[Federal Register Volume 76, Number 185 (Friday, September 23, 2011)]
[Notices]
[Pages 59156-59157]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2011-24340]
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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Bureau of Land Management
[LLAZG03000.L16100000.DQ0000. LXSS085A0000.241A.00]
Notice of Availability of the Proposed Ironwood Forest National
Monument Resource Management Plan/Final EIS
AGENCY: Bureau of Land Management.
ACTION: Notice of Availability.
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SUMMARY: In accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act of
1969, as amended, and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of
1976, as amended, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has prepared a
Proposed Resource Management Plan (RMP)/Final Environmental Impact
Statement (EIS) for the Ironwood Forest National Monument and by this
notice is announcing its availability.
DATES: BLM planning regulations state that any person who meets the
conditions as described in the regulations may protest the BLM's
Proposed RMP/Final EIS. The protest must be filed within 30 days of the
date that the Environmental Protection Agency publishes this notice in
the Federal Register.
ADDRESSES: Copies of the Ironwood Forest National Monument Proposed
RMP/Final EIS have been sent to affected Federal, State, and local
government agencies; the Ak Chin Indian Community, Gila River Indian
Community, Tohono O'odham Nation, Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian
Community, and San Carlos Apache Indian Community; and to other
stakeholders. Copies of the Proposed RMP/Final EIS are available for
public inspection at the BLM Tucson Field Office, 12661 East Broadway
Boulevard, Tucson, Arizona. Interested persons may also review the
Proposed RMP/Final EIS on the Internet at http://www.blm.gov/az/st/en/prog/planning/ironwood.html. All protests must be in writing and mailed
to the following addresses:
Regular Mail:
BLM Director (210), Attention: Brenda Hudgens-Williams, P.O. Box
71383, Washington, DC 20024-1383
Overnight Mail:
BLM Director (210), Attention: Brenda Hudgens-Williams, 20 M.
Street, SE., Room 2134LM, Washington, DC 20003.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Laura Olais, Ironwood Forest National
Monument Manager, Tucson Field Office, 12661 East Broadway, Tucson,
Arizona 85748-7208; or by telephone at 520-258-7235; or by e-mail at
lolais@blm.gov. Persons who use a telecommunications device for the
deaf (TDD) may call the Federal Information Relay Service (FIRS) at 1-
800-877-8339 to contact the above individual during
[[Page 59157]]
normal business hours. The FIRS is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a
week, to leave a message or question with the above individual. You
will receive a reply during normal business hours.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The Ironwood Forest National Monument,
established by Presidential Proclamation on June 9, 2000, encompasses
approximately 128,400 acres of Federal land administered by the BLM;
approximately 54,700 acres of State Trust land (administered by the
Arizona State Land Department); and approximately 6,000 acres that are
privately owned. The Proposed RMP/Final EIS affects only Federal lands
and Federal interests located within the established boundary of the
monument. The BLM's Tucson Field Office has the responsibility of
planning for and management of Federal lands within the monument.
Issues identified as part of the planning process and addressed in
the Proposed RMP/Final EIS include air resources, biological resources,
cultural resources, fire management, grazing management, hazardous
materials, lands and realty, mineral and energy resources, Native
American issues, recreation, social and economic conditions, soils,
wilderness characteristics, transportation and access, visual
resources, and water resources. The Proposed RMP/Final EIS includes
strategies for protecting and preserving the biological, cultural,
recreational, geological, educational, scientific, and scenic values
for which the monument was established.
Four alternatives were analyzed in the Proposed RMP/Final EIS. The
``no action'' alternative represents current management of the Ironwood
Forest National Monument. Three additional ``action'' alternatives
present reasonable, yet varying, management scenarios. The alternatives
range from emphasizing maintenance of the naturalness of the Ironwood
Forest National Monument (by restricting some human uses) to
emphasizing continued human uses, while still protecting the objects
and resources for which the monument was established. The range of
alternatives in the Proposed RMP/Final EIS evaluates planning decisions
brought forward from current BLM planning documents, including the
Phoenix Resource Management Plan (1989), Arizona Standards for
Rangeland Health and Guidelines for Grazing Administration (1987), and
the Arizona Statewide Land Use Plan Amendment for Fire, Fuels, and Air
Quality Management (2003).
Comments on the Draft RMP/EIS received from the public and internal
BLM review were considered and incorporated as appropriate into the
proposed plan. Public comments resulted in a variety of clarifications
and modifications throughout the Proposed RMP/Final EIS, but did not
significantly change the overall proposed land use plan. Revisions made
between the Draft RMP/EIS and the Proposed RMP/Final EIS include:
Identification of objects of the monument to be protected and more
detailed analysis of the impacts on the objects of the monument; the
addition of an alternative to allow recreational shooting in specific
areas, and the inclusion of a shooting analysis of the planning area;
deferral of the decision to classify two ephemeral grazing allotments
as perennial; and quantification of some management goals and
objectives, and modifications to implementation-level decisions to
correctly categorize them as plan-level decisions or administrative
actions. Other revisions of certain management actions consisted of the
following: Under cultural resources, Cocoraque Butte will not be
allocated to public use; also under cultural resources, cultural
resource surveys were conducted along roads that would be open for
motorized use, and survey findings have been added to the RMP as well
as associated impacts for each alternative; under travel management,
some minor changes have been made to the alternatives to close certain
routes and open others to motorized use, resulting in minor changes to
the overall number of miles of routes designated for various uses; also
under travel management, mechanized use would now be allowed on all
designated routes with the exception of routes designated as trails or
where otherwise restricted; under vegetation management, the proposed
plan has been revised and proposes that only native plants be used in
restoration activities; under lands and realty, utility corridors have
been shifted so that they are not centered on the existing right-of-way
in order to increase maneuverability for additional utilities; also
under lands and realty, the BLM will not acquire surface estate unless
mineral estate can be acquired concurrently (or is already federally
owned).
Instructions for filing a protest with the Director of the BLM
regarding the Proposed RMP/Final EIS may be found in the ``Dear Reader
Letter'' of the Ironwood Forest National Monument Proposed RMP/Final
EIS and at 43 CFR 1610.5-2. E-mail and faxed protests will not be
accepted unless the protesting party also provides the original letter
by either regular or overnight mail postmarked by the close of the
protest period. Under these conditions, the BLM will consider the e-
mail or faxed protest as an advance copy and it will receive full
consideration. If you wish to provide the BLM with such advance
notification, please direct faxed protests to the attention of the BLM
protest coordinator at 202-452-5112, and e-mail to Brenda_Hudgens-Williams@blm.gov.
All protests, including the follow-up letter to e-mails or faxes,
must be in writing and mailed to the appropriate address, as set forth
in the ADDRESSES section above.
Before including your phone number, e-mail address, or other
personal identifying information in your protest, you should be aware
that your entire protest--including your personal identifying
information--may be made publicly available at any time.
While you can ask us in your protest to withhold your personal
identifying information from public review, we cannot guarantee that we
will be able to do so.
Authority: 40 CFR 1506.6, 40 CFR 1506.10, 43 CFR 1610.2, 43 CFR
1610.5.
James G. Kenna,
Arizona State Director.
[FR Doc. 2011-24340 Filed 9-22-11; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4310-32-P