Pendley: Dispelling False Narratives About BLM Move

In The Hill, William Perry Pendley defends the move by pointing out:

• The BLM manages 88,000 wild horses and burros, mostly in Nevada but also in neighboring western states, BUT the top officials who run that program are in Washington, D.C.
• The BLM leases land for energy development in New Mexico’s Permian Basin, the hottest area in the Lower 48 for these activities, BUT the officials who oversee that program are in Washington, D.C.
• The BLM operates a $1 billion alternative energy program in California, BUT the officials who approve these projects are in Washington, D.C. 

He then pretty well trashes the critics. With reference to the 11 members of congress who attempted to kill the funding for the move, Pendley says they have less than 2,500 acres of BLM land in their districts. They are D.C. area reps who don't want the jobs leaving their area. And as for a recent column by former BLM Directors. Pendley takes them to task for their many distortions and errors: 

• Despite the open way we have discussed the move, the thousands of words we have expended detailing it, and the boxes of documents we have provided in support of it, they falsely label it a “stealth plan” that was “below the radar;”
• Despite our policy to retain public lands, they incorrectly assert the BLM’s land is “quietly being taken away from [the American people];”
• Despite senior career BLM officials, including the BLM’s deputy director, assistant directors and state directors helping to decide the best location for all positions to best serve national, state and local needs, they wrongly blame “political appointees”;
• Despite filling scores of important positions that have remained vacant for years because the experts needed by BLM do not want to work in Washington, D.C., they inaccurately say we plan to “dismantle the organization” and “destroy the agency from the inside;” and
• Despite the director and a deputy director, along with a staff of nearly 40 senior decision makers moving to the new headquarters in Grand Junction, Colo., they disingenuously claim all decisions will be made by “politically appointed officials within the Office of the Secretary of the Interior,” without the BLM’s involvement.

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