Press Releases

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Congressional Western Caucus Chairman Dan Newhouse (WA-04) and Senate Western Caucus Chair Cynthia Lummis (WY) sent a letter to Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Director Tracy Stone-Manning urging a comment period extension on the agency’s Greater Sage-Grouse Rangewide Planning Draft Resource Management Plan Amendment and Draft Environmental Impact Statement (Draft RMPA/EIS) released last week.

The letter reads, “As Chairs of the Congressional and Senate Western Caucus representing 130 members of both the House and Senate, we write to express our concerns with the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Greater Sage-Grouse Rangewide Planning Draft Resource Management Plan Amendment and Draft Environmental Impact Statement (Draft RMPA/EIS), especially the time allotted for public comment. It is imperative that the BLM provide a timeframe for review commensurate with the scope of the proposal. As such, we request the BLM extend the comment period to a minimum of 180 days.

“The Draft RMPA/EIS is considering amendments to 77 different BLM resource management plans (RMPs), which will impact millions of acres across ten different Western states. Along with these potential amendments, your agency could potentially designate millions of acres as new Areas of Critical Environmental Concern (ACECs). Coupled together, these proposals will have drastic effects on grazing permitees, resource developers, timber harvesters, and recreators whose livelihoods depend on responsible management of our federal lands.

“In the proposal, the BLM said it expects comments to be as ‘specific as possible and include suggested changes, sources, methodologies and references to a section or page number.’ With such a brief public comment window, impacted stakeholders – the individuals who will ultimately be responsible for meeting the habitat conservation metrics – need more time to properly outline their concerns and suggested changes. For these reasons, we respectfully request that the comment period be extended to a minimum of 180 days upon publication in the Federal Register.”

The full letter can also be found here.

The Notice of Availability from the Bureau of Land Management can be found here.