It’s time to connect the dots about what’s really going on in eastern Nevada
Your comments are needed!
Pancake and Triple B wild horse HMAs are affected for this round of oil and gas leasing. What other HMAs are next?
From a BLM press release:
Ely – The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Ely District is asking the public to provide input on potential issues associated with oil and gas leasing on 41 parcels of public land, totaling 82,121 acres, in White Pine County, Nevada. Leased parcels may later include exploration and development. The BLM is analyzing the parcels to identify potential impacts in an environmental assessment (EA), in accordance with the Oil & Gas Leasing Reform mandated in 2010. The deadline to provide input is Friday, June 3, 2016.
The input received will assist in the preparation of a preliminary EA that the BLM will make available for public review and comment in late June 2016. A Competitive Oil and Gas Lease Sale is scheduled on Dec. 13, 2016.
Scoping information and other documents can be found at http://1.usa.gov/1ssQyIn. Interested individuals should address all written comments to the BLM Ely District Office, 702 N. Industrial Way, Ely, Nevada 89301 Attn: 2016 Oil & Gas Lease Sale or fax them to (775) 289-1910, Attn: 2016 Oil & Gas Lease Sale. Email comments will not be accepted.
Before including your address, phone number, e-mail address, or other personal identifying information in your comment, you should be aware that your entire comment – including your personal identifying information – may be made publicly available at any time. While you can ask us in your comment to withhold your personal identifying information from public review, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to do so.
For more information, contact Leslie Riley at the BLM Ely District Office at (775) 289-1860
[End of BLM press release]
Protect Mustangs is an organization who protects and preserves native and wild horses.
The Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for the Continental Divide-Creston (CD-C) Natural Gas Development Project is now available for a 30-day public availability period.
Project Background
BP American Production Co. and approximately 20 other companies propose to develop up to 8,950 additional natural gas wells within a 1.1 million acre project area. Development would occur over the next 15 years with about 47,200 acres of new disturbance. An estimated 12.02 trillion cubic feet of natural gas worth $45.6 billion would be produced and 167.3 million barrels of condensate would generate revenues of $6.4 billion over the 30-40 year life of the project. More than 4,000 wells have been developed in the project area since the 1950s with approximately 49,218 acres of surface disturbance, including nearly 8,500 acres of long-term disturbance.
NEPA Status: The DEIS was released for public comment on Dec. 7, 2012, and ended on March 6, 2013. Approximately 8,700 DEIS comments were received.
Copies are also available for review at the following locations:
BLM Wyoming State Office
5353 Yellowstone Rd., Cheyenne, Wyoming
BLM High Desert District Office, 280 Hwy 191 N, Rock Springs, Wyoming
BLM Rawlins Field Office, 1300 N 3rd St., Rawlins, Wyoming.
The FEIS is available for public review for 30 days after the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) publishes its Notice of Availability (NOA) in the Federal Register. The EPA will publish its NOA on Friday, April 15, 2016.
Any comments received on the FEIS will be reviewed and may be addressed in the Record of Decision. Comments can be sent to:
Before including your address, phone number, email address, or other personal identifying information in your comment, you should be aware that your entire comment, including your personal identifying information, may be made publicly available at any time. While you can ask the BLM in your comment to withhold your personal identifying information from public review, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to do so.
Thank you for your interest in this project. If you have questions or need additional information, please contact Jennifer Fleuret at (307) 775-6329.
MEEKER, Colo. — The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) White River Field Office is seeking public comments on a proposal to gather alleged excess native wild horses in northwest Colorado. The BLM claims they want to sustain healthy public lands and wild horse populations yet their management levels are too low. Wild horses should have principal but not exclusive use of the land. The BLM’s multiple use manifesto is unfairly pushing wild horses off their native land.
The BLM is proposing to use a helicopter to locate and stampede wild horses toward a set of corrals as well as using water and bait trapping. The roundups could begin as early as September 2015. Up to 167 wild horses could be removed.
The White River Field Office manages the Piceance-East Douglas Herd Management Area to maintain a healthy wild horse herd in balance with other resources and uses such as mining, drilling and livestock grazing. This area currently has an estimated 377 wild horses, but the appropriate management level for that area is too low at only 135 and 235 wild horses. The adjacent West Douglas Herd Area is not managed for wild horses but currently has an estimated population of 365 wild horses. Cruel roundups could occur in either area as well as areas within the White River Field Office outside these boundaries.
The BLM planning documents, evaluating the proposed roundup and removal operations, are available at the White River Field Office at 220 E Market Street and online at www.blm.gov/co/st/en/fo/wrfo.html.
