Thread: Organ Pipe Cactus Nat'l Monument Being Destroyed

The environmental cost of illegal immigration
Melissa Blasius
12 News
Apr. 5, 2007 06:20 PM


The Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, one of our country's natural gems, is being trampled by illegal immigrants. While politicians fight over border policies, we took a driving tour to see the environmental damage caused by waves of immigrants passing through.

Mary Kralovec, the park's chief of natural and cultural resources, showed 12 News a historic ranch site containing a few small piles of wood. She says a historic corral used to sit here, just yards from the border. She says during the last two years, people have dismantled the corral and dragged the wood through the border fence. She believes it's being used for corrals in Mexico or even for firewood.

Kralovec says that the damage goes beyond cultural sites. She says park rangers have documented 300 miles of car tracks and 400 miles of footpaths likely created by illegal immigrants traveling through the monument. It is just north of the Lukeville Port of Entry. The National Park Service recently built a 30-mile vehicle barrier to stop the cars from crossing into the protected desert. Kralovec says the people can still crawl through the fence, and they leave trash along the paths they create.

Currently park rangers are documenting the damage from the illegal immigrants. Next they want to research the overall impact on the animals and plants that live the area. Then they can determine how the illegal border crossings are changing the unique ecosystem within the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument.

http://www.azcentral.com/12news/news/ar ... 05-CR.html

This breaks my heart. If the public knew how bad illegal immigration affected our Parks, I think that they would be shocked. Funding is low anyway, and with the "help" of illegals they are just destroying everything. I am tired of the traffic, the garbage, the drugs being grown, and that we have to close down sections of the Park to keep the public safe. Where are all of the tree huggers? Help!