B.L.M.
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Past efforts to grab national forests, parks, wildlife refuges led by livestock industry. Now it will be Koch Bros, oil, GOP- Some call our public lands “American’s common treasure,” but the love of our land expressed in many forms, and the freedom they provide, have not stopped what are sometimes called “sagebrush rebellions” every decade…
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Did non-violent protest work here? The news is that Tim de Christopher is getting out of a California federal prison a bit early, after 18 months instead of 2 years. He will serve out the last 6 months in a Salt Lake City halfway house. Presumably there in work release they will try to have…
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Debate over immigration and enforcement attracts major effort to savage environmental laws within 100 miles of the borders- OPINION Americans are having a heated debate over illegal immigration, cross border drug smuggling and what to do about it. This has attracted some very contentious legislation at the state and federal levels. The President, various state…
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The Idaho Statesman reports that Mike Simpson has withdrawn the rider which would have prevented the BLM and US Forest Service from addressing the ongoing issue of disease transmission from domestic sheep to bighorn sheep and would have bypassed years of analysis and a long public process which generated 15,000 public comments. The rider would…
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This week there have been two significant developments for bighorn sheep in Idaho that relate to the closing of domestic sheep grazing in occupied bighorn habitat. Payette Decision Moves Forward First, in an unusual ruling from the bench, Judge B. Lynn Winmill ruled that the closing of three domestic sheep allotments on the Payette National…
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Trial of the accused Hammond family arsonists is now underway in Pendleton, Oregon– We have been following this amazing story since it broke two years ago. On the first day of the Pendelton, Oregon trial, young Dusty Hammond told the court how his uncle Steve Hammond had passed out boxes of Diamond (wooden) matches during…
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A new federal assessment of rangelands in the West finds a disturbingly large portion fails to meet range health standards principally due to commercial livestock operations. In the last decade as more land has been assessed, estimates of damaged lands have doubled in the 13-state Western area where the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM)…
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Resource Management Plans Won’t Affect Already Permitted Activities With a decision by the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) about whether sage grouse should receive Endangered Species Act protection due by 2015, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has begun a process to revise the Resource Management Plans (RMP’s) which dictate how resources are managed…