{"id":46329,"date":"2021-06-09T11:16:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-09T17:16:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/blm-headquarters-in-grand-junction-sits-mostly-empty\/"},"modified":"2021-06-09T17:16:00","modified_gmt":"2021-06-09T17:16:00","slug":"blm-headquarters-in-grand-junction-sits-mostly-empty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/blm-headquarters-in-grand-junction-sits-mostly-empty\/","title":{"rendered":"BLM headquarters in Grand Junction sits mostly empty"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"The
The Robert F. Burford Bureau of Land Management Headquarters in Grand Junction on May 21. (Chase Woodruff\/Colorado Newsline)<\/span>Chase Woodruff\/Colorado Newsline<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

On a recent blustery spring morning in Grand Junction, the parking lot outside the small office building at 760 Horizon Drive steadily filled up as the workday began.<\/p>\n

Employees filed in and headed toward office suites emblazoned with corporate logos: Shaw Construction, ProStar GeoCorp, Moody Insurance Agency, Chevron.<\/p>\n

None, however, could be seen entering the Robert F. Burford Bureau of Land Management Headquarters, which occupies space on the building\u2019s first and third floors. The national headquarters of the BLM, which employs more than 10,000 people and manages more than 245 million acres of public land across the country, was, by all appearances, deserted. A security guard told a Newsline reporter that no one from the agency was available, as employees were \u201cmostly teleworking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Behind a closed glass door, tucked to the side in an empty reception area, a poster read: \u201cYour public lands matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Few federal agencies were more deeply impacted by four years of the Trump administration than the BLM, which found itself charged with spearheading Republican efforts to achieve \u201cenergy dominance\u201d on America\u2019s public lands and transformed by a sweeping 2019 relocation plan that moved its headquarters to Grand Junction and reassigned hundreds of senior positions away from Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration and its allies, including former Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, called the move a \u201creorganization.\u201d Critics said it was more like an evisceration.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought it was a bad idea at the time, and certainly nothing has changed,\u201d Bob Abbey, a former BLM director who led the agency from 2009 to 2012, said. \u201cIt was nothing more than a poorly disguised attempt to destroy the Bureau of Land Management from the inside.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ex-BLM employees and public-lands advocates paint a dire picture of what happened to the agency after the relocation, which was announced by Gardner and Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, a Colorado native and longtime oil lobbyist, in July 2019. It\u2019s a picture that was backed up by figures released by the Interior Department after President Joe Biden\u2019s inauguration in January; out of hundreds of positions affected by the move, Interior officials said, 287 employees chose to resign or retire from the agency, while 41 accepted relocation. The latter number, however, includes employees who moved to BLM field offices scattered throughout the West as part of a broader reorganization.<\/p>\n

The number of employees who relocated to Grand Junction, BLM officials confirmed this week, is three.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf the 41 BLM employees who relocated, three moved to Grand Junction and the rest to state offices across the West,\u201d an agency spokesperson said in a statement issued to Newsline.<\/p>\n

The new disclosure comes as the Biden administration works to rebuild the agency after four years of departures and disruptions. Under Bernhardt\u2019s successor, Secretary Deb Haaland, the Interior Department is weighing a host of critical questions involving the BLM\u2019s future, from a review of its oil and gas leasing programs to efforts to support the \u201c30 by 30\u201d conservation agenda \u2013 and, not least, whether the relocation of the agency\u2019s headquarters to a small city in western Colorado can be salvaged, or was fatally flawed from the start.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a decision that has forged unlikely alliances in Colorado political circles and pitted local boosterism against questions of effective agency management \u2013 and at the center of it all is a nearly empty office suite in Grand Junction that many in government and public-lands advocacy view as a punch line.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a joke,\u201d Abbey said. \u201cIt would be humorous if there weren\u2019t a lot of people whose livelihoods are dependent upon the Bureau of Land Management doing their job. And when that job\u2019s not being performed, at any level of the organization, then it\u2019s a disservice to the public that BLM employees are supposed to be serving.\u201d<\/p>\n

Confirmation hearing<\/div>\n

There aren\u2019t many environmental or public-lands issues on which Rep. Lauren Boebert, the controversial first-term GOP congresswoman who represents Grand Junction, finds herself aligned with top Colorado Democrats such as Sen. John Hickenlooper, Rep. Joe Neguse and Gov. Jared Polis. But all four agree that maintaining a headquarters for the BLM in Grand Junction is the right decision.<\/p>\n

