On Point: Taking on the Army

Published February 16, 2007 at midnight

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Want to bend your mind around the magnitude of 418,000 acres - the amount of land the Army plans to "acquire" to expand a training facility in southern Colorado?

Think of roughly 650 square miles - or more than four times the size of the city of Denver.

Or think of the entire developed metro area - except that even it doesn't encompass as much land as the Army now has its eye on.

What the Army covets is a monster territory that it would add to the 238,000 acres that already comprise the giant Piñon Canyon Maneuver Site.

Giving our troops what they need should be everybody's goal. But what if the military insists the troops need a ranch that's been in someone's family for generations?

What if they "need" many such ranches and farms, and what if the owners don't want to sell them?

What if the property cannot be acquired without first condemning it?

Then the prudent citizen follows the lead of U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, the Republican representing Colorado's 4th Congressional District, and denounces this proposed land grab and assault on rural Colorado for what it is.

"I am astonished that they would go after such a large portion of this beautiful part of our state," Musgrave declared Wednesday in announcing her outright opposition to the expansion. "I am extremely disappointed in the handling of their announcement because the Army did not even include local officials in their notification. I spoke today with officials at the Pentagon and expressed my unequivocal opposition to the use of eminent domain and condemnation. . . . Sitting in the chairs in the Pentagon, Army brass has no idea what a negative impact this massive expansion is going to have on our area."

Musgrave has been a bulldog on this issue for the better part of a year, more so than any other lawmaker in the state delegation. She's issued press releases, peppered Pentagon officials with letters, even authored legislation to bar the military from expanding the Piñon Canyon site using condemnation (Sen. Wayne Allard introduced the same bill in the Senate).

So it must be in her district, right?

Wrong, although it's next door to the 4th and will gravely impact it. But that aside, Musgrave just doesn't like contemplating the possibility of farmers and ranchers being bullied off their property. And maybe she also doesn't like the idea of the federal government gobbling up yet another chunk of this state: The feds already own, among various agencies, more than 35 percent of Colorado.

New Gov. Bill Ritter, who ran on a platform of protecting rural Colorado, said Wednesday that "nobody's voice should be left out of a discussion that involves private property rights."

That's a start, governor, but crank up the volume. With your party in charge of Congress, southern Coloradans are going to need more pushy allies than Musgrave to beat back this threat.

Vincent Carroll is editor of the editorial pages. Reach him at carrollv@RockyMountainNews.com.

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