Plenty of Reasons to Stop This Race

If the U.S. Bureau of Land Management really wants to demonstrate that it is a sensitive and protective steward of the California desert, the agency would decide today to cancel, or at least postpone, this year’s Thanksgiving-weekend motorcycle race from Barstow to Las Vegas. The desert does not need another 1,700 motorcycles roaring across 170 miles of terrain, much of it designated as a special scenic region, just as Congress is attempting to decide the proper level of protection for these fragile lands and, indeed, whether the BLM is the agency to be managing them.

The reasons for halting this year’s race are even more compelling than in the past. The Department of the Interior, the BLM’s parent agency, declared the desert tortoise an endangered species several months ago. The race course would go directly through some prime desert tortoise habitat. But so far, the BLM has resisted requests from conservation organizations that it conduct a new environmental impact study before attempting to justify further races on questionable grounds that the effect on the desert is acceptable. The desert tortoise population has declined at an alarming rate in recent years and no such activity should be allowed until it is clear that the tortoise will not be endangered even further by an event officially sanctioned by the federal government.

The BLM’s casual methods were emphasized again recently after the race sponsor acknowledged he bulldozed 5 1/2 miles of the race course before he had permission to do so. The sponsor said he just assumed he would get the BLM permit “and so I just went down and did it.” The BLM issued a trespass notice only after the illegal earth-moving was called to its attention by the office of Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.).

The desert deserves better. If the BLM will not see to it, then Congress or the courts should.