\u201cWesterners deserve a voice in the land-use decisions that affect their lives daily,\u201d Boebert, who has introduced legislation requiring the agency to keep its headquarters in Grand Junction, said in a statement earlier this year. \u201cSince 99% of the lands that the Bureau manages are west of the Mississippi, it only makes sense to have the agency located close to the communities it serves.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hickenlooper, in particular, has emerged as a champion of maintaining a BLM headquarters in Grand Junction. The first-term senator, who unseated Gardner in the 2020 election to help Democrats narrowly take control of the Senate, has used his position on the Energy and Natural Resources Committee to protect one of his predecessor\u2019s signature accomplishments, lobbying Haaland and other Biden appointees on the issue.<\/p>\n

\"An
An office building in north Grand Junction that houses the Robert F. Burford Bureau of Land Management Headquarters on May 21. (Chase Woodruff\/Colorado Newsline)<\/span>Chase Woodruff\/Colorado Newsline<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

He got another chance to make his case Tuesday, when the committee held a confirmation hearing for Biden\u2019s pick to lead the BLM, veteran environmental advocate Tracy Stone-Manning. Hickenlooper\u2019s office said that in a June 4 meeting, the senator and Stone-Manning \u201cdiscussed several Colorado priorities, including restoring the BLM\u2019s commitment to protecting public lands and maintaining the agency\u2019s headquarters in Grand Junction.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTracy Stone-Manning values public lands as much as Coloradans do and has experience working with Western communities on responsible stewardship,\u201d Hickenlooper said in a statement. \u201cWe discussed her vision for the agency and I\u2019m confident she\u2019ll give full consideration to the benefits of housing the BLM out West.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"William
William Perry Pendley, former acting director of the Bureau of Land Management, speaks Aug. 14 to the media on the Grizzly Creek Fire in Eagle. (Chris Dillmann\/Vail Daily via AP, file)<\/span>Chris Dillmann\/Vail Daily via AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

If confirmed, Stone-Manning would be the BLM\u2019s first permanent director in more than four years. Under Trump, the agency was led by a series of acting directors \u2013 none more notorious than William Perry Pendley, who was tapped by Bernhardt to lead in the agency in 2019. Pendley, the longtime director of the Lakewood-based Mountain States Legal Foundation, had long advocated for federal public lands to be transferred to the states and private interests, in addition to routinely denying the science of climate change and making a host of other controversial comments, including likening undocumented immigrants to \u201ca cancer.\u201d He faced legal challenges to his authority as acting director of the BLM, and a federal judge ruled in September 2020 that he had been serving unlawfully.<\/p>\n

In the view of many experts and advocates, it\u2019s impossible to separate Pendley\u2019s troubled tenure at the head of the agency from the devastating impact of the reorganization on its senior leadership. By forcing out hundreds of career employees in the BLM\u2019s D.C. headquarters \u2013 employees who, because of civil-service protections, could not easily be fired \u2013 Bernhardt and Pendley were able to concentrate decision-making power within a tightly-knit circle of Trump appointees.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe result of the relocation,\u201d Abbey said, \u201cis that it allowed for most if not all public land management decisions to be made by political appointees within the office of the Secretary of the Interior, rather than by employees living closer to the public lands whose decisions are primarily influenced by best available information and public input.\u201d<\/p>\n

Circumventing careful review processes overseen by career civil servants, critics say, helped Trump\u2019s BLM dramatically increase oil and gas lease sales, roll back a slew of Obama-era environmental regulations and make sweeping changes sought by industrial interests to many of its resource management plans.<\/p>\n

\u201cGetting rid of the career staff who know the law, who know how to implement (the Federal Land Policy and Management Act) and things like that, was the goal the entire time,\u201d said Aaron Weiss, deputy director of the Center for Western Priorities, a Denver-based conservation group.<\/p>\n

Unlikely allies<\/div>\n

In supporting the Grand Junction headquarters, Colorado Democrats find themselves at odds with other members of their party and allies in the conservation community, many of whom remain deeply suspicious of the motives behind the move and doubtful that the BLM can be restored to full strength without returning to Washington.<\/p>\n

In a February letter to Biden, Polis touted the economic benefits that the relocation had delivered to Colorado, and warned against \u201cassociating this with the many other misguided legacies of your predecessor.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile the Trump administration\u2019s lack of knowledge of the West framed this initiative for him as one of energy dominance, the opportunity for you is to see this initiative as an opportunity for locally driven conservation,\u201d Polis wrote. \u201cWhere he seemed to think it would favor extractive industries, I know that Coloradans across our state realize the need to conserve the places we love.\u201d<\/p>\n

