CMC mission
demands environmental stance on issues

Skip Schweiss writes in the December-January issue of Trail & Timberline that he wishes the CMC would refrain from getting involved politically in environmental issues. He says the CMC should “stick to its knitting,” implying that the only thing we know about or should be doing is hiking in the mountains.

Our mission statement says in part that we are organized to “encourage the preservation of forests, flowers, fauna, and natural scenery and render readily accessible the alpine attractions of the region.” With tremendous pressure from multiple parties to develop our lands, it’s impossible to follow our mission without taking stands on environmental issues. If we fail to protect the areas we love, their virtues can be lost forever, and our mission will have failed.

—Ryk McDorman
Denver Group

October Wild Colorado articles praised and bipartisan environmentalism encouraged

Thanks for the especially informative articles (and the great art!) in the October-November 2003 issue of Trail & Timberline. The articles by Tony Massaro, Vera Smith, and Kurt Kunkle were frightening but should represent a call to action for the club and its members.

Although it is with dismay that I read about the voting records of our state and congressional delegation, and the threats to Dinosaur Monument, it is information that we as CMC members sorely need. If we are to continue to enjoy the Colorado outdoors, it appears more and more that we must be actively involved in the campaigns to protect our state from destruction of all kinds. What kind of organization are we if we fail to take action on the appalling attacks on the natural values we all love and enjoy?

It is unfortunate that conservation and the environment have become largely partisan issues in Colorado, as you can see from the voting records. It has not always been so, and even now some areas of the country, such as the northeast, enjoy a bipartisan support for protecting natural values. Maybe it’s because they have so little left. At the rate we are going, Colorado could be like the northeast someday—and in the not-so-distant future.

Protecting the places we all love should be a bipartisan effort, and we need to work with our personally-chosen political candidates, Republican or Democrat, to let them know where we stand.

What kind of Colorado do we want to leave for future Coloradans?

—Erick Finstick