Bill Clinton

“ Farming during the Puebloan period was affected by population growth and changing climate and precipitation patterns. As the population grew, the Ancestral Puebloans expanded into increasingly marginal areas. ”

“ Archaeological and historic objects such as cliff dwellings, villages, great kivas, shrines, sacred springs, agricultural fields, check dams, reservoirs, rock art sites, and sweat lodges are spread across the landscape. More than five thousand of these archaeologically important sites have been recorded, and thousands more await documentation and study. The Mockingbird Mesa area has over forty sites per square mile, and several canyons in that area hold more than three hundred sites per square mile. ”

“ By about 1500 B.C., the more sedentary Basketmakers spread over the landscape. As Ancestral Northern Puebloan people occupied the area around 750 A.D., farming began to blossom, and continued through about 1300 A.D., as the area became part of a much larger prehistoric cultural region that included Mesa Verde to the southeast. ”

“ Because most of the Federal lands have already been leased for oil and gas, which includes carbon dioxide, and development is already occurring, the monument shall remain open to oil and gas leasing and development; provided, the Secretary of the Interior shall manage the development, subject to valid existing rights, so as not to create any new impacts that interfere with the proper care and management of the objects protected by this proclamation ”