On January 27, the Garfield County Commissioners voted 2-1 not to rename one of the county’s roads after President Donald Trump.
Commission Chairman Leland Pollock first proposed the idea to apply the new name to Burr Trail, the 66-mile scenic backway running between Boulder and Bullfrog. He announced in a January 13 commission meeting that a decision would be made following a public hearing on the question.
Later, after the county received a significant amount of opposition from the eastern half, Pollock floated the idea of applying the name change to Johns Valley Road instead. That road runs between Bryce and Antimony in the western half of the county.
“I had no idea all the so called Trump supporters do not want this over there,” Pollock said on Facebook about the Burr Trail. He then invited the public to attend the January 27 hearing to consider, if not Burr Trail, two other road options, including Johns Valley.
Meanwhile, commissioners David Tebbs and Jerry Taylor began gathering opinions from community members. Jerry Taylor held a townhall event in Boulder on January 21.
Tebbs, after receiving over 500 emailed and texted comments mostly from outside the county, decided to post an informal poll. To winnow out comments from out of the area, the poll asked respondents to identify Garfield’s school mascots. He said of the hundreds of responses the poll gathered, he focused on the 300 that answered the mascot question correctly.
At the public hearing held in the Fair Building, only a few who signed up to speak were called to the mic. Attending was a large group of the descendants of John Atlantic Burr (1846 – 1914) for which the Burr Trail was named. Several of them spoke in opposition to the renaming, arguing it paved over their heritage.
Burr descendant Brenda Baird of South Jordan asked the commissioners to not politicize the road. “Pioneers should never be cancelled out by any politician,” she said. “Our pioneers are more important than politicians.”
Piute County rancher Stanton Gleave, another Burr descendent, took a different stance. “I don’t see anything wrong with naming it the Trump Highway,” he told the crowd.
Roger Gleave of Antimony argued that the ancestors who settled Johns Valley and Widtsoe would be proud to name Johns Valley Road after Trump. “Trump took a bullet for this country,” he said.
After public comment, the commissioners weighed in with their thoughts. Commissioner Pollock said that the effort to rename one of the roads after Trump was about recognizing someone who has helped the county.
Commissioner Taylor joked that since Garfield County’s announcement of the proposal, John Atlantic Burr must have been the most Googled name in America. Even people out of state were able to recite Burr’s story in their emailed comments, he said. Ultimately though, the feedback he received from local residents was what mattered most to him, and because of their opposition, he would not back the measure.
Commissioner Tebbs acknowledged the heritage the Burr family had come to defend. But he also criticized the comments from hundreds of outsiders who feigned to care about the heritage and culture of Garfield County residents — merely to oppose applying Trump’s name to something.
If these commenters actually cared, Tebbs asked, “Where were you during the process to develop the GSENM Management Plan that was being forced down our throats this past year by the Biden Administration?”
Taylor concurred, stating that none of these people who said they cared about our heritage were there for us when Biden’s Department of Interior worked to restrict AUMs under a revised Resource Management Plan for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and the Paria River District.
Tebbs pointed out that Biden’s new management plan totally ignored local input and sought to reduce grazing by as much as 12,000 AUMs (animal unit months). He added that outsiders trying to protect our heritage don’t understand how important grazing is to local heritage. “Where were you?” he asked.
Tebbs explained his vote against the proposal, saying that it would be based on the 300 survey responses he received from community members. He noted that of the respondents, 95% were opposed to renaming Burr Trail, and 78% were opposed to renaming Johns Valley Road.
With Taylor and Tebbs opposed, the commission voted 2-1 to not rename either road.
Half the story, however, turned out to be the significant response received from people outside Garfield County — a phenomenon locals are very familiar with. For the hundreds of outsiders who cited heritage to oppose a rename, Tebbs offered some advice.
“Going forward, if you truly do care about our local heritage, I expect each of you to stand shoulder to shoulder with us when the federal government tries to reduce grazing,” Tebbs said, “because it impacts our heritage and our future generations!”
– The Byway
Feature image caption: The 66-mile Burr Trail Road was named after John Atlantic Burr, an early cowboy of the area. The Garfield Commissioners voted 2-1 Monday to not rename the road.