Wyoming agencies seek more grazing, drilling access via Rock Springs RMP ‘protests’

Five state agencies have filed formal protest letters with the Bureau of Land Management seeking broad changes in the administration of 3.6 million acres of public property in southwest Wyoming.

Publicized in a press release from Gov. Mark Gordon, the protest letters came from the Wyoming departments of Environmental Quality, Game and Fish and Agriculture, along with the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission and Wyoming State Parks. The expected appeals echoed dissatisfaction voiced by the governor and Wyoming’s federal delegation with the BLM’s proposed Resource Management Plan for the Rock Springs Field Office, recently outlined in a final environmental impact statement.

The conservation-heavy draft of that plan, released in summer 2023, ignited a political firestorm in Wyoming. Fueled by misinformation and hysteria , displeasure in the draft plan was acute — federal employees were even subjected to “veiled threats.” The BLM released a final plan in August that sought more of a balance between landscape protection and the kinds of industrial development that southwestern Wyoming has depended on economically.

The protest letters from the five state agencies show that Wyoming officials believe the plan is still too protective of the environment at the expense of the economy and other interests.

The Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, for example, described the BLM’s planning document as “woefully inadequate.” State Oil and Gas Supervisor Tom Kropatsch, who signed the agency’s protest letter, charged that the BLM “wholly ignored” analysis related to carbon sequestration and violated legal standards for designating new “areas of critical environmental concern,” among many other grievances.

Kropatsch’s letter culminated in a request that the BLM “rescind” its final plan and start anew.

The current resource management plan for the Rock Springs Field Office dates to 1997. Its update has been 13 years in the making.

The Department of Environmental Quality, meanwhile, alleged that federal officials “blatantly ignored” its comments and “wholly disregarded DEQ’s primacy” over environmental regulation.

“The state of Wyoming, acting through WDEQ, has primacy over water (with the exception of drinking water), air, solid and hazardous waste, abandoned mine land reclamation, and coal mining within Wyoming,” DEQ officials wrote in a letter signed by Director Todd Parfitt. “Because Congress has not authorized the BLM to regulate the same matters, BLM must defer to Wyoming’s WDEQ on all primacy subjects and matters.”

Comparatively, the Wyoming State Parks’ protest letter was more decorous in tone. Chris Floyd, the agency’s deputy director, wrote “we recognize that the BLM did respond to and address many of our comments and recommendations.”

Still, State Parks voiced concerns that the final Rock Springs plan will negatively impact recreation, specifically limiting access for off-highway vehicles. The letter also took issue with the lack of non-motorized trails in the final plan.

Game and Fish’s protest included a grievance about the “excessive” acreage of areas of critical environmental concern. “Scientifically unwarranted blanket restrictions” in those areas, the agency’s letter contended, could “negatively impact sensitive wildlife populations” in areas outside of designated ACECs.

New Game and Fish Director Angi Bruce , who signed off on the letter, specifically took issue with the expansion of the Steamboat ACEC and creation of the Upper Wind River ACEC, which would effectively impose a high level of protection on “substantial portions” of the Sublette Mule Deer Migration Corridor.

“The protections afforded by [Wyoming’s migration policy] are sufficient for ensuring maintained functionality of this migration corridor,” Bruce wrote.

Agriculture Department Director Doug Miyamoto’s protest letter pushes back on some of BLM’s plans for expanding and creating new livestock grazing exclosures. Grazing is now permitted on 99.97% of the Rock Springs Field Office, but the final plan reduces the land available to cattle, sheep, horses and other livestock to 99.95%.

Wyoming state agency heads offered various changes for relief and suggested remedies in their respective protest letters.

Whether or not their requests will be granted is up to BLM officials at the agency’s Washington headquarters.

“The state office will assist headquarters, but that will be for them to … respond to [protests] accordingly,” said Micky Fisher, BLM-Wyoming’s lead public affairs specialist.

As of Wednesday afternoon, Fisher did not know the final number of protests BLM received in response to the proposed Resource Management Plan for the Rock Springs Field Office. Other parties, like nongovernmental organizations or individuals, also have the latitude to submit protests, which are a standard part of the National Environmental Policy Act process required when changes are proposed to federal land.

BLM officials expect to release a “protest resolution report” in about a month, Fisher said. Major changes to the final plan are still possible, he said.

“Anything within the whole range of alternatives remains on the table,” Fisher said.

The post Wyoming agencies seek more grazing, drilling access via Rock Springs RMP ‘protests’ appeared first on WyoFile .