Latest news with #FederalLandPolicyandManagementAct
UPI
23-07-2025
- Politics
- UPI
Ariz. border land passed to U.S. Navy as future 'National Defense Area'
1 of 2 | The transfer of Arizona land along the southern border will, according to federal officials, allow the Navy Department to aid U.S. Customs and Border Protection to further secure the border and "reduce unlawful border traffic and its adverse effects on natural and cultural resources." File Photo (2001) By Chris Corder/UPI | License Photo July 23 (UPI) -- The federal government on Wednesday switched ownership of hundreds of acres of land in Arizona to the U.S. Navy, and it was designated as the future site of a special militarized area to be used in America's southern border immigration efforts. The U.S. Department of the Interior said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum signed off on on the jurisdictional transfer of roughly 285 acres in Yuma County to the U.S. Department of the Navy to be used "in direct support of border security operations," according to officials. The public land will pass hands for a three-year period while construction presses on to establish a so-called "National Defense Area" to align with President Donald Trump's hardline immigration policies. "By making this land available for border infrastructure improvements and defense operations, we are closing critical security gaps, stopping illegal activity and protecting both our nation and its natural resources from the damage caused by unchecked illegal immigration," Burgum claimed in a statement. Burgum, North Dakota's former Republican governor, invoked powers under the 1976 Federal Land Policy and Management Act to withdraw the public space from its federally protected status. Officials said it lies along the U.S.-Mexico border in a desert region known for "persistent illegal cross-border activity." The department explained that then-President Theodore Roosevelt, a noted conservationist, in 1907 put the desert region in a public trust to combat cross-border smuggling. The transfer, according to federal officials, will allow the Navy Department to assist efforts by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents to further secure the southern border and "reduce unlawful border traffic and its adverse effects on natural and cultural resources." The Trump administration has been confiscating border land for months in the name of national security. Meanwhile, the U.S. government controls about 33% of land abutting its southern border. But that includes Native American reservations largely exempt from most federal statues. It comes as the Pentagon in recent months ordered the creation of a string of "buffer zones" along the U.S.-Mexico border where military personnel can apprehend non-citizens. Interior argues that without the federal government's action the area will "not only present national security risks," but may also cause "significant environmental harm to sensitive desert ecosystems." The secretary justified the change over as being about "law and order, national sovereignty and using our public lands to defend the American people."
Los Angeles Times
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
‘Enduring Wild' is an engaging travelogue about California public lands under attack
Josh Jackson's 'The Enduring Wild: A Journey Into California's Public Lands' is a story of adventures across 41 California landscapes, with photos of beautiful places you are unlikely to have seen, in locations ranging from the Mojave Desert to the Elkhorn Ridge Wilderness in Mendocino County. Early on, the author lays out mind-bending stats: more than 618 million acres in the United States are federally owned public land and 245 million of those belong to the Bureau of Land Management. Public lands, he notes, 'are areas of land and water owned collectively by the citizens and managed by the Federal government.' These lands 'are our common ground, a gift of seismic proportions that belongs to all of us.' Drive across the United States and consider that 28% of all of that is yours. Ours. Jackson's assertion that we are all landowners is a clarion call amid a GOP-led push to sell off public land. The shadow of the current assault on public lands weighs heavy while reading this lovely book. The book has endearing origins. When Jackson could not get a reservation for weekend camping with his kids, a buddy suggested that he try the BLM. Until that moment he had never even heard of the Bureau of Land Management. Yet, 15.3% of the total landmass in California is … BLM. Jackson starts out with history: All these lands were taken from Native American peoples, and he does not overlook that BLM used to be jokingly referred to as the Bureau of Livestock and Mining. In 1976, a turnaround came via the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, which built a multi-use mandate to emphasize hiking and conservation as much grazing and extraction (a.k.a. mining). This effort to soften the heavy use of public lands by for-profit individuals and companies led to the so-called Sagebrush Rebellion and the election of President Reagan. Arguably, we've been struggling with finding the multi-use balance ever after. Jackson's first BLM foray was out to the Trona Pinnacles in the Mojave Desert, where he and his two older children camped, playing in a wonderland where 'hundreds of tufa spires protrude like drip-style sand castles out of the wide-open desert floor that extend for miles in every direction,' while his wife, Kari, an E.R. nurse, stayed home with their newborn. The pandemic shutdown in 2020 inspired Kari's suggestion, 'Why don't you start going to see all these BLM lands?' Jackson's love affair with BLM lands was not immediate, as just a few miles into his next hike in the Rainbow Basin Natural Area near Barstow, he was underwhelmed, like he was missing something. A few miles later, he sat and considered a Terry Tempest Williams quote from 'Refuge': 'If the desert is holy, it is because it is a forgotten place that allows us to remember the sacred. Perhaps that is