Bureau of Land Management

Public Meeting Tonight in Golden Colorado on BLM Proposed Public Lands Rule

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Note from Sharon- this seems a little light on public meetings compared to national FS efforts like Roadless and Planning Rules. They are in three cities, Denver, Albuquerque and Reno (not Salt Lake?). Plus two virtual meetings.


Proposed Public Lands Rule

Rule would protect healthy public lands, promote habitat conservation and restoration and further thoughtful development

WASHINGTON — The Bureau of Land Management has updated its schedule for five public meetings that will provide forums across the country for the public to learn more about the proposed Public Lands Rule and have questions answered.

The proposed Public Lands Rule, which was announced in late March, would provide tools for the BLM to protect healthy public lands in the face of increasing drought, wildfire and climate impacts; conserve important wildlife habitat and intact landscapes; better use science and data in decision-making; plan for thoughtful development; and better recognize unique cultural and natural resources on public lands.

The BLM intends to host two virtual and three in-person meetings to provide detailed information about the proposal. Members of the public will have an opportunity to ask questions that facilitate a deeper understanding of the proposal. The dates and cities of the meetings are:

Virtual meeting on Monday, May 15, 2023, from 5-7 p.m. MT
Register at https://swca.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_S4-EBLxqRHa-yikYQQUNQw)
Denver, Colorado, on Thursday, May 25, 2023, from 5-7 p.m. MT
Denver West Marriott, 1717 Denver West Blvd, Golden, Colorado
Albuquerque, New Mexico on Tuesday, May 30, 2023, from 5-7 p.m. MT
Indian Pueblo Cultural Center, 2401 12th Street NW, Albuquerque, New Mexico
Reno, Nevada on Thursday, June 1, 2023, from 5-7 p.m. PT
Reno-Sparks Convention Center, 4950 S Virginia Street, Reno, Nevada
Virtual meeting on Monday, June 5, 2023, from 9:30-11:30 a.m. MT
Register at https://swca.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_QwRH6XZeS6amUDI70FzriA

The proposal would help the BLM fulfill its mission, ensuring public lands and the resources they provide are available now and in the future. The proposed rule would build on the historic investments in public lands and waters, restoration and resilience, and clean energy deployment provided by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act. It would not prevent new or continuing recreational or commercial uses of our public lands, such as grazing, energy development, camping, climbing, and more.

“Our public lands are remarkable places that provide clean water, homes for wildlife, food, energy, and lifetime memories,” said Bureau of Land Management Director Tracy Stone-Manning. “We want to hear from our permittees as well as the millions of visitors who hunt, fish and recreate on our public lands on how to keep them healthy and available for generations to come.”

In addition to these informational public meetings, the BLM wants to hear from the public on the proposed Public Lands Rule. To learn more about this proposed rule, or to provide comment, please visit the Conservation and Landscape Health rule on https://www.regulations.gov. The public comment period is open until June 20, 2023.

-BLM-

New BLM Rule Surfaces on April Fool’s Day! Biden Admin Adopts PERC Ideas-Signs of a Libertarian Turn?

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An alert TSW reader sent me the new BLM reg which is full of interesting stuff- today, April Fool’s Day.

It’s to be released Monday.

What is Monday? Well, we’re coming into the week of Passover for Jews and Holy Week for Christians.  If you are in either of those groups,  your eyes tend to be focused on history, the spiritual and family. So no, not good timing for something very complex. Although to be fair, the press release had one version was posted on the 30th.

There is indeed MOG stuff in there..and the FS is coming out with their MOG maps soon. I think political scientists would be fascinated by the differences in approaches between the FS and the BLM. I am still a fan of the Service First concept. In my experience, the public liked it a lot (local human beings with direct experience). Is it in the interests of good government for these two agencies to be pushed apart by certain groups with current political power? Should it be a Good Government priority to manage any policy and procedural drift between the two multiple-use agencies carefully?

I thought of our old TSW friend David Beebe, who used to say that the FS was a “captured agency”. (We miss you, David!) When I looked up “regulatory capture” on Wikipedia.. I realized that agencies could be captured by ideological forces..

In politics, regulatory capture (also agency capture and client politics) is a form of corruption of authority that occurs when a political entity, policymaker, or regulator is co-opted to serve the commercial, ideological, or political interests of a minor constituency, such as a particular geographic area, industry, profession, or ideological group.[1][2]

When regulatory capture occurs, a special interest is prioritized over the general interests of the public, leading to a net loss for society. The theory of client politics is related to that of rent-seeking and political failure; client politics “occurs when most or all of the benefits of a program go to some single, reasonably small interest (e.g., industry, profession, or locality) but most or all of the costs will be borne by a large number of people (for example, all taxpayers)”.[3]

(my bold)

I’m sure we may disagree about what “the general interests of the public” are.. whether processes or outcomes, and how these might best be determined. Nevertheless, I would say that the “general interests of the public”  is to have the two agencies attempt to harmonize as much as possible.

