Oppose the Northern Rockies Land Grab! Take Action Here Dear Colleague: The Roundtable is deeply concerned with legislation, introduced by Connecticut Representatives Carolyn Maloney and a group of primarily non-Western Members of Congress. The Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act (H.R. 980) would designate 24 million acres of mostly Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service lands in five states as federal wilderness areas. H.R. 980 is an attempt -- primarily by interests from outside the region -- to cram these designations down the throats of the West. The bill would designate 9.5 million acres of wilderness in Idaho; seven million acres in Montana; five million acres in Wyoming; and 1.25 million acres in Oregon and Washington combined. We believe that this bill, if passed, will damage public access and recreation in many states across the West, stymie efforts to meet our nation’s energy needs (including renewable energy expansion) and wreak havoc with already struggling local economies. It is not surprising that the bill lacks support from any of the effected states’ Congressional delegations. Wyoming Representative Cynthia Lummis summed it up at a recent hearing on the bill: “…Perhaps the worst aspects of this legislation have as much to do with its approach as with the content. Any legislator worth his or her salt knows that good policy making comes from the ground up. The most basic governing principle upon which our nation was founded is: ‘by the people, for the people.’ The sponsors of H.R. 980 have either forgotten this edict or have simply chosen to ignore it.” Join the Roundtable and citizens from across the West and add your name to our bipartisan petition in opposition to this legislation. Click here to review and sign our citizen petition. We are also preparing to launch a nationwide grassroots campaign to generate thousands of individual communications to elected officials in opposition to this campaign.� Please support these efforts and send a pre-drafted communication to your elected official by clicking here. Thank you for continuing to let your voice be heard! Sincerely, James Sims President & CEO Western Business Roundtable

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