why every pilgrimage to the desert is a pilgrimage to the self.' Revisiting this quote on repeat, Jackson had an emotional shift, deciding to stop hiking and … start walking. On his next trip to the Amargosa Canyon, Jackson began by reaching out to the Amargosa Conservancy, learning about the Timbisha Shoshone people whose ancestral land this is, about past mining and dozens of plant and animal species. Committed to going at the pace of discovery, he admired the enchanting, striated geology of Rainbow Mountain, cherished creosote, mesquite and the brave diversity of desert flora and was struck by the gaze of an arrogant coyote. On his return, he found that in three hours, he had only traveled … a mile. Yet it was during this meander that his writing made a steep drop into seeing, feeling, connecting, plunging toward transcendence. A highlight of the book is a repeat trip to Central California's Carrizo Plain, first during a drought, silenced by its sere magnificence. After the heavy rains of 2022, he joined Cal Poly San Luis Obispo botanist Emma Fryer and was overcome by the delirious beauty of a superbloom, feeling like 'I had wandered into the Land of Oz.' Fryer observed that the drought was so severe that only the hardy native seed survived within the soil, releasing their beauty the moment water allowed them to come to life. Seeing the same place twice was revelatory, both familiar and completely new. It's hard to tell if the places he visits gets more beautiful over the course of the book or his capacity to appreciate them and share his joy has grown. Despite the frequent paucity of BLM cartographic resources, apparently Jackson never got lost or worried about dropping the thread of a trail. Describing his father, Jackson might as well be talking about himself: 'I have no memories of my dad being worried or fearful in unfamiliar situations.' Nevertheless, toward the end of the book, when he and his hardy father camped next to the rushing Eel River, Jackson did worry about bears breaking into their tent. Fortunately, the bears did not arrive but, inspired by William Cronon's 'The Trouble With Wilderness,' Jackson's heart opened as he realized that 'Nature' is not out there; nature is wherever we are. Back in Los Angeles taking long walks with his daughter, past bodegas and car washes, he saw jacaranda, heard owls and coyotes and realized the wild had been here all along. An urban sycamore claimed its space regardless of enclosing cement and car exhaust, as spectacular and venerable as any sycamore in the state. Can the places Jackson visited for his book endure public larceny? He is tracking the answer to this question, real time, on his Substack, where he's currently describing the shocking attempts to sell millions of acres of BLM land. 'It's been a wild few weeks for BLM lands. 540,385 acres in Nevada and Utah were on the chopping block to be sold off,' Jackson recently noted. 'Everyone was talking about the land totals — but no one was showing what the landscapes actually looked like. So, I decided to go see them.' Great advice: Bring a friend, pack water and go. Watts' writing has appeared in Earth Island Journal, New York Times motherlode blog, Sierra Magazine and local venues. Her first novel is 'Tree.'
Yahoo
18-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump moves to rescind public lands conservation rule
In another action drawing harsh outcry from environmental groups, President Donald Trump's Department of Interior is moving to rescind the BLM's Public Lands Rule that set conservation on the same footing with other forms of use on federal public land. Others lauded the move. 'We are thrilled the Trump Administration has decided to reexamine the Biden-era Public Lands Rule. This rule could keep Utahns off public lands and would employ a museum-type management approach — you can look, but you can't touch," Utah Attorney General Derek Brown said in a statement. 'All Utahns should have access to Utah public lands under a policy that allows for multiple uses. The Trump administration has a better understanding of Utah's unique public lands challenges and we look forward to working with them to increase access to Utah's public lands.' The policy, implemented during the Biden administration, sought to put conservation and ecosystem restoration as part of multiple use on Bureau of Land management land like drilling and grazing. New leases would have been offered improving and recovering federal lands and offsetting development impacts. The action was swiftly condemned by Utah and other Western states. 'Utah has a long track record of successful conservation and restoration of its public lands in tandem with local BLM offices,' Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said in a statement after a draft of the rule was released in 2024. 'The added layers of red tape and federal bureaucracy embedded in the BLM's Public Lands Rule create new roadblocks to conservation work. The health of Utah's lands and wildlife will suffer as a result. This rule is contrary to the bedrock principle of 'multiple-use' in the BLM's governing law, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act. I look forward to working with Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes and his office to challenge this rule in federal court as soon as possible.' In the letter of concern before the rule's adoption, Cox and the other governors wrote: 'The proposed rule would then require the BLM to identify intact landscapes on public lands, and manage these lands to protect them 'from activities that would permanently or significantly disrupt, impair, or degrade the structure or functionality of intact landscapes.' While the specific activities that would harm these intact landscapes are not identified in the proposed rule, we are concerned that different forms of multiple use such as conifer removal projects, livestock grazing, renewable energy development, mining, oil and gas exploration, road improvements, dispersed camping, and many other activities could be deemed to 'disrupt, impair, or degrade' in different situations.' It went on to stress this: 'In fact, it is conceivable that almost all of the West's BLM land could qualify as 'intact landscapes' under the BLM's vague and overly broad definition.' Prior to his election to the U.S. Senate, then Utah Rep. John Curtis proposed legislation to nullify the rule and industry groups were readying for a legal battle. This year, Rep. Celeste Maloy, R-Utah, and Rep. Russ Fulcher, R-Idaho, reintroduced the Western Economic Security Today, or WEST, Act that would require the national director of the BLM to withdraw the rule. The White House Office of Management and Budget posted a rescission notice for the rule this week, following an executive order Trump issued directing federal agencies to determine and invoke regulations that undermine national interests. