Interior Department Secretary Ryan Zinke this week announced the Donald Trump administration would review a plan to protect sage grouse in western states. Plans to protect sage grouse have met opposition by industry and farm groups along the way, which argue the rules go too far. Zinke said he assembled a review team comprised of scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey, Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to study the plan. The Washington Post reports the two-month review will take into consideration issues that concern some western politicians: jobs and energy development, some of the very things that scientists say led to the bird’s decline. Zinke’s predecessor, Sally Jewell, defended the existing management plan for sage grouse stemming from the Obama Administration. Jewell says the rules were “designed to be very flexible and to allow the states and the federal land management agencies to work together” on both energy development and conservation.
From the National Association of Farm Broadcasting News Service.