Colorado Mountain Club
prevails in “RAC Stack” case

by the CMC conservation department staff

The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a federal district court opinion in the Colorado Mountain Club’s lawsuit against the Bureau of Land Man-age-ment and the Department of the Interior. The CMC, along with the Colorado Environmental Coalition and two individual plaintiffs, brought the lawsuit in 2000 alleging that the Secretary of the Interior had violated federal law by “stacking” the BLM Resource Advisory Councils (RACs) with political appointments.  The case was dismissed by a federal district court in 2001 on a pretrial motion claiming that plaintiffs did not have standing and appointments were not justiciable.

Colorado’s Resource Advisory Councils (RACs) are made up of citizens that advise the U.S. Bureau of Land Management on its management of 8.3 million acres of public land in Colorado. In 2000, thirteen of the fourteen members of the Secretary’s appointments were people suggested by Governor Owens, despite the fact that over fifty other citizens applied but were denied.  Moreover, the Governor and the Secretary filled the position of environmental representative with someone completely unaffiliated with the environmental community despite the requirement to do so in federal regulation.

“The RAC is supposed to be a forum where citizens with varying views can work together to develop proper management for our public lands. Without this diversity, the RACs are just a pawn of the Governor and the Secretary and not representative of Coloradans at all,” said Pete Kolbenschlag, Western Slope Field Director with the Colorado Environmental Coalition.

The appeals court reversed the lower court’s dismissal ruling that the individual plaintiffs had standing and that the requirement in regulation for equitable representation on the RACs could indeed be judged by a court.

“The CMC filed this lawsuit to prevent future corruption of the RACs,” stated Vera Smith, Conservation Director for the CMC.  “Now that the appeals court has ruled that we were valid in objecting to the stacked appointments, we will continue our effort to build permanent safeguards into the process that will prevent this type of abuse in the future.” P