Obama should act on monument

By Jane Feldman, Las Vegas

Friday, June 24, 2016 | 2 a.m.

I was happy to see that the Sun carried two articles about President Barack Obama’s visit to Yosemite National Park.

The American people have a love affair with our national parks. We recognize Half Dome, even those of us who haven’t seen it in person. In Las Vegas, we are blessed with national parks and monuments so close to us. We are in a region of incredible beauty, ancient cultural sites, and fragile desert ecosystems that need size and care to thrive.

I’m urging President Obama to act quickly to designate a Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument. This proposed new monument will protect an additional length of the Colorado River, and it will connect the Grand Canyon National Park to two monuments that extend into Utah. It hurts to think about the contaminated water from an abandoned uranium mine on the canyon’s south rim that is poisoning a spring-fed creek deep within the canyon. On the north rim, there is a moratorium on uranium mining, but only for another 16 years; it’s a moratorium that needs to be made permanent. The monuments must be protected from threats like toxic uranium mining.

The Greater Grand Canyon needs to be permanently safeguarded​, for us and for future generations.​