DuBois column - Interior reorg. - Floyd Rathbun comments

On my column posted today, Floyd Rathbun had these comments:

Floyd Rathbun said...

The Dept of Interior regions will cut across state lines, cut across county lines, cut across allotment boundaries, and ignore the fact that property rights laws are different in each state which means that property held in equity within BLM allotments or withdrawal areas a.k.a. existing rights protected in FLPMA are not part of the plan. However moving the national offices to a location in central Utah has some possible benefits from exposing the Dept of Interior employees to conservative people and that would be good. There are also some excellent locations in central Nevada where there are no cell phone signals and no internet connections that would interfere with completing the deep thinking and important work of the federal employees.

Then comes the interesting but not at all believable statement about boundaries "based on "ecosystems, watersheds and science." If science means statements that are based on rigorously honest scientific investigation that includes statistical analysis of data then we are out of luck. Several years ago the Office of Management and Budget wrote the federal standards for "peer review" (OMB; December 16, 2004; M-05-03; “Final Information Quality Bulletin for Peer Review”). In about 2007, I was told by the USFWS biologists that they (Dept. of Interior) have their own standards for peer review and the biologist refused to look at the OMB publication. Their adherence to Peer Review standards is about the same as their adherence to Federal Employee Ethics standards. Those Dept. of Interior biologists also would not provide a written statement of how they identify peer review. Most often the publications they cite as science indicate that objective facts are not as important as political statements in biology. Even the most casual observer can figure out that the Dept. of Interior agencies do not have a reputation for truthful and factual statements as indicated by Judge Navarro in this same article. Please ask Secretary Zinke to provide a definition of his terms, especially the use of the word science.

 Frank DuBois said...

Floyd raises an interesting issue, which leads to some others.

Not only do property rights laws differ by state, but so do fish and game laws, water law, state law enforcement jurisdiction and I'm sure other things that can be added to the list. One can easily see how this might complicate regional mgt. plans, rather than simplify.