BLM’s industry-friendly ways go back to its roots. Founded in 1946 when the U.S. Grazing Service and the General Land Office combined, the BLM quietly dispensed mining patents and grazing allocations in the spirit of the finders-keepers West. Its allegiance to traditional users intensified during the Reagan years under Interior Secretary James Watt and BLM Director Robert Burford. The duo slashed budgets, compounding the BLM’s status as the ugly stepchild of federal land management. Other federal agencies filed scathing reports that depicted BLM lands deteriorating from overgrazing and neglect.
The agency’s mandate–to treat the land both as a commodity and a recreational resource-puts Jamison between a rock and another, harder rock. Much of the land’s “highest best use,” as he puts it, remains livestock and mineral production. But miners and ranchers are edgy after Jamison agreed that public land-use reforms are inevitable. He alienated off-road-vehicle buffs by stopping the Barstow-to-Las Vegas motorcycle race that has been run sporadically since 1967. When the BLM recommended timber-harvest limits in Oregon, loggers balked at the restrictive limits while environmentalists said they were far too high.
Dozens of clashes between business and environmental interests will soon test the BLM’s new resolve. Recently Jamison asked for a rare meeting of the so-called God Squad, an expert panel created under the Endangered Species Act to weigh the potential extinction of wildlife against economic interests. Jamison wants the panel to supersede the recommendation of the Fish and Wildlife Service and permit logging in spotted-owl habitats in Oregon. The move heightens the fears of environmentalists that Jamison is more adept at rhetoric than reform.
Jamison acknowledges it will take years to repair the damage done during the BLM’s years of excess and abuse. He tells his staff, “My goal here is to get you all up to the early ’70s. Then we’re going to leap to the 2 1st century.” With dug-in opponents battling every step, he’ll need a running start. The gulf between the agency’s legacy and its vision for the future is still plenty wide.
