BLM invests $6M for ecosystem restoration
Bipartisan infrastructure law funds benefit eight states
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News from U.S. Dept. of the Interior, BLM
MONTANA — The Bureau of Land Management recently announced nearly $6 million for ecosystem restoration projects in seven western states and Florida. The funds are available through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, a signature feature of the Biden-Harris Administration’s Investing in America agenda.
“The funding announced today from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will advance important restoration projects, putting Americans to work on our public lands to help restore wildlife habitat and protect clean air and water,” said BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning. “We are proud to use this key investment to work closely with our partners to improve the health of our public lands.”
About $2.5 million of the investment will be directed toward projects using Good Neighbor Authority, which allows Federal land management agencies to create agreements with non-Federal partners for projects on public lands.
Projects being funded through the investment include:
Montana $750,000 to expand a partnership with Fort Belknap Indian Community, doubling an investment made last year. The project is part of Seeds of Success, the national wildland seed collecting program. This co-stewardship effort integrates Indigenous knowledge and employs Tribal youth in restoration of Great Plains grassland prairies on public lands that are part of the ancestral homelands for the Aaniiih and Nakoda Tribes.
To date, BLM has allocated more than $61 million toward ecosystem restoration from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. Good Neighbor Authority partnerships account for nearly one-quarter of the total amount, with other large investments aimed at restoring lands impacted by historic mining, improving sites and increasing access to recreation, and restoring public lands impacted by wildfire, drought, and other human and natural causes.
BLM’s conservation and ecosystem restoration program advances President Biden’s Justice40 Initiative which aims to deliver 40% of the overall benefits of certain federal investments to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized by underinvestment and overburdened by pollution.
For more information about the BLM’s investments using the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, visit: BLM.gov/infrastructure.
