Tribes and Feds Agree On Fort Wingate Restoration

Above, the front entrance to the Fort Wingate Army Depot. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

About 10 miles west of my home (as the crow flies), Fort Wingate sits unused since 1993. It is a former Army depot.

Two tribes have come to an agreement with the federal government on future restoration of the Fort Wingate property.

AP News (Associated Press) reported:

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Two Native American tribes, the state of New Mexico and the U.S. Army have finalized a restoration plan for a former military installation near Gallup.

Explosives and munitions were stored and disposed of at Fort Wingate until it closed in 1993.

The Navajo Nation, Zuni Pueblo and the New Mexico Office of Natural Resources Trustee reached an agreement with the federal government in March 2022 to settle claims that land, water and cultural resources were negatively impacted by hazardous substances at the site.

The site now is undergoing environmental cleanup before the tract of land can be transferred to the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs to benefit the two tribes. Both tribes have long-standing historical ties to the lands in and around Fort Wingate, which sits on about 24 square miles (62 square kilometers). The land is almost entirely surrounded by federally owned or administered lands, including national forest and tribal lands.

To read more, go here. 

Senate Passes The Great American Outdoors Act

Above, Lower Yellowstone Falls of the Yellowstone River. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

The Republican-led U.S. Senate has passed the Great American Outdoors Act which will fund the backlogged maintenance projects of our national parks in a rare show of bi-partisanship.

According to the Good News Network:

In a rare moment of bipartisanship on Capitol Hill, Democrats and Republicans in the Senate voted 73-25 to pass the Great American Outdoors Act, a funding bill that one lawmaker called the “single greatest conservation achievement in generations.” 

The Outdoors Act creates a fund into which not less than 50% of all revenues made from energy production on public lands—from oil and gas drilling and renewables—to be dedicated to finally funding over $20 billion worth of delayed maintenance projects in America’s national parks and public lands. 

70% of the fund’s contents will go to the National Parks Service for projects in America’s national parks, encompassing over 400 places of historic, recreational, and scientific importance, from the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone to the Appomattox Courthouse and Statue of Liberty. Another 15% will go to the Forest Service, for maintenance on public lands, while 5% will be given to the Bureau of Indian Education, the Bureau of Land Management, and the Fish and Wildlife Service respectively.

The bill now goes over to the House of Representatives. If passed in the House, it will then go to President Trump for signature.

To read more, go here. 

Fort Wingate: Tribal Park or National Monument?

Above, the area of Fort Wingate the task force wants to preserve. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

There is a 500 "patch of land" near Fort Wingate that the Old Fort Wingate Task Force wants to transfer from the control of the Bureau of Indian Affairs to the National Park Service. It is then hoped that once the transfer is complete, the task force hopes to work with the NPS to establish the 500 acres as a tribal park or as a national monument.

Above, task force president Martin
Link. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Heading the Old Fort Wingate Task Force is its president, Martin Link. Link, as many readers of this blog knows, is a local Gallup, New Mexico historian and writer and it is at his residence in Gallup that I attend monthly dinners.

Several of Fort Wingate's buildings have been saved from near-demolition under the Bureau of Indian Affairs, despite several of them are on the National Register of Historic Places.

John Taylor, secretary for the task force, says the ultimate goal is to preserve the fort as a depiction of living history. The land will be either transferred to the Navajo Nation as a tribal park or to the National Park Service as a national monument.

The proposed tribal park or national monument would not involve the land of the Army Depot section of Fort Wingate which contains the ordnance storage bunkers.

Above, the entrance to the Army depot section of Fort Wingate. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Martin Link hinted at last month's dinner that things were beginning to happen with Fort Wingate. The biggest issue standing in the way is funding.

Source: Gallup Sun.