In June, the Department of the Interior proposed major changes to the Bureau of Land Management’s federal onshore leasing program that would drastically reduce bonding amounts and other fees for the oil and gas industry, gut public process and have far-reaching impacts on our public lands, wildlife and communities.
If the rule is finalized, what we’ll have left is a system that blatantly favors extraction as leasing activity ramps up to levels we haven’t seen in over a decade. The public comment period on this proposal ends Aug. 24, and we urge Coloradans to weigh in before then.
To understand what’s at stake, the BLM auctioned off over 134,000 acres of public lands in Colorado last month in the largest oil and gas lease sale in modern state history. As local elected officials, it’s difficult for us to overstate the impacts that this sell-off and others on the horizon will have on our communities.
Two-thirds of the leased acreage sits just south of Dinosaur National Monument, an attraction that supports Colorado’s outdoor recreation industry, preserves cultural heritage and is one of few certified International Dark Sky Places in the country.
The area also provides winter range and a migration corridor for mule deer, pronghorn and the nation’s largest elk herd, which helps sustain our state’s hunting industry and contributes significantly to local economies.
Other parcels sit near community drinking water sources such as the Aurora Reservoir, which serves the city’s 400,000 residents.
This wasn’t a careful, balanced decision. Federal law now requires BLM to hold at least four lease sales a year in Colorado and eight other Western states, regardless of whether the land in question makes sense to drill. Comment periods have been shortened, and land managers who once had the discretion to defer parcels with wildlife conflicts no longer have that authority.
What happened last month is just the beginning. Another sale of similar scale is on the calendar for December, covering nearly 127,000 acres across the state. As before, the land up for auction threatens sensitive wildlife habitat, watersheds, cultural resources, community health and economically valuable terrain.
About 5,000 acres will be auctioned on the Roan Plateau, despite the fact that a hard-won legal settlement, reached in 2014 after years of collaborative planning and public engagement, was intended to shield the area from leasing. Lands in southwestern Colorado, including near the ancestral Puebloan site Chimney Rock National Monument, are also at risk.
Colorado is not alone. Public lands are for auction in Wyoming, Montana, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Alaska on a fixed schedule that leaves little room for local input or environmental review.
Our communities depend on a mix of land uses to stay afloat, and oil and gas development is indeed one of them. But the choice being presented to us — energy dominance or environmental protection — is a false one.
About 21 million acres of BLM land nationwide are already leased for oil and gas, yet only about 12 million are producing anything. The mandate for more leasing and less oversight only locks up public land for years, often without producing a single barrel of oil, while closing the door on uses such as hunting, fishing and agriculture.
Polling in Colorado and across the West consistently shows bipartisan majorities want a far more balanced approach to conservation and energy development. Our constituents are invested in what happens to the landscapes that support our livelihoods, draw millions to our state each year and are the reason we’re lucky to call Colorado home.
We urge our congressional delegation to push back on these mandatory sales, call for restoration of agency discretion to defer sensitive parcels and insist on maintaining safeguards against these land giveaways. And we call on public land owners across Colorado to make their voices heard by commenting on BLM’s proposal for the oil and gas leasing program — it may be the most consequential near-term opportunity we have to shape how our lands are managed for years to come.
Naquetta Ricks, of Aurora, was elected to the Colorado State House in 2020 and is currently serving in her third term as the Representative for District 40.
Erica Sparhawk, of Carbondale, was elected in 2026 as the mayor of Carbondale after serving nine years as a trustee.
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