Winnemucca, Nev.–The Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Winnemucca District will be releasing the Final Drought Environmental Assessment (EA) which provides the BLM and its livestock permitee’s and stakeholder’s a variety of management tools to help mitigate the ongoing impacts of drought on natural resources.
The EA establishes a District Drought Detection and Monitoring Plan (DDMP) and contains drought response actions (DRA) that will be used to inform land managers about how uses on public lands are impacting natural resources during drought. The DRAs provide guidance and instructions on how to properly identify what actions must be taken to mitigate impacts from authorized or unauthorized uses on public land. “The Drought EA will not be a standalone document that can be used to authorize projects and activities to mitigate drought,” said BLM Humboldt River Field Manager Vern Graham. “It will provide documentation and a range of potential management actions that can be used to more quickly and efficiently make decisions in a rapidly changing environment.” The Preliminary Drought Environmental Assessment was released for public review in February 2013. Comments were received from six entities with approximately 20 comments made to the EA. A list of the questions and the BLM’s response to each question will be available for the public to review. The documents are available on the Winnemucca website at www.blm.gov/nv/st/en/fo/wfo/
For additional information, please contact Wes Barry, Assistant Field Manager-Range, at (775) 623-1500, or at the above address.
