(Mark Noonan) – What is wrong with this picture?
“The U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s Ely district office is seeking public input on its proposed management plan for the Mount Grafton, South Egan Range, Far South Egans and Highland Ridge wilderness areas. Comments on the proposal will be accepted through next Friday, Nov. 20…
…Even as the BLM gathers public comments for a proposed draft plan, agency officials have a good idea of what they would like to see in the final document…”
Wow!
They’ve given the people 9 whole days to comment on the BLM’s plans. How noble of them; how in keeping with the high calling aristocracy! Perhaps they’ll even allow people to visit the lands, from time to time…if there are no objections from environmentalists in San Francisco and New York who know better than Nevadans what should be done with the land.
Here’s the thing: far too much of Nevada is owned by the federal government (about 84%, all told) and that means that we, in our own State, have to go hat in hand to bureaucrats in order to use what is ours. This situation works out fine if you are an out-of-State environmentalist who wants to play around with other people’s land. It also works out fine if you’re able to help certain Nevada Senators (Harry Reid, call your office) work out amazingly profitable land deals.
But it doesn’t work out so fine for we, the people of Nevada.
That is our land. Our land for preservation as wilderness, to be sure – but also our land for farms, ranches, mines, factories, power plants. Our land for all the things we need to build a diverse and vibrant Nevada economy. But the current power structure doesn’t want that. Put the land in the hands of the people of Nevada, and there won’t be any room for corrupt land deals and environmentalist experiment.
And, I ask you, where is the upside for the elite in that?
