|
Project News
Visit In the Media for current and archived news articles on land deals. Click here to see a list of the projects we are currently working on.
NV bill privatizes federal land, sweeps aside WLXP lawsuit
In mid-June, the Nevada congressional delegation introduced a huge legislative proposal for eastern Nevada that makes way for massive water and land developments by privatizing federal land in rural Lincoln County, north of Las Vegas. The main thrust of the Lincoln County Conservation, Recreation and Development Act of 2004 is to gain cost-free right-of-ways on public land for the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA), which provides water for Las Vegas and Clark County.
Half-mile-wide corridors totaling 448 miles would be designated on currently undeveloped federal land so that the SNWA and the county can run pipelines to transport water within and out of the county.
The bill orders the auctioning off of more than 100,000 acres of federal land and mandates that 45 percent of the proceeds from these sales of public land would go directly to the County, and 5 percent to the state school fund.
The bill also includes a provision that would effectively set aside the Western Land Exchange Project’s recent successful lawsuit against the Bureau of Land Management in Nevada (see next story). To read our summary and analysis of HR 4593, click here.
WLXP court victory stalls Nevada land sale
Download the 1.2 mg PDF to read the entire judgment.
(A high speed connection is recommended.)
Western Land Exchange Project and fellow plaintiffs have scored an important legal victory with a ruling against the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) on a plan to dispose of thousands of acres of public land in eastern Nevada. In a decision filed on March 22, 2004 the Federal District Court in Reno ruled in favor of Western Land Exchange Project, Boise-based Committee for the High Desert, and the Center for Biological Diversity in Tucson. WLXP staff attorney Christopher Krupp handled the case.
The land disposal scheme stemmed from the Lincoln County Land Act (LCLA), passed by Congress in 2000. The LCLA, sponsored by Senator Harry Reid (D-NV), authorized the BLM to sell a total of 13,000 acres of federal land in Lincoln County, Nevada—northeast of Las Vegas and just north of Mesquite—over five years.
The Lincoln County land sale is a strikingly irresponsible project. Privatization of these federal acres and their subsequent development would allow for a 1,360 percent increase in the area’s population within 20 years. That is the equivalent of doubling the population every 1-1/2 years—in an arid landscape that was never meant to accommodate golf courses, swimming pools, or large numbers of people. In its cursory environmental analysis of the project, the BLM baldly stated that it did not know where the water would come from to sustain the expanded community.
In its ruling, the Court held that BLM violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by:
- neglecting to analyze the impact of pulling water from nearby basins to supply development of the federal land;
- failing to develop mitigation plans sufficient to protect five threatened and endangered species;
- ignoring the cumulative impacts of the LCLA combined with other planned development for the region— additional land privatization, a power plant, and a new Mesquite regional airport. Together, the actions would open more than 36,000 acres to development and would support 200,000 people in the Mesquite area.
The court’s decision prohibits BLM from further attempts to sell the lands until the agency has prepared an environmental impact statement addressing the issues raised by the plaintiffs.
WLXP and others fight “collaborative” Idaho deals
The Western Land Exchange Project has joined with 34 other environmental organizations from across the country to stop two Idaho land deals currently being promoted by Boise conservation groups. The 35 groups issued a joint letter of concern to Idaho Conservation League, the Wilderness Society, and the Sierra Club regarding "consensus" wilderness proposals for the Owyhee canyonlands, southwest of Boise, and for the Boulder and White Clouds mountains in central Idaho. Click here to read the letter.
Both projects have come under increased scrutiny since many previously unknown details were exposed in the Salt Lake Tribune.
The Owyhee Initiative is under negotiation between conservation groups, ranchers, right-wing county commissioners, and other public land users. Participants have been working on an agreement under which part of the canyonlands would be designated wilderness in exchange for concessions to the ranching industry and off-road vehicle enthusiasts. About 450,000 acres are proposed as wilderness, but up to 250,000 acres now protected as wilderness study areas (WSAs) would be "released."
In the interest of disseminating information on the project — hard to come by from the groups who are promoting it — our organization and two others have created a website about the Owyhee Initiative. Feel free to contact any of us if you need more information.
The Boulder-White Clouds project, under discussion between the same groups and anti-environmental interests, would create a wilderness area in the Boulder, White Clouds, and Pioneer mountains in central Idaho—but at a heavy price. One precedent-setting provision under consideration is the outright conveyance of up to 16,000 acres of federal land to Custer County, Idaho to bolster its failing economy. The County would sell the formerly public land to facilitate second-home developments.
The Owyhee and B-WC proposals exemplify a growing tendency among environmental groups to take a collaborative approach to their issues. This is particularly true among wilderness advocates, whose recent "innovative" proposals in Oregon, Nevada, and now Idaho, are based on the concept that wilderness must be "paid for" through concessions to anti-wilderness interests. Many grassroots groups, including those opposing the Idaho wilderness agreements, see that such consensus-oriented work circumvents and weakens environmental laws and leads to compromises that fail to protect the earth.
