Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Management

Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Management Course 3000-64 BLM National Training Center Telecast September 11-13, 1996 This transcript is from the closed-captioning file produced during the telecast. It may contain errors in transcription and omissions. Day 1 begins here Day 2 begins on page 60 Day 3 begins on page 128 The Bureau of Land Management Satellite Network Presents Live From the BLM National Training Center in Phoenix, Arizona: Today's Instructors Are: and Now the Host of Your Program, Matt Shumaker. Good Morning, Everyone and Welcome to the BLM National Training Center. Today's Telecast Is Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Management. We'll Be Having a Look at the New Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Regulations at 43 CFR 3715. Our Instructors Will Be Rick Deery and Scott Murrellwright. Rick Deery Is the Principal Author of the New Regulations. He's Also a Long-time Instructor On Mining Law at the Training Center and He Does a Great Job Of Putting Things into Perspective. Good Morning, Rick. Good Morning, Matt. Scott Murrellwright Has Considerable Experience in Dealing with Mining Claim Uses And Occupancies. He Has a Unique Outlook as a Result. Good Morning, Scott. Good Morning, Matt. Joining Us Later Will Be Dennis Mclane, the Chief Ranger From Boise, Idaho and Bob Gibson, Geologist from the Nevada State Office. I Would Also like to Introduce You to Elmo Which Is the Brand Name of Our Overhead Projector. We'll Be Using it Quite a Lot. We Want You to Participate as Much as Possible. We'll Conduct this Course over Three Days and We Have Time for Questions and Answers. We've Received Some Questions Already, and We'll Try to Work Them In. If We Can't Answer Your Question On the Air Today, We'll Get Back To You Once the Class Is over. Now, Let's Take a Look at the Class Notes. We Sent One Double-sided Master To Each Office That Contacted Us Through Groupwise. It Should Have Been Duplicated For Each Person Attending this Week's Broadcast. I Apologize for the Short Turnaround Time Available to Your Office. However, We Had to Generate the Entire Program from Scratch, Including Training, in less than Three Weeks. This May Be a New Record. Your Notes Are in Six Sections And All Are Double-sided. Sections after the Introductory Material Are Hand-numbered in Sections D, M, S, L and G. We'll Be Referring to Those Page Numbers as We Proceed. Most of the Charts and Examples That We Show You on the Elmo Are Also Included in Your Notes. We'll Probably Need to Send You Overnight Updates F You Haven't Faxed Us a Groupwise Address for Your Location Yet, Please Do So Right Away. There Will Be Two Ways for to You Participate. We'll Ask for Telephone Calls During the Course. That's Your Cue to Call Us at The Number in Your Course Notes. When You Call, We Ask That You Stay Away from Your Television Or Turn the Sound down. Don't Get Frustrated If You End Up on Hold. Your Question Is Important. Steve Fetchner and Michael Horn Will Be Our Phone Operators and Will Get to You as Soon as They Can. You Can Send Us a Fax Question At Any Time. Use the Form in Your Course Notes. Be Sure to Print Your Question With a Dark Marker. In Either Case, We Encourage You To Use Real-life Situations in Your Questions. Fax and Call-in Telephone Numbers Are Listed in the First Few Pages of Your Notes. If You Don't Have a Fax, Call Us And We'll Write Your Question Down. Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Is a Fascinating New Program Without a Lot of Easy Answers. So Let's Get Right Tight. Notes for this Section Include The Regulations and the Remaining Page Numbers in the Section Have the Letter D in Front of Them. Rick, Are You Ready? I Suppose I'm as Ready as I'll Ever Be. Well, Take it Away. Well, the Regulations That Are in Front of You Are Listed As Part 3710. The Section of the CFR That Regulates Activities under Public Law 167, the Act of July 23rd, 1955. Specifically, We Found a Subpart For These Regs at 3715, and Entitled the Regs Use and Occupancy under the Mining Law. Now, Why Did We Get These Regulations? And for What Purpose Did These Regulations Arrive on Your Doorstep? Well, Quite Simply, Because of History. We Have a Problem. The Problem Is a Long-standing One. It Is One That Requires Us to Take Three Steps. First, We Have to Start Managing Occupancy and Stop Just React to Go Occupancy. Second, We Have to Integrate the Management of Future Occupancies Into Our Many and Varied Surface Management Jobs. And Last, We Need to Regularize The Management of Existing Occupancies. This Problem Was the Problem That Director Jamison Promised The Congress in 1990 That We Would Get Around to Solving. Now, What Caused Us to Get These Regulations? In Large Part, We Owe it to Geology. Geology Requires That a Miner Occupy a Site to Occupy the Ground. And the Mining Law Recognizes This Fact in the Very Second Sentence. Unfortunately, So Do Folks Who Want to Get Some Land Even Though They Have No Right to It. Now, Who Are These Folks Who Want to Get Some Land and Have