Keeping the 'Public' in Public Lands
| Date | 01 April 2018 |
| Author |
4-2018 NEWS & ANALYSIS 48 ELR 10295
The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) touches
more lives in more ways than any other federal
agency. Currently led by Secretary Ryan Zinke,
the agency manages one-fth of the land in the United
States, including our national parks, wildlife refuges, and
the delivery of water and power in the West.
We have entrusted Secretary Zinke and DOI with the
care of wildlife, sh, waterways, and land for the benet
of us all. By the law of nature, certain things are common
to all mankind. is idea has ancient roots, beginning in
Greek and Roman civil law. It is embedded in the statutes
the U.S. Congress has passed governing the management
of public lands and waters.
As trustee, Secretar y Zinke is accountable to us—the
beneciaries of the trust—to show that he has managed
them for the common good. So, how is he doing? DOI’s
website promotes its stewa rdship role. Quoting President
Donald Trump, the website proclaims, “We have to be
” Zinke’s
actions, however, fail to live up to these words.
I. The Source of Zinke’s
Stewardship Duty
e laws that govern management of our public lands
require that they be managed in the public interest. Certain
lands—like our national parks and monuments—a re set
aside “to conserve the scenery, natural a nd historic objects
and the wild life.”1 Created in 1916 as a bureau within DOI,
the National Park Service must manage the lands it over-
sees “in such manner and by such means as will leave them
unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.”2 e
National Park Service oversees 58 national parks plus 359
additional units covering more than 84 million acres.3
e National Wildlife Refuge System is also managed to
conserve. As the agency responsible for the National Wild-
life Refuge System, DOI’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
(FWS) administers “a national network of lands and waters
for the conservation, management, and where appropriate,
restoration of the sh, wildlife, and plant resources and
2. Id.
3. National Park Service, , https://www.nps.gov/
aboutus/faqs.htm (last visited Feb. 9, 2018).
their habitats within the United States for the benet of the
present and future generations of Americans.”4 FWS man-
ages refuges totaling just over 81 million acres.5
Much of the large estate that makes up our public lands,
however, is outside of our national parks and refuges.
DOI’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) oversees three
times the amount of land within the National Park System.
BLM manages 247.3 million acres in 20 states, including
the deserts of California, the red rock canyons of Utah,
the plains of Montana, and the Iditarod Trail in A laska.
Although some lands are managed for specic purposes,
BLM in general applies a “multiple-use” standard in its
oversight of the public lands. e statute governing BLM’s
management denes “multiple-use” as “harmonious and
coordinated management of the various resources without
permanent impairment of the productivity of the land and
the quality of the environment.”6
Congress required that BLM manage the public’s
lands so they are “utilized in the combination that wil l
best meet the pre sent a nd future needs of the American
people.”7 In the development and revision of land use
plans, the Secreta ry of the Interior sha ll “weigh the long-
term benets to the public against shor t-term benets.”8
Moreover, “ in mana ging the public lands the Secretar y
shall by regulation or ot herwise take any action required
to prevent unnecessary and undue degradation of the
lands a nd their resources.”9
In sum, these three DOI agencies—the National Park
Service, FWS, and BLM—oversee 65% of the acres of land
owned by the federal government in the United States.10
Our national forests totaling an additional 192.9 million
acres are managed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture
(USDA).11 Our public la nds are assets intended to enrich
4. 16 U.S.C. §668dd(a)(2).
5. FWS, U.S. DOI, S D T F W S-
L (as of 9/30/2017), available at https://www.fws.gov/refuges/
land/PDF/2017_Annual_Report_of_Lands_Data_Tables.pdf.
6. Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA), 43 U.S.C. §1702(c).
See also 43 C.F.R. §1601.0-5(i) (2018).
7. Id.
8. 43 U.S.C. §1712.
9. Id. §1782(c).
10. C H V, C R S, F
L O: O D 1 (2017).
11. Id. Like the responsibility imposed upon DOI, Congress has required that USDA
manage the national forests “to serve the national interest.” 16 U.S.C. §1600(3).
Keeping the “Public” in Public Lands
by Sharon Buccino
Sharon Buccino is a Senior Attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Copyright © 2018 Environmental Law Institute®, Washington, DC. Reprinted with permission from ELR®, http://www.eli.org, 1-800-433-5120.
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