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance says the rescission of the rule flies in the face of public opinion, pointing out that 92% of the comments the Bureau of Land Management received during a public comment period on the rule were positive. '(Interior) Secretary Doug Burgum routinely trashes the very concept of conservation of public lands — likening them to a corporate balance sheet to be monetized, applauding as President Trump fired thousands of employees at BLM and the National Park Service, and now this: undoing the wildly popular Public Lands Rule. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance opposes these efforts and will work to keep the Public Lands Rule in place,' said Steve Bloch, legal director for the organization.
Yahoo
21-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Opinion - Building homes on federal land could lower costs — if cities are held in check
The Departments of the Interior and Housing and Urban Development are exploring making some federal land available for homebuilding to alleviate a stubborn housing shortage estimated at over 20 million homes. Their success will depend not only on how quickly and broadly the plan is implemented, but on making sure any newly opened land is not bogged down by the local land use regulations that make housing so scarce and expensive in the first place. The current home shortage is primarily due to excessively restrictive local land-use rules that favor relatively expensive homes on large lots. But particularly in western states, land for homebuilding is limited by federal holdings near fast-growing metropolitan areas like Las Vegas, Phoenix and many others. Western land was opened to large-scale settlement through 1862's Homestead Act, which resulted in the sale of more than 420,000 square miles — around 11 percent of the country — in blocks of up to 160 acres, typically to small farmers. As quality agricultural land grew scarce, claims plummeted and nearly dried up by the 1930s. In 1946, the Bureau of Land Management was formed, reflecting a shift from sales toward maintaining land that had not attracted buyers. In 1976, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act repealed the Homestead Act, signaling an embrace of federal ownership and management, growing environmental concern and other changing currents in public opinion. But in the following years, something else changed: The rapid growth of sunbelt cities made valuable land once thought worthless. But selling federal land had become complex and politically fraught under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, and western cities began to chafe against confinement. By the 1990s, the situation had become too pressing to ignore. The Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act authorized the Bureau of Land Management to transfer certain land to address a housing shortage in Las Vegas. Its success has been mixed, with around 40 percent of the designated land still unsold. Land that has been sold has been subject to municipal zoning, which typically imposes restrictions such as minimum lot sizes, frontage requirements, setbacks and other mandates that hinder builders from constructing low-cost houses. Today, western states such as Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, California and Oregon have some of the highest home price-to-income ratios in the nation. Hemmed in by federal land and burdened by their own expensive regulations, cities that should be centers of opportunity for a new generation are instead starter-home deserts. New houses are prohibitively expensive for too many buyers. The new initiative promises to revisit the Federal Land Policy and Management Act's assumptions in a comprehensive way that encompasses all affected municipalities. Done right, it could cut through burdensome procedural barriers to selling federal land, relieve cost pressures on western urban markets, allow new cities to grow in appropriate locations and remain attentive to environmental and conservation concerns. But the number of resulting homes that most Americans can comfortably afford will be closely tied to local land use regulations. In Reno, Nevada, I found that new homes on lots smaller than 5,000 square feet appraised at an average of $343,000, while those on 5,000-to-7,000-foot lots were appraised at $461,000. Yet less than 10 percent of the single-family lots in Reno — and zero percent of the area of one major development district — allows homes on less than 5,000 square feet of land. Frontage requirements also played a role in Reno. Each additional 10 mandated feet corresponded with an extra $60,000 in home costs. So, unless the Bureau of Land Management and HUD push back against local policies like these by attaching robust, enforceable conditions to transfers or negotiating ironclad development standards that ensure that starter homes are legal to build, expect to see some nice, spacious — and expensive — homes built. Local politics almost inevitably lead to zoning that would blunt the affordability impact of land sales. Beyond cost, there are environmental benefits to allowing smaller homes, including both single-family homes on small lots and multifamily housing. Higher-density housing makes more efficient use of urban land, reducing the rate of outward sprawl. Small lots in arid western climates also mean fewer large, irrigated yards sapping water supplies. And while the benefits for American families could be immense, the amount of land required relative to total federal acreage is modest. The homesteading farmer sought 160 acres or more, but today's starter homes can sit on one-tenth of an acre or less. Mountains of evidence show the exclusionary, cost-raising effect of overzealous local zoning. Federal authorities have an opportunity to do more than open land to Americans seeking a home to call their own. They can show our cities and counties what happens when inclusive policies allow for starter homes in addition to houses only the wealthy can afford. Charles Gardner is a research fellow with the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
