BLM Mission Comment - September 2012

Memorandum:

To:      BLM All

From:  Stan Olmstead – Natural Resource Specialist

Date:   September 28, 2012

Re:      Last Formal Comment on the Commitment to the Mission.       

Never looking through “rose colored glasses” it is obvious that we have monumental environmental concerns both in the nation and on the planet and are in need of serious solutions. The U.S. government has all the abilities to perform state-of-the-arts environmental management and yet we continue to fail. The land management agencies have hard-working people and they put in sincere time to perform their work. However if the Vernal Field Office is representative, there is concern in the implementation of the BLM mission. The Vernal Office has placed priority on the exploitation of public land for commodities. This effort is because of a focus on development of energy, due to a fossil-fuel fixation, politics, Energy Policy Act (2005), Vernal Field Office RMP (2008), and office managers that do not understand their purpose. A quarter of the employees of the Vernal Office have a personal interest, academic knowledge, and intent to serve the American public in the performance of the mission. The mission and natural resource knowledge is their prime reason for working with the Bureau. The intent of the natural resource professional is to wisely manage habitat and fauna of public land for our citizens.

U.S. history has shown repeated failure in the care of the natural world. We placed the exploitation of natural resources and profits from these resources ahead of wisdom. In the past we mined, logged, grazed and exploited the natural world. Pressure on our political officials to reverse this attitude and stop deterioration of natural systems was necessary and resulted in excellent environmental laws. The U.S. has lost numerous species and yet we do not act for their ethical protection and subsequently in defense of our own healthy environment. At the Vernal Office little concern has been shown to care for sensitive species (mountain plover, sage grouse, hookless cactus). We promote energy development without stop and continue to measure natural resources by dollar value.

The mission of the BLM is to sustain the health, diversity and productivity of public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations. As civil servants we are obligated to all Americans to perform the BLM mission. Yet our elected, appointed and agency administrators ask us to focus on commodities and economics as opposed to environmental health. Commodities and economic gains are easier to measure. We work with our elected officials but we work for our citizens. Outside influences that lead us away from our required service to the American citizen and the BLM mission, should be repelled by the servant. Our service to the American people is to fulfill the mission through science, law, regulations and “team work”. Our fellow civil servants that administer the Bureau should insist that we work together in a common goal to fulfill the intent of the mission. Yet the Vernal Office does not work together as a professional team, instead the office works as fragmented groups, individually following bureaucratic requirements catering to the exploiter and political antagonist.  There is little thought for the future by those in charge for real land health.  

Health and diversity of public lands are natural entities. They do not include oil wells, livestock, crested wheatgrass nor guzzlers. These are developments and tools to exploit and have nothing to do with health and diversity. Productivity is not synonymous with commodities. Protection of healthy soils, vegetation, clean air & water and a natural fauna are the true products, which we should diligently promote before commodity extraction. Science teaches us to not act until we know that harm will not occur to the natural system. Whereas development asks for proof of damage to the natural system before you restrict. The natural environment and subsequently the human environment will be injured seriously if balance is not restored. U.S. federal land management agencies have it in their power to be the best land stewards anywhere in the world. We fail not in ability but in our attitude, a lack of understanding, lack of futuristic thinking and our implementation. Our actions are based on outside forces inconsistent with the intended mission and wisdom.

  

The BLM employee that did not study for a career in natural science frequently works for the Bureau for different reasons than the natural resource professional and it appears from experience that those who work for these different reasons are unable to visualize the intended mission. Knowing environmental health, diversity and the true customer must be known by the team before we can fulfill our service. Without a personal interest for the health of the land it is difficult to implement a professional understanding. If as some have said incorrectly that “their job was to promote oil & gas” they fail in the mission and service to the people.

Aldo Leopold had four requisites for land-health:

1. Cease throwing away its parts
2. Handle it gently
3. Recognize that its importance transcends economics
4. Don’t let too many people tinker with it.