No Right to It? Well, Historically We've Called Them Squatters. They Have Been Around Prior to The Republic's Creation. They Were There in Colonial Times. They Have Been There Prior to The Mining Law. They Probably Occupied the Second Mining Claim Ever Located Under the Mining Law, and They Have Been Increasingly a Difficult Problem, Particularly Over the Last 20 Years Where Hunger for Land Has Been Replaced by Criminal Activities. These Regulations Are Aimed at Squatters and We're Going to Remove Squatters from the Public Lands by Doing So We Will Help The Legitimate Miner. The Legitimate Miner Is Not Endangered by this Rule. The Squatter, on the Other Hand, Is the Primary Target of this Rule. Now, How Did We Come to These Regulations? Well, Back in 19 -- in the Late 1980s, Gao Did a Series of Investigations at the Behest of Many of the Members of Congress, And in Particular, the House Interior Committee Was Doing a Whole Series of Investigations On the Mining Law. One Such Investigation Focused On Illegal Occupancy. This Was Done at the Request of Chairman Nick Joe Rayhall of West Virginia, and in August of 1990, the Gao Report Mentioned In the Preamble to the Regulations Was Published. That Report Became the Catalyst For These Regulations. The Report in Graphic Detail Explained That Illegal Activities, Drug Labs, Illegal Squatting Was Ongoing on the Public Lands. The Report Also Found out That There Were Activities out There That Were Not Mining but Were Being Conducted under the Guise Of the Mining Law. Chairman Rayhall Did What Any Good Chairman of a Subcommittee Would Do. He Held What's Known as an Oversight Hearing. An Oversight Hearing Is a Hearing That Looks to the Issue At Hand, Even Though There Is No Pending Legislation. It Is Part of a Process on the Hill Known as Building the Record. At That Hearing, Testimony Was Given by All Interested Parties, And the Government Was Represented by the Director, the California State Director, the Foe Some Area Manager. And All Three Agreed That There Was a Problem and All Three Agreed That There Needed to Be a Solution. In the Course of His Testimony, Director Jamison Promised to Give the Field Offices the Tools They Needed to Begin Solving the Problem of Occupancy and to Begin Managing Future Occupancies. At the Same Time, Director Jamison Was Strongly Supportive Of the Legitimate Miner. He Stressed That the Legitimate Miner Has Oftentimes a Need to Reside on the Land, Not Just Occupy, but to Reside on the Land. Subcommittee Members, Notably Larry Thomas, Now in the Senate -- Craig Thomas -- No, Larry Craig, I'm Sorry, Senator Larry Craig, Observed That Occupancy Was a Detestable Problem but That Even Though We Were Going To Solve the Problem, We Also Need to Do Remember That People, The Citizens, Had Due Process Rights and Those Due Process Rights Had to Be Preserved. Everyone Present, Including the Director, Agreed with this Concept. Well, Having Made That Promise, Director Jamison Then Returned To His Office and Began to Give Out Instructions. Those Instructions Ultimately Filtered down to My Desk. Hillary Oden, Then Our Assistant Director for Mineral Resources, Created a Task Force to Composed Of Forest Service Headquarters Personnel, BLM Personnel from The Field and from the Washington Office. The Task Force Was Composed of Myself, Bob and You Are Sun, Alan Rabinoff, Dennis Mclane, Who Will Be Here Later, and Jack Bills of the Forest Service Washington Office. The Task Force Met for Several Days in DC in mid October to Work out the General Principles Of a Rule and Put Together a Set Of Draft Regulations and Then Went Home. Now, What Did That Rule That They Worked On, That We All Worked On, Do? Well, We Took a Slightly Different Tact on this Rule. We Said We Wanted to Have a Rule That Had Some Teeth to It. We Built a Rule That Was More Substantive than Procedural. We Built a Rule That Recognized That Miners, Legitimate Miners, Work in One of the Most Heavily Regulated Areas and Have to Deal With a Plethora of Permits. Mclaughlin Mine in Northern Nevada Had to Achieve a Compliance with Something on the Order of 236 Permits Before They Could Go into Operation. Rick, I Think Mclaughlin Is In California, Isn't It? Northern California? Where Did I Say? You Said Northern Nevada. Mclaughlin Is Either in Two or Three Counties. Yes, I'm Sorry. Thus We Decided to Create a Rule That Would Leverage this Existing Rule-making Environment. Now, What Authorities Did We Use? Well, We Used a Couple of Different Authorities, but We Have Primarily Four Authorities: Four Authorities That Provide The Basis of this Rule Are the Mining Law, 30 Us Code 22, 43 U.S. Code 1061, the Unlawful Enclosures Act, 43 U.S. Code 1730, FLPMA, and 30 U.S. Code 612, the Surface Resources Act. It's Important to Note, Rick, The People Don't Need to Be Writing this Information down. You Have this in Your Packets. this Is All Included with the Handouts, and it Is in the Regulations Themselves at 3715. It's Several Pages Back from the Beginning. Now, with this Mixture of Rules, We Set out to Create Some Forms under Which We Would Work. The First Question