Anyway, I’m sure there’s lots of interesting stuff in there to talk about. Let me know in the comments, and we can set up separate posts/discussion threads for different topics of interest.

Sometimes on TSW I’ve heard negative things about PERC. Certainly they are fans of things some people here disagree with (as per Jonathan Wood’s House testimony last week on the Cottonwood fix).

They have long touted conservation leasing . Here’s their March 31 post, with links to other of their articles on the subject. I am not necessarily a fan of conservation leasing, but I do like it when the government takes ideas from all comers, regardless of ideological orientation.

Though more work remains to advance conservation leasing, this announcement represents a positive step forward toward that goal.

“The Bureau’s proposed rule is a big step in the right direction toward putting conservation on equal footing with other uses like drilling, mining, and ranching. Empowering conservationists to channel their interests through a market mechanism is more effective than zero-sum political warfare.”—Brian Yablonski, CEO, PERC

PERC believes that creating markets for conservation on public lands would allow resources to be managed for their highest-valued uses, whether that means consumption or conservation. Open markets that give everyone a seat at the table would be a cooperative way to make trade-offs in land use decisions and reduce conflict through voluntary exchange.

 

BLM Proposed Rule Stirs Up MOG-y Drama With Certain ENGOs

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Perhaps a proposed Rule will drop in the Federal Register tomorrow. But I received this email today. It was so different from the DOI announcement that Steve posted, that at first I didn’t think they were talking about the same thing. But maybe there are two? Anyway it sounds like some groups were given advance copies so they could respond quickly.. but maybe they are guessing, or engaging in wishful thinking. From what I’ve heard, the FS will have some information on their OG initiative within the month. Hopefully the agencies are aligned. I think the theme of these two weeks is “are agencies aligned? And how does that occur? And who is calling the shots?”

Contact:

Environment America Research & Policy Center,
Natural Resources Defense Council,
Oregon Wild,
Sierra Club,
Standing Trees,
ReWilding Manager, WildEarth Guardians

Department of Interior moves to protect mature and old-growth trees and forests from logging

Wide-ranging rule will include Bureau of Land Management forest policies

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) announced Thursday a wide-ranging conservation rule with a goal to “promote ecosystem resilience on public lands” and which includes an acknowledgment of the importance of mature and old-growth trees and forests. The DOI will launch a 75-day public comment period during which members of the public will weigh on forest protection and other policies being considered. Members of the Climate Forests Campaign, a coalition of more than 120 organizations working to protect mature and old-growth trees and forests on federal land from the threat of logging, praised this welcome recognition by DOI, and further called on the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to adopt rules that protect mature and old growth trees and forests as part of its work to restore U.S Forest Service lands and safeguard communities from fire.

Thursday’s announcements come nearly a year after President Biden issued an executive order acknowledging the critical roles that forests play in fighting climate change and protecting wildlife habitat and directing the DOI and USDA to “develop policies, with robust opportunity for public comment, to institutionalize climate-smart management and conservation strategies that address threats to mature and old-growth forests on Federal lands.”

Over 63 million acres of mature and old-growth forests safeguard carbon, clean water, and biodiversity across all federal public lands, including over 5 million acres managed by the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and over 53 million acres managed by the U.S. Forest Service in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Of these, some 50 million acres are at risk from logging. The DOI’s announcement would begin a rulemaking process for forests managed by the BLM.

The Climate Forests Campaign has been working to raise awareness about the necessity of protecting these trees and forests from logging highlighting 22 logging projects targeting mature and old-growth trees in Forest Service and BLM forests. Yet, only one of those projects, Flat Country in the Willamette National Forest, has been withdrawn because it was incongruous with the Biden administration’s policies regarding protecting trees that are important for fighting climate change.

In response to the agencies’ announcements, advocates issued the following statements:

“This is a much welcomed, necessary step in the right direction for protecting mature and old-growth forests,” said Blaine Miller-McFeeley, senior legislative representative at Earthjustice. “President Biden made clear last Earth Day that he wants to incorporate the conservation of these vital trees as a part of the climate solution. We encourage the U.S. Forest Service to follow the lead of the Bureau of Land Management in progressing that vision.”

“These agencies face many challenges when it comes to protecting mature and old-growth forests on federal lands and they have enormous sway over whether logging takes down our mature forests,” said Environment America Research & Policy Center’s Public Lands Campaign Director, Ellen Montgomery. “Americans love our forests and want to see our oldest trees growing tall for decades and centuries to come. We’ll urge people to make these views known through the upcoming public comment process.”

“BLM manages some of America’s most climate-critical mature forests and trees,” said Garett Rose, Senior Attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). “Logging them releases carbon, destroys habitat, and undermines recreational opportunities. Following today’s welcome announcement, the Agency must ensure that the final regulation includes robust protection for these magnificent forests and trees.”

“Recognizing the importance of mature and old-growth forests as a natural climate solution is a huge step forward for the Bureau of Land Management,” said Oregon Wild’s Conservation Director, Steve Pedery. “Now all eyes are on Secretary Haaland to see meaningful protections established that preserve these giants from logging and ensure they remain standing for generations to come.”

