My friend Tom died last week at the age of 42. He was an agent for the Bureau of Land Management then came to work for my agency. After a couple years, he returned to BLM. To be honest I've really never had a grasp of BLM's function, but in Tom's honor, I've researched it and posted excerpts of their mission. On one hand it's not the stereotypical crime fighting federal agency that gets violent criminals off the street; but when you think about it, they're protecting our future in other ways. If they're all as conscientious and hardworking as Tom, then we are in good hands!
The BLM focuses on the management and conservation of resources on 258 million surface acres, and 700 million acres of subsurface mineral estate, These public lands make up about 13 percent of the total land surface of the United States and more than 40 percent of all land managed by the Federal government.
The agency manages multiple resources and uses, including energy and minerals; timber; forage; recreation; wild horse and burro herds; fish and wildlife habitat; wilderness areas; and archaeological, paleontological, and historical sites.
BLM is one of the top revenue-generating agencies in the Federal government; in 2007, onshore mineral leasing activities will generate an estimated $4.5 billion in receipts from royalties, bonuses, and rentals that are collected by the Minerals Management Service. Approximately half of these revenues will be returned to the states where the mineral leasing occurred.
The job of balancing this mix of resources and uses grows more complex each year, as the West’s population growth creates new pressures and heightens existing management challenges.
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