Following is an excerpt from the official BLM Statement presented at the Nevada Bundy ranch demonstration this past week.  “The BLM manages more than 245 million acres of public land, the most of any Federal agency. This land, known as the National System of Public Lands, is primarily located in 12 Western states, including Alaska. The BLM also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the nation. The BLM’s mission is to manage and conserve the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations under our mandate of multiple-use and sustained yield. In Fiscal Year 2013, the BLM generated $4.7 billion in receipts from public lands.”

 The arrogant display of force by armed BLM personnel operating under unconstitutional power and authority revealed how far this Agency has strayed from its original purpose and responsibility.  Congress has been negligent in allowing this level of behavior led by nonelected officials to develop in this out-of-control agency which has apparently assumed for itself law-making powers. Our government was not designed for top-down totalitarian administration through federal Agencies ruling by “armed enforcement” of their own rules, regulations and controls while claiming “power of law”. Federal environmental agencies in need of reining in are:  Bureau of Land Management, Environmental Protection Agency, US Forest Service, Fish and Wildlife, and US Park Service

 The public display of the last few days on the Nevada Bundy ranch belies their claimed purpose and reconfirms true objectives of these renegade agencies. They even fail to address the wild life and environmental issues they proclaim to protect, exemplified by actively destroying a claimed endangered desert tortoise rather than protecting it.  It is past time that federal agencies be reined in, or disbanded, with federally held lands turned over to states and local management, closer to the citizens to whom they actually belong.  Hiring and financing devoid of approved performance accountability had been entrusted to elected congressional officials who have betrayed our trust with massive waste of tax dollars as well as lost productive use and enjoyment of our public lands.   

 Clarice Ryan, Bigfork