BLM’s failure to implement master leasing plans in prime fish and wildlife habitat represents a flawed approach to public lands energy development, say sportsmen
DENVER – The Bureau of Land Management has considered the list of Colorado candidates for leasing reforms that take a landscape-scale look at conservation of public lands, and the result is no good news for fish, wildlife and sportsmen.
Sportsmen for Responsible Energy Development said Thursday that the BLM’s decision not to approve a master leasing plan for South Park, a premier fish and wildlife haven in central Colorado, is the latest case of the agency’s failure to follow through on the promised reforms a year after identifying sites that merit MLPs. None has been approved in Colorado and little progress has been made in other Western states.
South Park, prized by sportsmen for its world-class fisheries and pronghorn, mule deer and elk herds, is a prime candidate for an MLP, which would identify important conservation values and potential cumulative impacts early in the energy development process, SFRED said.
The sportsmen’s coalition is led by Trout Unlimited, the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership and the National Wildlife Federation.
“Despite the economic slump, oil and gas development continues to grow in Colorado. Yet the BLM is not utilizing one of its best management tools to secure certainty for industry by focusing on long-term, comprehensive planning that also protects fish, wildlife, habitat and water quality,” said John Gale, NWF’s regional representative. “The BLM has failed to keep an important part of its promise to balance our energy needs with the hunting, fishing and recreation on public lands that boost rural economies and sustain our Western heritage.”
The BLM describes a master leasing plan as a way “to restore needed balance to the development process by improving protections for land, water and wildlife” and to address potential conflicts.
An MLP would provide a crucial step between the more general, overarching resource management plan and approvals for specific leases and drilling permits, when there’s limited opportunity for analysis of the potential, cumulative impacts, said Suzanne O’Neill, executive director of the Colorado Wildlife Federation, which formally proposed South Park for an MLP.
“The BLM’s rejection on Tuesday of an MLP for South Park is an opportunity lost,” O’Neill added. “The BLM’s explanation was that it would be jumping the gun because South Park hasn’t seen that much oil and gas activity. But that’s precisely the right time to act, before the great tracts of unfragmented habitat are carved up and the South Platte and its tributaries are threatened.”
About 450 people and businesses, many of them from the South Park area, signed a petition asking the BLM to approve an MLP to conserve one of the “last wild places” while allowing energy development.
In Colorado’s North Park, a site proposed by the BLM itself for a master leasing plan, agency officials deemed the proposal too late because the area already is “substantially leased.”
“So, it would appear that we are too late for North Park and too early for South Park,” SFRED wrote in a Feb. 1 letter to BLM Director Bob Abbey.
The lack of final guidance for the development of MLPs has created confusion within the agency and among the public about where and when the plans should be used, according to SFRED.
North Park contains the headwaters of the North Platte River and is home to moose, elk, bear, pronghorn, mule deer and the greater sage-grouse, which is a candidate for listing under the Endangered Species Act. Both North Park and South Park already have oil and gas wells and sit atop the oil-rich Niobrara formation, seen as possibly the nation’s next big play.
“If not North Park and South Park, where are they going to do MLPs?” asked Trout Unlimited’s Bob Meulengracht, who lives in Colorado. “The BLM is in the process of writing new resource management plans, yet they’re pooh-poohing the idea of master leasing plans.’’
Meulengracht challenged the BLM’s reasoning that at roughly 50 percent, too much of North Park is already leased to preclude preparation of an MLP.
“What makes 50 percent substantial?” Meulengracht asked. “North Park has been called the Serengeti of Colorado, and that characterization is absolutely appropriate. It has some of the best hunting and fishing around. It’s a special place, one worth conserving.”
Sportsmen for Responsible Energy Development is a coalition of more than 500 businesses, organizations and individuals dedicated to conserving irreplaceable habitats so future generations can hunt and fish on public lands. The coalition is led by Trout Unlimited, the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership and the National Wildlife Federation.
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