It’s important to send in public comments regarding the BLM’s proposed roundup and removal plans favoring other users by May 5. Written comments can be mailed to the White River Field Office, 220 E. Market Street, Meeker, CO 81641 or submitted via email to mkindall@blm.gov. General questions can be directed to Melissa Kindall at 970/878-3842.
Before including your address, phone number, email address or any other personal identifying information in your comment, you should be aware that your entire comment, including personal identifying information, could be made publicly available at any time. While individuals can request the BLM to withhold personal identifying information from public view, the BLM cannot guarantee it will be able to do so.
Coalition Urges BLM to Cancel Lease Sales to Protect Water, Health and Environment
RENO, Nev.— Protesters wearing blue and carrying water jugs will rally outside the U.S. Bureau of Land Management office in Reno on Tuesday morning to protest the auction of fracking leases on public lands. The auction of over 150,000 acres in Lincoln and Nye counties in BLM’s Ely District will begin at 9 a.m. at the BLM Nevada State Headquarters building located at 1340 Financial Boulevard in Reno. Frack-Free Nevada and Nevadans Against Fracking, which is organizing the protest, is calling on the BLM to cancel the sale in order to protect water, people, wildlife and quality of life from the dangers of fracking.
The protest will be Tuesday, Dec. 9, from 7:45 a.m. to 9:15 a.m.
“Fracking is a big risk to Nevada’s water, and without adequate clean water, we have nothing,” said Dan Patterson, with the Center for Biological Diversity, a member of the coalition. “The fracking industry wants to get its hands on Nevada, but while they reap profits, our wildlife and water supplies will pay the price. Across the state, from Reno to Austin and Reese River Valley, to Ely, eastern Nevada and Las Vegas, Nevadans want to protect our water, quality of life, lands and wildlife from the fracking push.”
Fracking uses huge volumes of water, mixed with sand and dangerous chemicals, to blast open rock formations and release oil and gas. The controversial technique is being proposed on hundreds of thousands of acres of public lands managed by the BLM across Nevada.
A typical hydraulic fracturing process uses between 1.2 million and 3.5 million gallons of water per well, with large projects using up to 5 million gallons. This water often resurfaces as “flowback,” which is often highly polluted by fracking chemicals as well as radioactive materials from fractured shale.
Fracking has brought environmental and economic problems to rural communities across the country. Accidents and leaks have polluted rivers, streams and drinking water. Regions peppered with drilling rigs have high levels of smog, global warming gases, as well as other airborne pollutants, including potential carcinogens. Rural communities face an onslaught of heavy truck traffic — often laden with dangerous chemicals used in drilling — and declining property values. Wildlife habitat is also fragmented and degraded.
“Fracking is part of a larger problem, a problem where money trumps common sense and we jeopardize our precious water for a few dollars,” said Dawn Harris of Frack-Free Nevada and Nevadans Against Fracking. “Nevada state and local officials should ban fracking to protect our water, as people in places like Denton, Texas and San Benito County, California have done.”
“Nevada’s precious groundwater should not be sacrificed for short term profits of corporations. In our arid desert, groundwater should always trump oil,” said Bob Fulkerson of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada.
Communities directly affected by oil and gas fracking, as a result of these sales, were not alerted by BLM in advance of preparing lease sale.
“Nevada Tribes have a vested interest in protecting our ancestral homelands from being harmed by the oil & gas industry,” said Jennifer Eisele, of the Shoshone Paiute Tribes, Duck Valley Indian Reservation. “We have a spiritual relationship with Mother Earth and it is our duty to protect our natural resources for the future existence of ourselves and descendants. Exploitation of fossil fuels may harm our water quality and damage our agriculture, which is our primary means of economic support.”
“Water is precious in the desert. I’m afraid of fracking chemicals being injected into our groundwater,” said Jennifer Messina of Ely, a retired teacher. “People are working to promote eastern Nevada as a great place to live and visit. All our efforts are lost if fracking poisons our ground.”
“BLM has a mandate to protect the safety of the environment and human health, but both BLM and the oil and gas industry have poor records,” said Dr. Bonnie Eberhardt Bobb of Austin, Nevada, in southern Lander County. “Dangerous fracking fluids could seep in to our groundwater. Disposal of fracking waste by injection in to the ground has also been correlated with increased earthquake activity.”
This summer, Lander County Commissioners objected and filed administrative protests over BLM’s sale of oil and gas fracking leases in Big Smokey Valley. Earlier this fall, the Lander County Water Board unanimously passed a resolution opposing any drilling or fracking in the Middle Reese River Valley, near Austin, due to threats to town water sources.
