Battles over public lands loom even after sell-off proposal fails

By Alex Brown Stateline org Hunters hikers and outdoors lovers of all stripes mounted a campaign in June against a Republican proposal to sell off millions of acres of federal residents land The inhabitants outcry was so forceful that the measure s sponsor pledged to scale back the proposal Then on Saturday before an initial U S Senate vote on Republicans tax and spending cuts package he withdrew it altogether But even though the land sales proposal was defeated experts say federal lands face a slew of other threats from President Donald Trump s administration Agency leaders have proposed rolling back the Roadless Rule that protects million acres from logging and other uses Trump s Justice Department has issued a legal opinion that the president is allowed to abolish national monuments Regulators have moved to slash environmental rules to ramp up logging and oil and gas production And Trump s cuts to the federal workforce have gutted the ranks of the agencies that manage federal lands This is not over even if the sell-off proposal doesn t make it declared John Leshy who served as solicitor for the U S Department of the Interior during the Clinton administration The whole thing about leasing or selling timber or throwing them open to mining contends that s a form of partial privatization It s pretty much a giveaway Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum has repeatedly described society lands as America s balance sheet He has argued that certain lands could be used to provide housing while calling for an expansion of mining and oil and gas drilling to increase their economic output President Trump s force dominance vision will end those wars abroad will make life more affordable for every family in America by driving down inflation Burgum reported before his confirmation hearing Constituents lands advocates are bracing for ongoing battles for the rest of Trump s term in office They expect Republicans to add last-minute masses lands amendments to other bills moving through Congress and for land management agencies to attempt to strip protections from other federal lands Given the vocal backlash to the initial sell-off plan advocates expect future attempts to be shaped behind closed doors and advanced with little time for opponents to mount a defense Meanwhile they expect states to play a key role in shaping those battles In Western states where bulk federally owned lands are located various leaders from both parties view general lands as special places open to all Americans and critical for clean water wildlife and tourism But a few conservatives resent the fact that large portions of their states are managed by administrators in Washington D C limiting enhancement and private enterprise Representatives in specific states including Idaho Utah and Wyoming have pushed lawsuits or resolutions seeking to force the feds to hand over huge amounts of land Community land experts say the lawmakers behind those efforts will likely press harder now that Trump is in the White House Such state-level takeover attempts could shape the proposals that emerge from Trump s allies in Washington Sell-off proposal The firestorm over federal lands exploded when U S Sen Mike Lee a Utah Republican introduced measure that would force the U S Forest Utility and the Bureau of Land Management to sell up to million acres of land The measure also would direct the agencies to make more than million additional acres eligible for sale We ve never seen a threat on this magnitude ever explained Devin O Dea Western agenda and conservation manager with Backcountry Hunters Anglers There s been an overwhelming amount of opposition We ve seen record-breaking engagement on this issue Lee a longtime federal lands opponent claimed the lands were needed for housing and argued the regime has been a poor manager of its land Washington has proven time and again it can t manage this land Lee noted in June when announcing the proposal This bill puts it in better hands But a wide-ranging coalition of opponents argued that the proposal had no protections to ensure the lands would be used for affordable housing and that plenty of of the parcels eligible for sale had little housing promising A furious social media campaign highlighted cherished hiking trails fishing lakes and ski slopes that were in danger of being sold urging people to call their lawmakers to oppose the measure In latest days Montana Republican U S Sens Steve Daines and Tim Sheehy as well as Idaho Republican U S Sens Mike Crapo and Jim Risch came out in opposition to the land sale proposal That put into question whether Lee s provision could earn even a simple majority Then the Senate parliamentarian ruled the sell-off could not be included in the reconciliation bill without a -vote majority That ruling came a day after Lee posted on social media that he would be making changes to the bill in response to concerns from Hunter Nation a nonprofit whose board includes Donald Trump Jr Lee circulated a scaled-back measure last week that would exempt national forest lands but would direct the Bureau of Land Management to sell up to million acres It would require land for sale to be within five miles of a population center and developed to provide housing Society land advocates say Lee s changes did little to assuage their concerns They argue that federal land sales or transfers should happen through the current long-standing process which requires local stakeholder input and directs the proceeds from land sales to be reinvested into conservation and residents access on other parcels It s the overwhelming belief of hunters and anglers that the budget reconciliation process is not the appropriate conveyance for citizens land sales mentioned O Dea with the hunting and fishing group In late June Lee reported that he was withdrawing the proposal saying that Senate rules did not allow him to include protections that land would not be sold to foreign interests But he pledged to continue the battle over federal land ownership working with Trump to put underutilized federal land to work for American families States role While the sell-off proposal aligned with specific state administrators goal of taking over federal lands a few lands experts say private developers would have been the real winner If the lands are transferred to the states without money the states lose announced Leshy the former Interior Department official It s a hit on their budget which means they re gonna have to sell them off If states got a key amount of inhabitants lands a lot of that would end up in private hands In Utah where leaders have made the greater part aggressive push to take over federal lands lawmakers argue that they could raise lease prices for oil and gas operations bringing in enough revenue to cover the state s management costs The strategy of the state is to keep these lands open and available to the general Speaker Mike Schultz a Republican notified Stateline O Dea pointed to an economic analysis of what it would cost Montana to take over federal lands The analysis uncovered it would cost the state billion over years to take on wildfire management deferred maintenance and mine reclamation He noted that multiple Western states have sold off a majority of the trust lands they were granted at statehood undermining indicates that a state takeover would leave lands in the inhabitants domain Related Articles What to know about buying electric vehicles after the federal tax incentives end EPA puts on leave employees who spoke out against policies under Trump In a big bill that hurts clean capacity residential solar likely to get hit fast Signs posted at National Park Facility sites seen as threats to whitewash dark side of history EPA employees put names to declaration of dissent over agency moves under Trump Other proposals While Lee s land sales proposal has gotten the biggest headlines residents land advocates are fighting a multifront battle against the Trump administration s moves to roll back the protected status of certain lands slash environmental rules and expand logging mining and drilling operations The approach is to throw as much as you can at the wall and see what sticks O Dea declared There s only so much you can mobilize opposition to There s a huge jeopardy that a few of these things could fly under the radar Particular conservative states and industry groups say Trump is allowing federal lands to be used to their full economic foreseen Alaska Sen Dan Sullivan a Republican reported his constituents are keenly aware of how the federal executive s ownership of percent of Alaska s lands can inhibit economic expansion and cause challenges for our communities Leshy noted that society lands have proven to be a popular cause but Trump s cuts to the federal workforce could undermine residents confidence that the federal cabinet is capable of managing the land if you make it terrible for long enough maybe people say The feds shouldn t be managing this they do such a bad job he revealed Stateline reporter Alex Brown can be reached at abrown stateline org States Newsroom Visit at stateline org Distributed by Tribune Content Agency LLC