Interior proposes to issue conservation leases on federal lands

 

Today the Department of the Interior published a proposal to guide the balanced management of America’s public lands for the benefit of current and future generations. The proposed Public Lands Rule provides tools for the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to improve the resilience of public lands in the face of a changing climate; conserve important wildlife habitat and intact landscapes; plan for development; and better recognize unique cultural and natural resources on public lands.

The proposed rule directly responds to the growing need to better manage public lands, waters, and wildlife in the face of devastating wildfires, historic droughts, and severe storms that communities are experiencing across the West, as well as to deepen BLM’s collaborative work with communities, states and Tribes to support responsible development of critical minerals, energy and other resources.

... “As the nation continues to face unprecedented drought, increasing wildfires and the declining health of our landscapes, our public lands are under growing pressure. It is our responsibility to use the best tools available to restore wildlife habitat, plan for smart development, and conserve the most important places for the benefit of the generations to come," said Secretary Deb Haaland. “As we welcome millions of visitors to hunt, fish and recreate on our public lands each year, now is the time to improve the health and management of special places.”

...It also proposes conservation leasing, a tool authorized by the Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA), to facilitate restoration work on public lands in cooperation with community partners. A conservation lease is a time-limited lease of public land that allows interested organizations to conduct specific restoration or mitigation activities and would generate revenue for the American taxpayer. This tool has the potential to expand opportunities to accelerate restoration of big game migration corridors or establish carbon markets, for example, and directly responds to comments from state and industry partners on the need for a reliable path on public lands by which to pursue compensatory mitigation to facilitate development projects...more

The proposal is consistent with strategies used by other state and federal land management agencies to ensure the federal government has tools and direction to identify areas in need of restoration or conservation, as well as the ability to encourage investments in public lands to help balance the impacts of development. 

The proposed rule includes a roadmap to align the BLM with other land management agencies, such as the U.S. Forest Service, in ensuring the agency is inventorying and assessing the health of public lands, including watersheds, forests and wildlife habitat. 

Here we see the BLM jealousy front and center again.

I explained this two years ago, when I wrote; 

The BLM has long been jealous of other land management agency’s budgets and programs, especially those of the Forest Service. BLM’ers were very resentful of always being considered a stepchild of natural resource management. Just watch them play copycat to Smokey. The Forest Service had many restrictive land-use designations. The BLM finally convinced Congress to create the National Conservation Lands System, along with the accompanying appropriations. The Forest Service and the National Park Service had national monuments, now BLM has them too. The Forest Service had a centralized system of law enforcement. BLM moved their LEO’s out from under the State Directors and created a national office. The Forest Service had administratively created roadless areas. In fact, it had 58.2 million acres of them, constituting about thirty percent of all Forest Service lands. The poor BLM, however, had…none.  Just imagine the terrible ache in that jealous bone!

I also find it interesting they are talking leases, not permits.