That the Task Force Wrestled with What Lands Were Going to Be Covered by the Rule? Forest Service Let it Be Known Early on That They Were There as Observers and They Did Not Want To Have this Rule Applied to Their Lands. Thus, the Only Rules That Lands That this Rule Applied to Are Those Administered by BLM, and That Is BLM Surface. This Does Not Include Lands That Are Stock Raising Homestead Lands. Those Lands Are Not Subject to This Rule. Well, Having, Then, Crafted That Particular Set of Draft Language And Draft Principles, We Then Said "What Else Do We Need?" We Then Decided That We Have Two Kinds of People That We Had to Deal With: the First Group of People Were the Obvious New Occupants, Those People Who Were Going to Come Through the Door Once These Regs, If They Ever Went Final, Went -- Were to Go Final Would Have to Address the Rules. That Meant We Had to Dovetail This Regulation into the Surface Management Regulations, and We Did So. The Second Part of the Equation Is the Existing Occupants. It's Been 41 Years since the Passage of the Law Known as Public Law 167, and for 41 Years Only One Small Section of the Regulations at 43 CFR 3712 Stood For Anything Related to That Aspect of Mining Law Administration, and it Simply Said You Have to Be Reasonably Incident and You Can't Use Your Mining Claim for Anything Other Than Mining or Reasonably Incident Purposes. But it Had No Penalties, it Had No Procedures, and it Had Nothing in There That We Could Get Our Teeth into to Push the Squatter off the Public Lands, And this Was Painfully Evident In the Process That Became Known As the Crawford Process. It Was Slow, it Was Cumbersome, It Gave Us a Couple of Good Cases, but it Didn't Give Us Any Of the Big Victories That We Really Needed. So We Had to Find a New Way to Deal with That. So, We Then Said, the Existing Occupancies Will Have to Be Treated the Same as the New Occupancies. And They Will Have to Come into Compliance. However, We Will Have to Give Them a Schedule to Come into Compliance. Basically We Dealt with the Existing Guys the Same We Deal With the New Guys, but the Difference Was We Would Take a Go Slow Approach Because They Had 41 Years of the Government Looking the Other Way. Okay. It's Great. You've Developed a Set of Rules. You've Developed a Set of Regulations. Where's the Beef? Where's the Teeth? Well, in this Particular Case, We Decided That this Rule Had to Have Teeth That Didn't Exist in The Surface Management Regular Legs, and We Built in from the Get-go Criminal Penalties, and You'll See a Citation to FLPMA Criminal Penalties Section and a Citation to a Legal Authority That BLM Does Not Often Use, and That Is Title 18, U.S. Code 1001 Federal Felonies. We Have Built Considerable Teeth Into this Rule. Now, Just Getting a Task Force Together and Flinging out a Set Of Rules and Getting Them Numbered the Way They're Supposed to Be Numbered and Getting Some Rough Language Doesn't Make a Rule, Because Sure Enough, Somebody in Management Is Going to Want to Take a Look at It, and So We Did Some More Work. We Did a Lot More Work. We Did Some Substantial Engineering. The Washington Office Took the Product, Did Some Restructuring, Some General Editing, and Basically Talked the Rule Through the Solicitor's Department, Through the Department's Solicitors in a Draft Phase. The Draft Was Then Given to the Bureau's Management Team, a Term We Don't Use Anymore, the BMT, And Their Concerns and Their Other Inputs Were Plugged into The Patrolled Rule. Of Particular Concern to the Bureau's Management Team Was the Situation That Confronted Them In Alaska. And How to Authorize Unlawful Occupancies. Well, We Dealt with That, and The Draft Rule Was in Place and Ready to Be Surnamed -- this Is An Infamous Term for Anyone Who Has Ever Worked in Washington -- This Is Where One Goes Begging For Somebody's Signature as Being in Concurrence with Your Proposal -- in 1990. Throughout the First Half of 1991, the Rule Was Cussed and Discussed in the Surnaming Process in Just about Every Part Of the Department, and Not Only Did We Talk about That Rule Inside the Department, We Took It out on the Streets. We Talked to the Environmentalists in Washington. We Talked to the Miners in Meetings in Spokane, Denver, and Sacramento. And by June of 1991, Enough People Had Agreed That the Rule Was Necessary That We Were Able To Get the Final Signature of The Assistant Secretary for Land And Minerals Management and the Rule Was Sent to Omb in June of 1991. However, Unbeknownst to Us, Certain Political Events Would Delay the Publication of the Rules until September 11, 1992, A Full 13, 14 Months after the Rule Went over to Omb. The Comment Period Closed on November 10th, 1992. Now, this Put Us Right into the Middle of an Administration Change, And, of Course, with That Sort of Circumstance, All Activity Grinds Very Nearly to a Halt, Except for this Rule. Hillary Oden Directed That We Have a Final Rule Ready for the New Administration When They Came Through the Door. So We Took All of the Comment, All of the Analysis, and Prepared Our Final Rule. The Final Rule Was Given to the