“The Department of the Interior manages some of the most important landscapes and ecosystems in the country, including portions of our last mature and old-growth forests,” said Alex Craven, Senior Campaign Representative with Sierra Club. “Today’s announcement shows important leadership from Secretary Haaland, and we look forward to working with the department to make sure it delivers long-awaited protections to these vital and precious forests.”

“We commend the US Department of Interior for taking an important step in the right direction for the protection of the Bureau of Land Management’s mature and old-growth forests,” said Zack Porter, Executive Director of Standing Trees, which advocates on behalf of New England’s public lands. “Now that the BLM is leading the way forward, we expect the U.S. Forest Service to quickly follow suit so that all mature and old-growth forests on federal public lands can be protected for the benefit of future generations, as directed by President Biden in his executive order from Earth Day 2022.”

“The BLM and President Biden recognize the crucial role mature and old-growth forests have in helping address the climate crisis, and we remain hopeful the government will safeguard them from harmful logging operations,” said Adam Rissien, WildEarth Guardians’ ReWilding Manager. “Halting the logging of older, fire-resistant trees is an immediate step the agency can take to stop exacerbating the many natural threats forest face under a changing climate.”

“BLM older forests are some of the most carbon dense on the planet that are essential to the Biden administration’s nature-based climate strategy. They should be protected from all forms of logging as part of BLM’s overall stewardship responsibilities and in compliance with the president’s executive orders to inventory older forests for conservation purposes and to protect 30% of the nation’s lands and waters by 2030” said Dominick A. DellaSala, Ph. D, Chief Scientist, Wild Heritage, Oregon.

Ramping Up Green Energy Permitting.. BLM asks for $20 Mill to Accelerate

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I got this map from the Greenwire story so it might not be the latest one.
There must have been something in the air.. after I posted the previous post on BLM geothermal permitting, I found this story from E&E News. It’s paywalled, so here are some excerpts.

It plans to do this primarily through organizational changes designed to more quickly review and approve applications forright-of-way grants for projects on BLM lands, according to a budget justification document.
The budget proposal would allow BLM to:
* Create a “project management office” that would support “technical development of BLM field staff for the review and permitting” of solar, wind and geothermal projects “and related transmission and battery storage infrastructure.” One goal is to coordinate with the Department of Energy to tap into $400 billion in grants provided through the Inflation Reduction Act “to advance clean energy.”
* Name a task force of experts to help with breaking “permitting bottlenecks and challenges,” as well as hiring additional staff at BLM Renewable Energy Coordination Offices in the West who are tasked with prioritizing renewable energy project applications.
* Establish a geothermal regional project support team. BLM has reported that there are 48 geothermal power plants
operating on bureau-managed lands, with a total 2,500 MW capacity.
BLM declined to answer specific questions about its renewables budget request in time for publication.
But the bureau says in the budget document that the increased funding, if approved, would “support siting, leasing, processing rights-of-way applications, and oversight of renewable energy projects and transmission lines connecting to renewable energy projects.”

The FS and other agencies have had trouble hiring people, but maybe these jobs would be work at home so perhaps more attractive.

While the pace of renewables development the Biden administration hopes to achieve might be faster than before, it’s not terribly impressive, either, said Carey King, a research scientist and assistant director of the Energy Institute at the University of Texas, Austin.
King noted that in Texas, which has very little federal land and few zoning laws, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) already has about 35,000 MW of wind power capacity in operation — by far the most of any state — and has turned its attention to solar. There is more than 8,000 MW of installed solar capacity in 2021, with plans to add another 8,000 MW capacity by the end of this year.
“The BLM plans sound about the same size as Texas rate of permitting/installation,” he said.

But.. the federal lands are subject to a different regulation scenario with a variety of different stakeholders as we have seen in the Geothermal Toad project.

BLM is on pace to approve 48 wind, solar and geothermal energy projects with the capacity to produce an estimated 31,827 MW of electricity — enough to power roughly 9.5 million homes — by the end of the fiscal 2025 budget cycle, according to an Interior Department report to Congress last year (Greenwire, April 20, 2022).
Much of that effort has focused on solar resource-rich Nevada, where the bureau in the last year has removed tens of thousands of acres of federal lands for use while it evaluates commercial-scale projects.
BLM last year removed the equivalent of 185 square miles of federal lands in southern Nevada’s Esmeralda County from new mining claims and other uses for two years while it studies seven utility-scale solar power projects that would have the capacity to produce 5,350 MW of electricity, or enough to power roughly 1.8 million homes (E&E News PM, July 26, 2022).
BLM last week segregated from new mining claims and other uses 5,281 acres straddling Clark and Nye counties in Nevada, about 40 miles west of Las Vegas, while it studies the proposed 500-MW Mosey Solar Project (E&E News PM, March 20).
The Mosey project is near three other large-scale solar project proposals covering nearly 16,000 acres of federal lands southeast of Pahrump, Nev., that BLM in 2021 withdrew from new mining claims while it evaluated each.
But the buildup has prompted some pushback from those worried about impacts to natural resources.
A number of residents in Nevada and California told BLM during an online hearing last month to gather public feedback on the bureau’s plan to update its 2012 Western Solar Plan (E&E News PM, Feb. 14).
“We are basically, to put it very simply, we are right in the middle of this attack of solar on our community,” said Don Sneddon, a Desert Center, Calif., resident who asked BLM to designate in the plan “exclusion zones” around towns and residential areas to prevent solar power plants from encroaching on homes. “Very simply said, the human element needs to be considered.”