…and another bad plan for Nevada
The Wilderness Society TWS) and Friends of Nevada Wilderness (FNW) have been involved in a legislative proposal that, similarly to the Idaho projects, would hook wilderness designation in eastern Nevada to development projects. Reportedly, the bill (not yet available for review) will obtain designation of 300,000 acres of Wilderness in Lincoln County, a portion of the more than 3 million acres proposed in the Citizens Wilderness Proposal for eastern Nevada. But the main thrust of the bill is to promote water and land development projects in the rural county, including:
- Granting water pipeline rights-of-way (on public land) to the Southern Nevada Water Authority and other entities to move water around and out of the County. There would be no environmental analysis and no payment levied;
- Ordering the disposal of 80,000 acres of federal land in Lincoln County. If modeled on past Nevada disposals, the land will be “released” from federal ownership and auctioned off;
- Relocating a currently unoccupied public transmission line corridor off the land of a developer who plans a 50,000-home, 10-golf course project straddling Lincoln and Clark counties. Instant relocation of this inconvenient transmission right-of-way would free up an additional 11,000 acres for development—likely at little or no cost to the developer.
The Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter has voiced strong opposition to the pipeline provisions, and now TWS and FNW are not saying whether they will continue to negotiate with the bill’s sponsor, Senator Harry Reid. The Western Land Exchange Project has issued a letter of concern to both groups, urging them to sever their wilderness proposal from the development bill.
BLM's land exchange program is in very deep trouble
The Bureau of Land Management, repeatedly called to task for questionable land deals, is once again reeling in the wake of several damning revelations regarding the agency's land exchange program.
The latest jolt to the agency came in the form of a report released by the Appraisal Foundation on October 16, 2002. The Foundation, an independent entity created by Congress to promulgate and oversee appraisal standards, conducted an investigation of the BLM's appraisal practices in 7 of its 11 western offices and found the system so gravely flawed that it called for a moratorium on land trades pending reform.
Click here to read a press release on the report issued by WLXP and PEER, which includes a summary of the AF's findings and recommendations. Visit our In The Media page to review recent coverage of the issue.
Click here to read the BLM's characteristically denial-filled press release responding to the report.
Release of the Foundation's report is but one of several high-profile events that have rocked the BLM's land trade program in recent weeks. Controversy over a huge land trade proposed between the BLM and the State of Utah has highlighted rampant malfeasance within the BLM and the Interior Department, and a whistleblower complaint on the same deal has necessitated an investigation within Interior.
BLM whistleblowers open books on land deal robbing taxpayers of $100 million
Read the WLXP/PEER press release of August 19, 2002
Read news articles on the Utah debacle
Bureau of Land Management staff in the agency's Utah Office are crying foul on a proposed land deal between the federal government and the state. Appraisal and minerals staff say their conclusions on land and mineral values to be exchanged were manipulated in closed-door negotiations and that the federal government is being taken to the cleaners.
The land exchange is proposed to be ratified through Congress under HR 4968, a bill sponsored by three members of the Utah delegation. The deal would trade about 135,000 acres of federal lands for about 108,00 acres of land managed by the Utah Schools & Institutional Trust Lands Administration (SITLA). The trade is supposed to consolidate federal holdings in the San Rafael Swell area--where Gov. Mike Leavitt proposes a national monument be created--and in return give the state valuable land and minerals to exploit for school revenues.
The legislation claims the exchange would yield "approximately equal value" to both parties, but BLM staff who assessed the lands and minerals say the exchange favors the state to the tune of tens of millions of dollars. Federal land values were whittled down and state holdings over-valued; in addition, significant mineral resources that would go to the state were low-balled or ignored altogether.
This is the third deal in four years that Utah BLM insiders have attempted to set right. Two exchanges negotiated during the Clinton Administration likewise bilked American taxpayers and gave Utah more federal land than was equitable. In 2000, it was the Utah West Desert Exchange, and in 1998 the Utah Schools Land Exchange.
Groups call for removal of BLM chief appraiser
UPDATE! Chief appraiser is out of a job
Click here for the latest
The Western Land Exchange Project and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility have called for the removal of the chief appraiser for the Bureau of Land Management. In a letter to Carson "Pete" Culp, Assistant Director of Minerals, Realty, and Resource Protection for the BLM, the groups cited numerous government audits pointing to improper conduct by Dave Cavanaugh, the agency's Senior Specialist for Appraisals.
