A big holiday gift came to all of us last month in the form of a policy order from Secretary Ken Salazar. Secretarial Order 3310 provides the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) the ability to designate our most precious landscapes that have wilderness characteristics, including ecological, scenic, recreational, educational and scientific values, as “Wild Lands” and to manage them to protect those wilderness values.

This is huge! Under the Bush administration, Gale Norton revoked wilderness management guidance from the agency’s handbook and left a gaping hole for the wilderness advocacy community. After that policy change, the only avenue for protecting wilderness quality areas with overlooked in the past by the BLM was through congressional designation of citizen inventoried landscapes. NWP was successful in garnering protections during this timeframe, but providing an agency or administrative option for promoting BLM managed lands to Wild Lands is very important because legislation opportunities are not easy to come by.

This new policy opens the door for public involvement in helping the BLM recognize the places on our landscape that most deserve this designation. NWP will have a significant role in driving this forward for Nevada by engaging with the BLM and steering them towards all of our best landscapes that deserve protection for their wilderness characteristics.

What can you do? Your continuing support of our work is always helpful. Additionally, reaching out to your member of the House can help.

• If you live in Congresswoman Shelley Berkley’s district, please call her Washington, D.C. office at 202-225-5965, and urge her to sign onto a letter of support for this policy that is being led by Congressman Edward Markey.

• If you live in either Congressman Dean Heller’s (202-225-6155) or Congressman Joe Heck’s (202-225-3252) districts, call them and let them know that you are supportive of this policy and hope that they will also support protecting Nevada’s most important places for future generations. Tell them you do not adhere to the false rhetoric about this policy “locking up our lands” that Congressman Heller recently expressed. (An excellent response to Heller’s points was presented on the Field and Stream blog this week.)

Finally, let Ken Salazar know that you support this new policy position. His leadership and courage to tackle this important issue head-on is worth commending. Please take a moment to send this simple form that our friends at the Campaign for America’s Wilderness have created.

Blue Eagle WSA, Nye Co. Photo by Tyler Roemer