The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 800,000 members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.
Frack-Free Nevada and Nevadans Against Fracking seeks to protect Nevada’s precious water, maintain the health and quality of life of Nevada communities, guard our air quality, improve agriculture and ranching, and preserve wildlife.
Protect Mustangs calls for a freeze on roundups for scientific reevaluation
Tonopah, NV (October 31, 2014)–The Battle Mountain District, Tonopah Field Office is rounding up about 120 wild horses from within the Reveille Allotment and Herd Management Area (HMA) located approximately 50 miles east of Tonopah, NV to remove alleged excess wild horses on 600,000 acres of public land.
“The BLM is wiping out America’s wild horses and taxpayers are paying for the abuse,” states Anne Novak, executive director of Protect Mustangs. “We need to stop the roundups and protect our native wild horses.”
The roundup will stampede native wild horse families by helicopter over a fragile ecosystem and possible sage grouse habitat in the Great Basin Desert. Often wild horses are injured and die in roundups. The treacherous roundup is paid for with tax dollars, and began October 30, 2014. Most herds need to be rounded up before given PZP.
After the roundup, approximately 70 wild horses will be permanently removed, 60 wild horses will be sent to holding facilities in Ridgecrest, California and about 10 horses will be offered for adoption after the roundup in Tonopah, NV on November 8. The remaining 50 wild horses will be released back into the HMA for a post roundup population of 98 wild horses, putting the survivors at risk. The minimum number for genetic variability is 150 wild horses.
Often the BLM returns wild horses with conformation defects to the range, instead of placing them in adoptive homes or long-term holding where they will not breed. Apparently the agency doesn’t realize that by returning wild horses with defects they will ruin the breeding pool. The BLM claims mares selected to maintain herd characteristics will be released back to the HMA. The public must watchdog the agency to ensure wild horses with defects are pulled from the breeding pool and rehomed. Euthanizing them is not an option supported by the American public.
The informed public is outraged over an EPA approved restricted use pesticide called PZP, made from pigs ovaries, to be used on native wild horses.PZP advocates campaign rigorously to treat mares with the Porcine Zona Pellucidae (PZP-22) in order to temporarily sterilize mares. PZP advocates hail the use of PZP in spite of the fact that wild horses are underpopulated on millions of acres of public land.
Experimental research on ovary damage in mares given the immunocontraceptive PZP is used to hone the drug for eventual human use. This could be where the “follow the money” piece fits in. Wild horse advocates are furious America’s herds are being used as lab rats. Science has proven the drug sterilizes wild horses after multiple use. PZP advocates are pushing for BLM to manage wild horses “in the wild” using these risky drugs.
The devastation of wild horses in the Reveille Allotment appears to be subject to a 1987 District Court Order and two orders issued by the Interior Board of Land Appeals (IBLA) in 2001 and 2002, requiring BLM conduct an annual inventory of wild horses in the Reveille Allotment and initiate a roundup to remove alleged excess native horses from the Allotment when the inventory shows that population numbers exceed the out of date Appropriate Management Level (AML) of 138 horses.
Current AML does not represent healthy herd populations and lacks scientific merit. AML must be updated to ensure healthy herds remain on public land. The herd census must never fall below 150 wild horses to maintain genetic variability.
The current estimated population, based on previous inventory flights is 168 wild horses, according to BLM. This is the low end of the genetic viability scale. The orders need to be challenged based on scientific reevaluation of wild horses benefiting the ecosystem as a native species, livestock causing range damage and the minimum number of wild horses needed for genetic variability.
“We must ensure native wild horses can survive upcoming environmental changes,” states Anne Novak, executive director of Protect Mustangs. “The minimum population for a genetically variable herd is 150. Why are PZP advocates and the BLM allowing wild horse herds to fall below safe numbers?”
According to a press release from National Academy of Sciences (NAS) released June 5, 2013, “The U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) current practice of removing free-ranging horses from public lands promotes a high population growth rate, and maintaining them in long-term holding facilities is both economically unsustainable and incongruent with public expectations,” says a new report by the National Research Council.
The NAS report states there is “no evidence” of overpopulation. Only tobacco science and spin backs up BLM’s population claim to justify roundups and fertility control/sterilizations. PZP advocates lobbied NAS to have fertility control recommended even though the herds are underpopulated.
