EDITORIAL: Expand caves monument

The Register Guard Editorial Board
December 4, 2014

Not much is expected of the current lame duck session of Congress, but it could produce one long-awaited success: an expansion of the Oregon Caves National Monument. Rep. Peter DeFazio has attached a proposal to must-pass legislation that would add more than 4,000 acres to the monument and make other improvements. The expansion would protect one of Oregon’s most unusual natural treasures, and also raise its profile as a destination for visitors to the southwestern corner of the state.

The expansion can’t be counted as approved until it’s passed by Congress and signed by the president, but it has three kinds of insurance against a last-minute derailment. It’s part of a larger package of that would establish, expand or launch studies of national parks, monuments and heritage areas across the country. That package is attached to the National Defense Authorization Act, whose approval is one of the top priorities for Congress and the White House in the lame duck session. And a separate bill to expand the Oregon Caves monument, backed by Sen. Ron Wyden, has already cleared the Senate.

The Oregon Caves monument has been too small since it was created in 1909 — the Department of the Interior proposed a 2,500-acre monument, but the legislation signed by President Taft designated only 480 acres for protection. Expansions have been proposed periodically ever since, and DeFazio has been working on the issue for decades.

The 4,070 acres to be added to the monument would be managed as a national preserve, allowing the area to remain open to hunters and fishermen. Livestock grazing permits on and near the monument will be retired through a program of voluntary donations. The expansion will allow for improved protection of the caves’ unique hydrology, and for the development of a system of hiking trails that will help make the monument a multi-day destination for more visitors.

The caves themselves — the biggest system of limestone caves open to the public west of the Continental Divide — are at once beautiful and spooky. A bear hunter found them in 1874, and since then 3.5 miles of passageways have been explored. The chambers and tunnels contain marble sculpted by nature’s hand, along with species of insects found nowhere else and the fossilized bones of a 500-pound jaguar. An underground stream, the River Styx, would be designated as the nation’s first subterranean wild and scenic river by the expansion legislation. A six-story lodge, completed in 1934, is built mostly of local timber and architecturally echoes the caves’ interior.

The caves are important to the economy and the identity of Josephine County, attracting 70,000 visitors a year to an area that would otherwise see little tourism. The expansion is broadly supported by local businesses that benefit from the 70 jobs at the monument and its $4.8 million in economic activity.

The broader public-lands bill would bring about the largest national parklands expansion in decades, designating or enlarging monuments and historic sites nationwide. Among them would be a Manhattan Project National Historic Park, with units in New Mexico, Tennessee and Washington state.

The Oregon Caves clearly deserve a place on the list. The experience of descending from the bright sunshine of the Siskiyou wildlands into the chilly limestone underworld is unforgettable. A hundred years from now, no one will accuse people living today of having provided the caves with too much protection.