The Bureau of Land Management

I need to understand something. Why is it that after 10 months in office that the Obama administration has allowed all of the bush appointed Bureau of Land Management state directors to remain in their jobs? Some of them should be transferred out for their complicity in ignoring environmental laws and allowing destructive practices on the lands they manage. Some of the Directors are nothing but political operatives of the republican party. One example is the state director in Utah who has no land management experience but did work for the GOP in New Mexico and Washington.

I was worried that the new BLM Director, Bob Abbey, would not take action. He is a former career employee of the BLM and a favorite of Senator Harry Reid. I felt if he was appointed that he would not want to rock the boat with the BLM bureacracy. So far, I have been right. For the sake of our western public lands Abbey(a generally good guy) needs to take action on some of these directors. Not all of them, but certainly a few of them to send a message that there is a new ethic in the Interior Department.

It is all to often that Democrats in power help their enemies more than their friends. Can you imagine the bush administration or any GOP management team doing that? Right now the Obama administration needs to put the health of western landscapes and watersheds in front of the politics. A lot of folks worked for them to do so last year.

No, this is not the most important agenda item for Obama. He has his hands full. But the Interior department needs to cover him on this and do the right thing.