Roundup activities within the Reveille HMA were analyzed in the 2010 Reveille HMA Wild Horse Gather Plan and Environmental Assessment (EA) and the 2014 Reveille Wild Horse Gather Determination of NEPA Adequacy (DNA). The EA, DNA, and Decision Record can be accessed on the Reveille Wild Horse Gather website: http://on.doi.gov/10qLBlh.
Members of the public are encouraged to witness the helicopter stampede and document America’s icons losing their freedom to spread awareness that cruel roundups must stop. Observation protocols and visitor information are available at http://on.doi.gov/1xAMeTp. The BLM will post updates, photos and other information about the roundup on the Reveille website and on the hotline at 775-861-6700 throughout the course of the roundup.
The BLM is wiping out wild horses for the extractive industry and New Energy Frontier in the West. The agency manages more than 245 million acres of public land, the most of any Federal agency. This land, known as the National System of Public Lands, is primarily located in 12 Western states, including Alaska. The BLM also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the nation. The BLM focuses on their mandate of multiple-use and sustained yield. In Fiscal Year 2013, the BLM generated $4.7 billion in receipts from public lands.
BLM’s roundups disturb the thriving natural ecological balance by disturbing habitat dynamics. This crime against nature causes abnormally high birthrate and puts native wild horses at risk of inbreeding.
“We are calling for an immediate freeze on roundups and removals for scientific reevaluation,” states Novak. “Right now native wild horses are at risk of being ruined by bad policy.”
Protect Mustangs is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the conservation of native and wild horses. The group is against using PZP in the wild. Today most wild herds are threatened with low numbers and a lack of genetic variability. Using PZP in a sanctuary setting where acreage is limited is a different situation. Wild horses must not be managed in the wild as if they were a zoo exhibit.
Injection-Site Reactions in Wild Horses (Equus caballus) Receiving an Immunocontraceptive Vaccine, By James E. Roelle and Jason I. Ransom, http://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2009/5038/
Wild horses are quickly being wiped out in Wyoming. Governor Mead encourages roundups and removals at federal taxpayer expense. Mead seems to be owned by the oil and gas industry so it’s no surprise he’s getting rid of their environmental obstacles.
By: Matt Mead
Date: Aug. 23, 2013
Location: Cheyenne, WY
Governor Matt Mead expressed that he is proud of Wyoming’s record of effective regulation of the oil and gas industry in his comments on the Bureau of Land Management’s proposed rule for hydraulic fracturing. Governor Mead wrote to Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell to say that the BLM should reject the duplicative regulation and defer to states like Wyoming.
“As a leading energy producer, Wyoming continues to set the standard for development and environmental stewardship,” Governor Mead wrote. He pointed to Wyoming’s first-in-the-nation hydraulic fracturing rules, updated well bore integrity standards, air standards for natural gas production and wells that are hydraulically fractured, and Wyoming’s recently released energy strategy. “Guided by this energy strategy, Wyoming is establishing baseline groundwater sampling, analysis and monitoring regulations.”
Given state leadership is already in place in Wyoming, Governor Mead expressed concern that the new BLM rule would add to existing delays and undercapitalization of federal permitting. Another area of concern is the BLM’s effort to grant variances to allow compliance with state or tribal requirements when those meet or exceed the federal rule or standard. What is troubling is that the ability to acquire variance is given to operators, not states or tribes. “Despite BLM’s contention that states will be afforded opportunity to work with the BLM to craft a variance, the mechanism in the rule only allows operators to pursue a variance,” Governor Mead wrote.
We invite you to post more information in the comments section below because the public has a right to know the real reasons why America’s wild horses are being terrorized, pushed off public land, to end up at risk of going to slaughter for human consumption abroad. Sadly the news in Wyoming doesn’t know what fair reporting means and is not covering the crisis as they should.
It’s shameful the energy industry, government employees and our elected officials refuse to find the win-win for wildlife and industry to coexist. Instead they are wiping out America’s wild horses to cash in on their land. Recently in the Wyoming Checkerboard roundup, the BLM zeroed out most of the wild horses despite public outcry. The BLM also tried to blame horse advocates for taking more than 400 additional wild horses when the truth is they were allegedly pushed by Governor Mead to take as many as they could find.
Wyoming’s Governor Matt Mead joined the fight against wild horses in the Checkerboard allegedly because he is pushing for maximum industrialization of public land and especially liquified natural gas (LNG) to replace diesel and for export to Asia’s growing market for fuel, electricity, etc.). The most important document for you to read to understand why Wyoming is getting rid of their wild horses is Wyoming LNG Roadmap (April 2014) Below is some news from last May:
Cheyenne, WY (May 12, 2014) – Governor Mead unveiled a report today showing Wyoming is well positioned to be a leader in developing a liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry for high horsepower uses.
