Bills in Congress would throw out comments for a proposed rule that would prioritize conservation and restoration on U.S. Bureau of Land Management public lands. House Resolution 3977 and Senate Bill 1435 would call for the BLM to stop gathering and discard public input on its draft Public Lands Rule, tossing out more than 216,000 public comments. .
An Arizona-based coalition is calling on the Department of the Interior to expand the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in addition to returning the Darby Wells town site to the Tohono O odham Nation and expanding the Hia-Ced O odham cemetery. Lorraine Marquez Eiler, a Hia-Ced O odham elder, board president and co-founder of the International Sonoran Desert Alliance, explained the proposal would transfer a parcel of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management near Ajo to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as a part of the Cabeza Prieta Wildlife Refuge. .
The U.S. is home to nearly 5,000 nonnative plant species. Most are not considered harmful but there are efforts to eliminate invasive ones from national parks, and South Dakota researchers are part of the project. .