Illinoisan gets involved in Kane road dispute

WASHINGTON — A prominent Democratic senator from Illinois is demanding that Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton intervene in a long-running road dispute between Kane County and the Bureau of Land Management.

Bring it on, responds Kane County Commissioner Mark Habbeshaw. "I fully support intervention at the highest levels, including the Congress and Secretary Norton. That's what we've been asking for."

Sen. Richard Durbin, whose motives for intervention are opposite to Habbeshaw's, hinted that he will hold up the Senate confirmation of Patricia Lynn Scarlett to be deputy secretary if Norton doesn't get involved.

"The action taken by Kane County officials defies the authority and responsibility of the department to manage the federal lands entrusted to your stewardship," Durbin wrote. "This current situation is a direct consequence of the department's failure to take action against Kane County when the county removed over 30 BLM route signs nearly two years ago."

"The department's lack of enforcement of BLM policy has emboldened the county and these individuals to increase their defiance of federal law," he added.

Durbin's May 26 letter is the latest salvo in a two-year feud between Kane County and the BLM, which manages the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and numerous proposed wilderness areas in the county.

In August 2003, the BLM put up 31 signs closing off certain dirt roads in the monument. And that prompted Habbeshaw and Sheriff Lamont Smith to take the signs down, saying the county owned the routes under a 19th-century law known as RS2477.

The county then began putting up its own "road open" signs in areas the BLM had designated closed.

"The county's placement of more than 100 illegal road signs throughout the monument directing ORVs to areas formally closed to ORV use directly contradicts the county's earlier agreement, and indicates that a binding, permanent resolution to this issue is now required," Durbin wrote.

Earlier this year, the county began posting signs designating off-road vehicle routes in a wilderness study area, setting off another round of charges and accusations. Habbeshaw said the county plans to eventually post signs on all roads the county claims under RS2477, according to Associated Press.

Durbin wants answers from Norton as to what specific legal steps the department intends to take to force Kane County to permanently remove all road signs illegally placed on BLM lands in the county.