In July 2001, the Interior Department’s Inspector General published the latest of four audit reports implicating Cavanaugh. The report highlights land exchanges in St. George, Utah between 1996 and 1999 wherein Cavanaugh conducted appraisal reviews in lieu of the State Office’s chief appraiser. The IG found that Cavanaugh developed an "alternative approach" to the appraisal process, involving the private landowners in the appraisal at a very early stage, and engaging in price negotiations prior to arriving at a final approved value. The IG stated that Cavanaugh’s approach "may have compromised the independence and objectivity of [the] appraisal process." The July 2001 report is entitled "Land Exchanges and Acquisitions, Bureau of Land Management Utah State Office: Independent Review Will Help Protect Integrity of Appraisal Process."
The report can be found on the IG website by going to: http://www.oig.doi.gov/latest-reports.html and scrolling down the list of FY 2001 reports.
The St. George audit is not the first to highlight flaws in Mr. Cavanaugh’s conduct of land exchange appraisal reviews. He was also at the center of several problematic land trades in Nevada in the 1990s, resulting in multimillion dollar taxpayer losses and a general deterioration in the reputation of the BLM’s exchange program.
Despite this record, the BLM has not acted to control Cavanaugh's actions. WLXP and PEER have therefore called on the BLM to relieve Cavanaugh of his position, as well as any work involving land exchanges, conveyances, sales, or acquisitions in the agency.
Groups sue BLM over land trade with mining conglomerate
Three environmental organizations have sued in Arizona’s federal district court to halt the proposed Ray land exchange between the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Asarco, a multi-national mining corporation and subsidiary of Grupo Mexico. The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), the Western Land Exchange Project, and the Grand Canyon Chapter of the Sierra Club filed suit against Interior Secretary Gail Norton, who oversees the BLM, citing numerous environmental and procedural problems with the agency’s decision to make the trade.
The exchange would give Asarco 10,976 acre of public land in exchange for 7,300 acres of the company’s private holdings, and would facilitate the expansion of Asarco’s Ray Mine, an open-pit copper mine located 65 miles east of Phoenix and 50 miles north of Tucson. By gaining private ownership of the land, Asarco would no longer be subject to federal planning, reclamation, and bonding requirements designed to reduce the environmental impacts of hard-rock mining operations.
Located on Mineral Creek, a tributary of the Gila River, the Ray Mine has been an open-pit operation since 1948. Environmental contamination at Ray has been so severe that in 1996 the Environmental Protection Agency and Arizona Department of Environmental Quality sued Asarco for repeated violations of the Clean Water Act. The company’s groundwater pumping at the site has reduced flows in Mineral Creek and the Gila and San Pedro Rivers, further imperiling endangered species including the cactus ferruginous pygmy owl, spikedace, and Southwestern willow flycatcher. Asarco’s ownership would also block public access to the White Canyon Wilderness area.
The groups are represented by attorneys Roger Flynn and Jeff Parsons of the Western Mining Action Project, a nonprofit legal advocacy firm based in Boulder, Colorado representing public interests on mining issues throughout the West.
Brian Segee of CBD has created a great web page on the Ray Mine, the exchange, and related issues at:
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/Programs/mining/ray.html
Land giveaway threatens Arizona towns
For the second year running, Northern Arizona citizens are gearing up to stop an incipient congressional land trade that would trade away public lands around the towns of Flagstaff, Clarkdale, Cottonwood, Camp Verde, and Williams to enrich a private rancher.
The Yavapai Land Exchange bill would trade tens of thousands of acres in the Verde Valley and northward to Fred Ruskin, an anaesthesiologist cum rancher who owns "checkerboard" inholdings in the Prescott National Forest (PNF).
The Forest Service would receive some 35,000 acres of now-private checkerboard lands within the PNF to consolidate public ownership--but Ruskin would retain a 3,200-acre inholding in the middle of public lands and cornering a  Wilderness Area.
Forest Service land near Camp Verde, Arizona to be traded to rancher Fred Ruskin. Photo: WLXP
In turn, Ruskin would consolidate his ownership in the northern portion of the national forest and would receive extremely valuable lands in the towns. Citizens of Camp Verde and Clarkdale are particularly concerned about the trade because it would facilitate further development in areas already hurting for water.
Taking the exchange through Congress would allow Ruskin to bypass the "equal-value" provisions that rule agency exchanges. It would also scuttle the environmental analysis and public involvement provided under the National Environmental Policy Act, required in any exchange the Forest Service implements.
The bill has yet to be introduced, but has hovered on the horizon for two years. Residents of some of the affected towns have launched an effort to keep the bill from advancing. Opponents are demanding that the exchange be considered only through the administrative process guided by the US Forest Service, affording public input and environmental analysis. If the exchange goes into the US Congress, it is likely to result in a fast-track deal that will harm the environment and leave citizens in the dust.
Legislation of the exchange is opposed by the Grand Canyon Chapter of the Sierra Club, Northern Arizona Audubon, Citizens for Public Review in the Verde Valley, Prescott National Forest Friends, and Citizens for the Protection of the Prescott Area.
|
|
