CHEYENNE – Yesterday the Bureau of Land Management released its proposed Resource Management Plan (RMP) for the Rock Springs Field Office. The plan includes 3.6 million acres in southwest Wyoming. Of that total, over 1.3 million acres, or over 36% will be designated Areas of Critical Environmental Concern (ACEC), Wilderness Study Areas (WSA), and management areas and other features. These designations will shut down economic activity that funds our schools.
“The Biden Administration continues to destroy education funding in the state of Wyoming with the proposed Rock Springs RMP,” said State Superintendent Megan Degenfelder. “Not only does this plan make it impossible to produce minerals on these federal lands, but also on hundreds of thousands of acres of adjacent and intertwined state land, and it circumvents Congressional approval in order to do so. I will do anything necessary to protect our students and the citizens of Wyoming from this federal overreach.”
This proposed RMP comes at a critical time when Superintendent Degenfelder, as a member of the Wyoming Board of Land Commissioners, is working to negotiate a deal regarding the Kelly state land parcel in Teton County with the National Park Service and BLM.
“The proposed RMP is especially disappointing given the Federal government’s current push to purchase even more Wyoming land at an extremely low price. For this reason, we must stand up to the federal government trying to bully us into deals that are bad for Wyoming. If this RMP is what they are willing to do to our state and way of life, they don’t deserve another net acre- ever,” said Degenfelder.
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Media Contact:
Linda Finnerty, Chief Communications Officer
307-777-2053
linda.finnerty@wyo.gov
