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The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior which administers America's public lands, totaling 262 million acres (1,060,000 km²) or one-eighth of the landmass of the country. Most public lands are located in western states. United States Bureau of Land Management logo. ... United States Bureau of Land Management logo. ... The United States Department of the Interior (DOI) is a Cabinet department of the United States government that manages and conserves most federally-owned land. ... In all modern states, some land is held by central or local governments. ...

Mission

The Bureau of Land Management states that it is their mission to sustain the health, diversity and productivity of the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations.

History

The BLM's roots go back to the Land Ordinance of 1785 and the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. These laws provided for the survey and settlement of the lands that the original 13 colonies ceded to the Federal government after the War of Independence. As additional lands were acquired by the United States from Spain, France, and other countries, Congress directed that they be explored, surveyed, and made available for settlement. In 1812, Congress established the General Land Office in the Department of the Treasury to oversee the disposition of these Federal lands. As the 19th century progressed and the Nation's land base expanded further west, Congress encouraged the settlement of the land by enacting a wide variety of laws, including the Homesteading Laws and the Mining Law of 1872. 1785 was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... The Northwest Ordinance (formally An Ordinance for the Government of the Territory of the United States, North-West of the River Ohio, and also known as the Freedom Ordinance) was an act of the Continental Congress of the United States passed on July 13, 1787 under the Articles of Confederation. ... 1787 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... The term War of Independence is generally used to describe a war occurring over a territory that has declared independence. ... A congress is a gathering of people, especially a gathering for a political purpose. ... 1812 was a leap year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... The General Land Office, a former agency of the United States government, was created in 1812 to take over functions previously conducted by the United States Department of the Treasury relating to the public domain. ... The United States Department of the Treasury is a Cabinet department, a treasury, of the United States government established by an Act of U.S. Congress in 1789 to manage the revenue of the United States government. ... Broadly, homesteading is a lifestyle of agrarian self-sufficiency. ... 1872 was a leap year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ...

These statutes served one of the major policy goals of the young country—settlement of the Western territories. With the exception of the Mining Law of 1872 and the Desert Land Act of 1877 (which was amended), all have since been repealed or superseded by other statutes. The Desert Land Act was passed by the United States Congress on 3 March 1877 to encourage and promote the economic development of the arid and semiarid public lands of the Western United States. ... 1877 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ...

The late 19th century marked a shift in Federal land management priorities with the creation of the first national parks, forests, and wildlife refuges. By withdrawing these lands from settlement, Congress signaled a shift in the policy goals served by the public lands. Instead of using them to promote settlement, Congress recognized that they should be held in public ownership because of their other resource values.

In the early 20th century, Congress took additional steps toward recognizing the value of the assets on public lands and directed the Executive Branch to manage activities on the remaining public lands. The Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 allowed leasing, exploration, and production of selected commodities such as coal, oil, gas, and sodium to take place on public lands. The Taylor Grazing Act of 1934 established the U.S. Grazing Service to manage the public rangelands. And the Oregon and California (O&C) Act of August 28, 1937, required sustained yield management of the timberlands in western Oregon. Under the doctrine of the separation of powers, the executive is the branch of a government charged with implementing, or executing, the law. ... 1920 is a leap year starting on Thursday (link will take you to calendar) // Events WIKIPEDIA EATS VAGINA January 7 - Forces of Russian White admiral Kolchak surrender in Krasnoyarsk. ... Coal is a fossil fuel extracted from the ground by deep mining, coal mining (open-pit mining or strip mining). ... Oil is a generic term for organic liquids that are not miscible with water. ... A gas is one of the four main phases of matter (after solid and liquid, and followed by plasma), that subsequently appear as a solid material is subjected to increasingly higher temperatures. ... General Name, Symbol, Number sodium, Na, 11 Chemical series alkali metals Group, Period, Block 1, 3, s Appearance silvery white Atomic mass 22. ... State nickname: Beaver State Other U.S. States Capital Salem Largest city Portland Governor Ted Kulongoski (D) Senators Ron Wyden (D) Gordon Smith (R) Official language(s) None Area 255,026 km² (9th)  - Land 248,849 km²  - Water 6,177 km² (2. ... State nickname: The Golden State Other U.S. States Capital Sacramento Largest city Los Angeles Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) Senators Dianne Feinstein (D) Barbara Boxer (D) Official language(s) English Area 410,000 km² (3rd)  - Land 404,298 km²  - Water 20,047 km² (4. ... August 28 is the 240th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (241st in leap years), with 125 days remaining. ... 1937 was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ...

