The feds are seeking public comment now through June 20th on a proposal to put habitat restoration and conservation on equal footing with mining, drilling, logging, ranching, and off-roading on public lands. The Bureau of Land Management manages 15 million acres in California, or 15% of the state. The proposal would also help address climate change and foster better consultation with Native American tribes.

Pamela Flick, California program director for Defenders of Wildlife, said native habitat on BLM land is losing out to energy development, livestock grazing, unsustainable recreation and climate impacts.

"For nearly 40 years, the agency has largely focused on resource extraction and other multiple uses, but neglected managing public lands for ecosystems health and wildlife. This rulemaking gives the BLM an opportunity to rebalance its priorities," Flick said.

The National Cattlemen's Beef Association and Public Lands Council oppose the rule change, saying in a statement that it would "completely upend BLM's multiple-use mandate and jeopardize the agency's ability to be a good partner to the ranchers who manage millions of acres across the West," the council said in a statement.

More than 85% of the land managed by the BLM is open to oil development, mining and logging, and conservatives in Congress have blocked the Public Lands Act, which would protect more than one-million acres in the Golden State.

Ryan Henson, senior policy director for the nonprofit Cal Wild, said this new rule could be a workaround.

"Last session, it passed the House twice and could never pass the Senate. And then this session, it's got a great chance of passing the Senate, but zero chance of passing the House," he said. "So, this new BLM policy allows President Biden to do what Congress can't do - but to do it administratively."

Henson added the new rule could inform the upcoming Northwest California Integrated Resource Management Plan, which is expected this summer.

The wild burro population in northwest Arizona is about four times the appropriate management level, according to the Bureau of Land Management.

The agency is seeking public comment on a proposal which would decrease the number of wild burros in three herd management areas south of Kingman. There are about 2,300 burros in the area.

Philip Cooley - branch chief for biological resources with the BLM's Arizona office - said burro numbers have exceeded what the land is capable of supporting, which has consequences for wildlife habitat and local communities.

"The animals overuse the resources in their herd management area and then, as those resources start getting overused and they're competing for the resources, they start moving out into areas outside of the herd management area," said Cooley. "And this is when we can have concerns with the animals going onto private property and causing damage."

Cooley added that the proposal calls for using temporary fertility controls, sex-ratio adjustments and periodic removals of wild burros over a 10-year period.

Although some wild horse and burro advocates prefer other alternatives, Cooley added that it's important to make sure all uses on public lands in Arizona are taken into account.

The comment period closes October 11.

Cooley said because wild burros have very few natural predators and are protected from hunting, herds can quickly grow in size. He added that Arizona is one of several BLM states that has a wild horse and burro program, and says there are coordinated efforts among those states to - in his words - "leverage resources and manage things appropriately."

Cooley said when animals are removed from the range, they're put into the BLM's Adoption and Sales Program, to be placed in private homes off the range.

"We do the 'gathers' in combination with the fertility control," said Cooley. "It's not permanent sterilization, it is a temporary fertility control, that slows down how fast the animals repopulate. It delays getting huge overpopulations."

He added that the agency determines the numbers for each herd management area by analyzing the rangeland resources, as well as population data spanning several years.

Lawmakers in Washington held their first Senate hearing on the Blackfoot Clearwater Stewardship Act.

Authored by Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., it would add 80,000 acres of new wilderness area in the state. The act would sustain economic development and recreational use of National Forest land in Montana's Bob Marshall, Mission Mountains and Scapegoat wilderness areas. Proponents say it would designate new areas for recreation, safeguard crucial tributaries of the Blackfoot and Clearwater rivers and protect public lands and other waterways.

Juanita Vero, a Missoula County commissioner and whose family has owned the E-Bar-L Dude Ranch outside Missoula for nearly a century, said the act protects the things that make Montana so environmentally special.

"Clean air. Clean water. Open space. Unfettered access. Public lands. Public waters," Vero outlined. "These are all the things Montana stands for, and we get to offer that."

While the bill enjoys strong support, critics contend it contains too many special-interest carve-outs by designating currently protected land as snowmobile and mountain-bike areas, for example, and opens roadless areas for logging companies to bulldoze and clear-cut.

A recent public lands survey found 84% of Montanans support the act, which has been in the works for years.

Todd Frank, owner of Missoula-based Trailhead River Sports, said adding tens of thousands of acres of recreational area is going to bolster Montana's already popular reputation as a mecca for outdoor activities. He added it would be good for business, too.

"I'm a merchant, and everybody that walks through my door is a potential customer," Frank explained. "I look at this thing and say this is a solution that answers every one of my customers' needs that walk through the door."

The Blackfoot Watershed is habitat for bears, moose, deer, elk and wolverines. The rivers and streams are home to world-class cutthroat and bull trout, synonymous with fishing in Montana.


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Two bills making their way through Congress could throw out more than 216,000 public comments on the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's new Public Lands Rule, which has come under fire from the fossil fuel industry for putting conservation and outdoor recreation on par with extraction on lands owned by all Americans.

Madeleine West, director of the Center for Public Lands at the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, said she supports the agency's plan to restore millions of acres of degraded public lands.

"Lands that, if improved, could be better for agriculture and grazing production, could provide higher quality habitat for species, could provide better access for recreation including hunting and fishing," West outlined.

House Resolution 3977 and Senate Bill 1435, which call for the BLM to stop gathering and to discard public input on its draft Public Lands Rule, could get a floor vote when Congress reconvenes after Labor Day. The American Petroleum Institute claims the new rule violates the BLM's mandate to manage public lands for multiple uses and to prioritize the nation's need for domestic minerals including oil and gas.

More than 90% of lands managed by the BLM would remain open for mining and drilling under the new rule.

Keith Baker, a Chaffee County commissioner, believes the industry's concerns are overblown, pointing to a recent report, which showed the nation's oil output will hit an all-time high in 2023.

"I don't think our petroleum industry is really in any near-term danger of being crippled by giving conservation and recreation an equal par with the more extractive traditional industries," Baker contended.

Conservationists say public comments largely in favor of the BLM's proposal show that Americans care about healthy land, water and wildlife, and want to see these values endure for generations. West believes the new rule provides the tools needed to manage a host of 21st century challenges.

"The spread of wildfire, and the cycle of invasive annual grasses, and fire exacerbated by drought," West observed." We have modern management challenges, and the BLM has old, outdated regulations guiding how they can respond."


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