Federal Lands Transfer

[Pierre]

After listening to Randy's podcast with Mr. Gianforte, it seems we are missing something.
There are certainly folks with the goal of selling Fed lands and all public lands and getting them in private hands. There are folks that think the State can manage the lands better than the Feds.
What scares me is that the same folks wanting transfer are the folks that have defunded these Fed. agencies to the point where they don't have the boots on the ground to do a better job. Look at the FS cuts for trails and the BLM's scarcity of monitoring and law enforcement folks. Secondly, these same folks are the folks who have done the same defunding of FWP, DNRC, and other state agencies so they are unable to do as good a job as possible.
You might think of having John Brenden, Debbie Barrett, Rick Ripley, Jennifer Fielder, Kerry White, and others interfering in the state's management like they have with our state agencies. The Montana Legislature has micromanaged the FWP and has ignored the public processes whereby citizens can comment and help guide management. In that respect, how can the state possibly do a better job? We have a legitimate concern about these kind of folks who are in large part folks that have demonstrated no respect for sportsmen/women.
The state would still be under the same environmental constraints and face the same lengthy processes to manage. We can't afford that. Fire? Why would all the other folks in the US who share ownership of these lands, want to transfer for any reason?
Mr. Gianforte also seems unaware of PLPW and other groups working to find common ground.
Ask tough questions and vote!

 

[u1299]

I tend to look at things in general terms and perhaps that is a fault of mine, but in "general" when people say State Control of Public Lands means better management, what they really mean or desire is for more mining, more gas and oil exploration, more logging, more subdivisions, more roads, and basically just more human intrusion on and into the places we hunt and fish. Steve Rinella said as much at the 2016 BHA convention in Missoula, when he said something to the effect some people tend to look at the mountain and remark, IT'S JUST SITTING THERE NOT DOING ANYTHING, JUST BEING A MOUNTAIN!! To those people (the drill baby drill crowd) it's a total waste of a valuable resource to let that happen.

I'm not stupid, I know we need mines, gas and oil and even homes for people to live in, but we also need wild unspoiled places, for ourselves and our sanity and for fish and wildlife to live.

I also know exactly what they mean when they say Better Management.

 

[howler]

one thing that raises a red flag for me about Gianforte is he has not come flat out and say that he is against the state taking over public lands, he dances around it by saying he is for public access to those lands which is good alright but we need our politicians to emphatically come out and say they are absolutely against the state taking over federal lands. and those that say they want more state management in the federal lands are more interested in swaying the land managers to their line of thinking.
the other red flag that I see is it is in the republican platform for the state to take over control of the public lands.. I can't believe that if we have a republican Gov. he will go against the state republican's platform.