Feds Don’t Actually Know How Big ANWR Is

If you want to know how big Arctic National Wildlife Refuge actually is, don’t ask the bureaucrats tasked with preserving the refuge. The Interior Department has three different answers to this question that vary by a whopping 500,000 acres — about the same size as 11 cities like Washington, D.C. “This begs the question: if the feds don’t know how big ANWR is, are they really its best stewards?” Alex Fitzsimmons, an energy analyst with the free-market American Energy Alliance, asked in a blog post. The Obama administration recently announced it would ask Congress to keep the “amazing wonder” of ANWR off-limits to oil and natural gas drilling, a move that was welcomed by environmentalists but derided by Alaska lawmakers and native tribesmen. The only trouble, Fitzsimmons points out, is that they don’t know exactly how big this “wonder” is...more

As the person who staffed the Asset Management Program for Secretary of Interior Jim Watt during the Reagan Administration, I can assure you the above is not unique. In his 2013 book Sagebrush Rebel:  Reagan's Battle With Environmental Extremists And Why It Matters Today,  William Perry Pendley writes:

The Asset Management Program was managed by the Property Review Board, a cabinet-level board that was established by presidential order, with the responsibility of developing policies on the "acquisition, utilization and disposition of federal real property," determining which lands to sell, and establishing annual targets for land sales.

I met with each "wing" of DOI, where each unit was to develop a list of surplus or underutilized property. After that experience I can assure you the federal government has no idea how much property it owns.  

Soon I will share my experience in meeting with the Property Review Board with Secretary Watt.