As to Biden Admin alignment, it appears that the new Avi Kwa Me National Monument was protected partially in response to concerns of the Fort Mojave Indian Tribe. There’s an open access article on this on Greenwire.

“To us, this is the last of what’s left out there,” said McDowell, who serves as project manager of the Topock remediation project, which aims to address groundwater contamination near the Topock Maze, a geoglyph near Needles, Calif., considered to be spiritually important to the tribe.

“Every time we turn around, there’s a proposal to put in a wind farm or a solar project that would wipe this landscape out,” she said.

McDowell noted that the Mojave are not opposed specifically to wind energy development, but rather its impact on an important area.

“It’s not that we’re against any type of energy development. It’s just where you put it at,” McDowell said. “And unfortunately, to people that don’t live here, don’t come from here … or don’t know the land like the Mojave people do, they see it just as a piece of desert, as a landscape than can be bulldozed and cleared.”

Ethics Watchdoggery at the BLM

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When Forest Service life is relatively dull, there’s always our friends at Interior to look to for drama.. thanks to Nick Smith for this. My BLM friends tell me that the drama is a function of the presence of politicals, and from outside I would have to agree.

I think it’s pretty clear that owning bonds would not make Culver suddenly friendly to the oil and gas industry,given her career and the apparent feelings of the Biden Administration.

Nevertheless, here are a couple of thoughts..
1. Knowing that your employees are held to standards, why wouldn’t you… follow the rules? It would be great if someone asked her this.
2. The IG said previously she violated ethics rules, but it was “unintentional”. I wonder how the IG knows that. Seems like more training would be useful perhaps.
3. You wonder whether if not for Protect the Public’s Trust queries, no one would have noticed. Because the IG only responds to complaints.
4. It’s pointed out in the article that “Protect the Public’s Trust bills itself as nonpartisan, but Chamberlain is a former Trump administration official.”

I think it’s great to point that out- many organizations are billed as nonpartisan, but have a more or less overt political slant. Still, it seems to me that both sides of watchdoggery can be useful if that’s what it takes to look at the performance of public officials. Here’s the link to the article, I don’t think it’s paywalled.

The complaint does not include direct evidence from Protect the Public’s Trust that Culver benefited financially from any actions she took involving oil and gas policy or decisions involving ConocoPhillips.

But it notes that the Interior Department is expected in the coming weeks to issue a final decision on ConocoPhillips’ controversial Willow oil and gas drilling project in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska that is strongly opposed by environmental groups.

Culver, as BLM’s deputy director of policy and programs, testified in April 2021 before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on oil and gas policies, and answered questions about the Willow project from Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) “without disclosing her interest in Conoco,” the complaint says.

“Ms. Culver’s testimony before the Senate clearly put her in a position where she could affect the marketability or market resale value of the bond through the public’s perception of the economic fortunes of Conoco,” the complaint says.

Protect the Public’s Trust has raised ethical questions with the IG’s office about Culver over the past couple of years.

The group in 2021 filed a complaint with the IG that alleged Culver violated agency ethics rules when she met with a previous employer on potential changes to the agency’s regulation of oil and gas development and climate change (Greenwire, Sept. 2, 2021).

The IG later issued a report that concluded Culver’s June 1, 2021, meeting with officials at the Wilderness Society did violate agency ethics rules. But it also concluded she violated the rules unintentionally and that her actions did not affect bureau policy decisions (Greenwire, Aug. 23, 2022).

Culver at the time was performing the duties of BLM director in the months prior to the Senate’s confirmation of Tracy Stone-Manning as bureau director.

Regardless of whether the IG agrees to conduct an ethics investigation, BLM during Culver’s time at there has been marked by revised policies and rules that have cracked down on oil and gas emissions, including a proposed rule targeting methane from oil and gas drilling on federal lands.

A Spin Too Far: Garrity’s Op-ed on BLM’s Clark Fork Face Project

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Gosh, for whatever reason it seems to be BLM week here at The Smokey Wire! Thanks to Nick Smith for this.

Matt Garrity had an op-ed in the Montana Standard about the project.

