Urgent: Saving UNESCO site, Chaco Canyon in New Mexico from drilling

I'm going to copy/paste what the folks over at Alt National Park Service wrote on Facebook about this. With my chronic illness, I just don't have the bandwidth this morning to do more than that. As a former resident of New Mexico, who still considers the state home, the power of rage is driving me this morning.

From Alt National Park Service:

We need your help please. Please share.

Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico is a UNESCO World Heritage Site containing over a thousand years of Indigenous history ancient ruins, sacred sites, and cultural landmarks built by the ancestors of today’s Pueblo peoples. In 2021, a protective buffer zone was created keeping 336,400 acres within 10 miles of the park off-limits to new oil and gas drilling. That protection is now under threat. The Trump administration has proposed revoking it, which would open the land surrounding one of America’s most sacred cultural sites to new drilling and development.

The damage wouldn’t be starting from scratch. Nearly 90% of the surrounding region is already leased for energy development, and existing drilling has already harmed Indigenous communities, destroyed cultural sites, and degraded air quality. The buffer zone was the last line of defense. Making matters worse, the administration is fast-tracking the rollback with only a 7-day public comment window compared to the 150 days of public input that went into creating the protections in the first place. Tribal nations, conservation groups, and 71% of New Mexico voters oppose the move. None of that appears to matter.

The comment deadline is Tuesday, April 7. Please submit a comment today at protectchaco.org. Not sure what to say? They have an auto-fill message

Additional messages they posted:

A lot of people are submitting comments to help save Chaco Culture National Historical Park and the website has been crashing. Give it a moment and refresh. This is in reference to our last post. Btw, thank you!

You can use their auto-fill message(don’t have to copy and paste ours). Btw “support Public Land Order 7923” is same as “strongly oppose revoking Public Land Order 7923”. Either wording works. 

Well, we crashed the website. Let’s try another route. It’s not as easy and doesn’t go out to as many people, but it will get the message directly to the BLM.

Click this link: https://eplanning.blm.gov/Project-Home/...

Then click the blue “Participate Now” button at the top. Fill out your information and copy and paste the message below.

I support Public Land Order 7923 and urge the BLM to select the No Action Alternative, keeping the 10-mile mineral withdrawal around Chaco Culture National Historical Park fully intact. This sacred landscape holds irreplaceable cultural and archaeological significance. The proposed rollback is being rushed through with only 7 days of public comment compared to the 150 days used to create these protections. That is not a legitimate public process. Do not open this land to oil and gas development.