[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 3]
[Senate]
[Pages 3621-3623]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                CRA DISAPPROVAL OF BLM PLANNING 2.0 RULE

  Mr. UDALL. Mr. President, yesterday, the Senate approved H.J. Res. 
44, a joint resolution of disapproval under the Congressional Review 
Act, CRA, that overturned the Bureau of Land Management's resource 
management planning rule, commonly referred to as the planning 2.0 
rule. I oppose this misguided revocation of a rule that would have 
allowed greater public involvement in the land-use planning process, 
increased government transparency, and improved the efficiency in 
making sustainable multiple use decisions for our public lands.
  The BLM is responsible for administering 245 million acres, or over 
10 percent of the total area of the United States, and 700 million 
acres, or 30 percent, of the Nation's mineral estate. The majority of 
BLM lands are in the 11 western States and Alaska.
  Across the West, the economy has changed significantly in recent 
decades. From 1990 to 2010, the population in the West grew by 36 
percent, and the economy of the West has grown faster than any other 
region in the country. As new people and new businesses have moved 
West, demands on public lands for outdoor recreation, hunting, fishing, 
tourism, conservation, and renewable energy development have been 
increasing. These demands have the potential to lead to conflicts with 
uses such as grazing, timber, mining, and oil and gas extraction.
  The planning 2.0 rule represented a new approach to addressing 
increasingly complex challenges on public lands and balancing what are 
competing uses and, quite frankly, at times

