Neguse, DeGette tuck wilderness amendments into defense bill

Two Democratic members of Congress from Colorado were able to get their long-sought wilderness wishes into the $740 billion defense spending bill that passed the House Tuesday.

U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette's bill to protect nearly 1.4 million acres of wilderness in Colorado, California and Washington passed the House Tuesday afternoon as part of a National Defense Authorization Act.

The bill passed 295-125, a veto-proof majority, which matters since the president has threatened to veto the bill that calls for renaming military bases named after Confederate generals.

Joey Bunch: "The game we see in Washington is not usually the game being played. And there's no bigger football than conservation right now."

U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse of Boulder County led an amendment to add the Colorado Outdoor Recreation and Economy Act, or the CORE Act, to set aside 400,000 acres of public land in Colorado to the National Defense Authorization Act.

DeGette's bill includes 660,000 acres in 36 areas across Colorado, including the Handies Peak, Dolores River Canyon and Little Bookcliffs. About two-thirds of the areas covered by the bill already are treated as wilderness because of their remote mid-elevation ecosystems that are critical habitats for plants and wildlife, as well as opportunities for limited outdoor recreation.

The wilderness designation would protect the land from future development, including logging, mining, drilling or road building.

A Colorado Department of Natural Resources official told a congressional committee that a bill to designate more than 400,000 acres of land in the state as "protected" would benefit conservation and the local economy.

DeGette introduced the legislation in January, and House initially passed the Colorado Wilderness Act on a 231-183 vote in February. Since then, the legislation has waited in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette: "The millions of acres that this administration has agreed to open up across the country will likely be destroyed forever — and no longer be available for future generations to benefit from and enjoy."

DeGette was able to tuck the proposal into the National Defense Authorization Act as an amendment, at it ensures Colorado's High-Altitude Army National Guard Aviation Training Site will be able to operations, a sticking point in DeGette's efforts to get the bill she's been working on for two decades into law.

"The purpose behind this amendment is simple," the congresswoman from Denver said in a statement. "It's to protect more of America's public lands and to ensure some of our nation's most elite military pilots have the opportunity to train for some of the harshest environments on the planet."