The La Plata County commissioners will hold a special meeting Tuesday and vote on comments they intend to submit to the Bureau of Land Management concerning drilling in the HD Mountains. Their worry is that the way the process is unfolding will lead to problems down the road.
Their fears are well founded and they are correct to weigh in. The situation is too complex and offers too many problematic possibilities not to be fully explored and worked out.
The proposed leases involve more than 6,000 acres in four parcels in a Forest Service wilderness southeast of Bayfield. That the leases would involve both the Forest Service and the BLM is itself cause for concern. As Commissioner Julie Westendorf said Wednesday, that multi-jurisdictional process can lead to overlap and confusion.
The commissioners likened it to the lengthy talks the county has had over the King II coal mine in Hesperus. That mine has generated opposition and complaints from neighbors over noise and dust, as well as its operations’ effects on county roads.
In that case, overlapping jurisdiction caused exactly the kind of confusion the county fears could develop in the HDs. And the commissioners quite rightly do not want another such situation.
There are other issues as well. The two parcels on the southern side of the area to be leased are the less worrisome. They have some roads, which as a county planner put it, offer “more options for developers to develop those leases.”
The two parcels to the north are of greater concern. To get to the gas underlying those areas, operators would have to drill from private land adjacent to the Forest Service parcels. And under Forest Service rules – overlapping jurisdictions again – there is no requirement that the landowners even be notified. Drillers could someday just show up.
The commissioners are concerned about that lack of engagement with landowners. And they are right to be. That is not only unwieldy and inconvenient, but profoundly unfair.
Other concerns are that the resource management plan that covers the four parcels lacks specificity, while the BLM’s process includes no provision for a county assessment of the overall impact of such development. The lands in question are federal and the final decisions as to their disposition will – and should – be made by the federal agencies involved. But nothing about that means that county government and nearby landowners should not be consulted and heard.
In particular, it should be required that any landowners who might someday have a drilling rig on their property be notified and consulted in a timely manner. That hardly seems like an onerous concession, and minor adjustments to how a well pad is located or laid out can sometimes make a big difference to the involved landowner.
Whether the county commissioners can accomplish much with the BLM and the Forest Service of course remains to be seen. But with the leasing scheduled for May 12 and the extended comment period closing Tuesday, they are certainly right to try.