It’s incredibly disappointing, but the Bureau of Land Management is no better under Tracy Stone-Manning’s leadership than under Trump. While the examples pile up nationally, here in Stone-Manning’s home state the agency is attempting to dodge required public review and comment for a massive 16,066-acre clearcutting and burning project that will bulldoze 22 miles of new roads in the Garnet Mountains in grizzly, bull trout, and lynx critical habitat.

What is it about BLM that seems to invoke hyperbole? “No better than under Trump” today, or yesterday “the President’s clean energy agenda can’t happen unless one person is confirmed”?

Somehow I doubt whether Director Stone-Manning has been involved in this project. Perhaps there’s a Montana subtext I don’t understand, but saying bad things about people publicly on one hand, while you ask them to do something, on the other hand, has never worked for me.

But let’s look at Garrity’s specific claims about this project. TSW readers have seen more than our share of fuel treatment and other projects.  Certainly  people can, and do, disagree about what to do where and sometimes why.  But it might be good to 1) agree on what’s in the EA and 2) assume that the BLM employees have good intentions.

Is it a 16,006 acre “clearcutting and burning project”? Here’s what the draft EA says..

Is there burning? Yes.  Is there thinning? Yes. Are there clearcuts?  Well, no, depending on your definition, of course.  Like the Pisgah-Nantahala, for structural and species diversity reasons (also climate resilience) to get new trees established, some openings are necessary. Is that a “clearcut”? There’s actually a photo in the EA of one of these..(there are many great photos in the EA, at the end, of all kinds of proposed treatments and conditions).  It seems to me that defining a clearcut might be handy.. to me there are size of opening and number of living trees left are both important.

Will it “bulldoze” 22 miles of new roads?

Yes, 16 miles of new permanent roads (not open to the public) and 6 miles of temporary roads to be obliterated within three years of treatment.

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The context for this project is unusual (at least to non-Montanans).  The BLM is part of a larger landscape that is mostly non-fed. They only have 10% of the project area.

 

Also, of the 23,666 acres of BLM in the planning area, 19% (4,519 acres) have no treatment proposed. Those lands are largely unroaded and were excluded from proposed treatment due to their value as secure habitat.

Apparently, industrial forest ownership was sold to future homeowners effectively making “new WUI”.  There are  > 2600 structures in the planning area, according to Montana State Library GIS data from 2020.

What was once a large industrial forest ownership, is now overwhelmingly (48% of the planning area) small, nonindustrial private landowners who are constructing homes and buildings in the forest (see table 1). This subdivision and rural development have effectively transitioned the entire planning area to Wildland–Urban Interface (WUI) when measured as a proximity to structures (See Appendix D, map 9.7). Because of this shift in ownership and use of the private land, the BLM’s forested parcels represent an increased risk from wildfire to the private structures and improvements and also to the safety of the residents and firefighters. It is these twin realities: the deviation from NRV and the expansion of the WUI that necessitate this project.


This gives you some idea of how these varying ownerships look from the air. You can click on this photo to enlarge.
Here’s the purpose and need:

Specifically, treatments are needed to:
1. Protect life, property and firefighter safety in and near the wildland–urban interface and promote resilience to wildfire by reducing forest fuel loading and breaking up homogeneous stand conditions.
2. Restore healthy ecological conditions by increasing the acreage of forest communities that are moving towards the midpoint of NRV.
3. Maintain and enhance native and sensitive plant communities; this includes maintaining and enhancing limber pine (Pinus flexilis) populations where present.
4. Improve ecological health by increasing resistance and resilience to forest insect and disease outbreaks.
5. Provide local and regional economic benefits through harvest of forest products and capturing the value of dead and dying timber while it remains salvageable

As I’ve said, dead trees store- but do not sequester- carbon, so insect and disease problems have carbon implications, as well as potential fuel hazards..

And this area has been designated high priority by the State (all lands, all hands and all that):

There are 142 pages in this draft EA and lots of information.

According to Garrity:

Carey should have ordered a full Environmental Impact Statement instead of trying to sneak the project past the public with no scoping, the lower-level analysis of an Environmental Assessment, and an illegally-shortened public review and comment period.

But there was scoping and public involvement, as detailed in this document. I suppose we could disagree on the definition of scoping as well, but it sure looks scoped to me. See for yourself. According to the folks involved:

Since we had already had two public meetings and scoping which did not indicate a overwhelming amount of public interest, a two week public comment period was identified. Once it became clear folks wanted a longer comment period, we made that change. This change was initiated prior to the opinion piece in the Standard.

The fact is that there was scoping, and the comment period is now 45 days.

Despite the legal requirement that the agency carefully consider public comments, the whistleblower also said there is no intention of taking input from the public or modifying the project prior to issuing a final decision.

Truth is the friend of time and all that. We’ll circle back and look at the response to comments in the final EA.

The way I see it is that the BLM, like the FS, is in a “darned if you do, darned if you don’t” position here. They would like to do WUI fuel treatment projects as residents, fire departments and others are legitimately concerned. They will be blamed if they don’t get them done. They received all kinds of $ from Congress to do them. But if they don’t do an EIS, then they will be criticized by folks like Garrity for not involving the public enough or writing a 120 page document instead of five alternatives and a 600 page document, or whatever. At the end of the day, it seems to me that it’s about finding zones of agreement among people – not more pages of analysis.

