Blueways designation, a AGO priority opposed by Republican Western Congressional Caucus members
Interior considering GOP request to rescind ‘blueways’
The Interior Department said this week it was evaluating a Congressional request to rescind a conservation initiative that designates rivers and their associated watersheds as national blueways.
Seven senators and 18 House members had written Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar February 14 to request cancellation of the program, as we reported in the last issue of FPR. They object to a provision of Salazar’s Secretarial Order 3321 setting up the National Blueways System that puts a committee of federal officials in charge, without Congressional input.
According to an official with the Department of the Interior: “We have received the congressional letter and are currently working to respond to their concerns.”
In their letter to Salazar the Republicans said, “According to the Order, it appears that any watershed in the United States could be designated without any vote in Congress and without proper public notice.” The letter was sent by the Western Caucus en masse. Caucus cochairs Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Rep. Stevan Pearce (R-Ariz.) and Rep. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) led the effort.
The caucus asked Salazar to rescind his executive order of May 24, 2012, that set up the blueways system. “We urge you to immediately withdraw Secretarial Order 3321,” the members said. “We also encourage you to bring proposals to Congress that are creating new land and water designations so that we may consider them through the normal committee process and with public transparency.”
While the Western Caucus had Salazar’s attention, they asked the secretary to formally withdraw once-and-for-all his “wildlands” policy. In that policy, which Salazar said he would not carry out, he directed his agencies to identify wildlands and protect them. The Republicans objected that the secretary was attempting to usurp Congress’s exclusive authority to designate wilderness.
Said the caucus in its blueways letter, “On August 2, 2012, members of the Senate and House Western Caucuses sent you a letter expressing concerns regarding Bureau of Land Management Manuals 6310 and 6320, which mirrored the same rejected policies of Wildlands Secretarial Order 3310. These manuals were crafted without public input or notice. These members asked you to withdraw these manuals, and set up a briefing for them. The manuals were not withdrawn, nor was the briefing request even acknowledged by your department. We would like to request once again, a briefing by DOI for our offices on the status of these BLM manuals.”
Salazar announced the establishment of the National Blueways System in June 2012 concurrent with the designation of the first unit – a Connecticut River and Watershed National Blueway in New England. On January 9 the Department of Interior designated a second unit – the White River National Blueway in Arkansas and Missouri. The White River blueway extends from the Ozark Mountains to the Mississippi River. Salazar established the system through the executive order.
The system is not supposed to affect either private property or the existing regulations that govern nominated lands, said Salazar in the secretarial order establishing the system. “Nothing in this Order is intended to be the basis for the exercise of any new regulatory authority, nor shall this initiative or any designation pursuant to this Order affect or interfere with any Federal, state, local, and tribal government jurisdiction or applicable law. . .,” the order says.
The secretarial order offers this definition of blueways: “National Blueways will be nationally and regionally significant rivers and their watersheds that are highly valued recreational, social, economic, cultural, and ecological assets for the communities that depend on them. National Blueways encourage a landscape-scale approach to river conservation that involves a river from its headwaters to its mouth and across its watershed, rather than individual segments of the channel and riparian area alone.”
