In a Colorado College poll released Tuesday, Mountain West voters were more than three times as likely to pick protecting water, air, critters and recreation on federal public lands than drilling and mining.

The Colorado Springs college’s State of the Rockies Project released its seventh annual Conservation in the West poll of voters in Arizona, Colorado, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.

The complete survey is available here.

Voters were asked about conservation, environmental issues, energy, government’s role, economic trade-offs and public priorities.

“It’s great to see in this new poll that not only is there strong support among Western communities for protection of our land, air and water, but that support is growing.” Jon Goldin-Dubois, president of Boulder-based Western Resource Advocates, said in a statement.

Public lands got close attention in the latest poll.

“As leadership changes hands in Washington D.C., and Congress votes in new budget rules removing any monetary value from public lands, voters in the Mountain West are sending a clear statement that they do not want to see a dramatic change of course when it comes to national public lands,” Dr.Walt Hecox, professor emeritus of economics at Colorado College and founder of the State of the Rockies Project, stated.

Those surveyed gave federal land management agencies high marks: 76 percent for the U.S. Forest Service, 82 percent for theNational Park Service, 76 percent for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and 56 percent for the Bureau of Land Management.

The poll surveyed 400 registered voters in each of the seven Mountain West states in late December and early January. The margin of error was plus or minus 2.74 percent as a whole and plus or minus 4.9 percent in each state.