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Amodei criticizes BLM for using sage hen to block energy development

September 13, 2012
I continue to marvel at the Nevada BLM Office's unilateral policy of shutting down multiple hundreds of thousands of acres from responsible leasing programs, which give no right to do anything on the area leased without additional BLM applications

IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Brian Baluta, 202-225-6155

September 13, 2012

WASHINGTON, D.C.-- Congressman Mark Amodei (NV-2) today expressed profound disappointment with the Nevada State Office of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) after receiving the agency news release announcing the exclusion of more than a quarter of a million acres in the Ely District from its most recent oil and gas competitive lease sale. The presence of the sage hen habitat is cited by the BLM as the basis for excluding two thirds of what was to be a 376,618 acre lease offering.

He released the following statement:

"I continue to marvel at the Nevada BLM Office's unilateral policy of shutting down multiple hundreds of thousands of acres from responsible leasing programs, which give no right to do anything on the area leased without additional BLM applications and permits, under the auspices of sage hen habitat protection.

"Nevada is not losing sage hen habitat due to competitive lease sales by Nevada BLM. It is losing habitat acres to wildfire. The misguided notion that regulating agribusiness, energy leasing and exploration, and the minerals industry will solve Nevada's habitat loss history is bureaucratic fantasy.

"In a fire season to date, which has resulted in nearly half a million additional acres of sage hen habitat destroyed by wildland fire, I continue to hope that Nevada's federal land managers will deal with the true habitat threats instead of focusing on a headlong rush to preclude responsible economic development and multiple use polices.

"Sage hen habitat in Nevada is not being overrun by mines, cows, or American energy development. It is burning up in wildland fires on BLM-owned acreage. That circumstance should be the primary focus of our federal land managers.

"It's time to manage fuels around the remaining habitat first rather than activities that account for almost none of the habitat threat."

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