Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its final Environmental Impact Statement and proposed plan amendments for Greater Sage-Grouse Rangewide Planning, laying out the blueprint of the agency’s intentions for 65 million acres of the bird’s public lands habitat but falling far short of what science says the birds need to avoid extinction. Conservation groups […]
Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) released a final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) indicating BLM’s intent to deny a right-of-way for the proposed four-lane Northern Corridor Highway through Red Cliffs National Conservation Area (NCA) in southwestern Utah near Zion National Park. The Utah Department of Transportation’s proposed Northern Corridor Highway […]
Advocates for the West and our partners filed a motion to intervene to defend the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Public Lands Rule against a lawsuit brought this past summer by the States of North Dakota, Idaho, and Montana in North Dakota federal district court. The conservation groups—including Conservation Lands Foundation, The Wilderness Society, and […]
On Friday, September 6, the U.S. Forest Service released the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) and Draft Record of Decision (DROD) for the Stibnite Gold Project. The planned open-pit cyanide vat leach gold mine in Idaho’s Salmon River Mountains would jeopardize public health and clean water, harm threatened species, violate Indigenous treaty rights, and permanently […]
Advocates for the West and our partners at the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation and the Center for Biological Diversity won a significant victory against the federal Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) over its program allowing pesticide spraying on millions of acres in 17 western states to kill native grasshoppers and crickets. U.S. District […]
Advocates for the West and our partners filed a motion to intervene in federal court to defend the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) recently finalized Public Lands Rule. The motion comes in response to a case and motion for preliminary injunction filed by the States of Utah and Wyoming that seeks to prevent the BLM […]
Advocates for the West filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) for failing to ensure cattle grazing on the Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge in Montana’s Centennial Valley does not harm wildlife. We are representing WildEarth Guardians and Western Watersheds Project in the case. Despite long-standing recognition of grazing’s harmful […]
Today the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) released a draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) to reconsider a right-of-way for the proposed four-lane Northern Corridor Highway through Red Cliffs National Conservation Area (NCA) in southwestern Utah near Zion National Park. The proposed Northern Corridor Highway route violates five […]
The Idaho Board of Environmental Quality issued a decision invalidating Perpetua Resources’ air pollution permit for the proposed Stibnite Gold Mine in Valley County. Blasting and hauling operations at the proposed mine would emit massive amounts of arsenic-laden dust. The Board found that the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) failed to follow Idaho air pollution […]
Advocates for the West is pleased to provide learning experiences for future environmental leaders through ongoing internship, externship, and clerkship opportunities. We spoke with Meridian Wappett, former Advocates for the West extern and current University of Montana law student, about her passion for, and connection to, the West. Advocates for the West: Will you please […]