The whole world is seeing what a disaster the U. S. Department of Interior under Ken Salazar is.

Activists who work on public lands and rare animal protection in the hinterlands of the West warned that the Bush environmental horror show would continue unabated when Obama appointed cattle rancher Ken Salazar as Interior Secretary.

In January 2009, a letter was written asking Obama to not appoint Salazar.

Barack Obama criticized — again — over pick of Ken Salazar as Interior secretary
LA Times

Colorado Group Urges Against Pick of Salazar for Interior Secretary
WildEarth Guardians press release

Who were the groups willing to speak out? Largely regional, small groups who work daily on the tangle of environmental destruction overseen by the Department of Interior. Meanwhile, the establishment enviro camp was pussyfooting around making happy talk about the Salazar appointment. They feared their cherished “access” to the Obama administration, Harry Reid, or a boatload of Bluedogs would be diminished if a discouraging word was uttered about Salazar.

Besides being boss of the infamous Minerals Management Service (MMS), Salazar also is in charge of both the Fish and Wildlife Service and the Bureau of Land Management. FWS oversees Endangered Species Act Listings and Wildlife Refuges. BLM is the land “manager” in charge of 253 million acres of PUBLIC land, or one-eighth of the land mass of the U.S., with “resources” that belong to us all but that are every day being sold or destroyed forever by industries for a pittance. BLM lands are the heart of the Western states and much of Alaska. What goes on, and who profits from these public lands and resources at the expense of the public, still drives the politics of the Interior West.

Despite that sick, sinking feeling with the Salazar appointment, we held out hope for some positive changes. A few dry land drilling crumbs were tossed out, but the Bush agenda continued. Salazar’s reign as Interior Secretary has been all about letting Industry – welfare public lands cattle ranching, oil and gas on dry land, and big wind – pillage the public domain.

When asked why we weren’t seeing even minimal change, good people still surviving inside the Department of Interior, themselves eager for change, replied “Salazar”.

Now here we are as the Gulf debacle unfolds, and we learn the nuances of what “new” and “permit” means in Interior-speak.

Meanwhile, there is a new letter asking for Salazar’s resignation …

Greens call for Salazar’s resignation

The one thing the Salazar regime has done in Interior is engrain in all the Secretary’s underlings that any and all Energy development trumps everything else. A recent FOIA response related to El Paso Gas’s highly controversial Ruby Gas Pipeline Project provides insight into this. The Pipeline slashes across Wyoming, Utah, Nevada and Oregon – to get gas to California while assiduously avoiding environmental “permitting” in California.

Here’s one of the e-mails from fall 2009.

Email exchange about route of Ruby Pipeline

Obama-appointed FWS Director Hamilton saying:

“This is a big energy project–splits between bureaus could be “news” and could make the Secretary look bad. I alerted Nevada BLM to the importance to avoid placeing DOI in that 
position”.

Sam died of heart attack on a ski vacation in Colorado this winter. Copied on the Hamilton e-mail is Rowan Gould, the current Acting Director of FWS. The context of the e-mail is that a fierce Battle was playing out within two Interior Agencies (FWS and BLM) over the Ruby gas pipeline’s proposed route through some of the last undeveloped wild sagebrush lands in northern Nevada.

Instead of following Energy Corridors designated by the federal government, El Paso sought the cheapest (and a very environmentally damaging) route to avoid tougher environmental regulations in California to get gas to a “hub” in Oregon so it could ship the gas south to California.

FERC, another federal agency bonded at the hip with Big Energy, was in charge of the whole Ruby EIS process. The primary Alternative considered to the damaging route on BLM lands was by the main road inside a National Wildlife Refuge. Instead of Interior acting as a unified voice to stop this madness of two senseless Alternatives, and calling FERC and El Paso on the carpet over being boxed into terrible routing, FWS took the side of El Paso.

Agencies were split, as El Paso divided them. FERC has now approved the terrible BLM Route, and is awaiting BLM finalization of a Permanent Right-of-Way. Salazar’s Interior did not act to require the pipeline to follow established Energy Corridors to the south.

What was most important to Salazar’s courtiers in FWS? Not the damage that the Ruby Pipeline and its Route would do. Rather, it was how Ken Salazar would look if disagreement between agencies on a Big Energy project got into the public eye. To hell with the environmental concerns: Sage grouse, scarce desert water and watersheds, hundreds of Native American cultural sites including at least one Traditional Cultural Property.

Salazar symbolizes how bought and sold by Big Energy and Industry the Obama Administration is. Other FOIA documents show the El Paso executives meeting with the heads of the agencies, the gas company making sure it was “singing the same tune” as Salazar’s FWS, Regional offices tamping down on “squabbling” – i.e. the major battle between BLM and FWS over routes.

Just like the big groups wouldn’t speak out against the Salazar appointment, Salazar appointees are themselves “captured” sycophants – where, ultimately, Industry wins out and destroys the public lands.