And according to Monday’s table, Montana BLM staffing is down by 23% to do all this.  So disagree about the project all you want, but give these gals and guys a break!

Scott Streater E&E News Piece on BLM Staffing and Hiring – and More Questions

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Above chart given to Scott Streater of E&E News.

Folks, Scott Streater (reporter at E&E News) and I were not in collusion here..but I guess folks are naturally wondering two years into the new Administration, how has the BLM progressed in fixing what went wrong during the Trump Administration. And perhaps there were forces responsible for loss of folks (like the natural post-Covid forces or retirement of more Boomers) that didn’t have to do with Trump. The Forest Service is also down and having trouble hiring people. And according to this tweet by Kelly Lunney, Interior Deputy Secretary Tommy Beaudreau says:

Finding qualified engineers who understand drought, water issues for Reclamation is a challenge, says Interior official @DepSecBeaudreau @EnergyDems hearing. Hopes to finish hiring 400 new staff (they are about 1/4 there) in coming year @SenMarkKelly

So, we might wonder, for BLM and FS folks, to what extent are the right kind of people not being hired due to 1) they’re not out there (universities aren’t producing them), 2) they don’t want to work for the Feds 3) they don’t want to work in the places BLM and FS (perhaps not so much BOR?) want them to (with DC being a special case of high cost of living); maybe they prefer remote work, 4) they don’t want to do the work that Feds have (field as opposed to computer), or 5) can’t make their way through the federal hiring processes? Please feel free to add your own reasons and your own experiences.

So let’s go back to Scott Streeter’s article from yesterday and see if we can pick up inklings about those questions for BLM.

can’t tell if it has a paywall, here’s the link to his story.

Note: The differences between these BLM numbers and the ones I noted in the previous post from “Best Places to Work in the Federal Government” are still puzzling.

But the bureau’s overall staffing level now stands at 12,183 authorized employees, marking a significant increase after dropping during the Trump administration below the minimum 10,000-employee threshold BLM has said it needs to oversee the 245 million acres the bureau manages, according to the table of organization chart obtained by E&E News.

BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning has said doing so is her top priority after former President Donald Trump’s Interior Department reorganized the bureau’s headquarters, prompting hundreds of staffers to leave.

Logic, here.. if they are down 3,073 positions and the Trump Admin prompted “hundreds” of staffers to leave.. it’s not really about the Trump Admin is it? I guess unless you’re DOI comms…

The vast majority of the vacant positions — 2,732 in total — are at BLM’s 12 state offices, according to the chart.

I thought this was particularly interesting..

For example, 46 percent of the 72 permanent positions within the energy, minerals and realty management department that oversees all onshore energy development, including oil, natural gas and coal, as well as renewable energy, were vacant as of Nov. 19, the chart shows.

I have a couple of hypotheses here.. perhaps the Admin’s obvious dislike of fossil fuels might lead to some kind of hostile work environment- or perhaps be just a little demoralizing? Or no one wants to go to work in a seemingly dying field? Or perhaps back to universities aren’t churning them out, or the positions require experience in the field at higher levels and that’s missing? Would be interesting to interview some of these folks (or recent retirees) and get their views.

As to headquarters employees:

“Headquarters employees are continuing to feel the strain brought on both by the continued vacancies and the overall reduction in the workforce that occurred with the move West,” Paulete said in an email. “Employees are burdened with doing multiple jobs to cover vacancies and have a workload to cover that previously had been done by multiple positions that were eliminated” during the Trump years.

She added that union representatives have reached out to BLM to work with the bureau on strategies to solve the issue, but so far she said the bureau has yet to take them up on the offer.

It sounds like there was both a reduction in number of HQ people, and the move itself. I hadn’t actually picked up on that before. Although staff reductions in one place do tend to pile up work in other areas, if the same work is done the same way. But in the case of NM there was apparently no actual reduction, and people are still overworked.

But Davidson said “the high vacancy rate” remains a top concern for BLM New Mexico staffers.

“The number of vacancies impacts workplace conditions for employees because many staff have been asked to work two or more jobs resulting in overworked and burnt out staff,” Davidson said in an email.

She also said BLM is too slow to approve employee requests to work remotely and that the “private sector” and other government agencies that “offer higher wages and remote positions” have successfully poached bureau staffers, adding to the vacancy issues.

“We hope the agency will fill more positions remotely to retain the workforce we need to serve the public,” she said.

I thought this was particularly interesting, as it brings up possible interagency federal competition with higher wages and remote positions, and the observation that people are easier to hire if they can work remotely. I’d like to know more about which series are being poached by the private sector. I’d think foresters in NM, not so much.

In addition to increased funding, BLM is also working to ease the hiring process in the name of filling vacant positions.