In their own letter to Biden in January, Hickenlooper and Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet suggested that the Trump administration had erred only by relocating a few dozen jobs to Grand Junction, rather than hundreds.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Trump administration did not follow through on their commitment to Grand Junction,\u201d wrote Hickenlooper and Bennet. \u201cWhile this is a reasonable start and is appreciated by the Western Slope, the job is far from finished. \u2026 We believe that such an effort must be more than symbolic and must include the staff and resources to improve management and protect our public land.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not a view shared by many conservation advocates and ex-BLM officials, who argue that the agency can maintain a headquarters in Grand Junction, or it can effectively navigate a complex federal bureaucracy to manage public lands \u2013 but it can\u2019t do both.<\/p>\n

\u201cI certainly understand why that argument is being made by elected officials in Colorado,\u201d Abbey said. \u201cIt\u2019s just the wrong decision relative to how agencies should be organized and managed. The national leadership team needs to be within the Washington, D.C., area, given the need for daily interactions and communication with a wide variety of groups and other agencies.\u201d<\/p>\n

A \u2018ghost town\u2019<\/div>\n

Nearly two years after the move was announced, many of the consequences of the BLM\u2019s reorganization remain shrouded in confusion \u2013 starting with the question of how many people are even working at its new national headquarters, or what kind of work they\u2019re doing there.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sounds like it\u2019s been a ghost town,\u201d Weiss said. \u201cEspecially with the pandemic, it\u2019s quite possible that a number of folks accepted a move on paper, but have been working remotely since then.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"The
The Powderhorn Wilderness, most of which is managed by the Bureau of Land Managed, is at the northern part of the San Juan Mountains. (Bob Wick\/BLM\/Public Domain Mark 1.0)<\/span>Bob Wick\/BLM\/Public Domain Mark<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A BLM spokesperson told Newsline that 41 senior positions \u201care assigned to\u201d the Grand Junction headquarters, but declined to say how many are working there in person. \u201cEmployees with telework agreements and supervisor approval are authorized to work from home to reduce risks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic,\u201d the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

Nearly half of the about 300 headquarters positions that were reassigned to BLM offices across the West are currently vacant, the agency said. As announced in February, the agency is currently undertaking a review of the 2019 reorganization, but it declined to say when any determinations are expected to be made.<\/p>\n

\u201cInterior leadership has committed to assessing the impacts of recent structural changes to the BLM and what, if any, changes can or should be made,\u201d an agency spokesperson said. \u201cAccordingly, the BLM continues to engage staff, assess employee and stakeholder feedback, and develop appropriate strategies to strengthen the agency and its workforce.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many observers don\u2019t expect Colorado Democrats\u2019 efforts to preserve the new BLM headquarters to be successful. A transition memo written by a team of close Biden allies in November 2020 urged the incoming administration to \u201cimmediately begin reversing damage to BLM by returning its headquarters and at least some staff to Washington.\u201d Advocates predict that it\u2019s only a matter of time before the agency, currently rebuilding its leadership team on the fly, follows through on those plans.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pretty confident that they will look at the numbers, and say, \u2018Wow, this has been an epic failure, we need to fix it quickly in order to have a functioning agency,\u2019\u201d Weiss said. \u201cAnd clearly, that\u2019s not going to work in Grand Junction for a number of reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCould there be a role for a Bureau of Land Management Western office or regional hub in Grand Junction? Certainly,\u201d Weiss added.<\/p>\n

In his February letter to Biden, Polis also opened the door to a solution that would preserve some senior BLM jobs in Colorado while others returned to D.C.: \u201cIt is undoubtedly in your and the Secretary of Interior\u2019s purview to decide where specific positions are located, and it is understandable that a handful of top positions may be housed at Interior\u2019s headquarters,\u201d wrote Polis. \u201cIt is less important to have any one or few specific positions in any one location. Rather what is more important is to have a significant, growing and valuable contingent of Bureau of Land Management leadership located in the communities, and in touch with the lands the agency manages.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere needs to be a decision made soon,\u201d Abbey said. \u201cIt\u2019s taken a little longer than I would have anticipated for a good decision to have been made. And as a result of that decision not being made, there\u2019s still a lot of uncertainty. It\u2019s really difficult to recruit and hire staff when you really don\u2019t know where people may be located.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the BLM poised to be at the center of major federal policymaking efforts on climate change, clean energy, biodiversity protections, outdoor recreation and more over the next several years, public lands advocates are eager to leave that uncertainty behind. They hope that Stone-Manning\u2019s confirmation can begin to close the book on a tumultuous few years at the agency \u2013 and, perhaps, on the strange chapter of its deserted Colorado headquarters.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving 40 jobs in Grand Junction is great,\u201d said Weiss. \u201cIt\u2019s tough to make the case that you should hamstring an agency for the rest of the agency\u2019s life for the sake of 40 jobs in Grand Junction.\u201d<\/p>\n

To read more stories from Colorado Newsline, visit www.coloradonewsline.com<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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