There're large areas of public lands that're only accessible by walking. The administration is trying to open these places by allowing roads to be built into them.
Even though i can't walk 100 feet without resting, i know how important it is to keep these places from being more easily accessed. Here's an article w a link to do something.
https://www.outdoornews.com/2026/06/12/commentary-the-roadless-rule-is-under-attack/
The youtube video is a recording of a Western Watersheds Project webinar held on 25.September.
If you can, please look at this website....
It is about efforts to delist the grizzly from the Endangered Species list. Support to keep them on the list must be submitted by tomorrow, September 30th..
Use this link to the form to submit a note of support.
https://www.bearsbelong.com/send-a-message
Last Friday, May 9, Western Watersheds Project and our union, city government, and non-government organization allies won a court order blocking Donald Trump, Elon Musk, DOGE, and other federal agencies from moving forward with a scheme to gut federal agencies by using Reductions in Force (RIFs) to eliminate federal jobs. We rose to the defense of federal agencies because we perceived that the administration was undertaking an effort to undermine environmental regulations and thwart responsible land management across the West.
It is a sweeping victory, blocking—at least temporarily—an overhaul of federal agencies in the name of deregulation, energy dominance, and ultimately the selloff of western public lands.
In her ruling, the judge castigated the Trump administration for undermining the Constitution’s checks and balances – it is Congress, not the Executive Branch, that creates and eliminates government agencies and determines their staffing levels through budget appropriations. The judge also ordered the administration to produce for court review its secret blueprints, called “Agency RIF and Reorganization Plans.”
The judge ordered that the president, Elon Musk, DOGE, and several other agencies cease their efforts to gut federal agencies, including Bureau of Land Management U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, and Forest Service, and to not order any further RIFs for employees. The Temporary Restraining Order lasts for 14 days, and there is a hearing set for May 22nd in our case, where the judge will consider whether to extend the moratorium indefinitely through a Preliminary Injunction.
Attorneys on the case include Democracy Forward and Altshuler Berzon LLP, as well as Protect Democracy, Public Rights Project, and Democracy Defenders Fund. Our co-plaintiffs include the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) and four AFGE locals; American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME); Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and SEIU Local 1000; Alliance for Retired Americans; American Geophysical Union; American Public Health Association; Center for Taxpayer Rights; Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks; Common Defense; Main Street Alliance; NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council); Northeast Organic Farming Association Inc.; VoteVets; City and County of San Francisco, California; County of Santa Clara, California; City of Chicago, Illinois; City of Baltimore, Maryland; Harris County, Texas; and King County, Washington.
We’re proud to be allies in this important fight.
The WWP Team
We have great news to share! Thanks to our advocacy and legal action, an administrative judge has halted a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) project that would have bulldozed 13 reservoirs to redistribute cattle within Bears Ears National Monument.
This decision is a critical win for the fragile desert ecosystem of Bears Ears. Western Watersheds Project (WWP) challenged the project, arguing that the BLM failed to conduct a thorough environmental analysis before approving actions that could cause irreversible harm. Sage Steppe Wild filed a separate appeal of the same decision. The judge agreed, ruling that the project posed "immediate and irreparable impacts" to the monument’s lands.
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Photo by volunteer with Great Old Broads for Wilderness. |
The BLM’s plan aimed to spread livestock across previously ungrazed areas, in an allotment leased by The Nature Conservancy, by bulldozing 13 new water reservoirs and adding miles of additional barbed-wire fencing. But this approach ignores well-documented science: Cattle concentrate around water sources, damaging vegetation, compacting fragile biological soil crusts, and accelerating desertification.
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Yesterday, Western Watersheds Project signed a comprehensive settlement intended to usher in a new era at Point Reyes National Seashore and bring an end to a decade of litigation.
Together with Resource Renewal Institute and the Center for Biological Diversity, and tirelessly represented by Advocates for the West, we hammered out an agreement that retires commercial ranching on 16,756 acres of Point Reyes (totaling 4,729 cow-calf pairs). This will enable the population of rare tule elk to roam freely across all of the National Seashore, and it ends the agricultural practices of manure-spreading — as well as the growth and harvesting of silage crops associated with the dairy ranches— for good.
The Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria will continue to have a say in aspects of Seashore
Yesterday, Western Watersheds Project signed a comprehensive settlement intended to usher in a new era at Point Reyes National Seashore and bring an end to a decade of litigation.
Together with Resource Renewal Institute and the Center for Biological Diversity, and tirelessly represented by Advocates for the West, we hammered out an agreement that retires commercial ranching on 16,756 acres of Point Reyes (totaling 4,729 cow-calf pairs). This will enable the population of rare tule elk to roam freely across all of the National Seashore, and it ends the agricultural practices of manure-spreading — as well as the growth and harvesting of silage crops associated with the dairy ranches— for good.
The Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria will continue to have a say in aspects of Seashore management. Recreational opportunities and public access will improve, and environmental benefits like increased native wildlife populations and better water quality will be realized.
The buyout and voluntary retirement of 12 of the 14 ranches on the National Seashore was accomplished using private funding. Two commercial ranches will remain on the Seashore, with 282 cow-calf pairs continuing to affect 2,210 acres. On the 16,756 acres where ranchers have agreed to relinquish their grazing leases, targeted non-commercial grazing operations will be allowed, with ecological objectives such as weed control and restoration of native coastal grasslands. Commercial ranching will continue on Golden Gate National Recreation Area.
Overall, the settlement creates a path to restoring the native coastal grasslands of the National Seashore. We will work to ensure our goal of reducing livestock impacts on public lands and restoring wildlife and healthy native ecosystems is met by this agreement.
It's a big change in priorities for how the National Seashore is managed, and all-in-all, and we’re proud of what we’ve achieved.
An administrative law judge in the Department of the Interior has ruled against the Bureau of Land Management for failing to properly assess the environmental impacts of renewing grazing permits across 24 allotments in the PonchaVilla area of Colorado’s San Luis Valley. These allotments cover a staggering 65,273 acres of public lands, including critical habitat for the Gunnison sage grouse, a bird listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
The court found that the Bureau's decision to renew these grazing permits did not take the required “hard look” at how increased grazing could harm the environment. The judge highlighted that in some of the allotments, actual grazing use has been as low as 1% or even 0% of what’s currently permitted and of the future levels under the appealed decision. BLM failed to analyze and explain how these lands could handle more grazing without negative environmental impacts.
With Gunnison sage grouse already facing threats from habitat degradation and cheatgrass invasion, it’s essential that public agencies act responsibly to safeguard the ecosystems that these birds depend on.
BLM's allotment Land Health Standards (LHS) assessment records (1997 - 2023)
This link is to Western Watershed's Projects webpage about a matching grant of $25,000.00 to honor Grizzly 399.
This link is to the Wikipedia page about Grizzly 399.
Please donate; every dollar helps!
Nov 6, 2024
By now, America has woken up to the reality that we are facing a second Trump presidency.
In a Trump administration, anti-environmental extremists and corporate exploiters of federal public lands have their dream situation. While on the campaign trail, Candidate Trump disavowed Project 2025 and pretended not to endorse it, but these are the policies of his first administration, written by the political appointees from his first administration. We expect the coming administration to push aggressively to implement this agenda.
We have been here before. We know how to do this.
The first Trump presidency made little lasting impact on environmental issues. They slashed Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments. His administration delisted wolves nationwide and stripped protections from Yellowstone grizzlies. Sage grouse protections were gutted, millions of acres of public lands were auctioned to the oil industry, and Dwight and Steve Hammond – the poster children of the Bundy insurrection – were awarded the public land grazing permit that had been revoked for violation of federal law.
Legal victories by Western Watersheds Project and our allies were essential in reversing each of these setbacks, and more.
And during those dark years, wolves reoccupied much of their historic range, and grizzly populations increased.
It wasn’t without setbacks. Sage grouse populations have continued their downward spiral, fueled by inadequate habitat protections. Flammable cheatgrass has expanded its invasion of the West, and land health remains dismally poor, both driven by chronic overgrazing by livestock. While WWP and allies scored one legal victory over a massive Trump drilling project in eastern Wyoming, another in western Wyoming overcame our best legal defenses, and now the fate of the Path of the Pronghorn migration is at the mercy of market forces.
The Biden administration has been no picnic from an environmental perspective. Despite significant gains on National Monuments, many opportunities to advance conservation have been squandered. The complicated narrative and confused policy priorities have cloaked opportunities for our opponents to advance their priorities.
For the next few years, the narrative gets a lot simpler: The sworn enemies of environmental conservation expect to be handed the keys to the agencies that manage public lands and wildlife. The battle between conservationists and our traditional foes will be thrown into stark relief. The darkest hidden agendas of anti-environmentalists will be paraded in public. That makes them easier to defeat.
The coming Trump administration is assured a Republican Senate, for its first two years anyway, allowing them to push through ideologically extreme political appointees to head federal agencies. Throughout the long arc of history, ideologues have tended to overreach, offering opportunity for reversals.
Despite election outcomes, the overwhelming majority of Americans support healthy lands and abundant wildlife. Vast numbers of us don’t want to see western public lands despoiled by industrial destruction or turned into a livestock-blighted cesspool.