Since Governor Matt Mead took office in January of 2011, he’s made it a point to maximize the use of Wyoming’s natural resources. “One of the things I really wanted to accomplish was an energy strategy. An energy strategy is energy, economy and environment,” Mead said.
Mead went out and partnered with Gladstein, Neandross & Associates (GNA), to provide an “LNG road map” about the feasibility, potential, costs and benefits of using liquefied natural gas.
“Liquefied natural gas gives our customers who are currently use diesel to power their engines the ability to reduce costs of ownership. Abundantly domestically produced natural gas offers lower fuel costs and reduced emissions,” said Richard Wheeler, President & CEO of Wyoming Machinery Co.
Wyoming is the third leading producer of natural gas and the use of LNG as a supplement to diesel fuel in Wyoming’s high horsepower sectors such as mining, drilling and over-the-road trucking.
“It’s a 300 to 400 million dollar investment as best we can tell to really get this going here in the state, but that will create about 5,000 really good, high paying, high tech jobs,” said Erik Neandross, CEO of GNA
According to GNA, the investment could return 160 to 170 million dollars in fuel cost savings for Wyoming based businesses.
“It’s an opportunity for coal companies to lower their fuel costs and also use a product that we have in abundance in Wyoming,” Mead said.
This isn’t the first time a public affairs firm is pushing energy driven missions through at the expense of wildlife and especially native wild horses. Just follow the money . . .
According to a June 2010 press release, “Kearns and West has been known to gather scientific experts and build a movement of common interest “stakeholders” to crush public outcry and true environmentalism.”
see: http://noyonews.net/?p=6231
Kearns and West Inc., the same “Collaboration and Strategic Communications” company that ran public meetings for the corrupt Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) “Initiative” [and who illegally barred public recording and comment at their public meetings] has also been accused of running manipulative “public workshops” for the BLM – in the controversial roundup of wild horses in northern Nevada, and other Western States.
According to a June 2010 press release, “Kearns and West has been known to gather scientific experts and build a movement of common interest “stakeholders” to crush public outcry and true environmentalism.”
Although Kearns and West, Inc. claims to represent the public and the environment, and impartially facilitate public meetings, in reality they represent energy interests. They function to facilitate government approval for private projects, and shift policy in favor of private “stakeholder” interests. They specialize in marginalizing and excluding public involvement – with contrived and manipulative “stakeholder collaboration” processes.
Interestingly, in the Brave New World of modern day environmental policy, private interests, not tax dollars, are financing public policy processes and decisions. These processes were once taxpayer supported, and deemed to be fair and impartial. But now, with governments going broke, governmental processes and the agencies entrusted to design, control and regulate corporate industrial interests, have been bought and paid for by the same corporate interests they are supposed to regulate.
Corporate crooks such as Kearns and West have stepped in the void, to conduct what are ostensibly public meetings, but in reality are paid for by private corporations and individuals. The MLPA “Initiative” was a classic example of corruption easing it’s way into a bankrupt democracy.
Kearns and West contracts out what are essential out public policy endeavors. But they serve the private corportations and individuals who pay for their services – to create favorable governmental outcomes for proposed “projects.”
Kearns and West’s clients are a laundry-list of energy and natural gas interests. They are cashing in on what once would have been unacceptable, criminal conflict of interest in determining public policy.
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In the case mentioned below, Kearns and West was allegedly involved in helping to exterminate wild horses from Northern Nevada, so that the Ruby Pipeline could go through. The Ruby Pipeline is a 42 inch diameter natural gas pipeline, that as of last year, runs from 680 miles from Wyoming to Oregon, and passes right through the heart of the wild horse country in Northern Nevada.
According to many in the west, the wild horses were an obstacle to the pipeline project that the BLM (Bureau of Land Management) did not want to deal with. So in comes Kearns and West – to hold “public workshops.” But why is a company with direct ties to natural gas and energy interests – running public meetings and workshops, supposedly on behalf of the public – on an issue between wild horses, public land, and a natural gas pipeline project?
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There is nothing more heartbreaking than seeing helicopters terrorizing the beautiful wild mustangs, a living icon of the American West. The 2010 press release below is part of a tragedy that is continuing to this very day.
