Wildlife refuge should be just that

The U.S. Senate is debating right now on whether or not to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. What don't we understand about the words "Wildlife Refuge?"

How are the interests of the wildlife concurrent with drilling, extracting, and transporting oil? ANWR is considered to be the last of "America's Serengeti." It was considered so important that in 1960 President Dwight D. Eisenhower (a real Republican) set it aside as ANWR. Biologists predict that the Porcupine River caribou herd's birthrate could fall by 40 percent if drilling occurs. Will it still be a refuge then?

Our current attitude is to extract everything today! This arrogance is even transformed into denying our children an opportunity to visit the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and viewing the natural world virtually unchanged since prehistoric times. This is certainly a value to be cherished!

This drilling operation will not increase our national security or decrease our dependence on foreign oil. Only once did our oil dependence decrease between 1977 and 1984 when oil imports declined from 47 percent to 28 percent.

Conservation, energy efficiency, and higher mileage cars were the main reasons behind the decline.

Barry McMonagle
Sedro-Woolley

Letters to the Editor - Skagit Valley Herald