However Vernal:

1. Lost the mountain plover; the only known population in Utah while at the same time the species is in decline throughout its range. Little effort to prevent this loss was implemented and is a serious mission departure.  
2. Plugging and abandonment of well sites have not been a priority. Numerous oil & gas wells have not produced for more than 15 years and yet these sites remain un-reclaimed. Notable of these is Seep Ridge #1; Lease #U-6616 & Seep Ridge #3; Lease #U-10178-A. Why is it that after more than 20 years of non-production these two wells remain idle and un-reclaimed? Federal regulation for well abandonment (Title 43 CFR 3162.3-4) requires abandonment.
3. Land reclamation after use still appears difficult to solve. What’s the problem? The user wishes to profit from the land and the land is owned by the citizens. Insist that the user fulfills the reclamation requirement before permitting additional use. Our only task is to identify need and confirm success. 
4. Animal Unit Months; we have grazing allotments, allotments have specified AUM’s and grazing occurs. Yet we disturb large percentages of our allotments located in oil & gas fields and AUMs remain the same. If you lose 30% of the forage in a specific allotment it is logical to reduce the AUMs by 30%.   

In the Vernal Field Office we have shown no concern for the cumulative impact of the developed area and provide in NEPA documents little quantitative analysis. We fragment habitat extensively in energy areas resulting in ecosystem damage not unlike that which occurred from over grazing and other historic land exploitation. It took decades for government to stop over grazing and move toward land health. Today scars remain from time before the Taylor Grazing Act. We have lost the only population of mountain plover in the state of Utah, contrary to science, ethics, and policy (BLM Manual 6840 – Special Status Species Management). We have watched as direct and indirect impacts have literally killed individuals of a federally listed plant species with only a token effort to prevent future actions and not an apology for our failure. Analysis of water depletion associated with endangered fish of the Colorado River system is accomplished through a series of documented explanations that have no attempt to monitor the quantity of depletion and is inconsistent with critical habitat for the species. The air within the Uintah Basin continues to be fouled in our effort to maximize energy and economic gain. Climate change receives but token language in our NEPA documents. Socio-economics are measured on dollar values gained without analysis showing measurement of “degradation/benefit” to the community. Air quality causes respiratory ailments, traffic within the community is industrial and large sums of money leave the community to outside corporations. A myriad of other community related issues are in need of detailed analysis.  

We need to alter our bureaucratic method of operation. Focus on our mission and team implementation as professional civil servants. Work together as a unified team of professionals to implement the science, law, and regulations for service to the American people. Discontinue our practice of placing our budget on projects that in truth are developments in disguise and termed mitigation. We should utilize the budget on monitoring and over sight. The use of the public land is the burden of the user to minimize injury and restore to its natural state.

Without serious fulfillment of the mission we continue to harm public land as it has been harmed so frequently in our historic past. Be honest about what is happening. It is easier to break something than to fix it, so let us stop breaking the land.

“Our Quest, is to see that we are connected to all things, that there is no separation, only in the mind”- John Mayers; Geologist.

Letter to the Editor - Johnson City Press; February 2016

Don’t deny the climate is in change

The earth once tropical and then glaciated does change due to natural phenomenon. Climate change this time is caused by one species, us.

Can’t accept climate change, maybe global warming or climate disruption? A minor number of politicians reject the assumption. This past December, 196 countries met in Paris for the global climate conference to strike an accord on carbon dioxide emissions. The accord makes promises for CO2 reduction. The U.S. Congress should implement reasonable methods for the reduction and citizens should also reduce their carbon footprint to reduce impact. 

Climate change is impacting national and global events: droughts, floods, sea level change, radical snow events, melting ice-sheets, tectonic plate instability, agriculture changes and more.

It is essential we change our source of energy. We can reduce consumption of fossil fuels and alter our energy use. Demand politicians to seek alternate forms of energy and understand the science that clearly demonstrates the risk.  One solution is Citizens Climate Lobby (CCL) seeking legislation for a fee and dividend approach. Discontinue the dependency on fossil fuels and leave the product in the ground. Encourage the alternative energy of solar power.

We need to act, to act now, and we need to understand the risks and expect our politicians to be knowledgeable and act in our best interests. Humans have an ability to change their environment. We have done so with agriculture, technology and energy, and medicine. During the last century human numbers have more than quadrupled. That is a lot of fossil fuel use once under ground now impacting our climate.