Department. However, it Remained Dormant Throughout Most of 1993. Why Did this Rule Remain Dormant In 1993? Well, this Rule Was Dormant Because Most of You Recall in 1993 and 1994 Battles over the Mining Law Reform Were in Full Swing on the Hill, and the Decision Was to Wait for the Outcome of Those Battles. I Will Make a Note Here That We Had the Strongest Possible Support from Director Jim Baca On this Particular Rule. Finally in Late 1994 When the Department Began to Realize That There Was No Chance of Mining Law Reform in the Foreseeable Future They Began to Actively Work on the Final Rule. Once Again They Took the Proposed Language That We Did up In a Proposed Package and Began To Change It, Alter It, Rewrite It in Return for Giving Us Surnames. By April 1995, the Department Then Decided That the Rule Was Ready to Go and Advised BLM That We Should Publish it Immediately. We of Course, Demurred and Said, Unfortunately, Folks, the Timing Would Bring the Law out Right in The Middle of the Mining Season And That Wouldn't Be a Particularly Good Idea. The Department Said, "Oh, Well, You Figure out the Timing." And So Throughout 1995 We Worked With the Department to Come up With the Content Adjustments and A Final Signed Rule and Looked For the Optimum Time to Publish It. And Our Decision to Publish Was Going to Be Based on Possession Of a -- Possession of a Budget. Unfortunately Train Wrecks I & Ii, the November 1995 and the December 1995 Through January 1996 Furloughs and the Loss of Collection of Information Brought Everything to a Screeching Halt and the Department Was Forced to -- Those of You Who Have Not Worked In Washington Are Puzzling over This. On All Regulations We Have to Comply with the Paper Work Reduction Act of 1980 as Amended By the Paper Work Reduction Act Of 1995, and Essentially this Rule or this Law Says That We Will Reduce the Burden on the Public, Notous, on the Public of People Complying with the Rules. The 1995 Amendments to the Act Added 120 Days of Waiting Time To Our Rule. The Department Received Considerable Appreciater from The White House and the Reinvention Teams to Put a Thousand Pages of BLM Rules into What's Known as Plain English And over the Strenuous Objections of the BLM Staff and The Solicitor's Office, the Rule Was Redrafted into the Plain English Format That You Have Before You. Now, Having Sat Through That Process, I Will Tell You That it Is a -- it Is -- at the Outset An Irritating One When You Have A Final Package Ready to Move, But We Believed When We Reached The End Product That the Product In Front of You Is a Better Rule, Makes More Sense, and the Public Has a Better Chance of Understanding it Because It's Not Written in Legalese. It Is Written in the Main in Questions and Answers, and Will Then Provide a Template or a Model for Some of the Other Minerals Regulations to Be Revised in a Similar Fashion. Well, the Final Rule Went to Omb In May and Was Approved in June Of this Year. We Published the Regulation as Final in July and it Became -- Took Effect in August of 1996. That's Almost Six Years after The Date of the Regulations, and I Will Say this to Everybody, Just as I Told Director Jamison On the Phone, for Six Years I Carried Your Water, the Least Can You Do Is Buy Me a Beer for That. As I Said, What's Purpose of This Rule? Well, I Briefly Discuss That. We Have a Fax That Just Came In from Las Vegas. Go Ahead and Drop That onto the Elmo, Because I Think it Will Be A Good Illustration. The Fax Asks Are the Overhead Guides That You Are Using in Our Handout Materials? We're Completely Lost. What Rick Is Doing Now, Probably, Is Not in Your Handout Guide, However, as Soon as He Gets into the Regulations, and Especially the Definitions, Which I Believe He'll Be Doing Fairly Soon -- Rick, Are You Going to Be Getting into the Definitions Before the Break? Yes. Yes. Okay. Then, They'll Start Showing Up. Now, It's Important to Note We Had to Put All of the Camera Cards or Elmo Cards That You're Seeing on Your Television in a Landscape Format. So You'll Get about a Third of a Vertical Page for Each Television Screen, but We'll Try And Make Some Indication of When You're Getting to the Regulation So You Can Follow along on Paper. Anyway, Rick, Go Ahead. Okay. Well, Anyway, We Have Now a Set Of Rules, They Are Final, They Are Done, and They Are Complete -- Before Us Complete with a Time Line That Will Have a Drop-dead Date for the Existing Occupancies on October 15th of This Year. What's the Purpose? Why Are We Here with These Rules? The Purpose of this Subpart Is To Manage Use and Occupancy. It Is Not to Eliminate Trespass. It Is Not to Cleanse the Public Lands of Squatters. It Is to Manage Use and Occupancy. And We Are Managing it in Support of the Development of Locatable Minerals by Limiting Such Use or Occupancies to That Which Is Reasonably Incident. By That We Mean the Squatter, The Nonminer, the Drug Lab Operator Interferes with the Development of Minerals by Legitimate Miners. One, by Simply Occupying the Ground and Being a Hazard to Hard-working, Normal Miners. And, Two, by Generating an Awful Lot of Bad Press, and It's