By a narrow 4-3 margin the Grand County Council voted July 7 to send a letter to Bureau of Land Mangement officials in Vernal concerning an environmental assessment of what is now called the Seep Ridge Road. The letter asks that Grand County be included as a stakeholder in the planning process.

The letter also objects to the “segmentation” of the assessment because it “does not address the impacts on Grand County of increased oil shale development, recreation, or environmental effects of this road so close to our northern border.” The letter calls that segmentation a violation of the law.

Uintah County’s proposal for the Seep Ridge Road is less grandiose than the original Book Cliffs Road that was proposed in the late 1980s. That proposal led county citizens to vote in 1992 to change in the form of Grand County’s government from a three-member commission to a seven-member council.

Immediately upon taking office, that new council dissolved the Grand County Roads Special Service District that Grand County’s three-person commission had established to build the Book Cliffs Road.

The current proposal would widen existing rights-of-way of existing roads from 66 to 150 feet over a 44.5-mile stretch between Ouray in Uintah County to the boundary between Uintah and Grand County. That stretch, which is currently graveled, would be blacktopped to serve many gas wells along the way, according to the plan.

Grand County Council members Audrey Graham, Chris Conrad, Chris Baird, and Bob Greenberg, said that paving the road to the county line would put inexorable pressure on Grand County to pave, or allow Uintah County to pave a road from the county line to I-70.

Graham, Conrad, Baird and Greenberg argued that because of the potential costs imposed on Grand County it is appropriate to ask the BLM to include Grand as a stakeholder in the current planning process and for the county to object to the “segmentation” aspect of the assessment.

“I’m not necessarily against [paving in Uintah County], but we should have a say,” Graham said.

“This is a continuation of a major gas [well] road. It does not put pressure on us to black top any of our roads,” council member Gene Ciarus said. He added that the only thing the proposal does is limit dust stirred up by trucks on Seep Ridge.

In fact, while the “environmental consequences” section of the assessment states that paving the road would decrease dust, the “no action” analysis states: “The continued dust levels produced by vehicle traffic along the unpaved Seep Ridge Road would not result in an exceedance of current air quality standards.”

“The big issue is segmenting the environmental assessment. I’d almost call it sleazy. It’s not quite right,” Baird said, arguing that the assessment should include Grand County.

“If Uintah County said, ‘if you’ll let us we’ll build [the Grand County section] and maintain it,’ what would the Grand County Council’s position be? I don’t know,” Greenberg said.

Greenberg agreed that segmentation is the issue and that Grand voters will not allow any county funds to go to the paving the road to I-70. But he said he feared that expanding the environmental assessment to Grand County might actually increase pressure to do just that.

“Normally I don’t think we should get involved in other counties’ projects,” Conrad said. “But I’ve heard from my constituents... that they fear the Book Cliffs Road coming back.”

Council member Ken Ballantyne agreed with Ciarus that paving the road in Grand County would actually decrease traffic in Grand because the paved road would allow for wells in Grand to be serviced from Uintah County instead of from I-70, as is now the case.

Council member Pat Holyoak joined Ciarus and Ballantyne in voting against sending the letter.