NM panel votes to protect Mount Taylor

Comment: We need to register the Bannister River as a Protected Area, it has rare flowers, fossils, and Native American Fish Weir!!!

Posted on Fri, Jun. 05, 2009
By HEATHER CLARK
Associated Press Writer

The cultural and natural resources of New Mexico's Mount Taylor will now be protected by the state, ending a yearlong battle between American Indians and landowners all concerned about preserving their rights to use the mountain without interference.

A state committee voted unanimously Friday to list the mountain on the State Register of Cultural Properties, a state spokesman said.

The mountain, which as many as 30 Indian tribes consider sacred, is threatened by exploration and proposals for uranium mining. The mountain was listed among America's 11 most endangered historic places for 2009, which is compiled by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

The protected area includes nearly 540 square miles around the 11,301-foot summit of the western New Mexico mountain down to surrounding mesa tops.

Within the designated property are 316,456 cultural resources that are important for the tribes, including pilgrimage trails, shrines, archaeological sites, burial sites, petroglyphs and other artwork as well as natural resources, including places where minerals and plants are gathered.

It excludes private property within the boundary, a news release from the Historical Preservation Division said.

Five tribes - the pueblos of Acoma, Zuni and Laguna, the Navajo Nation and the Hopi Tribe in Arizona - nominated the protected area and worked to show why it should be preserved.

"It's a historic day for all of us, all the five nominating tribes. We're very ecstatic and very grateful," Laguna Pueblo Gov. John Antonio Sr. told The Associated Press by telephone after the meeting.

But landowners and other residents of Grants, N.M., who fought the designation feared it would inhibit their ability to visit the mountain and limit what private landowners could do on their property.

"It's a huge blow to private property rights and owners," said Marron Lee Nelson, whose family owns the largest piece of private property on Mount Taylor. "I do think lawsuits will be coming."
The debate over the designation increased racial tension between American Indians and whites in the area, some residents told the committee last month.

But tribal leaders moved quickly to assure residents that the designation would benefit everyone and that they never intended to limit access to the mountain.

"We are not taking over the mountain. We are not going to take the mountain away from anybody," Gov. Chandler Sanchez of Acoma Pueblo said.

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