Stone-Manning told employees at town hall meetings at the Oregon-Washington office in August and the Colorado office in September that the bureau wants to reduce the time it takes to obtain security clearances and has already cut in half the amount of time needed for conditional preappointment screenings and the number of days needed to process temporary promotions and work details (Greenwire, Oct. 4).

She also said that BLM is conducting a workforce assessment of the bureau’s personnel structure to determine where there are gaps in expertise and specific job skills, and to identify where new positions might need to be established.

It seems to me that there might be a need for “best hiring practices” across the federal government since so many Bureaus and Agencies seem to be struggling.

And to end with a dose of humor, apparently the Hotshot Wakeup Person lost access to his Instagram account because someone reported this as “dangerous and harmful.”

Request to Journalists -The Rest of the Story: What Happened with BLM, the HQ Move, Morale, and Hiring?

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Remember a few years ago when there were many stories in the news about BLM employee morale and the HQ move to Grand Junction. I think it would be useful for one or more journalists to do an update… how many HQ employees have actually been moved back to DC since the Biden Administration came in? Are the same jobs now in Grand Junction or remote? How many career Assistant Directors and Deputy Assistant Directors (if any) are duty stationed back in D.C.? How many political hires are working for BLM? What does the org chart look like and how is it different from the previous Administration? How well is the current system actually functioning in the views of employees?

What do employees think about apparent nepotism with the State Director position for Colorado- Doug Vilsack being the son of Tom Vilsack, the Secretary of Agriculture? Supposedly BLM lost a lot of career employees due to Trump and his politicals… did the BLM hire any of them back (that wouldn’t be hard if they actually wanted to come back, I wouldn’t think). How are they doing with hiring new career employees? Rumor is the agency has had about a 30% overall career vacancy rate. There’s been much about Forest Service hiring, especially fire hires, but what about BLM- are they having the same or different problems?

As we discussed at the time, there’s value in having career folks with field experience develop positive working relationships with politicals to help them avoid mistakes and hopefully make better decisions. If the career folks with field experience are not in the office, how is that working? In a post-Covid remote work world, can trust still be built without presence “down the hall”?

Anyway, I think an update from our journalist friends would be valuable.

Just for grins, I took a look at the Best Places to Work in the Federal Government rankings, which we have looked at before, and there were some interesting things about BLM.  I have no clue how accurate their data are (or not), but these figures show the workforce being larger than it ever has been, whereas as I said above, the rumor is that they are down 30%.  And these figures don’t show a dip during the Trump period, which is curious.  There actually seems to be a big dip between 2012 and 2014. from 8422 to 7699. Currently they are at 10,451 according to this.

Once again, I have no idea how the “Best Places to Work” folks weigh the data, but here’s how they see trends in “engagement and satisfaction”.

It would be great, IMHO, for someone to put all the pieces together here and see what’s going on. Now I don’t know whether any journalists will actually address these questions, but feel free to add in the comments other questions of interest to you.

Shout Out to BLM NEPA Folks!

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I’d like to give a special shout-out to some BLM employees today, who traditionally have labored in relative obscurity.

There have been quite a few news stories saying they “did not look at” this or that, based on plaintiffs’ assertions.  Then because it’s in litigation, we never get to hear the BLM side.. unless we dig into some relatively obscure “response to comments” document.  So this post will be successful if the next time you read a news story that says “BLM’s NEPA did not…”, you consider the fact that well.. maybe.. they actually did.

What reminded me of this was today’s story about the results of some (in this case, sue-and-settle) litigation against oil and gas leasing in California. As per this Reuters story..

The 2019 lawsuit was filed in California federal court by the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club, who were later joined by Monterey and Santa Cruz counties. It claimed the federal plan to move forward with development ignored the potential harm from oil and gas extraction on groundwater, the climate and seismic activity.

And the solution…

A federal plan to lease over 725,000 acres of Central California land for fracking and oil drilling has been blocked after a federal judge approved a settlement brokered between the Biden administration and environmental groups that sued over the plan The U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management agreed in the deal approved Tuesday to take a fresh look at the environmental impacts of the leasing plan, which was approved by the Trump administration in 2019.

is…more analysis.  From the settlement, it looks like they need to do an SEIS with more alternatives (?).  Which isn’t exactly saying their analysis of the alternatives was inadequate.  But maybe legal folks will understand what this settlement says.

Now if you’ve been following these stories (there are many across the west, and they all say the same thing,  “BLM did not consider…” ), you might wonder “what about those BLM folks.. why can’t they do it right? After all, NEPA is a procedural statute, so conceivably even if the BLM  said “this project will extinguish life on earth as we know it” the project could go ahead.  Well maybe that’s a bit of an overstatement, but you see my point.

My own experience with BLM NEPA folks and solicitors was that they did good work. Take a look at the Central Coast RMP Amendment’s pretty overwhelmingly complete documentation here.

