The
Crestone Eagle, October 2008:
Industry lawyers directed wildlife
refuge drilling study, concerns of scientists overridden by
Interior officials
Crestone—In the wake of the Inspector
General’s $5.3M investigation exposing oil lobbyists
lavishing favors on U.S. Department of Interior (DOI) employees
in the Denver Office of Minerals Management Service, documents
obtained through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed
by the Citizens for San
Luis Valley Wilderness Protection Coalition (WPC) points to
far more wide-reaching corruption plaguing Interior.
Emails, memos and other official records show
lawyers in the U.S. Department of Interior’s Office
of the Solicitor allowed industry lobbyists and attorneys
for the Canadian firm, Lexam Inc., to improperly influence
the analysis of Lexam’s plan to drill exploratory wells
in the Baca National Wildlife Refuge.
“The Interior Department is once again acting like
a wholly owned subsidiary of the oil industry,” said
PEER (Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility) Executive
Director Jeff Ruch, pointing to recent reports of Interior
staff partying and sleeping with oil lobbyists. “These
documents provide the inside view of how supposedly objective
reviews are manipulated and skewed by those who stand to profit.”
Handwritten notes on internal drafts, presumably made by
a lawyer in the Interior Department Solicitor’s office,
emphatically directed the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service not
to assess the drilling impacts of Lexam’s proposed drilling
plan. “NO!!! The drilling is not part of the proposed
action!!”
DOI attorney Thomas Graf worked closely with Lexam’s
attorney David Bailey to limit the scope of the EA analysis
and push aside important concerns of FWS scientists regarding
environmental impacts. According to Mark Salvo, with Earth
Island Guardians, Grafserved as the “eyes and ears”
for Julie MacDonald, former DOI deputy assistant secretary
for fish, wildlife and parks who resigned amidst controversy
over her inappropriate involvement in editing, commenting
on, and reshaping the Endangered Species Program’s scientific
reports. Salvo’s group was instrumental in getting a
court order requiring the FWS to reassess the decisions in
light of Graf and MacDonald’s interference.
Interior officials also held meetings with industry attorneys
including Thomas Sansonetti, a former top attorney in the
Environment and Natural Resources Division of the Department
of Justice from 2001-2005, whose role has not been disclosed
by the government.
Some other significant findings of the FOIA documents include:
- Lexam attorney David Bailey advised officials to eliminate
discussion of the cumulative impacts of drilling on the
refuge;
- Lexam attorney David Bailey handpicked the contractor
ENSR to conduct the study;
- DOI attorney Thomas Graf instructed ENSR not to consider
the potential impact of long-term development if exploratory
wells found natural gas;
- Graf sent internal drafts of the environmental assessment
to Bailey and others to review and line-edit;
- Graf and Bailey discussed how to circumvent public comment
on the study.
The records came to light only after a protracted legal fight
led by WPC. The government still has not disclosed the specific
changes made by Lexam’s attorney to internal drafts
of the EA. The pending suit seeks a court-ordered disclosure
of those documents. A scheduling conference is set for October
16, 2008.
“The back and forth between Graf, Sansonetti, and
Bailey makes a mockery of the USFWS role as surface owner
with duties to prevent unreasonable use and occupancy of the
federal surface estate —a right which the federal court
has recognized is co-equal with the mineral right in Colorado,”
says Travis Stills, attorney for the Energy Minerals Law Center
representing the WPC.
The revelations in the newly released documents come on the
heels of a series of scathing reports about inappropriate
relationships between Interior Department officials and industry.
Employees of the Mineral Management Service’s Royalty
In Kind program in the Lakewood, Colorado office were found
to have engaged in sex, substance abuse, and accepted trips
and gifts from industry officials in exchange for preferential
treatment of industry contracts. Although headlines focused
on the scandalous activities in the Interior Department’s
Denver offices, the MMS scandal also involves questionable
practices in the selection and use of industry contractors.
Drilling on the Baca NWR has been a major concern to citizens
of the San Luis Valley and has gained considerable national
attention since it was proposed in 2006. The FWS received
more than 48,000 letters criticizing the draft study and demanding
that the agency do a better job of assessing the potential
impacts on nearby communities, endangered species, sensitive
wetlands and aquifers that the Refuge was established in 2000
to protect. The Great Sand Dunes National Park adjacent to
the Refuge, Environmental Protection Agency, Colorado Division
of Wildlife and Office of Archaeology and Historic Preservation
sharply criticized the study earlier this year.
“The overreaching involvement of industry-friendly
DOI attorneys, lobbyists and Lexam’s lawyer who know
nothing about the Baca NWR explains why the resulting assessment
was so inadequate”, says Ceal Smith, consultant for
the WPC.
The agencies are in the final stages of deciding whether
to call for a more thorough Environmental Impact Study of
Lexam’s proposal to drill on the Baca NWR or to allow
the drilling to go forward. “USFWS has every reason
to scrap this study and initiate a full analysis that seriously
considers a minerals buyout,” says Chris Canaly, Director
of the San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council who filed the lawsuit
forcing FWS to do the study. “If there ever was a place
unsuited for oil and gas development, the Baca National Wildlife
Refuge is it.”
Additional information
Documents disclosed under Freedom of Information Act:
http://www.slvwater.org/pressrelease/index.html
PEER’s report on America’s Ten Most Imperiled
Refuges:
http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=1052
For more on the DOI Inspector General’s Report on MMS
scandal:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/washingtonpostinvestigations/2008/09/
exclusive_gao_questions_govern.html
Contact the WPC at: info@slvwater.org
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