Salazar out to tame interior

One Interior Department scandal featured sex, drugs and influence peddling. Another involved politics trumping science in endangered-species rulings. Then there are the agency's intractable problems, such as the $8.7 billion maintenance backlog for national parks or a 12-year-old class-action lawsuit on behalf of Native Americans. The Interior Department manages 507 million acres, equal to about one-fifth of the country. But in recent years, it has had difficulty managing itself. When Democratic Sen. Ken Salazar of Colorado takes over as interior secretary next month, he'll assume responsibility for a department beset by turmoil. He'll oversee everything from oil- and gas-leasing decisions to relationships with American Indian tribes. And he'll face large expectations from a new president and myriad special-interest groups. Changing the face and the politics of the department is not likely to happen easily or quickly. Salazar, through his spokesman, declined to comment. His past statements offer a guide to how he might handle some decisions. As senator, he has often pushed for compromise. But as interior secretary, he will implement President- elect Barack Obama's agenda as well as his own. "Sen. Salazar is going to be counted on to restore credibility, to restore sound science," said Elise Jones, executive director of the Colorado Environmental Coalition....