There are 18,229 active oil and gas wells in the 11 counties within the boundaries of the BLM Central Coast Field Office: 110 or roughly 0.6 percent are located on Federal mineral estate. Completion of this proposed RMPA/Final EIS will allow the BLM to resume oil and gas leasing within the planning area, which could result in development of up to 37 new oil and gas wells during the next 20 years, as described in the Reasonably Foreseeable Development scenario.

It also sounds from the news story (plaintiffs’ claims quoted) as if the problem were analyzing impacts.   Without looking at the document, did the BLM actually “ignore” the impacts on groundwater, the climate, and seismic activity?  Even back in my day, the BLM did analyze climate impacts, so I looked into this.

It was easy to find the response to comments for the Sierra Club and CBD on page I410:

Sections 3.6 and 4.6 (Climate Change/Greenhouse Gas Emissions) of the RMPA/EIS provide the regulatory framework, baseline conditions, and provides an assessment of impacts to GHG emissions (a proxy for impacts to climate change) from activities allowed under the RMPA alternatives. The primary GHG impacts that can be reasonably expected to occur are emissions from the combustion of fossil fuels and from releases of CO2 and methane due to oil and gas development and production. Discussions of impacts to other resources affected by climate change appear in the respective sections in Chapter 4 of the Draft RMPA/EIS. As discussed in the assumptions presented in Section 4.6, all activities must comply with applicable laws and regulations and may be subject to review for certain types of GHG emissions by the local air permitting authority. Therefore, utilizing this as a foundation for the analysis presented in Section 4.6, the RMPA/EIS considers current information regarding climate change.

Section 1.2.2 (Planning Approach) of the RMPA/EIS explains that oil and gas leasing and development on Federal mineral estate requires multiple stages of BLM Central Coast Oil and Gas Leasing and Development Appendix I. Comments and Responses to Comments May 2019 I-411 Proposed RMPA/Final EIS environmental analysis and authorization. Environmental review under NEPA is required at each phase. Therefore, future projects would also conduct specific project-level assessments of potential impacts to air, water, induced seismicity and human health; and may conduct Health Impact Assessments. Sections 4.4 (Hazardous Materials and Public Safety), 4.3 (Geology), 4.5 (Air Quality and Atmospheric Conditions), 4.7 (Groundwater Resources), and 4.8 (Surface Water Resources) of the RMPA/EIS provide a detailed analysis of the potential impacts to these resources under the RMPA alternatives.

Regardless of what they analyzed and how,  it sounds as if the BLM folks need to produce more alternatives and reanalyze.  Which can be somewhat demoralizing when you do good work; I’ve been there.   And then you reanalyze, and the court finds something else not quite right in the new analysis.

I’m not sure that that’s the case here, but if you note in the photo, if looks like this EIS is in response to a court order to give more detail on well stimulation techniques, which they did.  And so it goes.

Anyway, here’s a great big shout-out to the BLM folks who do NEPA and analysis work; all of you across the country!  Your work is appreciated..

Colorado big game corridor amendment

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Wildlife crossings, such as this one under U.S. Route 285 near Buena Vista, Colorado, provide safe passage for migrating elk and other animals.
Matt Staver/Getty Images

The Bureau of Land Management Colorado State Office is considering an amendment to oil and gas program decisions in existing BLM Colorado resource management plans to promote the conservation of big game corridors and other important big game habitats on BLM-administered land and minerals in Colorado.  The scoping period ended September 2.  This press release includes a link to the official website.  Here is the project description:

Description: The BLM will propose and analyze, with the best available scientific methods and information, a statewide amendment to existing BLM Colorado land use plans to evaluate alternatives for planning-scale oil and gas management prescriptions for the conservation of important big game habitat. The BLM will consider whether to incorporate new or changed oil and gas management decisions in existing land use plans, such as limits on high-density development, including facility and route density limitations, and other lease stipulations that would incorporate conservation measures for important big game habitat areas in Colorado.

This is in response to the 2018 USDI Secretarial Order No. 3362, “Improving Habitat Quality in Western Big-Game Winter Range and Migration Corridors,” and the release of the state of Colorado’s Big Game Policy Report, which recommended the bureau actually undertake this amendment to strengthen oil and gas lease stipulations consistent with new wildlife rules.

This sounds like good planning, which should be expanded to include:

  • The Forest Service.  Especially if you are talking about connectivity, it does little good if it runs into a “wall” created by management of other ownerships.  How is the Forest Service going to be involved in this?  (Especially where BLM administers leases on national forests.)
  • Other energy.  We have talked about the need to do this kind of thing for renewable energy proposals, and why shouldn’t that be integrated with this kind of planning effort for oil and gas?
  • Other species.  Just because big game species have more lobbying power doesn’t mean such efforts should ignore the same kinds of connectivity issues for other species like sage-grouse and large carnivores.  Including areas used by many species should be a goal.
  • Other states.  The Order calls for collaboration with states, and it looks like Colorado has taken the initiative here, but that doesn’t mean the BLM couldn’t be promoting this elsewhere, or that it is precluded from initiating an effort that would include state participation.