U.S. Public Lands and Rivers Conservation

Since 2016, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the U.S. Forest Service have advanced five land management plans that would eliminate protections for the roughly 60 million acres of federally managed lands—the most of any state—in Alaska. If enacted, the Alaska plans would open vast stretches of the Bering Sea-Western Interior, Tongass National Forest, Central Yukon, National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, and other pristine landscapes to extractive development with significant potential repercussions for lands, rivers, wildlife in Alaska, and the Indigenous peoples whose lives and culture are intrinsically connected to these places.

The Pew Charitable Trusts submitted written responses to two hearings of the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on Public Lands, Forests, and Mining, held June 16 and June 23, on 10 public land and river conservation bills.