Congress to Hold Hearing on DOI's 'Wild Lands' Policy

The U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources will hold an oversight hearing on March 1 entitled "The Impact of the Administration's Wild Lands Order on Jobs and Economic Growth." "This is a prime example of why Congress must exercise vigorous oversight of the Obama Administration," said Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings. "The Wild Lands policy expressly circumvents Congress' statutory authority to establish Wilderness areas." A Wilderness designation is one of the strictest forms of public land management. Once Congress designates an area as Wilderness, nearly all forms of non-pedestrian recreation are illegal. The AMA supports appropriate Wilderness designations that meet the criteria established by Congress in 1964, but anti-access advocates have been abusing the legislative process to ban responsible OHV recreation on public land. With the new "Wild Lands" policy, anti-access advocates and the administration are now seeking an end-run around Congress. Salazar's order has far-reaching implications because the BLM manages about 245 million acres of public land nationwide, primarily in western states...more