The Bureau of Land Management NEWS |
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The Bureau of Land Management NEWS |
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Last updated: 04/04/03
For release: Wednesday, March 25, 1998
The Bureau of Land Management is working to meet the demands of a changing West by establishing partnerships with local communities, using the best available science and technology, and by creating a diverse workforce, according to the BLM's newly released Annual Report for 1997.
"The needs of a growing and increasingly urbanized West are creating profound challenges for our agency," said BLM Director Pat Shea, who noted the public's particular interest in outdoor recreational opportunities. "The BLM is responding to these challenges by implementing a long range management strategy that will move our agency into the 21st century." The BLM describes the implementation of this strategy in its 1997 Annual Report, titled "Working Together for the Health of America's Public Lands."
Shea said the BLM's emphasis on partnerships with local communities has been particularly evident in the more than 20 Resource Advisory Councils (RACs) that Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt created in 1995 to advise the BLM on rangeland issues. "The RACs, which have completed their work on establishing rangeland standards and guidelines, have been remarkably successful in building consensus among diverse interests, including ranchers and environmentalists," Shea said. The RACs, he said, will now turn their attention to other public land issues, such as the use of prescribed fire in wildland areas and the control of noxious weeds, which are spreading at a rate of about 4,600 acres a day on Federal lands in the West.
In releasing the BLM's Annual Report for 1997, Shea noted that the BLM has developed a five-year Strategic Plan aimed at improving the agency's management of the public lands and its customer service to constituent groups and the general public. "Under our Strategic Plan," Shea said, "the BLM will apply the best science and technology as we carry out landscape or 'Big Picture' management of the public lands." This includes the deployment of the Automated Land and Mineral Record System (ALMRS), a computerized information system that automates more than 200 years of U.S. land-related history and more than one billion individual land and mineral records.
Under its Strategic Plan, Shea said, the BLM will also ensure that its workforce reflects America's ethnic and racial diversity. "Diversity brings together an array of talented individuals from a variety of backgrounds, creating a talent bank that will enable our agency to respond more effectively to the changing needs and demands of the West," Shea said.
The BLM's Annual Report for 1997 is now available from the agency's State Offices. Copies, which are free of charge, can also be obtained from the BLM's Washington, D.C., Public Affairs Office at (202) 452-5125. The 1997 Annual Report is also available online at BLM's homepage on the Internet (www.blm.gov).
The BLM, with a workforce of more than 9,000 employees, manages more land than any other government agency in the United States -- 264 million surface acres. The agency, which is part of the U.S. Department of the Interior, manages an additional 300 million sub-surface acres of mineral estate.
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