Bureau of Land Management

Under the Biden Administration, the Bureau of Land Management developed a rule that prioritized conservation as a use on its public lands, equal to other uses like mining and grazing. While lauded by public lands and environmental advocates, many in the Trump Administration oppose the policy.

Politicians and environmentalists are sounding the alarm on the impacts of federal job cuts in land management agencies like the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management. They say services like firefighting, recreation management, and access to permits for extraction will be affected.

Kathleen Sgamma is the president of Denver-based Western Energy Alliance, where she’s worked for nearly two decades to reduce barriers for oil and gas producers extracting from federal lands.

Fights over public lands aren’t unusual in the West. But Utah is now going straight to the U.S. Supreme Court to wrest control of 18.5 million acres of federal land.

The Bureau of Land Management wants to expand environmental protections around the canyon. The plan would restrict new fossil fuels extraction on hundreds of thousands of acres. But some community members are concerned about the proposal.

Colorado leaders are pushing for the headquarters to remain in the state, but the Biden administration may have other ideas.