PUBLIC LANDS: BLM gets deadline for revising OHV decisions in Utah
Phil Taylor, E&E reporter
E&E News: Tuesday, May 26, 2015
A federal judge has given the Bureau of Land Management three years to explain how its designation of nearly 4,300 miles of motorized vehicle routes in southern Utah would minimize harm to wildlife, lands and solitude, and to take better stock of the archaeological sites that surround those routes.
The order issued Friday by U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball in Salt Lake City will keep BLM focused as it corrects what Kimball in 2013 identified as major deficiencies in the agency's Richfield resource management plan (RMP).
The 2.1-million-acre Richfield plan, completed in the waning months of the George W. Bush administration, covers lands between Capitol Reef National Park, Canyonlands National Park and the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. It includes popular backcountry sites, including the Dirty Devil Canyon complex, a hideout for Butch Cassidy, and the Henry Mountains and Factory Butte. BLM acknowledged that more than half the lands are "wilderness quality."
The Richfield plan was among six RMPs that the Bush administration revised covering nearly 12 million acres of southern and eastern Utah. Conservation groups challenged all six plans in federal court, arguing they left too many lands open to off-highway vehicles (OHV) and oil and gas drilling, among other concerns.
Kimball ruled on the Richfield plan first, finding in November 2013 that BLM had failed to document how its designation of OHV routes would minimize harm to soils, plants, air, wilderness character, wildlife, and quiet uses such as hiking and hunting, as required in BLM's regulations. The judge also ruled that BLM failed to conduct an intensive "class III" inventory of archaeological resources along most of the OHV routes, which require site visits (Greenwire, Nov. 5, 2013).
Kimball's new order gives BLM three years to fix those deficiencies.
Within the first year, BLM must complete work on all routes in the area between Capitol Reef National Park, the Henry Mountains and the Green River.
Work must be completed within two years for designated routes in the former Forest planning area and former Cedar-Beaver-Garfield-Antimony planning area; and within three years for any designated routes within the former Mountain Valley and former Parker Mountain planning areas, Kimball said.
Kimball also gave BLM six months to issue a new decision on whether to designate the Henry Mountains as an area of critical environmental concern, which could result in stronger protection for the area's bison herds, and one year to revisit the eligibility of Happy Canyon and Buck and Pasture canyons as wild and scenic rivers.
The order was hailed today by conservationists who are challenging the Bush-era plans.
The environmental plaintiffs were the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, the Sierra Club, the Grand Canyon Trust, the National Parks Conservation Association, the Wilderness Society, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Utah Rivers Council, Great Old Broads for Wilderness, the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Rocky Mountain Wild.
"The court has sent a clear message that the status quo is not acceptable," said Stephen Bloch, SUWA's legal director. "Utah's remarkable red rock landscapes demand better."
Following Kimball's 2013 ruling, environmental groups argued that BLM's designated routes should be closed until it completed its supplemental review. But Kimball ruled otherwise, arguing that vacating BLM's decision could be more harmful than leaving the designated routes open.
Kimball's 2013 decision was a major blow to a sweeping Bush administration planning effort that was broadly supported by Utah, its counties, OHV groups, and oil and gas drillers.
While Kimball has only ruled on the Richfield plan, environmental plaintiffs expect he will find similar deficiencies in the other plans, which could lead to major land-use changes in the coming years.
But it is not clear whether BLM's beefed-up review of the Richfield plan will result in fewer OHV trails. The Obama administration thus far has defended the Bush-era plans, so it may simply choose to better document the previous administration's designations, while completing the requisite archaeological surveys.
RMPs are revised by BLM roughly every 15 years and determine where and how oil and gas development and motorized recreation should be managed, in addition to other uses, including grazing, hunting, hiking, and wildlife and resource protections.
Conservationists said OHV routes in the Richfield plan would stretch from Los Angeles to New York City and partway back, threaten Utah's scenery and cultural resources, and spoil opportunities for primitive recreation.
Before BLM's 2008 plan, OHV use in the area was largely unregulated. BLM's plan closed about 10 percent of the lands to OHVs. The majority was left open for trail use, with a small portion available for off-trail, "cross-country" travel.
