SALT LAKE CITY — Roughly 1,000 people sang, danced and demonstrated on Utah's Capitol Hill on Saturday to save the Great Salt Lake.
"Because of our pressure? The wheels are turning," Chandler Rosenberg of Stewardship Utah said to cheers from the crowd.
The Great Salt Lake is once again facing serious declines because of impacts from water diversions, drought and climate change. Saving the lake has been a top priority for the public and turned into political pressure to save it.
"I want them to start looking at not only land but water instead of as a commodity that we buy or sell or develop, instead looking at land and water as our relative that needs to be nurtured and cared for," said Darren Parry, the former chair of the Shoshone Nation.
At Saturday's rally, some were feeling hopeful.
"I’m feeling optimistic today in a way I wasn’t last year," said Cale Crosby, a drag artist who goes by the Great Salt Lake-inspired name "Salina Marina."
Some gave a little credit to Utah's political leaders for recent efforts to save the lake. Governor Spencer Cox's goal of getting the lake to a healthy level by 2034 drew some cheers from the crowd. Others celebrated the Utah State Legislature quickly spending $30 million to buy the bankruptcy assets of U.S. Magnesium with plans to keep a lot of the industrial plant's water in the Great Salt Lake.
But others were quick to demand more from their elected leaders.
"They’re trying and I appreciate that," said Carmen LeCluyse. "It’s a complicated issue and I understand that. I don’t think it’s necessarily enough because if it were, I think we would see lake levels rising."
Liam Mountain La Malfa with Youth Coalition for Great Salt Lake, said there must be more efforts to save water.
"We need more water-wise landscaping, we need more support for farmers and we need more efforts from the state to make sure this happens and this lake gets saved," La Malfa told FOX 13 News.
One member of the Utah State Legislature who attended Saturday's rally said he agreed.
"I think the legislature has the right intentions," Rep. John Arthur, D-Cottonwood Heights, told FOX 13 News. "Everybody wants to get more water to the lake. The urgency and how we do that differs between who you’re talking to. For me? I don’t feel like enough has been done yet. I think good steps have been taken."
The rally included a call to action from organizers, who urged people to show up and speak up in the Utah State Legislature on behalf of the lake.
"We’ve only got a matter of time," Franque Baines, the Utah chapter president of the Sierra Club, told FOX 13 News. "We’ve got to really act expeditiously to create policy to get water to the Great Salt Lake."
This article is published through the Great Salt Lake Collaborative, a solutions journalism initiative that partners news, education and media organizations to help inform people about the plight of the Great Salt Lake—and what can be done to make a difference before it is too late. Read all of our stories at greatsaltlakenews.org.
