Amid shutdown chaos, BLM rushes lease sales of treasured public lands in Wyoming and Utah
Agency short changes the public input process in favor of oil and gas industry
The Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has announced its final parcels for their March 2019 lease sales in Wyoming and Utah, rushing through the consideration of public comments and posting over 350,000 acres of public lands across landscapes too wild to drill, with more expected in the coming days across the West.
Without a shutdown, Utah and Wyoming BLM offices would have had 28 days and 25 days, respectively, to review comments in between the comment deadlines and initially scheduled protest periods. But now, following the 36-day shutdown, and with today’s posting of final lease sale acreage, the Utah and Wyoming BLM offices gave themselves just nearly a week to review thousands of comments.
In Wyoming, 140 parcels, totaling 150,000 acres were posted for sale today, with just 6 parcels deferred from the original sale list before the comment period. Meanwhile, in Utah, 156 parcels, totaling 217, 475 acres were posted, with no parcels deferred. The entire process brings into question, how much consideration the BLM gave to the comments submitted.
“Given the recent government shutdown, one would think the agency might think twice about rushing a lease sale in Wyoming of this magnitude, particularly since the energy industry is already sitting on thousands of unused acres of drilling permits,” said Dan Smitherman, Wyoming state manager for The Wilderness Society.
“With BLM staff already stretched thin, it’s outrageous to believe that the few days the government was open since comments were submitted on these lease sales could be sufficient to address the many risks to wildlife, wilderness and archaeological resources across hundreds of thousands of acres of public lands,” said Nada Culver, Director of the Wilderness Society’s BLM Action Center. “And the fact that the vast majority of these parcels are still in the sales raises some red flags.”
The protest period for the Wyoming and Utah Lease sales ends on March 1.
Contact:
Alex Thompson, Communications Manager, The Wilderness Society, (202) 429-3940, alex_thompson@tws.org
Chelsi Moy, Communications Manager, The Wilderness Society, (406) 240-3013, cmoy@tws.org
The Wilderness Society, founded in 1935, is the leading conservation organization working to protect wilderness and inspire Americans to care for our wild places. With more than one million members and supporters, The Wilderness Society has led the effort to permanently protect 109 million acres of wilderness and to ensure sound management of our shared national lands. www.wilderness.org