Westerners, the time has come to steel ourselves for the expected onslaught. To embrace the beauty of the West. To love the place we live. And to fight for what we love.
At Western Watersheds Project, we’re ready.
Are you with us?
Erik Molvar
Executive Director
Western Watersheds Project
Donate to support their work
Western Watersheds Project
P.O. Box 1770 Hailey, ID
83333 United States
The Advocates For the West Fall/Winter Case Notes recently came out. Given the challenge of staying-the-fight with major bureaucracies, I find their efforts inspiring. Hopefully, you will too...enough to lend your support.
The link is to the updates on their lawsuits/cases.
This press release (link is to URL below) from PEER, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, references a new map that shows the poor conditions that are the result of the Bureau of Land Management's inability to enforce the grazing standards.
'The map creates a visual compilation of the agency’s data on the rangeland health of each allotment and identifies allotments failing to achieve standards where livestock grazing was determined to be a significant factor."
Press Release: March 2022
https://peer.org/agency-records-paint-bleak-picture-of-western-landscape/
The Map
(it takes a few seconds to appear)
The draft
Supplemental
Impact Statement
for the North Corridor Highway that is being pushed to go through the Red Cliffs National Conservation Area (NCA) was released yesterday, 9.May.2024.
The link below is to Conserve Southwest Utah's website, a non-profit that is spear-heading the effort to have the highway routed around the NCA.
https://mailchi.mp/conserveswu.org/231220-2714050?e=b6ee4c4527
The NCA is prime desert tortoise habitat and a beautiful area that Congress set aside in 1893, long before cars were a problem.
The link below is to Advocates For the West's latest newsletter.
https://mailchi.mp/advocateswest/protecting-idaho-2024
The video is of their April, 2024 Webinar.
The URL (link) below goes to Conserve Southwest Utah's newsletter about the Congressional Field Meeting held yesterday in Hurricane, Utah.
It is encouraging to see how many people showed up to show their opposition to the highway.
https://mailchi.mp/conserveswu.org/231220-2714057?e=b6ee4c4527
There is a proposal to build a highway through the Red Cliffs Conservation Area north of St. George, Utah. The area is prime gabitat for the endangered desert tortoise and was set aside decades ago to preserve the natural beauty of the area.
Now, as the city has grown, development interests are threatening the area. There is a Congressional Field Meeting in Hurricane tomorrow, Aoril 22, 2024 at 11:00 a.m.
Anyone and everyone opposed to the highway is being asked to attend the meeting which was organized by a Republican senator opposed to public lands. You can read the details and location information in the link to Conserve Southwest's newsletter below.
https://mailchi.mp/conserveswu.org/april_field_hearing?e=b6ee4c4527
Advocates for the West won a significant victory in defense of a pristine corner of Arizona’s Tonto National Forest just below the scenic Mogollon Rim.
The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Forest Service made “serious errors” in violation of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in approving a plan to expand grazing on the Tonto National Forest’s Bar X allotment—including opening pastures that had been closed to grazing for nearly 40 years, which surround the communities of Colcord and Ponderosa.
“Nestled in ponderosa pine forests, this area is beloved by hikers, anglers, and other recreationists for its scenic beauty, and by local residents as a quiet place to enjoy nature,” said Andrew Missel, Staff Attorney at Advocates for the West. “I’m heartened that the Court recognized the Forest Service’s shoddy analysis and harm grazing could pose to our cherished public lands.”
Read all about it here.
Read about more of their successes in the 14.Dec.2023 newsletter here.
On Wednesday, 25.Okt, I attended Advocates for the West’s Voices for the West webinar titled, Pillars of Conservation: Advocacy, Litigation, and Public Education.
It's always inspiring to see the committment and energy of these folks.
This meeting included Mark Salvo from Oregon Natural Desert Association and Advocates' senior attorney, Todd Tucci.
A recording of the webinar can be accessed on Advocates' YouTube Channel, along with previous Voices for the West programs.
It's hoped you'll share this latest program with your friends, family, and whomever you think might appreciate their work.
If you're interested in supporting the groups involved in this week’s webinar, you can find more information at the following links:
Also, the October 2022 Voices for the West webinar focused on the study "Livestock Use on Public Lands in the Western USA Exacerbates Climate Change: Implications for Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation" with co-author Marc Liverman, and which was referenced during last night's program, can be found here.
Thanks again for joining us! We look forward to seeing you at our next Voices for the West webinar in December. For details on upcoming events, or to receive updates on our work, you may sign up here.
With heart for the West,
-Will
There're large areas of public lands that're only accessible by walking. The administration is trying to open these places by allowi...
