Mesa County Enters into MOU with BLM for Uncompahgre Field Office Resource Management Plan
Mesa County Commissioners approved a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on Nov. 7 with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) regarding the development of the Uncompahgre Field Office Resource Management Plan Amendment and Environmental Impact Statement (RMPA/EIS).
The MOU will establish a cooperating agency relationship, providing a framework for cooperation and coordination and documenting agreed-upon procedures, roles, and responsibilities associated with preparing the proposed Uncompahgre Field Office RMPA/EIS.
The Uncompahgre Field Office Approved RMP and Record of Decision (ARMP/ROD) was signed in April 2020. The BLM received and settled three lawsuits on the ARMP/ROD. Under one settlement agreement, in 2022, the BLM initiated two statewide planning efforts: one for big game and one for Gunnison sage-grouse. Those planning efforts are currently underway. In the remaining two settlement agreements, the BLM agreed to complete an RMP Amendment process with a specific scope for the UFO decision area.
The BLM is initiating this planning effort to conform to two settlement agreements on 678,500 acres of BLM surface and 954,686 acres of subsurface mineral estate (see Attachment A). The BLM must consider the management of oil and gas resources, areas of critical environmental concern, and lands with wilderness characteristics within the specific parameters described in the settlement agreements. For consistency, the BLM may propose additional alternatives to the settlement agreement, which align with the alternatives identified as BLM preferred in the other two ongoing statewide plan amendments for big game and Gunnison sage-grouse.
In the environmental analysis, the BLM will carefully consider the impacts of proposed oil and gas leasing decisions consistent with the settlement agreements. The BLM will also consider the effects of proposed ACEC designations and management of lands with wilderness characteristics as previously analyzed under Alternative B in the 2019 Uncompahgre Field Office Proposed RMP and Final Environmental Impact Statement. The cumulative impacts from other BLM multiple uses is something that BLM will analyze in the RMPA/EIS.