That Bad Press That We're Going to Make a Major Effort to Turn Around. The Bureau Will Prevent the Abuse of Public Lands. We Will Recognize Valid Rights Under the Mining Law, and We Will Take Appropriate Action to Eliminate Any Invalid Uses, Including Unauthorized Residential Occupancy. Now, What's the Scope? I Said Earlier That the Scope of This Rule Applies Only to the Lands Administered by BLM, Not Any Other Land. You Will Get Questions, and I Have -- I Have Been Getting Them About I Have a Mining Claim on The Lolo National Forest. Does this Apply to Me? No, it Does Not. I Have a Mining Claim on Split Estate Lands. Does this Apply to Me? No, it Does Not. They Do Not Apply to State Lands, Private Lands in Which The Minerals Have Been Reserved To the United States. They Do Not Apply to Federal Lands -- Rick, I Think it Might Be Important to Point out at this Time That We Are Now into the Handouts That People Have in Front of Them, and We Are on Page 20 of 43 Cfr 3715, and Rick Is into Section 3715.01, Which Is What Are the Purpose and Scope of the Subpart and We'll Be Moving down from There. Okay. Thank You, Matt. Now, I Want to Stress a Point That Was Made to Us by a Bunch Of Folks in Alaska. These Are Our Most Extreme Cases Of the Need for -- the Needful Residential Occupancy. We Have Language at C Within This Subpart, and it Says, this Subpart Does Not Impair the Right of Any Person to Engage in Recreational Activities or Any Other Authorized Activity on Public Lands BLM Administers. Now, What in the World Does That Mean? What That Basically Says Is That Just Because You Have a Mining Claim, Just Because You Have Perhaps Even a Residential Occupancy, You Are Not Prevented From Going out on the Public Land and Hunting or Fishing or Engaging in Any Other Activity That Any Other Citizen Is Allowed to Engage In. In Other Words, the Miner Is No Different than the Average Citizen. Possession of a Mining Claim Does Not Change His Status. And We Want to Make That Point Over and over and over Again. The Fact Appear Miner Has a Residence on a Mining Claim Does Not Mean the Miner Cannot Go out And Hunt and Fish or Do Anything Else out There That Anyone Else Can Do. Rick, in the Remaining 15 Minutes We Have Before the Break, You Want to Start Getting Into the Definitions? Yes, We're Going to Start in Section 3715.0-5. Okay. Mining Laws... First Definition. You Can Follow along in the Rule. You Don't Necessarily Need to Read Them Verbatim. I Don't Plan on Reading Them. The Mining Laws Are Essentially Those Laws That We All Know and Deal with on a Daily Basis. Public Law 167, the Mining Law Of 1872, and All the Variance of It. We Have Been Getting Some Phone Calls, and They Are Very Interesting Phone Calls from Placer Miners. We Have Said in this Particular Definition That it Is Hard Rock Mining. That Is an Unfortunate Choice of Terminology That Has Seeped into Mining Law Administration, Driven Basically by the Mining Law Reform Battles. On the Hill They Refer to Mining As Hard Rock Mining to Differentiate it from Coal Leasing and Oil and Gas. And it Never Occurred to Any of Us, Including the Solicitor, John Leshy, That Somebody Would Interpret this Particular Phraseology to Say, Oh, I'm a Placer Miner, These Rules Don't Apply to Me. So When You Get That Particular Question, the Answer Is Simple: Public Law 167 Says All Mining Claims Hereafter Locate Shall Not Be Used for Mining -- Any Purposes Other than Mining and It Is the Phrase "All Mining Claims." It Doesn't Excuse the Placer Miner. They Are Subject to this the Same as Anyone Else. Although You Can't Blame the Guys for Trying. Mining Operations: the Term Mining Operations in this Particular Case Is Similar to That of the 3809 Regulations. It Means All Functions and Work Facilities and Activities Reasonably Incident to Mining or Processing of Mineral Deposits. It Means Road Construction and It Means Other Means of Access To a Mining Claim or Mill Site On Public Lands. I Will Also Say That it Includes The Support Activities That Are Normally Going to Be Found Associated with Mining Activities. It's Going to Include Vehicle Maintenance. It's Going to Include Going to Town to Buy Spares. Now, If You Happen to Be in Alaska, That Can Be a Pretty Long Trip to Town. I'd Also Want to Add That it Also Includes Keeping Spares on Site. Yes. And While We Prefer That Some People Keep Spares on Site, There Are Times When Spares on Site Are Not Present. Now, the Big Question: What Is Occupancy? What Is Occupancy? Well, Occupancy Means Full-time Or Part-time Residence on the Public Lands. It Also Means Activities That Involve Residence, That Involve The Construction, the Presence Or Maintenance of Either Temporary or Permanent Structures That May Be Used for Residence, or the Use of a Watchman or Caretaker for Purposes of Monitoring. Now, Here in this Definition We've Covered a Lot of Ground. Occupancy for the Purposes of These Regulations Is Full-time Or Part-time Residence, Either One, and it Also Means the Presence, Construction, Maintenance of Any Building That -- and this Is Important -- That May Be Used for Such Purposes. If You