As drafted, per High Country News, the plans open about 80 percent of this land to energy development. Nearly half a million acres would lose their status as areas of critical environmental concern.
That means ORVs tearing up more fragile land. It means fragmenting wilderness study areas to deliberately make it harder to make them into protected wilderness. And it means more oil and gas drilling.
“It’s the Bush administration’s last stand to make sure Utah’s public lands are open for development,” says Liz Thomas, attorney at the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.
To make matters worse, the BLM is rushing the changes through.
“We really need to get these wrapped up because we’re running out of money,” explains Don Ogaard, lead planner for the Utah BLM. The fiscal year ended on Sept. 30, and the Utah BLM cannot suck any more money out of the national coffers for the plans, he says. All of the records of decision will be signed by the end of October.
Uhh, yeah, right. Nov. 4 is the date on your calendar, Mr. Ogaard.
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