Amid an hour-long Moapa Valley Town Board discussion last week dealing with the National Park Service (NPS) policies on Overton Beach, County Commissioner Tom Collins made a public comment that posed a rather meaningful question. The implied question was simple. Why is this small, volunteer town advisory board getting itself mired down in dealing with large federal issues of this kind?

To be accurate, Mr. Collins didn’t actually ask that particular question directly. Rather he cited his involvement on influential regional boards like the Colorado River Commission and the Southern Nevada Water Authority; entities that have considerable pull in dealing with Lake Mead issues. He also pointed out that it was because of his own request to park officials that the “Closed” sign posted at the locked gate to Overton Beach now includes the word “Temporary”. With his value as our elected representative thus established, he then suggested that there was possibly more sophisticated and direct avenues for getting what the community wants. In all this, Mr. Collins seemed to be saying, “Don’t worry about anything. Just leave it to me. You ought to leave the big stuff like this to the professionals.”

So, while not stated specifically, the aforementioned question was embedded in Mr. Collins’ comment. And it seems to be a very fair question. Why should a little local town advisory board be getting wrapped up in complex federal lands issues? After all, such things are so far removed from the real scope of influence of a town advisory board. Shouldn’t such big-league issues be left to our big-league elected representatives to sort out for us?

From a local standpoint, the answer to this question is two-fold.

Firstly, relying on our elected officials to see to our interests in federal issues hasn’t worked too well for us in the not-too-distant past. Especially in the realm of public lands. Many still recall the events of the fall of 2008. At that time, Rep. Shelley Berkley attempted an end-run by introducing legislation for a National Conservation Area (NCA) designation with additional wilderness for the vast Gold Butte complex, all of which lies well outside of her district. This was done expressly against the wishes of most of the nearby residents of the northeast Clark County communities, none of whom Ms. Berkley represented. Since no one in the northeast county was even remotely in her district, Ms. Berkley’s office could conveniently refuse to take any comments or feedback from northeast residents on this important issue. And there were many! Meanwhile, it seemed that the elected officials who were supposed to represent us, including some then on the county commission, seemed to fall right in lock step to the party line with Berkley on this matter; contrary to the clear wishes of their rural constituents. All too often then, we have found that when we entrust our important issues to the professionals, our professionals quickly turn to politicians.

The second reason why our lowly local town board should be involved in these federal matters is that they are not just federal matters. Make no mistake these are fundamentally local issues that the federal government and its agencies have gradually encroached upon. The fact is, decisions like these; coming down to our lowly village from the halls of federal power on high; profoundly and directly affect the lives and livelihoods of the few people under the purview of the Moapa Valley Town Advisory Board.

Overton Beach is a situation where federal policy has become the rubber hitting the road right here in our little rural town.

These bureaucratic decisions have affected our access to an area where local folks and their ancestors before them have gone to work, to play and to just enjoy the outdoors. They have loved these places. They have treasured these places. And, through the generations, they have cared for these places with more sensible and effective hands-on management than any federal agency could match.

In addition to our traditional access, these federal decisions have affected our livelihoods. There are more than 100 local business that are being impacted every day by broad, sweeping policy decisions like the one at Overton Beach. In recent years, many of those business have fallen by the wayside. Others are still hanging on for all they’ve got. But each are feeling acute and painful local effects of federal decisions. In the end, that little locked gate reading “Temporary Closure” is not just a high level federal issue. To this community it is a profound local one.

Many recent federal policy decisions, just like this one, have had a profound effect; not just for high powered lobbyists and distant special interests in Washington; but directly on the lives and livelihoods of real people in real places all across the country; like here in Moapa Valley, Nevada. So many decisions, made casually and remotely by the “professionals”; men and women in high places who feel they know so much better than the real folks in real places; have often become the millstone that grinds out the vital local enterprises and small business that have always generated the jobs and brought the prosperity to this nation.

This is why our local residents and our little town advisory board should, and well ought to, be fighting our local battles in the larger federal arena; and anywhere else they can get a foothold. Because these are not just federal issues. They are specifically local ones to us. And they are far too important to us to allow our faint rural voices to get lost amid the urban clamor that so often keeps the attention of our elected representatives.

That is the reason why we can not, and we should not, trust such important local issues wholly to the “professionals” to manage for us.

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