THANK YOU TO WILD HORSE ADVOCATE, "KATHLEEN HAYDEN" FOR SHARING WITH US THIS IMPORTANT INFORMATION.
KATHLEEN HAYDEN IS A VERY WELL KNOWN AND RESPECTED WILD HORSE ADVOCATE AND RESCUER HERE IN CALIFORNIA--GREAT JOB KATHLEEN AND THANK YOU FOR ALL THAT YOU DO.Sent: Thursday, September 8, 2011 11:36 AM
Subject: : Wyo. declines to identify lands worth conserving
Subject: : Wyo. declines to identify lands worth conserving
reminder. Herd areas are designated wild horse habitat in perpetuity. It is our duty to hold the guvmint's feet to the fire to maintain and manage herd inventories on those critical habitats.
Wyo. declines to identify lands worth conserving
Updated 06:29 p.m., Friday, September 2, 2011
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Gov. Matt Mead and the state's 23 counties have declined to recommend that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management designate any parcels of land in the state as "crown jewels" worthy of possible wilderness protection under a federal program.
Thursday was the deadline for the Wyoming office of the BLM to recommend parcels for possible congressional protection to the U.S. Department of Interior.
Cindy Wertz, spokeswoman for the Wyoming BLM, told the Casper Star-Tribune that the reason no sites in the state were listed was because the governor and the counties didn't recommend any.
Congress will consider placing "crown jewels" areas recommended by the Interior Department off-limits to most development and human activity.
Mead and many county commissions have criticized the effort, saying removing areas from multiple uses would hurt Wyoming's economy. Members of the state's congressional delegation also wrote to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar last month expressing similar concerns.
On the other hand, 10 conservation groups recommended that the Wyoming BLM consider more than 50 sites for wilderness protection. They included areas in the Red Desert, the Dubois Badlands, the Wind River Basin and the Sweetwater Canyon in Fremont County.
Wertz said the conservation groups' suggestions will be passed along to federal officials as "informational" supplements.
The federal government created the "crown jewels" initiative after Salazar in May backed away from a policy that would have made millions of acres of undeveloped land in the West eligible to be placed off-limits in coming years. That would give Congress time to consider designating the land as wilderness.
Federal wilderness lands are placed off-limits to most road construction, motorized equipment, permanent structures and other activities. The Wyoming Wilderness Act of 1984 set aside 910,000 acres in the state and designated more than 180,000 acres of BLM lands as wilderness study areas.
Jim Magagna, executive vice president of the Wyoming Stock Growers Association, said he was pleased with the BLM's decision not to list any "crown jewel" sites in the state. He serves on the board of the Wyoming Wild Lands Coalition, a group of county commissioners and representatives of energy and agricultural inters who came together earlier this year to fight Salazar's initiative.
The Wyoming Outdoor Council was one of the environmental groups that submitted proposed sites to the Wyoming BLM. Bruce Pendery of the council said he hoped the Interior Department would give their recommendations a better reception.
"I would hope that the Washington office will be a little more aggressive, and dig a little more and try and make some determinations about whether there are, in fact, crown jewels in Wyoming worthy of trying to move forward to Congress," Pendery said.
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