{"id":25170,"date":"2019-06-10T21:12:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-11T03:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.summitdaily.com\/news\/interior-secretary-stresses-cooperation-to-governors\/"},"modified":"2019-06-10T21:12:00","modified_gmt":"2019-06-11T03:12:00","slug":"interior-secretary-stresses-cooperation-to-governors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/local-news\/interior-secretary-stresses-cooperation-to-governors\/","title":{"rendered":"Interior secretary stresses cooperation to governors"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

VAIL \u2014 While protesters nearby \u2014 but out of sight \u2014 voiced their displeasure, United States Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt and a dozen Western governors talked about how to cooperate.<\/p>\n

Bernhardt was the first main speaker at this week\u2019s meeting of the Western Governors Association, being held this year at Vail\u2019s Hotel Talisa.<\/p>\n

Bernhardt was slated to give a keynote address to the group \u2014 a full ballroom of sponsors, staff, security and media \u2014 but chose instead to hold a question and answer session with the governors.<\/p>\n

Addressing deferred maintenance<\/p>\n

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis led the questions, first with compliments on the feds\u2019 involvement in the Colorado River Drought Contingency Plan.<\/p>\n

Polis also asked about how the feds and states can work together to address a massive backlog in deferred maintenance at the nation\u2019s national parks, most of which are in the West.<\/p>\n

That backlog is \u201cunsustainable,\u201d Bernhardt said, adding that his department has proposed using revenue generated on public lands to fund $12.6 billion in deferred maintenance at the nation\u2019s parks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to actually do it,\u201d Bernhardt said. \u201cWe need the support of the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Utah Gov. Gary Herbert asked about the prospect of moving some Department of the Interior functions \u2014 particularly the Bureau of Land Management \u2014 out West.<\/p>\n

Moving west?<\/p>\n

Bernhardt said the department is examining the possibility of moving some staff from Washington, D.C., to a spot closer to where most of the nation\u2019s federal lands are located.<\/p>\n

Bernhardt said that could create \u201cgreater accountability\u201d between the agency and its constituents.<\/p>\n

After that evaluation, Bernhardt said Congress will be informed. Legislators would have to approve and fund any potential move.<\/p>\n

While most of the session was a relatively pleasant back-and-forth, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown asked about the status of protecting the Bureau of Land Management property in that state that has been classified as having \u201cwilderness characteristics.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bernhardt said he isn\u2019t familiar with the case and promised to get back to Brown with an update.<\/p>\n

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem told the audience that Bernhardt has been responsive in his short time in office, noting that he has given governors his personal cell phone number.<\/p>\n

She also asked Bernhardt what governors \u2014 most of whom have been recently elected \u2014 should know about dealing with the federal government.<\/p>\n

Bernhardt said there\u2019s a lot of opportunity to collaborate with states, and that the federal agency has some flexibility in rules and regulations, if states want it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re open to doing things differently,\u201d Bernhardt said. \u201cIf you have an idea, we\u2019re open (to hearing it).\u201d<\/p>\n

On the other hand, Bernhardt said just about any federal action is open to litigation, so agencies have to explain in detail why they acted as they did.<\/p>\n

While there are limitations, \u201cthere are a lot of things we can accomplish,\u201d Bernhardt said.<\/p>\n

Vail Daily Business Editor Scott Miller can be reached at smiller@vaildaily.com<\/a> and 970-748-2930.<\/p>\n

via:: Summit Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VAIL \u2014 While protesters nearby \u2014 but out of sight \u2014 voiced their displeasure, United States Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt and a dozen Western governors talked about how to cooperate. Bernhardt was the first main speaker at this week\u2019s meeting of the Western Governors Association, being held this year at Vail\u2019s Hotel Talisa. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[97],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-25170","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-11 21:32:49","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KIFT - The LIFT FM","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25170"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25170\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}