Life's Diversity
Wilderness safeguards large tracts of pristine habitat for fish and wildlife, including migration corridors, winter range, and breeding areas. Many imperiled species, such as the canyon tree frog, kit fox, Kachina daisy, sage grouse, and the Colorado River squawfish also depend on these areas for their survival.

Clean Water 
Preserving Colorado's wild places also maintains the quality of our rivers and drinking water by protecting watersheds from damaging activities and pollution.

Backcountry Recreation 
Wilderness provides a diverse range of recreational opportunities for anglers, hunters, hikers, horsepackers, snowshoers, backbackers, kayakers, rockclimbers, canoeists, birdwatchers, photographers, cross-country skiers, and other visitors.

Future Generations 
Protecting our last remaining wild places guarantees that we will have a place to experience the solace & spiritual rejuvenation of nature. Wilderness designation preserves our unique natural heritage for future generations to enjoy.

Cultural and Scientific Resources 
Wilderness designation protects important sites, such as the ancient Anasazi ruins of Colorado's Cross Canyon and the fossil beds in South Shale Ridge, from development and vandalism.

The Economy 
Wilderness pays large and growing economic dividends to local communities. Protected public lands increase the property values of surrounding private lands and contribute to a high quality of life that attracts new businesses and residents.

The Bush Administration's "No More Wilderness" Policy
In April 2003, Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton entered into a settlement agreement with the State of Utah in which she committed to never allow the BLM to ever again consider wilderness values or protecting those values in its planning and management processes. Secretary Norton also retroactively declared that all wilderness reviews conducted by the BLM since 1991 are illegal and void. This settlement runs contrary to existing environmental law as well as the wilderness policies of all preceding administrations since President Ronald Reagan, and is being challenged by conservationists in court.

Meanwhile, however, this "No More Wilderness" policy could have huge implications for Colorado's wildlands. For the past seven years, the BLM in Colorado was guided by its "Colorado Wilderness Review Policy" which required the agency to review citizen-proposed wilderness areas on BLM lands before proceeding with any proposals - such as oil and gas drilling - that would degrade an area's wildness. The Bush Administration's new policy, however, revokes this common-sense Colorado guidance, placing over 600,000 acres of citizen-proposed wilderness areas in Colorado at immediate risk of being developed for oil and gas development, logging, or new off-road vehicle routes -- before Congress has a chance to decide whether to designate them as wilderness (only BLM Wilderness Study Areas designated before 1991 will be safe). This means that not only will special places like Roan Plateau and Vermillion Basin not be considered for wilderness protection by the BLM, they could be drilled and roaded in the very near future