Public Lands

The bill would have required the Bureau of Land Management to sell up to 1.2 million acres within five miles of population centers in Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon and Utah.

The question of whether the federal government should sell off some public lands has been debated in Congress in recent weeks. Leaders in Western towns will consider a more focused version of that controversial idea in the months ahead: They’ll look at how places with severe housing shortages – like many mountain towns in Colorado – might buy or lease nearby federal land and use it for housing.

The updated bill targets Bureau of Land Management land near population centers. But hunters say these areas are important for recreation — and wildlife.

Some local officials in the Mountain West say federal land could be used in certain cases to ease the region's housing crisis. But they view a plan from Senate Republicans as going much farther than the solutions that have worked in their areas.

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Eagle, Gunnison, Pitkin and Summit direct local tax dollars toward backcountry rangers who will maintain trails, douse fires and pick up trash amid surging visitation to public lands. Listen to "Morning Edition" host Michael Lyle, Jr. discuss this story with Colorado Sun reporter Jason Blevins and then read The Colorado Sun story at the link below.

A Republican representative from the Mountain West led an effort Wednesday to remove a controversial provision to sell 450,000 acres of federal land in Nevada and Utah from the House reconciliation bill.

Thanks to a new initiative, private landowners in Colorado and Wyoming are now letting people cross through their property for free to access these acres.

Republican representatives in Nevada and Utah this week were successful in getting an amendment to sell public lands in federal budget legislation. In Nevada, the idea is already facing strong opposition.

An amendment introduced late in the evening includes over 10,000 acres in Utah and identifies nearly 450,000 acres in four Nevada counties for sale or exchange.