was told that getting rid of cattle and sheep is the first thing you want to do.”
“That would be great! Do it,” came a low, soft-spoken voice from somewhere along the other side.
“Who said that?” the old rancher hollered.
Several environmentalists turned. Harold Grimmsley held his gaze on Joe Morgan. The line of his jaw—visible because his hair was pulled back in a pony tail—suggested he was ready to throw more gas on the fire.
A rancher in a brown hat raised his hand. Joe nodded for him to speak.
“I’ve got to admit, I’m concerned, too,” he said. “I’ve heard the same thing these other fellers are talkin about…from reliable sources. They tell me…that you…and I was told it was you, the Superintendent of Piedras Coloradas…that you were working with those people over there.” He turned his eye in the direction of the environmentalists. “If that’s the case,” he said, his anger growing, “we’re gonna fight you every step of the way, and on everything you try to do.”
Joe looked over at Jack.
Jack felt a thump in his chest. He cleared his throat. “Should I speak to this?”
“Please,” Joe said. “This is Jack Chastain. One of my staff.”
A voice called out, “He’s just another lyin’ fed.”
“Hey,” Joe shouted back, angrily. “If you want to abuse someone, direct your comments at me. Jack’s not paid to take that kind of treatment.”
“If he’s a fed, he’s fair game.”
“Yeah, right,” Joe said, sarcastically. “Be careful what you ask for.” He flashed an apologetic look at Jack. “Never mind.”
“It’s okay, Joe,” Jack said. He turned to the rancher in the brown hat, and studied his face. “May I ask you a question?” He got a nod. “Is it possible that this person who told you those things…that we might eliminate grazing…is it possible that they were just confusing the park and the monument? After all, it can be confusing.” He waited for the response.
The man looked around. “I don’t think so,” he said. He looked back at a group standing behind a park bench.
“There’s a reason I ask,” Jack continued. “The proclamation expressly allows grazing.”
“That is the case,” agreed Angie Manriquez.
Jack waited for a response from the rancher, but he gave none. “Would you do me a favor?”
The rancher gave another nod.
“Whoever gave you that information, would you give them my name? They could contact me, and I’d be happy to talk to them. I can even send them—and you—a copy of the Presidential proclamation. Yes, I know you don’t like it, and it can be confusing, but it might give them, and you, some comfort, just to read it.”
“Sure,”
