| The theme for the Public Land Foundation's annual meeting, scheduled for Sept. 11-12 in Park City, Utah, is “Sustaining the Ecological, Economic and Social Vitality of the Public Lands.”
The Foundation is a national organization that advocates keeping America’s public lands—namely, those administered by the Bureau of Land Management—in public hands and sustainably managed for the public’s common use and enjoyment through professional, science-based education and advocacy.
Foundation President George Lea said, “Sustaining the vitality of public lands in light of increasing demands and smaller budgets is a real challenge for BLM and other land managers. By bringing together a number of experts to share their knowledge and experiences at this meeting, we hope to better understand how this challenge might be met.”
Robert B. Keiter, a Wallace Stegner Professor of Law, and Director of the Wallace Stegner Center for Land, Resources and the Environment, will be the featured Thursday luncheon speaker on September 11.
Thursday’s sessions also will include presentations from the Bureau of Land Management’s Headquarters Office in Washington, D.C. and its Utah State Office.
Professor Frank (Fee) Busby and Professor Terry Messmer, both from the Utah State University Department of Wildland Resources will lead a panel discussion to define sustainability.
A panel on “Sustaining Public Lands through a National Landscape Conservation System” will follow with speakers from BLM, the National Landscape Conservation Foundation and Utah State University.
Friday’s panels will discuss the role of fire in sustaining ecological vitality, the importance of evaluating and monitoring ecological changes, and how invasive species jeopardize ecological vitality.
Panel discussions will focus on what can and should be done to help assure that social and economic opportunities continue to be available on public lands, ways to provide for social and economic opportunities while mitigating impacts and what is not being done that should be done.
Panelists will include representatives from the Grand Canyon Trust, Utah Department of Natural Resources, University of British Columbia, Western Spirit Cycling Adventures, The Nature Conservancy and the U.S. Forest Service.
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