Secretarial order targets nation’s largest federal conservation fund
A new Department of Interior secretarial order announced today puts onerous restrictions on the use of the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). LWCF is the nation’s major source of funding for conservation and recreation projects and provides agencies like the Bureau of Land Management and National Park Service with the resources they need to acquire and protect ecologically significant habitat.
Most damaging, Secretarial Order 3442 halts the use of LWCF for conservation and recreation expansion on Bureau of Land Management lands, with few exceptions. In a break from the current process, it cedes the veto authority for federal projects to local and state governments. The order goes into effect immediately.
With this order, hundreds of projects across the nation will not receive funding as Congress intended, pausing or indefinitely tying up existing projects and land acquisitions. New requirements would eliminate successful, locally-driven Congressional processes that ensure the availability of LWCF funds for high priority projects wherever they occur.
“This directive will add burdensome red tape to the Land and Water Conservation Fund. With it, the administration has failed to meet Congress’ intent for the nation’s largest conservation and recreation funding program. The administration's changes to settled law address areas that have been asked and answered by Congress, the first Trump Administration, the Dingell Act, and the popular and bipartisan Great American Outdoors Act. Rather than solve a problem, this action defies Congressional authority and could see Congressionally appropriated LWCF funds misdirected,” said Krystian Lahage, Public Policy Officer of the Mojave Desert Land Trust.
The Mojave Desert Land Trust currently has agreements with the BLM for the transfer of 36 parcels totaling 2,285 acres in federally designated wilderness or desert national monuments that are ready to go into public hands. These projects would all be impacted by the secretarial order. Additionally, MDLT is stewarding another 11,000 acres that are in the pipeline for potential transfer to federal agencies.
Elsewhere in the region, major projects face freezes, including a substantial transfer of six miles and 16,565 acres of the Pacific Crest Trail into public hands near the Jawbone Special Recreation Management Area. This project, popular with OHV and non-motorized recreationists, would have provided connectivity for designated OHV trails and expanded access for low-impact activities like hiking and camping. To the west, millions of dollars for improvements and protection of the Santa Rosa-San Jacinto Mountains National Monument and adjacent San Bernardino National Forest will be diverted or left unallocated.
“These investments improve the well-being of our communities by enhancing the health of our ecosystems, supporting people’s physical and mental health through recreation, and boosting rural economies. Conservation in the California desert has benefitted greatly from LWCF, with projects piecing together public lands, protecting wildlife corridors and critical habitat, and strengthening the durability of our wildernesses, national parks, and national monuments. As our public lands struggle to adapt to the changing climate and biodiversity, loss, we should be doubling down on programs like LWCF, not diminishing them,” said Kelly Herbinson, Executive Director of the Mojave Desert Land Trust.
LWCF funds are critical to support MDLT's wilderness inholdings conservation program, which is designed to reinforce conservation protections for our national parks, wilderness and monuments. MDLT acquires private land locked inside federally protected areas. At times, these properties are vulnerable or degraded and require restoration and clean up. These lands are conveyed to our federal partners using LWCF funds to ensure uninterrupted habitat where wildlife can thrive.
The importance of this program to conservation cannot be overstated. Across local and state governments, nonprofit organizations, and recreation champions, LWCF has invested more than $78 million into permanently protecting public lands in the California desert since 1964.
LWCF provides a significant lifeline to rural communities and gateway economies, with funds for local parks and recreation areas. The unseen cost of this secretarial order will land with desert communities and the landscapes they cherish.
The Mojave Desert Land Trust’s first land acquisition, the 627-acre Nolina Peak preserve, was transferred to Joshua Tree National Park using LWCF funds in 2008. This property is part of the crucial Joshua Tree North Wildlife Linkage used by bighorn sheep and mule deer to traverse between the Park and surrounding habitat.
Since 2006, the program has enabled the Trust to convey 28,941 acres to Joshua Tree and Death Valley National Parks and Mojave National Preserve, and another 28,960 acres to the Bureau of Land Management in federally designated wilderness and Sand to Snow and Mojave Trails National Monuments.