Pueblo Chieftain Editorial July 18, 2010

No means no
Chieftain editorial
Sunday, July 18, 2010

   A KEY House subcommittee has approved a budget bill that includes continuing the ban on the Army from spending any money to expand the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site.

   The ban again is thanks to Rep. John Salazar, D-Colorado, who serves on the military construction subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. He first put the ban into federal legislation three years ago.

   Rep. Salazar is adamant that the Army should not be allowed to expand the site, where area ranchers fear that would devalue their property even if the Pentagon would never use condemnation to grow the site. And he was unequivocal.

   "I'm not going to allow the expansion of Pinon Canyon as long as I am in Congress," he said last week after the subcommittee's approval of the legislation. That legislation will go now to the full House Appropriations Committee to be folded into the 2011 Defense Appropriations Act.

   The Army has failed to make a persuasive case for its need to expand Pinon Canyon. If it hasn't been able to come up with good reasons by now, we doubt it ever will.