The CSA Flag

The Confederate Flag flies proudly

October 23, 2015

Well not really; the confederate flag, the “Stars and Bars”, was short lived and looked a lot like the Union flag confusing the troops at the start of the “Civil War”, the second confederate flag; the ”Stain-less Banner”, included the battle flag of northern Virginia in the field but looked a lot like a flag of truce so the confederate states added a red bar at the end; the “Blood-Stained Banner” to prevent confusion. Then after four years of death and destruction and the loss of the war by the Confederate States, the flag was relegated to history.

Recently though the battle flag has been flying regularly in the area. I am not sure, which version of the battle flag though, because there were so many.  It seems that after the recent racial violence in the nation and most specifically the shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, the South Carolina state legislature decided to remove the battle flag from the capitol grounds and so once again the flying of the battle flag is prominent in the area. It seems every time there is a challenge to racial bias in the U.S. the battle flag comes to the fore.  It arose in the 1920’s due to the expansion of the KKK, in 1948 when the Dixiecrats were active and all through the 1950’ & 60’s with the civil rights movement and the forced legislation to provide a free society for all U.S. citizens. Then it was set aside but for a few southern states that just couldn’t give it up. These few states remain embroiled in the discussion and are slowly realizing that the battle flag alginates a large number of their citizenry.

I was at the Flea Market the other day; you know the flea market is the pulse of the citizens, not highly affluent but a demonstration of the populace; and while at the market the battle flag of the confederacy was prominent in many sales booths. Sales included other items with the flag; T-shirts with the slogans; “Not hate but heritage” or “If you think it is about hate you need a history lesson” or less provocative, just a license plate for your car. Well history is tricky, I have read a little history, and I assure you the flag was about hate, a hateful economy of enslavement of humans for their labor and the confused assumption that a white “race” was superior and if not hate then indifference; like you may be indifferent to your cow although it provides milk or indifferent about a horse although it provides transportation. You may care for the animal but it isn’t a big importance out side of its use. That hate, that indifference, existed then and it exists today.

The history of the civil rights in the United States is troubling when you consider a free nation, placing so many in servitude by force and by law, and this action, this institution, this economic business of forced servitude conducted by a free nation will never be lived down. However we can enlighten ourselves to assure that the mistake of enslavement, bigotry, discrimination, in a nutshell ignorance and meanness, remains history. In a nation of freedom, with freedom of speech we do have the right to be dumb but not the right to abuse. Flying a hateful symbol on your car is dumb but on the capitol grounds is abusive.  An abusive state telling part of it’s citizenry that we are proud that we enslaved you, confined you, hurt you, and prevented you from having the freedoms that the dominant race were entitled and we remain proud of that heritage.

Make no mistake, the Civil War or War of Northern Aggression if you prefer, was about slavery. The early draft of the Declaration of Independence had much wording on the issue but was edited from the final declaration. The Constitution addressed slavery cautiously to encourage the southern state to agree. Jefferson himself made many quotes about God’s wrath on the individuals utilizing the institution of slavery.  Troubling for a man that owned so many humans, his hypocrisy must have been a burden, how would we know? U.S. history from the first drafts of the Declaration of Independence to the Civil War is fraught with the argument to maintain a balance of free and slave states. The Mexican American war and the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo where America acquired large areas of land in the Southwest catapulted the U.S. into an Electoral College inequity of free and slave states. Lincoln tried to hold the middle ground on the issue but he knew that we were divided and could not stand, “half free and half slave”, so the war became the “last battle of the revolution”.  If you read the secession statements of the southern states there is no confusion that the war was about slavery, cheap labor and the economic assets of human bondage.

Mississippi: … Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product; which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin. That we do not overstate the dangers to our institution, a reference to a few facts will sufficiently prove. ...