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From a June, 2010 press release by the Cloud Foundation:
Spin Doctors Hired for the Destruction of America’s Wild Horse and Burro Herds
Denver, CO (June 14, 2010)—The Cloud Foundation has learned that the San Francisco based public relations and public affairs firm, Kearns and West, with ties to big energy and offices across the country, has been hired to push the Salazar Plan for Wild Horses and Burros through Congress in Fall 2010—despite public outrage. Kearns and West has expertise in crisis management as well as accomplishing policy and regulatory goals. Their clients range from Mineral Management Services (MMS) and PG&E to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). The Department of Interior (DOI) has enlisted the firm using the Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution (ECR) as the go between. Senior mediator of Kearns and West, J. Michael Harty will facilitate an unprecedented public workshop in Denver, Colorado at the Magnolia Hotel, 818 17th Street, on June 14th followed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Public Advisory Board Meeting on June 15th. Both days will be live-streamed and viewing available on http://www.thecloudfoundation.org. The public and members of Congress are encouraged to watch. The public will protest on June 15th from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. with a press conference at noon.
BLM’s recently announced and highly polished but unsubstantial, “Strategy Plan” as well as their association with PR firm Kearns and West, appears designed to manipulate the public and marginalize the opposition to the Salazar Plan for wild horses and burros. The plan calls for the purchase of Eastern and Midwestern “preserves” populated by sterilized wild horses, captured from their Western ranges.
“This is ALL about manipulating public opinion. And ramming ONE thing – Salazar’s Plan – through” states author R.T. Fitch.
The Kearns and West Salazar Plan Executive Summary states, ‘The U.S. Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution (‘Institute’) is assisting BLM in assessing stakeholder interests and developing an effective stakeholder engagement plan for the Strategy.’ Disturbingly, BLM often does not include the public as a stakeholder in their planning documents regarding the management of wild horses and burros.
“Who is the biggest stakeholder in the discussion of the public’s land and its wild horses if not the public?” asks Terri Farley, author of the Phantom Stallion series, adding “A public agency must represent the public and utilize taxpayer dollars responsibly—not spend excessively on another private contractor.”
According to their website, Kearns and West offers their clients (in this case the BLM) ‘A compelling credible, resonant case. True, high-impact support for your position.’ Advocates support a new direction that abandons the endless, expensive cycle of roundup, removal, and warehousing. BLM must adopt a far less expensive path that is kinder to the land and the wild horses legally living there, one that contains truly transparent solutions, not a slick, taxpayer-funded PR campaign.
“By hiring a high powered PR and Public Affairs firm, it seems that BLM is aiming to extinguish the opposition rather than solve the controversy over their management of our wild herds,” explains Ginger Kathrens, Volunteer Executive Director of the Cloud Foundation. “The public by the thousands has shared their opposition to the Salazar Plan. I hope we can sit down at this public forum and seriously talk about a moratorium on roundups while we work to reinstate protections that are consistent with the intent of the 1971 Wild Horse and Burro Act.”
According to The Holmes Report, “Kearns & West recognizes the important value of collaborating both with our clients and their stakeholders. For more than 20 years, the firm has employed its unique brand of stakeholder-centric strategic communications and collaboration processes to design innovative, but pragmatic programs, achieving superior results for clients in the federal, state and local government, private and nonprofit sectors. Kearns & West works with tough issues and big ideas.”
Besides specializing in ‘accomplishing policy and regulatory goals’ Kearns and West also represents PG&E—a primary customer in the Ruby Pipeline natural gas project threatening public lands and five public herds with environmental devastation from Wyoming to Oregon. Kearns and West also represents Duke Energy, the Association of Western Governors and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, among others.
While Secretary Salazar vowed to restore the Interior Department’s ‘respect for scientific integrity’ he has failed to consider science, reason, or even the law when it comes to managing our wild herds.Kearns and West has been known to gather scientific experts and build a movement of common interest “stakeholders” to crush public outcry and true environmentalism. Wild horse advocates feel the Kearns and West prepared Salazar report for Congress will be biased in favor of big energy ties with DOI at the expense of federally protected wild horses who somehow are in the way of ‘The New Energy Frontier’.
“We hope Monday’s workshop will be a productive one rather than a demonstration of BLM’s inability to change,” concludes Kathrens.
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Who is really dictating wild horse roundups and removals and why are they zeroing them out? Protect Mustangs invites you to research the subject and post what you find in the comments below. This is also a welcome forum for you to politely voice your outrage at wild horse removals.
Protect Mustangs is a 100% volunteer non-profit organization where the wild horses come first! We are not paying big bucks on marketing campaigns. The majority of our donations go towards feeding and caring for rescued wild horses.
Gladstein, Neandross & Associates: http://www.gladstein.org
Leading environmental consulting firm for emission reduction, energy and transportation policy, and market development for alternative fuel vehicles.