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competing values for the use of our public lands. Planning 2.0 was the 
first update of the BLM's planning regulations in 34 years. It included 
tools to help local land managers respond to these new challenges and 
the changing needs of western communities.
  Under the BLM's 1983 planning regulations, the BLM's planning process 
has been far too slow. State, local, and tribal governments and the 
public have been frustrated with the BLM's inability to complete 
resource management plans that support key infrastructure projects like 
pipelines, utility corridors, oil and gas leasing areas, and other 
management designations. It takes an average of 8 years to complete a 
resource management plan, and the public is provided few opportunities 
for input. By the time a plan is completed, it is almost already out of 
date. Since public involvement doesn't occur until nearly the end of 
the planning process, new information provided near the end can require 
revision and cause further delay. Litigation also can stall the process 
and add significantly more time and costs.
  Nullifying planning 2.0 through CRA disapproval permanently forces 
the BLM to use a planning process that wastes taxpayer money and is 
inefficient at best.
  Planning 2.0 provided earlier and more frequent opportunities for 
public involvement as part of the new planning assessment step. By 
inviting State, local, and tribal governments and the public to share 
information and participate in developing alternatives before the draft 
resource management plan could be published, planning 2.0 made it 
possible to discover the issues and potential conflicts and work out 
solutions before huge investments of time and labor were expended. 
Early involvement and collaboration with the public and all 
stakeholders made the planning process more efficient and effective.
  Under planning 2.0, the formal planning process remained largely 
unchanged: a draft environmental impact statement and a draft plan were 
still required, but with an expanded public comment period, from 90 
days to 100 days. Draft plan amendments are often less complex, and so 
the minimum comment period was reduced from 90 days to 60 days. The 
rule provided opportunities to extend any comment period as necessary.
  Planning 2.0 preserved and enhanced partnerships with State, local, 
and tribal governments in the planning process. The rule maintained the 
coordination and consistency requirements, and it recognized the 
special roles of State, local, and tribal governments, affording 
opportunities to participate side-by-side with the BLM as cooperating 
agencies. The final planning 2.0 rule took meaningful steps to 
accommodate requests from States and local governments to improve the 
planning process and to ensure governors were able to raise concerns 
and fully engage in the planning process, as required by the Federal 
Lands Policy and Management Act.
  As vice chair of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, I closely 
review Federal actions that affect native people and Indian Country. 
Under planning 2.0, the right of federally recognized tribes to 
government-to-government consultation was clearly enumerated and 
protected. The BLM worked extensively to make sure the new planning 
process was more inclusive. Planning 2.0 recognized the value of the 
knowledge, history, and culture that tribes bring to the planning 
effort. By formalizing the tribal consultation role and providing early 
and more frequent opportunities for tribes to provide input, the BLM 
had taken an important step to ensure Indian Country was able to be 
fully engaged in the process. Repealing planning 2.0 through the CRA 
now risks ignoring the concerns of tribes in favor of commercial 
interests and their lobbyists in Washington, DC.
  Pressures on BLM lands have increased in scale and complexity, and 
planning 2.0 encouraged the collection and use of high-quality data. It 
encouraged flexibility to identify a planning area boundary that 
reflects the resource issues. By looking at larger landscapes, local 
offices could have collaborated where there are shared resource issues 
and could have reduced conflicts and litigation for large-scale 
projects. Planning 2.0 would have enabled the BLM to set clear goals 
and allowed local offices to work together on landscape-wide planning 
where resource issues span multiple administrative jurisdictions.
  The rule identified important corridors for wildlife and critical 
habitats early in the planning process so that those important areas 
could be managed and conserved in balance with other uses and 
development decisions. Working across boundaries is especially 
important to tackle wildfire prevention and eradication of invasive 
species, which are degrading our public lands and placing neighboring 
private lands at risk of harm. Efficient and collaborative planning is 
desperately needed to approve infrastructure projects, pipelines, and 
energy transmission corridors that are stalled under the current 
planning process. Eliminating planning 2.0 reinstates a cumbersome and 
inefficient planning process that increases burdens on industries and 
the public.
  Opponents of the planning 2.0 rule mischaracterized the rule as a 
last minute ``midnight rule'' that excluded public comment. This is 
simply not true. The planning 2.0 initiative went through a transparent 
rulemaking process over 2 and a half years. The BLM responded to over 
3,000 public comments on the draft rule and made critical changes in 
the final rule. Congress held two hearings on planning 2.0, and the BLM 
incorporated that information before publishing the final rule. The BLM 
conducted extensive public outreach through public meetings, webinars, 
an extended public comment period, and input from a broad spectrum of 
the public that resulted in significant revisions to the final rule.
  However, the CRA resolution disapproving planning 2.0 was 
accomplished without public hearings and without transparency. 
Management of our public lands will now revert back to a process that 
gives commercial interest greater power and the public less opportunity 
for meaningful involvement.
  Opponents of planning 2.0 expressed concern that emphasizing 
landscape-scale planning could result in the primacy of national 
objectives over State and local objectives. This is not true. Planning 
2.0 did not centralize decisionmaking in Washington, DC, or dilute 
local control of the planning process. The rule actually allowed for 
more local community involvement and preserved the priority status for 
local governments and states in land use planning. Increasing the 
opportunity for public voices helped develop plans that met the 
increasingly diverse needs of western communities. Further, the rule 
did not require all resource management plans to be multistate 
landscapes. The rule provided the process for planning at larger 
landscape-scales when it made sense given the resources involved.
  The use of the Congressional Review Act to revoke planning 2.0 is a 
reckless tactic. Specific concerns could and should have been addressed 
through the regular rulemaking process or targeted legislation by 
Congress instead. Under the CRA, once Congress passes a resolution of 
disapproval, the BLM is prohibited from writing a new rule that is 
``substantially the same'' without additional legislative action. As a 
result, many of the provisions of planning 2.0 that improved the 
planning process cannot be enacted or proposed again without express 
congressional approval.
  Secretary Zinke has now been confirmed and should have been given the 
opportunity to consider revising planning 2.0 and making any necessary 
changes. With passage of H.J. Res. 44, Secretary Zinke will face 
considerable legal uncertainty, and his authority to reformulate a new 
planning rule will be limited substantially. This resolution should 
have been rejected and the new administration given the opportunity to 
reformulate planning 2.0 and to make sure the public continued to have 
a voice in decisions that affect their way of life.

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