Robert L. Glicksman (George Washington University – Law School) has posted Climate Change Adaptation at the Nexus of the Federal Land Management Systems on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
The federal government owns approximately 30 percent of the surface land area in the United States. Congress has allocated responsibility for managing these lands to four principal agencies: the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Bureau of Land Management. Each agency operates under its own organic statute, which provides the standards applicable to management of the lands under its jurisdiction. These standards differ from agency to agency, as the organic statutes differentially prioritize some goals and uses while restricting or prohibiting others. Two of the agencies operate under multiple use, sustained yield standards. The others are governed by “dominant use” mandates, which seek to foster preservation, recreation, or wildlife preservation. The impacts of climate change are making adherence to the management mandates of the four agencies problematic. Lands that used to be suitable for preserving certain species are, or may soon become, inhospitable to these species. Areas that used to have sufficient water to promote certain uses have become, or may soon become, too arid to support them. Wildfires that devastate lands subject to climate-related aridification may alter vegetation regimes, rendering existing uses impossible or undesirable. These changes are transforming the jurisdictional boundaries of the land management agencies into obstacles to effective management of the federal lands, as conditions that were once thought to be relatively static are in considerable flux. This Article focuses on the challenges facing the four agencies in the face of climate change and suggests how policymakers may need to adjust the relationships among the agencies, the procedures they use in making management decisions, and the substantive criteria that guide management choices in response to those challenges.
Highly Recommended!