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Earlier this year, the Trump administration formally moved the headquarters of the Bureau of Land Management to Grand Junction, Colorado. The move, which forced the resignation of dozens of career staff, was billed as a way to move agency leaders closer to public lands in the West and make it easier for stakeholders to meet with senior staff. Just months later, ranchers across the West are expressing frustration with the new headquarters' out of the way location.
As one rancher told The Guardian, Grand Junction is "darn hard to get to." The small city is roughly a four-hour drive from Denver and five hours from Salt Lake City. Grand Junction's regional airport handles flights from few major US cities and I-70, the city's lifeline, is often closed in the winter due to snow.
“You could have made a case for Denver – you can fly there from Bozeman, Montana or Rock Springs, Wyoming,” said Hillary Proctor, a Wyoming rancher. Proctor notes that the move isolates BLM staff from other key public land agencies. “If you moved all the natural resources agencies, they could talk to each other. But the BLM got stuck by itself in the middle of nowhere. It’s hard not to see the move as an effort to stifle the agency.”
Jeanie Alderson, a Montana rancher, expressed frustration with the move, noting, “If we go to DC we can visit with many more people who are decision-makers. We can talk to people in the House and Senate. We can speak to committees and staffers. But if we go to Grand Junction, we can maybe talk to one or two BLM employees … my guess is we won’t be really effecting any change."
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[The Bureau of Land Management's] notion that there will be no significant environmental impacts from clearcutting thousands of acres across the West is absurd on its face. This is nothing more than an eleventh-hour attempt by the outgoing administration to shut the public out of public land management.”
