Save Our Canyons

Save Our Canyons strives to educate the public and further the goals of protecting the natural environments around Salt Lake City. The group achieves this through active involvement in planning processes at city, county, state, and federal levels. It raises awareness on issues of concern through various outlets, publishing a quarterly newsletter edited by Alexis Kelner. The Save Our Canyons radio show airs on KRCL (90.9 FM) Sunday at 2:00pm.

Additionally, the group informs the media of events affecting the Wasatch Mountains as they arise. In past years, a large part of their effort went into the federal NEPA process. All four major ski resorts submitted Master Development Plans which were required to go through Environmental Analysis, including a “scoping” document, a “Draft Environmental Impact Statement” and “Final Environmental Impact Statement”. This process can take one or more years to complete.

Save Our Canyons also spends substantial time and energy working with local government entities, and their staff and elected officials, as approximately 20% of the land mass in the Wasatch Mountains is privately owned and, therefore, under the jurisdiction of these local government bodies.

Another of their major activities is the effort to get citizens actively involved in public land issues. Save Our Canyons accomplishes this through its extensive volunteering program. Presently, in cooperation with Salt Lake City Department of Public Utilities, Salt Lake County and many other stake holders, Save Our Canyons are pursuing significant expansions of existing congressionally mandated Wilderness Areas in the central Wasatch. Save Our Canyons played crucial roles in the enactment of the existing Lone Peak, Twin Peaks and Mount Olympus Wilderness Areas and believes that the proposed expansions are essential to the continued protection of Salt Lake City’s watershed.