LAS VEGAS, NV – After prioritizing extractive industries for the past 40 years, today the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its final “Public Lands Rule” to balance and uphold its multiple-use mission. The Nevada Conservation League applauds the Biden administration’s bold, comprehensive framework that places cultural lands protection, conservation, access to nature, wildlife, and climate change mitigation on equal footing with industrial development across the West. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for local collaboration with the agency to address intensifying drought, wildfires, and other threats to public lands and waters.
The BLM oversees nearly 63% of Nevada’s land base that provide clean drinking water and fresh air, wildlife habitat, destinations for outdoor recreation, and hold innumerable cultural sites and areas valued by Indigenous communities. However, these places are at risk from extreme weather events and loss of natural areas that are causing rapid changes across the West. The BLM’s new rule will help residents adapt to these challenges by providing the agency and local communities with fiscally responsible management tools, such as applying land-health standards and strengthening existing conservation options.
“We urge the Biden administration to get to work on the ground to implement the agency’s modernized vision,” said Nevada Conservation League’s Executive Director, Kristee Watson. “It’s critical that the administration facilitates collaboration between local BLM offices with local communities to safeguard Nevada’s natural and cultural heritage. Crucial to the success of the rule is co-stewardship and co-management with Tribal nations who have cared for these lands and waters since time immemorial. Together, we can create a legacy of responsible land management, and inclusive development for generations to come.”
This new direction is widely popular. In Nevada 79% support a national goal of conserving 30 percent of America’s land and waters by the year 2030. During the BLM’s 2023 public process, more than 90 percent of comments were in favor of elevating conservation for a more balanced approach to public land management. Legal experts have repeatedly confirmed that the rule upholds BLM’s core mission, including 8 state attorneys general and 27 law professors.
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