More appreciation for new BLM wilderness policy

"The 'no more wilderness' policy adopted under former Interior Secretary Gale Norton did not serve our nation well. It would have been tragic for this policy to be continued only for the sake of commercial, primarily oil and gas, interests."  Letter-to-the-Editor – Pantagraph

Protecting wilderness benefits sportsmen too

"The announcement is a very welcome change, if not yet in direction, at least in thinking, for the BLM, an agency that is of critical importance to sportsmen- it manages 245 million acres of US public land (which includes a lot of my antelope, mule deer and birdhunting, by the way) . Some of that land certainly merits protection as wilderness, isolated, rugged, intact places where you can ride horseback or hike and hunt and fish without worrying that next year the seismic trucks will come roaring in, the drillers assembling, the wind farms towering, the endless development schemes and plans that have poured like a Biblical flood over so many of the places we’ve known and loved and hoped to share with our children."  Read more – The Conservationist

Uintah Basin gas company penalized by the EPA

"David Garbett, an attorney with the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, called the consent decree 'an encouraging step,' though he said the U.S. Bureau of Land Management is already considering Gasco’s request to add another 1,500 wells in the region.

'It is good EPA is taking action to improve the air quality in the basin,' he said."  Read more – The Salt Lake Tribune