See a Building out There That Could Be Used for Occupancy, it Is Subject to These Rules. Even If it Looks like Something That No Normal Person Would Reside In. So That Is Occupancy, and it Is Essentially a Definition to Fill In the Gaps Found in 3809. If You Put a Structure on BLM Administered Lands and Somebody Could Possibly Live in It, Then It's Subject to this Rule. Now -- Rick, as You're Working with The Elmo Cards, Use the Marker. It Shows up Better on the Television. Yes, I Heard That. Thank You. Residence or Structures Include But Are Not Limited to Accesses, Access Vehicle -- Barriers to Access, Fences, Gates, Signs, Tents, Motor Homes, Trailers, Cabins, Houses, Buildings and Equipment or Storage Facilities. You Know, That Leads to an Interesting Question, Rick, About Permanent Structures Versus Temporary Structures. I Think If We Could Cue up Slide 148, I Would like to Show an Example of What Is Clearly a Temporary Structure, and That Particular Slide Shows Basically An 8 by 30 Trailer and it May Look Familiar to a Lot of People. It's the Sort We See All over The Place, and Can You Hitch That up to a Three-quarter Ton Pickup Truck and Tow it Away. It's Legal to Tow on the Highways, Assuming it Has All Its Wheels and Brakes and Doesn't Need Any Kind of Permit. But on Slide 164 We Have Something That's Considerably Different and Slide 164 Shows Us Really What's a Double-wide Mobile Home and That Is Made up Of 2 12-foot Pieces. You Can't Tow Witness a Regular Pick-up Truck. You Have to Take it Apart. You Have to Get a Moving Permit From the State. You Have to Have a "Wide Load" Sign, You Have to Have Pilot Vehicles. Clearly That Is Intended to Be Put into Place as a Permanent Structure. Now, I Would Suggest That Anything That Really Requires a Moving Permit or a "Wide Load" Sign to Move it Is Using -- Using Moving Techniques That Are The Same as House Moving. and That's Exactly What the Rules Give Us. The Definition of Permanent Structures We Have Chosen to Use Means a Structure Fixed to the Ground by Various Types of Foundations, Slabs, Piers, Poles Or Other Means Allowed by the Building Codes. Notice "Allowed by the Building Codes." That's a Major Issue in this Role. The Term Also Includes a Structure Placed on the Ground That Lacks Foundation, Slabs, Piers or Poles but That Can Only Be Moved by Disassembly into Component Parts or Techniques Commonly Used in House Moving And That Is Exactly the Term That Matt Has Described with the Double-wide. You've Got to Have Pilot Vehicles, You've Got to Put it On Beams, and You've Got to Haul It with Something Other than a Pick-up Truck. That Makes it a Permanent Structure. and That Would Apply Also to A Single-wide Mobile Home That Is over 8 Feet Wide. Anything Really That Requires a Moving Permit or a "Wide Load" Sign Is a Permanent Structure. Now, We Have the Definition Of Public Lands. Every Rule Has to Define Public Lands. As a Result, We Have Probably More Definitions of Public Lands In the Cfr than Any Other Definition. It Simply Means Lands Open to The Operation of the Mining Law Which BLM Administers, Including Lands Covered by Unpatented Mining Claims or Mill Sites. Rick in the Eight Minutes We Have Before Our Break, Can We Wrap up the Definitions or Do We Need to Run over? Yep, We're Almost Done. Okay. We Have Some Definitions That We've Chosen to Introduce. We Introduced the Time Prospecting or Exploration. And It's Basically the Search For Mineral Deposits by Geological, Geophysical or Other Appropriate Techniques. It Includes but Is Not Limited To Sampling, Drilling, Developing Surface or Undergroundworkings, and this Is Important. We must Not Forget That Exploration Often Includes Significant Undergroundwork. Now, We Have a Very Important Definition That We Need to Work About, and this One Is Reasonably Incident. Reasonably Incident Is the Statutory Standard Created by 30 U.s. C.612, Prospecting, Mining Or Processing Operations and Reasonably Incident Thereto. The Term Reasonably Incident Thereto Is a Shortened Version Of That Long Phrase, Prospecting, Mining or Processing Operations and Uses Reasonably Incident Thereto. Keep in Mind it Means Mining and It Means Associated Activities. It's Included -- it Includes for Our Purposes Those Actions or Expenditures of Labor by a Person of Ordinary Prudence to Prospect, Explore, Define, Develop Mine or Been Fish 88 a Valuable Mineral Deposit and Here Is the Important Part. Using Methods, Structures and Equipment That Are Appropriate To the Geological Terrain, the Mineral Deposit in Question and The Point in Time That You Are On the Development Cycle and This Is Particularly Important. It Means That What Is Going on There Has to Be Properly Placed Within the Cycle of Mineral Development. If Somebody's Going to Walk in And Sell You That They're Going To Create an Open-pit Property On the Strength of a Geophysical Anomaly, Then It's Pretty Safe To Say That They're Probably Not Reasonably Incident. We'll Get into Greater Detail On Life Cycles and Related Issues Tomorrow. We Have Another Term That We Need to Know about. "Substantially Regular Work." It Means Work