ST. GEORGE — Community members showed up in large numbers at St. George City Hall Thursday to express frustration about a controversial tortoise habitat expansion bill making its way to U.S. Congress that no one in the general public has been allowed to see.

Despite the public outcry, the St. George City Council approved a resolution in support of the Desert Tortoise Habitat Conservation Plan Expansion Act, which would expand the Red Cliff Desert Reserve by about 6,900 acres west of Bloomington and south of Santa Clara in exchange for a right-of-way for a new east-west northern corridor through a portion of the reserve’s existing boundaries.

“We are treating ourselves poorly. I don’t think we need an east-west corridor,” St. George resident Craig Booth said during the meeting’s public comment period. “It is across the ground where the deer and the antelope play, brothers and sisters. We will ruin it with a northern corridor.”

Booth was joined by several other St. George residents in expressing apprehension for the implications of the congressional bill.

“Why is the county in a hurry to get through congressional legislation,” city resident Richard Spotts asked. “I believe the rush is to take advantage of a very tilted political climate and try to ram through a one-sided wish list and not go through the normal process of objective scientific analysis, objective evaluation of feasible alternatives and meaningful public involvement.”

Of chief concern to most of the people who commented was the fact that no one besides government officials have yet been allowed to see the bill, which was proposed by the Washington County Commission with support from U.S. Rep. Chris Stewart.

“We would like more of the language,” rock climbing enthusiast Tyler Webb said. “We want to just see the legislation to make sure that it has our trails and our rock climbing areas that we all go to — mountain biking — as far as our future access to it.”

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