Hunkins calls Freudenthal's Wyoming Range stance 'a little bit extreme'
JEFF GEARINO Southwest Wyoming bureau | Posted: Friday, June 2, 2006 12:00 am
GREEN RIVER - Joining conservationists and labor representatives, Gov. Dave Freudenthal has asked federal officials to halt Tuesday's planned oil and gas lease sale of 13 parcels in the Wyoming Range.
In a letter Thursday to federal land managers, Freudenthal said officials should also consider taking back other leases already sold in recent months in the Wyoming Range. He said concerns over oil and gas leasing in the area are growing.
Freudenthal said the area has incredible natural resources and is important to recreation and tourism opportunities for the people of Wyoming.
"I ask that the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service halt the sale of these leases and that you also take a very serious look at retracting the other leases … offered for sale in the Wyoming Range," he wrote.
"Fishing and hunting in the mountains is a large part of our identity as Wyomingites," Freudenthal said. "While we understand the contributions oil and gas makes to our state, we are not willing to threaten the hunting and fishing experiences of future generations."
The BLM scheduled Tuesday's oil and gas lease sale for about 12,000 acres in the Wyoming Range. The BLM oversees oil and gas lease sales on Forest Service lands.
The parcels up for sale are part of 44,600 acres in the area of the Bridger-Teton National Forest that was released in 2005 by forest managers for possible leasing. That number was scaled back from about 175,000 acres after public outcry from residents, Freudenthal and U.S. Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo.
The parcels are located in the North Cottonwood Creek and South Cottonwood Creek areas of Sublette County in western Wyoming.
Ray Hunkins, the Republican challenger to Democrat Freudenthal, called the governor's objections "unfortunate" and a "little bit extreme."
He noted the BLM scaled back the original acreage from 175,000 acres to 44,600 acres and said the agency has taken "a moderate approach and one that shows the BLM has concern" for environmental issues in the area.
"The Wyoming Range is great country, but it's country that might yield in the future oil or gas that would assist not only this state, but the nation as well," he said in a telephone interview from Casper Thursday.
"And just like (the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge), I don't think there ought to be an exclusion from places in Wyoming other than the national parks and wilderness areas where leasing can't and shouldn't take place," Hunkins said.
'Already contributing'
In the letter to Wyoming BLM Director Bob Bennett, Freudenthal said there are some 150,000 acres of oil and gas leases on forest and federal lands adjacent to the Wyoming Range that are "already contributing" to the nation's energy needs.
Freudenthal said it would make sense to update the forest plan for the Bridger-Teton National Forest that made the decision offering the lease parcels for sale. He said much has happened in the 16 years since the completion of the plan, and decisions concerning leasing should be made with the most current information available.
The governor said that he was aware that the deadline for a formal protest has passed "and that the decision on this matter is a foregone conclusion." Despite that, "the BLM should be aware of the state's continued opposition to the lease sale," Freudenthal wrote.
The notice of the sale has met with an "overwhelming number" of protests from a wide variety of people, including conservation organizations and most recently, by union workers in southwest Wyoming's Sweetwater and Sublette counties, the governor said.
Freudenthal said those workers "spend their weeks working … and their time off fishing and hunting in the Wyoming Range with their families. These people are being wedged out of other areas and are finding the Bridger-Teton their only option, and now that option is at risk."
Last week for the first time in Wyoming State AFL-CIO history, the union sent a formal protest to the BLM concerning oil and gas over Tuesday's planned lease sale.
The governor echoed conservation and labor concerns with the potential effect of oil and gas development on mule deer herds. He said the Sublette mule deer herd - one of the state's largest - may already be harmed by development on adjacent BLM lands in fields such as the Jonah and Pinedale Anticline.
"By allowing oil and gas in the Wyoming Range, we may further affect a herd that may be already feeling the impact of oil and gas development on its winter range," he said.
In December 2005, a BLM oil and gas lease sale auctioned a 1,280-acre parcel in the foothills of the Wyoming Range. Conservation groups and outfitters and guides organizations protested the December lease sale. Those appeals are still pending.
In April, the Forest Service proceeded with another lease sale auction and offered nearly 20,000 acres on the Bridger-Teton forest for oil and gas development.
Southwest Wyoming bureau reporter Jeff Gearino can be reached at 307-875-5359 or at gearino@tribcsp.com.