United States Extractive Industries Transparency Initiatives Multi-Stakeholder Group Advisory Committee Meeting Draft Summary of Proceedings (2014): http://on.doi.gov/1w5aaOj Kearns & West
Data removed: http://www.recovery.gov/arra/News/featured/Pages/Some-Recipient-Data-Being-Removed.aspx “The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board will sunset on September 30, 2015 and has decided for its last year not to renew the licensing agreement that allows for the display of certain recipient-related data. As of October 1, 2014, maps, charts, and graphs on the site will no longer reflect this information. This change will also include the removal of the recipient profiles as well as the cumulative national download file.
Kearns & West
Kearns & West is a woman-owned collaboration and strategic communications firm founded in 1984. Our high-stakes projects include work at local, state, regional, and national levels and cover a variety of sectors including energy, water, marine resources, land use and natural resources, government, business and academia, and technology and Internet.
Kearns & West understands the special requirements of working with stakeholders to achieve an organization’s goals. We have a proven record of success thanks to our stakeholder-centric approach of providing robust collaboration and strategic communications services. Our commitment to positive, mutually beneficial results has helped us maintain long-term relationships with the people and organizations we assist.
BLM Seeks Public Comment on Public Lands Nominated for Oil and Gas Exploration and Development
ELKO, Nev. – The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Elko District Environmental Assessment (EA) for parcels of public land nominated for lease in the 2015 Competitive Oil & Gas Lease Sale is available for review. These parcels have the potential for future oil and gas exploration and development. The 30-day public review period concludes October 29, 2014.
The 24 parcels totaling 25,802.47 acres have been analyzed for potential impacts in the EA in accordance with the Oil & Gas Leasing Reform mandated in 2010.
Lease stipulations identified in the Elko (1987) and Wells (1985) Resource Management Plans are attached to applicable parcels to help protect resources. The EA is available for public review at: http://on.doi.gov/1rxlD8j
Inside the EA you will find information about how American wild horses will be impacted on page 64. It reads:
3.2.17 Wild Horses
Existing Conditions
There are 8 wild horse herd management areas (HMA) managed by the Elko District Office. They are the Owyhee, Rock Creek, Little Humboldt, Diamond Hills North, Maverick-Medicine, Antelope Valley, Goshute, and Spruce-Pequop HMAs. These eight HMAs total approximately 1.8 million acres and have an appropriate management level (AML) of 1,338 wild horses. Wild horses inhabit these HMAs year round. Deferred parcels 13 and 14 are within the Maverick /Medicine HMA and parcels 15 through 26 are located in the Antelope Valley HMA. The other parcels are not located within HMAs.
Effects of the Proposed Alternative
There are no direct impacts to wild horses associated with leasing, however wild horses can be found within some of the HMAs and future exploration could affect wild horses within those HMAs. Increased human and motorized activity could disrupt and displace wild horses. The wild horses inhabiting the area of the exploration could leave the area and move away from the noise and activity. During any long term or permanent activity it is probable that wild horses over time would become accustomed to the activity and resume normal activities at a reasonable distance. Construction of new fences as part of development production facilities could disrupt movement of free roaming wild horses and animals could be injured by colliding with any new fences.
Mitigations
Construction of fencing within a HMA would be evaluated during review of any development proposal to determine if flagging or other measures would be necessary to increase visibility to wild horses. Best management practices along with specific restrictions would be implemented to minimize negative impacts to wild horses.
The Competitive Oil and Gas Lease Sale will be conducted on March10, 2015.
If you have issues or concerns or need more information, contact Tom Schmidt, Project Lead at the BLM Elko District, at (775) 753-0200 or email at elfoweb@blm.gov
Watch the telling film Wild Horses and Renegades expose the truth behind wild horse roundups and removals. You can go to https://vimeo.com/ondemand/wildhorses to watch the documentary. Here’s a rough preview:
Josh Fox’s Oscar nominated GASLAND I explains how tracking ruins the environment and our water especially. Available on Netflix.
GASLAND 2 explains how the oil and gas lobbies control democracy, putting us all at risk and poisoning our water in order to become a world leader in exporting liquid natural gas. There is a nice segment linking wild horse roundups with fracking in Wyoming. Here’s a trailer for Fox’s GASLAND 2. You can also watch the film on Netflix.