21-03-2025
- Business
- The Hill
Building homes on federal land could lower costs — if cities are held in check
The Departments of the Interior and Housing and Urban Development are exploring making some federal land available for homebuilding to alleviate a stubborn housing shortage estimated at over 20 million homes. Their success will depend not only on how quickly and broadly the plan is implemented, but on making sure any newly opened land is not bogged down by the local land use regulations that make housing so scarce and expensive in the first place. The current home shortage is primarily due to excessively restrictive local land-use rules that favor relatively expensive homes on large lots. But particularly in western states, land for homebuilding is limited by federal holdings near fast-growing metropolitan areas like Las Vegas, Phoenix and many others. Western land was opened to large-scale settlement through 1862's Homestead Act, which resulted in the sale of more than 420,000 square miles — around 11 percent of the country — in blocks of up to 160 acres, typically to small farmers. As quality agricultural land grew scarce, claims plummeted and nearly dried up by the 1930s. In 1946, the Bureau of Land Management was formed, reflecting a shift from sales toward maintaining land that had not attracted buyers. In 1976, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act repealed the Homestead Act, signaling an embrace of federal ownership and management, growing environmental concern and other changing currents in public opinion. But in the following years, something else changed: The rapid growth of sunbelt cities made valuable land once thought worthless. But selling federal land had become complex and politically fraught under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, and western cities began to chafe against confinement. By the 1990s, the situation had become too pressing to ignore. The Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act authorized the Bureau of Land Management to transfer certain land to address a housing shortage in Las Vegas. Its success has been mixed, with around 40 percent of the designated land still unsold. Land that has been sold has been subject to municipal zoning, which typically imposes restrictions such as minimum lot sizes, frontage requirements, setbacks and other mandates that hinder builders from constructing low-cost houses. Today, western states such as Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, California and Oregon have some of the highest home price-to-income ratios in the nation. Hemmed in by federal land and burdened by their own expensive regulations, cities that should be centers of opportunity for a new generation are instead starter-home deserts. New houses are prohibitively expensive for too many buyers. The new initiative promises to revisit the Federal Land Policy and Management Act's assumptions in a comprehensive way that encompasses all affected municipalities. Done right, it could cut through burdensome procedural barriers to selling federal land, relieve cost pressures on western urban markets, allow new cities to grow in appropriate locations and remain attentive to environmental and conservation concerns. But the number of resulting homes that most Americans can comfortably afford will be closely tied to local land use regulations. In Reno, Nevada, I found that new homes on lots smaller than 5,000 square feet appraised at an average of $343,000, while those on 5,000-to-7,000-foot lots were appraised at $461,000. Yet less than 10 percent of the single-family lots in Reno — and zero percent of the area of one major development district — allows homes on less than 5,000 square feet of land. Frontage requirements also played a role in Reno. Each additional 10 mandated feet corresponded with an extra $60,000 in home costs. So, unless the Bureau of Land Management and HUD push back against local policies like these by attaching robust, enforceable conditions to transfers or negotiating ironclad development standards that ensure that starter homes are legal to build, expect to see some nice, spacious — and expensive — homes built. Local politics almost inevitably lead to zoning that would blunt the affordability impact of land sales. Beyond cost, there are environmental benefits to allowing smaller homes, including both single-family homes on small lots and multifamily housing. Higher-density housing makes more efficient use of urban land, reducing the rate of outward sprawl. Small lots in arid western climates also mean fewer large, irrigated yards sapping water supplies. And while the benefits for American families could be immense, the amount of land required relative to total federal acreage is modest. The homesteading farmer sought 160 acres or more, but today's starter homes can sit on one-tenth of an acre or less. Mountains of evidence show the exclusionary, cost-raising effect of overzealous local zoning. Federal authorities have an opportunity to do more than open land to Americans seeking a home to call their own. They can show our cities and counties what happens when inclusive policies allow for starter homes in addition to houses only the wealthy can afford.
