Wyoming leaders plan to fight against final BLM RMP

As the year ends and the nation prepares for the incoming of a new presidential administration in January, the hotly-debated fate of public lands in Southwest Wyoming seems to hang in the balance. 

When he was in town last Friday, Governor Mark Gordon met with the Sweetwater County Board of County Commissioners and local legislators to discuss the latest developments with the Bureau of Land Management's plans for the Rock Springs Field Office Resource Management Plan (RMP). On the same day, the BLM released their final Record of Decision (ROD) regarding the plan. With many Wyoming leaders still unhappy with the RMP, the Governor shared that he remains committed to fighting the proposed plan, and he is hopeful that the new presidential administration will help address the issue. 

At the beginning of last week, Governor Gordon submitted his appeal of the BLM's response to his Governor's Consistency Review. The consistency review, which the governor submitted at the end of October, shared recommendations for how the proposed RMP needed to be changed in order to be consistent with federal and state laws and statutes and to better align with a multiple use goal for public lands. The BLM gave a "perfunctory response" to the consistency review, according to Gordon, which prompted his appeal of that response. 

"They basically ignored the consistency review," Gordon told the Sweetwater County Commissioners and legislators at the beginning of their meeting. 

The BLM also rejected the Governor's appeal, with BLM Principal Deputy Director Nada Culver sending a letter to the governor maintaining that the BLM complied with all laws and policies, and detailing why the BLM rejected the governor's recommendations. 

The BLM then released their final Record of Decision on Friday, marking the end of the process to approve the updated RMP. With the release of the ROD, the BLM maintained that the final RMP took feedback and input from local stakeholders into account. 

"The approved plan incorporates input from the Governor and State representatives, local governments, the livestock, mining, oil and gas, and recreation industries, as well as conservationists, hunters and anglers, utility companies, and motorized recreation users," a BLM press release said. "The plan reflects the vast majority of the more than 100 recommendations made by the Governor's task force in its final report to the BLM."

However, Governor Gordon made it clear that he is not satisfied with the final RMP, and that he hopes it can be changed under the incoming administration. 

"The Biden Administration's BLM did everything within its power to push this out the door before President Trump takes office and their Director leaves for a position with an environmental group," Gordon said in his official statement responding to the ROD. "While it is not surprising that Wyoming's comments were figuratively dumped in the trash, it is disappointing that despite years of collaborative work between state agencies, impacted counties, concerned citizens, and interest groups, all Wyoming is left with is this parting shot from the Biden Administration."

Gordon shared similar sentiments with Sweetwater County leaders when he met with them on Friday, explaining that BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning told him that finishing the RMP was the one thing she wanted to be sure to get done before the Biden administration left office. He also noted that Stone-Manning has been hired by the Wilderness Society, and he confirmed that there will be a new BLM director and that he has been "very engaged in that process."  Gordon said the hope is to find someone with a good understanding of minerals and the need for public access. 

In addition to his hopes for a new BLM director, Gordon shared his hopes for the new leaders of the incoming administration in general. 

"With President Trump in office, former Governor Burgum at the head of the Department of the Interior, and a Republican Senate and House, I am confident that we will have the ability to finish the job and right a course that has been so far off track over the last four years," Gordon said in his press release. 

Gordon shared more about his relationship with Doug Burgum, who has been nominated for Secretary of the Interior, during his meeting in Sweetwater County. Gordon said he and Burgum, the former governor of North Dakota, are "very good friends" and "have a good working relationship and will continue to." 

With high hopes for the incoming administration, Gordon and his staff shared their hopes of fighting against the RMP. 

"We're thankful November went the way that it did," Gordon's Senior Policy Advisor, Nolan Rap, said during the Sweetwater County meeting. "We're more than likely not going to have to live with what the Record of Decision says."

Gordon and Rap both explained to the Sweetwater County leaders that there are several courses of action being considered when it comes to addressing the RMP. 

The primary course of action that has already been determined is that they will be challenging the RMP in courts. 

"I have no doubt that we'll be doing that," Gordon said. "We always knew at the end that there could be litigation... That's where we anticipate it going." 

Another potential course of action that the governor and his team are considering is a congressional review, provided for by the Congressional Review Act (CRA), which is meant to give congressional oversight of federal agencies' rules. However, a congressional review has never been used on an RMP in the past, Gordon pointed out. 

"We think it can happen, it just hasn't been tried before," Rap said. 

The other main course of action that could be pursued is amending the RMP, Rap explained. He noted that all three options have their own pros and cons. 

"CRA is the hammer approach, for lack of a better term," Rap said, adding that an amendment "would be more of a scalpel approach." 

Amending the RMP would open it up to the NEPA (National Environmental Policy Act) process again, but without having to totally start from scratch, Rap explained. He also pointed out that either the CRA or an amendment could be pursued at the same time as the RMP is being challenged in the courts. 

When it comes to the congressional review option, Rap admitted that there are some details that they are still researching, including whether it would be limited to overturning the RMP as a whole or if it could be used to address and overturn specific actions and not others, which Commissioner Island Richards asked about. 

"My preference would be if CRA could be implemented more surgically," Richards said. 

Richards and Gordon both pointed out that there were areas where the BLM took Sweetwater County's comments into consideration, such as in regards to Little Mountain. However, Richards said that the BLM lost the county's trust when they initially promoted the most conservative alternative for the RMP. 

"I hate to see the bomb go off if it's the CRA, but I think they're the ones that set the bomb off a year and a half ago," Richards said.  

Gordon shared that one of the main purposes of the meeting in Sweetwater County was to hear what local leaders are hoping for in regards to the RMP, and he reiterated his commitment to finding ways to fight it as it stands.