INTERIOR/RYAN ZINKE/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke says he is recommending changes to national monuments—vast nature reserves set aside by previous administrations—which could mean reducing the size of some of those protected federal lands.
The Interior Department didn’t release a detailed account of Mr. Zinke’s suggested changes, but any reductions would likely launch a battle between environmentalists, who want the monuments preserved, and some locals and businesses, who argue the protections go too far and would like the land open to the possibility of commercial activity.
Mr. Zinke has been reviewing 27 monuments across the country, under a directive from President Donald Trump, and on Thursday [8-24-17] he sent the president a report outlining his recommendations on the 20 that remained under consideration after others were pulled with no change or already recommended for downsizing…
Interior officials released an executive summary of his report Thursday, the deadline the president in April gave Mr. Zinke after signing an executive order ‘to end another egregious use of government power.’
They said the report including status of 20 land and water monuments under review and how they might be altered would be made public later.
Under the 1906 Antiquities Act, presidents or Congress can create monuments, but so far few changes have been made to existing monuments, and none in decades.”
-Jim Carlton, “National Monuments Could Be Pared Back Under Administration Guidelines,” The Wall Street Journal online, Aug. 24, 2017 01:21pm