Knees Knocking
By Lea Linse
Lea Linse is the Conservation Program Manager at EcoFlight and a longtime advocate for the Thompson Divide.
When I was young, I used to think “knees knocking” was an old, worn-out saying. Surely no one’s knees actually knocked together when they were nervous. I should know – I was an avid rock climber and skier and I was bold when it came to things other people thought were terrifying. That is, until I got up in front of a crowd of over 200 people in an overflowing Carbondale Town Hall meeting and prepared to tell the Bureau of Land Management why I thought they should let the existing natural gas leases in the Thompson Divide expire. The year was 2013, and I was a senior in high school at the time. My name was called. I got up to the small podium, and when I turned around and saw those BLM uniforms, my knees started knocking together so hard I thought they would knock themselves out from under me.
My interest in the Thompson Divide campaign began a few years earlier. As a student at the Colorado Rocky Mountain School, I was invited on an educational flight over the Thompson Divide with EcoFlight. From the seat of a 6-seater Cessna 210, my classmates and I cruised low over magnificent rolling hills, classic Colorado backcountry. Then a natural gas pad appeared. Then another, and another, until we were over the Colorado River Valley and a spider web of well pads, pipelines and access roads spread out as far as the eye could see. It was hard to see.
After the flight, I began asking my friends to get involved in the Thompson Divide campaign with me. We called ourselves the Thompson Divide Action Club. We met with experts, discussed news articles, and with the help of the Thompson Divide Coalition and Wilderness Workshop, our small group began to tackle bigger projects. A photo of us appeared on the front page of the Post Independent, in which I am handing over a heavy stack of letters nearly a foot deep to the BLM Field Manager. The letters asked the BLM to let decades plus old leases expire. Years later, in 2016, the BLM canceled dozens of leases. It worked.
Through this, I got to know the team at Wilderness Workshop, especially Sloan Shoemaker, Peter Hart, and Will Roush. They became influential mentors who helped me begin to understand the workings of an advocacy campaign, NEPA processes, and even environmental law. Leading the Action Club evolved into an internship at Wilderness Workshop the summer adjacent to my senior year of high school.
I don’t remember all of what I said at that meeting in the Carbondale Town Hall except for one thing – if such a remarkably unified and politically broad-based coalition couldn’t sway the outcome of a public process, then what could? What would that mean for my future, and the future of the outdoor landscapes I loved and relied on for my health and happiness, if this amazing coalition wasn’t enough to ‘Save the Thompson Divide’?
Over 10 years after that meeting, we have an answer. A united and passionate coalition like the one that has fought all these years to protect the Divide has the power to enact real, enduring protections for our natural landscapes and communities who rely on them. Without question, this coalition will inspire others as it inspired me to stand up at that public meeting.
