Hi, my name is Marie Frías Sauter and I’m the Superintendent at White Sands National
Park, and you’re watching This Week at Interior.
This Week at Interior
Secretary Haaland this week took action to protect the cultural and historic resources
surrounding Chaco Culture National Historical Park from new oil and gas leasing and mining
claims. A new order withdraws public lands within a 10-mile radius of the national park
for 20 years, subject to valid existing rights. The move responds to decades of efforts from
Tribes, elected officials, and the public to better protect the sacred and historic
sites and Tribal communities currently living in northwest New Mexico.
Interior this week announced plans to infuse $161 million into ecosystem restoration and
resilience on the nation’s public lands as part of the President’s Investing in
America agenda. The Bureau of Land Management will spearhead the work, which will focus
on 21 “Restoration Landscapes” across 11 western states —ranging from wildlife
habitat restoration in the sagebrush steppe of the high desert, to re-creating wetland
meadows, to repairing watersheds on former industrial timberlands.
In celebration of Great Outdoors Month and National Trails Day, Secretary Haaland announced
the designation of nine new national recreation trails in nine states. That adds 340 miles
to the National Trails System, managed by the National Park Service. The newly designated
trails join a network of more than 1,300 existing national recreation trails, which can be found
in every U.S. state, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.
Interior this week announced that nearly $725 million from the Bipartisan Infrastructure
Law is available to 22 states and the Navajo Nation to reclaim abandoned coal mine lands.
The law provides a total of $11.3 billion in abandoned mine land funding over 15 years
through the Office of Surface Mining, Reclamation and Enforcement, which will help communities
create good-paying jobs and catalyze economic opportunity while cleaning up dangerous environmental
conditions.
Assistant Secretary for Water and Science Tanya Trujillo joined other federal officials,
as well as state, local and Tribal partners to celebrate the Taylor Slough Flow Improvement
Project ribbon cutting this week. The project will increase the flow of clean, freshwater
to the Florida Bay, where it is needed to balance salinity levels and promote ecological
health.
The Bureau of Indians Affairs is celebrating a milestone this week, the approval of the
100th Tribal regulation under the Helping Expedite and Advance Responsible Tribal Homeownership
Act of 2012. The HEARTH Act promotes Tribal self-determination by making a voluntary,
alternative land-leasing process available to federally recognized Tribes.
The National Park Service this week awarded 14 grants totaling approximately $3.4 million
through the Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. The grants will fund
a variety of projects aimed at preserving and interpreting the history of Japanese American
incarceration during World War II.
A new study from the U.S. Geological Survey and its partners shows how Yellowstone's grizzly
bear population is adapting to a changing ecosystem. Grizzlies need substantial body
fat to withstand months of hibernation, even as their traditional food sources have diminished
due to climate change and human activity. The study shows grizzlies have learned to
shift to other available food sources within the Yellowstone ecosystem to maintain the
same levels of body fat.
And our social media Picture of the Week, the promise of a new day at Minnesota Valley
National Wildlife Refuge, where sunlight burns through the fog and bursts through a burl
oak tree on a serene Minnesota morning, casting light upon magnificent wildflowers.
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That's This Week at Interior