When Environmentalists go to Court
Rather than try to talk around the issue, I’ll make it clear at the outset that the subject of this column is indeed the Pikes Peak Highway. The City of Colorado Springs has received the results of yet another study—how many is it now?—and yet no clear plan of action to correct problems attributable to the highway is on the horizon, at least as far as we can tell. We are encouraged that City Council and other city officials finally acknowledge that problems exist in the highway corridor, but this should have occurred years ago (or several studies ago!). At this point those who have been calling for solutions ranging from drainage projects to the paving of the highway itself have a number of options. These include working through the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process soon to begin with respect to management of the highway and the peak as a whole, continuing to exert pressure on the city to implement the recommendations of the various studies it has commissioned over the years, or going to court.
Contrary to what the media and others who make it their business to oppose the so-called "environmental agenda" would have us believe, environmental groups such as the Sierra Club do not jump at the opportunity to drag government agencies and individuals into the courtroom. Legal actions to enforce environmental laws and regulations are undertaken most frequently with extreme reluctance and after all other avenues to resolve a problem have been explored and attempted.. Environmentalists, if anything, are overly patient and reticent about lawsuits. Why is this? Quite simply, legal action requires a significant commitment on the part of organizations such as ours, both in terms of financial resources and time. The Sierra Club, both at the national and local levels, chooses its opportunities carefully. Again, contrary to popular thinking, we have only limited resources to undertake these sorts of actions and can ill afford to expend them frivolously. When a Sierra Club group explores the option of going to court, these considerations are magnified simply because its resources, particularly financial ones, are held particularly dear. There are many other ways we can spend our limited funds.
Fundraising is always difficult for small volunteer organizations, and this more than anything discourages resorting to the courts when remedies are unavailable elsewhere. We all know very few lawyers who work for free, and although environmental groups probably get more bang for the legal buck expended than others because of the dedication, skill, and selflessness of the lawyers who represent us, it remains an expensive course of action. Most cases require expert witnesses who also seldom donate their time and expertise. Clearly, a decision to go to court is one reached only after serious and careful consideration and following concerted efforts to resolve the issue by other means available.
So what does all this mean with regards to the Pikes
Peak Highway? It means that like many other seemingly intractable problems in today’s
world, executive and representative governmental bodies, in this case the City of Colorado
Springs and its City Council, apparently lack the courage, the ideas, or the vision to
address in a prompt and effective manner what in the eyes of any reasonable person is the
serious degradation of environmental conditions in the Pikes Peak Highway corridor. We
have explored the story behind this regrettable state of affairs in previous columns, and
it would be easy to continue explaining away inaction on the part of the City by citing
the historical anachronisms which continue to hold much of the West in their grip,
preventing it from solving the dilemmas which pit the old West against the new. As
I’ve said before, we can and must do better. We owe it to ourselves and to the future
members of our communities who we can only hope will not have to live with the
consequences of our inaction and puzzle over our inability to do the right thing when the
opportunity presented itself.
by Rick Eckert 6/97
This was taken from the regularly featured column in the Timberlines Newsletter, published bimonthly by the Pikes Peak Chapter.
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131 Williams Street, Colorado Springs, CO 80905-1413 - Phone: (719) 592-0963
Last updated February 12, 1999.