In 1946, the Grazing Service was merged with the General Land Office (a product of the country's territorial expansion and the federal government's 19th-century homesteading policies) to form the Bureau of Land Management within the Department of the Interior. When the BLM was initially created, there were over 2,000 unrelated and often conflicting laws for managing the public lands. The BLM had no unified legislative mandate until Congress enacted the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (FLPMA). 1946 was a common year starting on Tuesday. ... The United States Department of the Interior (DOI) is a Cabinet department of the United States government that manages and conserves most federally-owned land. ... 1976 (MCMLXXVI) is a leap year starting on Thursday (link will take you to calendar). ...

In FLPMA, Congress recognized the value of the remaining public lands by declaring that these lands would remain in public ownership. Congress used the term "multiple use" management, defined as "management of the public lands and their various resource values so that they are utilized in the combination that will best meet the present and future needs of the American people."

The BLM today

Increasingly, the BLM has had to address the needs of a growing and changing West. Ten of the 12 western States with significant proportions of BLM-managed lands have among the fastest rates of population growth in the United States.

The American public values balanced use, conservation, environmental management, recreation, and tourism. Public lands are increasingly viewed from the perspective of the recreational opportunities they offer, their cultural resources, and—in an increasingly urban world—their vast open spaces. However, against this backdrop, the more traditional land uses of grazing, timber production, and mining are still in high demand. Conservation may refer to the following: Conservation ethic in relation to preserving ecosystems Conservationist Conservation movement Conservation ecology Conservation law of physics Conservation of energy Conservation of mass Conservation in genetics Conservation in psychology Prolonging the material integrity of cultural and artistic objects Art conservation Architectural conservation or immovable object... An environmental management standard or system or protocol attempts to reduce environmental impact as measured by some objective criteria. ... Recreation is often distinguished from leisure. ... A tourist boat travels the River Seine in Paris, France Beaches make popular tourist resorts. ... Grazing is the regular consumption of part of one organism without killing it by another organism. ... The El Chino Mine located near Silver City, New Mexico is an open-pit copper mine Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, usually (but not always) from an ore body, vein, or (coal) seam. ...

The BLM's task is to recognize the demands of public land users while addressing the needs of traditional user groups and working within smaller budgets. Fortunately, the public, constituent groups, and other agencies and levels of government have proven eager to participate in collaborative decision making. These diverse partners have joined with us in developing many partnerships that benefit the public lands and everyone who relies on them.

Perhaps one of the Bureau's greatest challenges today is to develop more effective land management practices, while becoming more efficient at the same time. The BLM has taken significant steps to reduce administrative costs, streamline work processes, focus on customer service, and improve accountability to the American people.

As the BLM is entering the 21st century, the bureau looks forward to continuing providing service to the public while strengthening partnerships with all who use or care about the public lands. Working together and the public can succeed in restoring and maintaining the health, diversity, and productivity of America's public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations.

The BLM has a wide range of responsibilities including collecting geographic information, maintaining records of land ownership and mineral rights, conserving wilderness areas while allocating other areas for grazing and agriculture, and protecting cultural heritage sites on public land. The BLM operates the National Landscape Conservation System which protects some U.S. National Monuments, some National Wild and Scenic Rivers, and some designated wildernesses among other types of areas. A U.S. National Monument is a protected area of the United States that is similar to a national park (specifically a U.S. National Park) except that the President of the United States can quickly declare an area of the United States to be a national monument without Congressional... National Wild and Scenic River is a designation for certain protected areas in the United States. ...

BLM is a major employer of wildfire firefighters and park rangers. The Old Fire burning in the San Bernardino Mountains (image taken from the International Space Station) A wildfire, also known as a forest fire, vegetation fire, grass fire, brush fire, or bushfire (in Australasia), is an uncontrolled fire often occurring in wildland areas, but which can also consume houses or... Firefighter with an axe A firefighter, sometimes still called a fireman though women have increasingly joined firefighting units, is a person who is trained and equipped to put out fires, rescue people and in some areas provide emergency medical services. ... A Park Ranger is a person charged with protecting and preserving parkland, forests (then called Forest Rangers), wilderness areas other natural resources. ...

Some of the text of this article was taken from the BLM website, which is in the public domain.

External link

• Official Bureau of Land Management Website