Northern California March at 2pm TODAY in #Oakland: @NorCalClimate #PeoplesClimate rally at Lake Merritt Amphitheater http://bit.ly/1vYeORj #PCM @350BayArea
The U.S. government should be cautious about adopting the state of Wyoming’s strategy for protecting the greater sage grouse—a grassland bird at the center of a national controversy—conservationists argue in a report scheduled to be released tomorrow. The critics say the state, which is home to an estimated one-third of the country’s remaining sage grouse, is pursuing a strategy that fails to preclude intrusive development in key habitat, provide adequate buffer zones, and preserve winter habitat. The critique comes as federal officials have begun to adopt portions of Wyoming’s approach to protecting the bird on federal lands, saying it offers a promising way to balance conservation and economic development.
The grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) makes its home in sagebrush steppe in 11 states and is the largest grouse in North America. Biologists estimate its current population is between 200,000 and 400,000 birds. That could be as low as 1% of historic levels, says Mark Salvo of Defenders of Wildlife in Washington, D.C., a lead author of the white paper. In 2003, the population decline prompted many scientists and environmentalists to ask the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to add the sage grouse to its list of animals protected by the Endangered Species Act. In 2010, the agency ruled that the bird warranted listing, but that other animals were of higher priority, and said it would reconsider the issue in September 2015.
That deadline is looming, and state officials and agencies across the grouse’s habitat have been scrambling to come up with management plans that they hope will prevent the bird being listed as endangered. State officials fear that a listing would force a wide range of development controls on lands owned by the federal government, which account for more than half of the territory of some western states. Nearly one-half of Wyoming, for example, is federal land, including areas key to the mining and oil and gas industries.
In a bid to avoid listing, Wyoming’s governor in 2011 outlined the state’s strategy in an executive order. It is based on a concept called core area protection, and recently the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) announced it was adopting major elements of the strategy in a long-range plan for protecting more than 800,000 hectares of federal land around Lander, Wyoming. The plan, officially known as a Resource Management Plan (RMP), is the first of 15 such plans BLM is developing across the 11 sage grouse states.
Rick Vander Voet, field manager at the Lander BLM office, says that the RMP was chosen as the best and most balanced mix of options among the alternatives considered. He says this plan “reflects years of extensive collaboration with cooperating agencies, non-governmental organizations and the public.” The Lander Field Office is unique among the other areas in the state considering RMPs, in that 99% of BLM land under their jurisdiction is sage grouse habitat—and nearly two-thirds of it is considered core habitat. Vander Voet says that in and around Lander, “every other resource, from archaeology to wilderness study areas will in some way influence greater sage grouse.”
The report concludes that the RMP’s version of the core area strategy will not prevent future declines in grouse populations. Among the specific concerns:
Buffer zones aren’t big enough. The plan establishes “surface occupancy buffer zones” around grouse leks—the areas where the birds gather for mating displays—which means no oil or gas infrastructure within about 1 kilometer of active leks. But that number is not supported by any scientific literature or studies, the report argues. Instead, Salvo notes, the best available scientific literature recommends about a 6-kilometer buffer. Critics note that a BLM draft of an alternative plan that was not adopted quoted a 2007 study which concluded that buffers of about 1 to 3 kilometers wide failed to prevent population declines of sage grouse. The agency should heed such research and widen the buffer zones, the report argues.
Too few controls on surface disturbances in critical sage grouse habitat. Such disturbances can include roads, oil and gas development, and construction. Wyoming’s plan allows for up to 5% of “suitable sage grouse habitat” to be disturbed, although a 2011 review prepared for BLM by nearly two dozen federal and state biologists and land managers recommended 3% or less surface disturbance. The Wyoming plan allows “too much drilling … in the wrong places,” Salvo argues.
It ignores threats to wintering grounds. The plan restricts development activities in sage grouse habitat that the birds use during the winter months, but eases up when the birds move elsewhere in the spring and summer. Research, however, suggests the birds will avoid returning to wintering grounds if they have been disturbed, critics say. They urge BLM to follow the advice of its 2011 review panel, which recommended prohibiting surface disturbance in or adjacent to winter habitat any time of the year.
The authors of the report hope BLM officials will take such issues into account as the agency finalizes its remaining management plans, including three more for Wyoming. The state “is key to sage-grouse conservation,” Salvo says.
BLM’s Vander Voet says the goal for his office, in administering the RMP, will be to balance the “primary drivers of the local economy” (oil and gas, tourism, recreation, and agriculture) while protecting important cultural and natural resources—including greater sage grouse—for the future.
*Correction, 11 July, 1:25 p.m.: The current sage grouse population compared with historic levels has been corrected. Additionally, FWS ruled in 2010, not in 2011, that the sage grouse warranted listing. Finally, a link to the report has been added.