Georgia: … Our Northern confederates, after a full and calm hearing of all the facts, after a fair warning of our purpose not to submit to the rule of the authors of all these wrongs and injuries, have by a large majority committed the Government of the United States into their hands. The people of Georgia, after an equally full and fair and deliberate hearing of the case, have declared with equal firmness that they shall not rule over them. A brief history of the rise, progress, and policy of anti-slavery and the political organization into whose hands the administration of the Federal Government has been committed will fully justify the pronounced verdict of the people of Georgia. The party of Lincoln, called the Republican Party, under its present name and organization, is of recent origin. It is admitted to be an anti-slavery party. While it attracts to itself by its creed the scattered advocates of exploded political heresies, of condemned theories in political economy, the advocates of commercial restrictions, of protection, of special privileges, of waste and corruption in the administration of Government, anti-slavery is its mission and its purpose. By anti-slavery it is made a power in the state. The question of slavery was the great difficulty in the way of the formation of the Constitution. …

South Carolina: … an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations, and the laws of the General Government have ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution. The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws, which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless any attempt to execute them. In many of these States the fugitive is discharged from service or labor claimed, and in none of them has the State Government complied with the stipulation made in the Constitution. The State of New Jersey, at an early day, passed a law in conformity with her constitutional obligation; but the current of anti-slavery feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the laws of Congress. In the State of New York; even the right of transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals; and the States of Ohio and Iowa have refused to surrender to justice fugitives charged with murder, and with inciting servile insurrection in the State of Virginia. Thus the constituted compact has been deliberately broken and disregarded by the non-slaveholding States, and the consequence follows that South Carolina is released from her obligation.

The ends for which the Constitution was framed are declared by itself; to be "to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity."

These ends it endeavored to accomplish by a Federal Government, in which each State was recognized as an equal, and had separate control over its own institutions. The right of property in slaves was recognized by giving to free persons, distinct political rights, by giving them the right to represent, and burthening them with direct taxes for three-fifths of their slaves; by authorizing the importation of slaves for twenty years; and by stipulating for the rendition of fugitives from labor.

We affirm that these ends for which this Government was instituted have been defeated, and the Government itself has been made destructive of them by the action of the non-slaveholding States. Those States have assume the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery; they have permitted open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain; have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.

For twenty-five years this agitation has been steadily increasing, until it has now secured to its aid the power of the common Government. Observing the *forms* [emphasis in the original] of the Constitution, a sectional party has found within that Article establishing the Executive Department, the means of subverting the Constitution itself. A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he has declared that that "Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free," and that the public mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.

This sectional combination for the submersion of the Constitution has been aided in some of the States by elevating to citizenship, persons who, by the supreme law of the land, are incapable of becoming citizens; and their votes have been used to inaugurate a new policy, hostile to the South, and destructive of its beliefs and safety.

On the 4th day of March next, this party will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States.

The guaranties of the Constitution will then no longer exist; the equal rights of the States will be lost. The slaveholding States will no longer have the power of self-government, or self-protection, and the Federal Government will have become their enemy. …

Alexander Stephens – Vice President of the Confederacy: Our new Government is founded upon  … and its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition.

The statements above are not confusing; the establishment of the Confederate States of America is fraught with these statements addressing secession and it’s connection with slavery.  The original draft of the Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, the compromised wording of the U.S. Constitution, the change in the Electoral College after the Mexican American War, Missouri Compromise, Dred Scott, John Brown and On and on and on. U.S. history shows our mistakes and we continue this by accepting the confederate battle flag (a symbol of hate) so casually.

A southern citizen of the 1860’s may have fought proudly for the homeland of the state but southern state politicians that acted to secede did it to maintaining slavery and an economic way of life built on the suffering of human bondage.

There are other flag symbols that could be flown, the flag of the “Third Reich” for example: but we know that flag was hateful. So why don’t we understand the hatefulness of the flag of the confederacy? It may be about heritage but there are some parts of our heritage we shouldn’t boast about. Compliment the southern soldier for his heroism but not for the cause.

If you are hateful and ignorant and are proud to be so then by all means fly the flag on your car or home so we can have disgust. However, if you are proud of your heritage but not hateful, relegate the confederate flag to the museum and unite to treat all with equality, kindness and understanding.

Gentlemen; pack away your battle flags and go home – Robert E Lee

Some symbols we should think about before displaying.