That Directly and Substantially Benefits a Mineral Property, Including Nearby Properties That an Operator May Have. So We're Not Restricting it to a Single Property, and You Will See an Example of a Property That Has Substantially Regular Work Occurring on it and Several Other Properties Later on in Our Show. This Work Has to Be Associated With the Search for and the Development of Mineral Deposits Or the Processing of Ores. It Includes Active and Continuing Explore Nation, Mining, Beneficiation or Processing of Ores. Substantially Regular Work Also Includes Maintenance, Assembly, Work on Physical Improvements, Procurement of Supplies Incidental to the Activities and It May Include Offsite Trips Associated with These Activities. It Also Includes Seasonal but Recurring Work Programs. We Want to Stress That, Particularly in the Northern Areas Where You Have a Short Mining Season Followed by a Whole Lot of Good Skiing. Now, this Is an Important One, This Last Definition. I Want to You Pay Careful Attention to this. Unnecessary or Undue Degradation Is Further Defined by this Rule. As Applied to Unauthorized Uses, It Means Those Uses That Are Not Reasonably Incident and Are Not Authorized under Any Other Applicable Law as Applied to an Authority Use it Means the Same Thing as the 3802 and 3809 Definitions. This Distinction Is Important And it Will Become Particularly Important During Enforcement Actions. We Have Used this Definition of Unnecessary or Undue less as a Standard and More as an Enforcement Tool Because it Lets Us Bring into Play the Criminal Penalties Section of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act. Matt, in the Three or So Minutes Remaining, Do You Have Any Other Observations or Questions about The Definitions? Well, as to the Definitions Of Unnecessary or Undue as They Pertain to This, We'll Be Going Into Some More Detail on That Tomorrow. It May Be Called Excruciating Detail, but We'll Cover It. Scott? I've Noticed We've Had Some Questions Come in and There Seems to Be Some Confusion on Some People's Parts That Whether Or Not Fences, Gates and Those Are Considered Occupancy and Whether or Not Those People Should Respond by Submitting Occupancy Notification Forms. Ah, Good Point. Okay. The Occupancy Form That We Are Dealing with Addresses Existing Occupancies, That Is, Those People Who Reside on a Mining Claim. We Have Fencing Addressed in This Regulation and I Have Not Spoken in Any Great Detail about Fencing in this Regulation, but Fencing Is a Prime Concern. But it Is Not the Major Concern. Occupancy, Residency, Structures Capable of Supporting Residency Are Really What That Occupancy Notification Form Is All about. If You Get One on Fencing, Well, Thank You, but it Doesn't Really Apply. We Had a Question That Came In, and it Has to Do with Using These on Withdrawn Land. Are These Rules in Effect on Public Lands That Are Withdrawn That May or May Not Have Mining Claims on Them? These Rules Will Apply to Any Public Land No Matter When the Rights in Question Were Created. So That If the Lands Are Withdrawn, the Regulations Will Still Apply. Good. and -- Well, I Think It's Time for a Break. I Know That I Could Use a Break, And I Imagine Everyone Else Can Use a Break. So We'll Be Back in 15 Minutes Exactly. Be Sure to Leave Your Television Turned On. Welcome Back from Your Break. I Hope Everything Went Well for You. We've Been Looking at Some Really Interesting Facts That Came in During the Break. I Also Hope Your Satellite Downlink Is Going Well. I Understand Some of the People From Phoenix District That Are Watching Us Today Lost Their Satellite Lock and Watched Old Reruns of the "Dating Game" for About Five Minutes but I Understand Phoenix Is Right Back With Us Now. We've Received a Number of Interesting Facts During the Break and We'll Deal with Them In a Moment. Rick, Let's Get Back to Work. One Fax That Came in from Salt Lake City, I Think, Is Really Important, and That Is Do These Rules Apply to Pre1955 Mining Claims? and the Answer to That Is Yes. Public Law 167 Was the Result of Congress Taking Legislation -- Taking Legislative Steps to Make Case Law Positive Federal Law. If You Look -- Positive Federal Law. If You Look at the Case That You Were Sent out Called Bruce Crawford and It's in Your Handouts at Some Point -- That's Right, the Bruce Crawford Case Follows the Regulations. I Believe It's the next Part of That Section. Judge Berske Did a Considerable Degree of Legal Research and Spent a Great Deal Of Time Discussing Pre-1955 Cases That Involved Illegal Occupancy, Saloon-keeping, Brothels, What Have You, on Public Lands under the Guise of The Mining Law. So Basically it Would Be a Good Read to Go Through Crawford Several Times? That's Why We Provided It. Exactly. Read Crawford and Read the History of the Case Law Prior to 1955 and Then Keep in Mind That In 1955 Congress Simply Said We Agree with All These Cases. We Are Now Going to Erect Them Into Positive Law and I Might Add That Even Back Then, the American Mining Congress in Testimony Supported the Passage Of Public Law 167 Just as the Now National Mining Congress -- National Mining Association Supported These Regulations. Good. I Have a Question from Gordon Pine. I'm Not Sure Which One of Us it Is Addressed To. The Question Gordon Sent Us Is: Is That a Tie or Is Appear Color Test Pattern? I Normally Won't Mention Someone's Name, But, Gordon, I Think It's a Tie. Anyway, Rick, Are We Ready to Get onto the Rest of It? We Have a Number of Questions. One of Them Was Why Don't -- Why Didn't the U.s. Forest Service Want These Regulations to Apply To Forest Service Land and Rick Will Address in That His Presentation Coming Up. Also Why Don't They Apply to Taylor Graze Lands and That's Not an Answer We Can Answer in Really Quick Form but Basically If the Land Is Functionally Equivalent to Public Land, Then They to Apply. When in Doubt, Check with Your Solicitor's Office. Another Question That We'll Deal With Is Historic Buildings. What Do We Do with Historic Buildings That Are Occupancies. We'll Deal with That in Greater Detail this Afternoon and Again In the Morning. And Another Question on Existing Occupancies on Claim with an Uncertain Boundary Between Public Land and Patented Land, Does That Mean We Have to Kick The People off Right Away? Does That Mean We Have to Kick The People off? No, That's Why There's the One-year Grace Period, and the Expiration of the One-year Grace Period Doesn't Mean We Will Be Lining up Fire Trucks and Burning up Buildings at the End Of That Year. Rick? That's Absolutely Right, Matt. If it Hasn't Been a Problem in The Last 10 Years, There's No Reason for it to Suddenly Be a Problem One Day after the Grace Period Ends and We Need to Keep That in Mind. We Have a Set of Regulations, And this Is a Good Point to Jump In and Start Talking about the Grace Period, Because It's the First Issue Boiling Around the Offices. The Timing of the Regulations, Fun Lynch, Coincided with a Lot Of the Standing -- Unfortunately Coincided with the Standard Filings Pertaining to the Mining Claim Recordation Fees and There Was Some Considerable Confusion On the Part of Some Folks Who Received the Postcard Mailing From BLM Advising Them of These New Regulations a Goodly Number Of Folks Confused the Filing of The Occupancy Notification with The Mining Claim Recordation Fees. For That, We Apologize, but Sometimes the Left Hand Isn't Exactly Certain What the Right Hand Is Doing. The Grace Period, as I Said Earlier, Is Intended to Bring The Existing Occupants into Compliance. During the Development of the Rule We Estimated That There Are Probably 2,000 or So Existing Occupancies on the Public Lands. Probably 650 of These Are Real, Live, Legitimate Mining Operations Covered by a Notice Or a Plan. The Remaining 1300 Are Probably Single Occupancies, Some of Which We Know About, Some of Which We Absolutely Don't Know About, That We Will Have to Address. And Dealing with Existing Occupancies Is Kind of like Herding Cats. The Very First Job You've Got to Do Is Get Them All into One General Place, and That's the Role of the Grace Period. We Have Said We Will Not Bring The Full Force and the Effect of These Rules on You, the Occupant, If You Supply Us with A Piece of Paper in the Proper Form That Says "I Have an Occupancy, it Is Located At... And Answer a Couple Questions And Give Us a Telephone Number That We Can Contact You At. Now, the Grace Period Then Runs From -- Effective -- the Effective Date of the Regs, the August Date, Date of Publication, to August 18th, 1997. During That Time Existing Occupancies Are Not Required to Come into Compliance with the Regulations. They Have a Year to Do So and It's to Their Advantage to Do So, but We Will Not Apply the Full Force of the Regulations to Them. Now, the Grace Period Applies to All but Two Categories of Folks Out There. The First Category Is That Person or Group of Persons That We Have Served a Formal Notice Of Trespass On. If it Was Sufficient to Be a Problem as of the Date of the Regulations to Warrant a Trespass Notice, Then You Don't Have the Grace Period Available To You. We've Already Decided That You're Not Doing Mining. The Second Group of People Are Those Group of -- Groups of Folks That We Decide on Inspection Are Not Reasonably Incident and Who Are a Threat to Health, Safety or the Environment. Now, How Do We Determine Somebody Is Not Reasonably Incident and a Threat to Health, Safety and the Environment? Well, It's Pretty Obvious. You Go out on the Ground and You Inspect During the First Year. The First Year Does Not Mean BLM Stops Doing Everything. The First Year of the Grace Period Means We Begin to Focus Our Activities on the Known Problem Sites, Those That While They Aren't Rising to the Level Of a Trespass, While They Aren't Rising to the Level of a -- Calling in the Black Helicopters, They Are a Concern And We Need to Deal with It. We Inspect Them. Having Determined That They Are Not Reasonably Incident and That They Are a Threat to Health, Safety or the Environment, We Are Then Empowered by Flpma to Bring in Section 302c of Flpma That Says in Plain English: If You Are a Threat, the Secretary Is Empowered to Tell You to Turn Off Your Operation and Get off The Public Lands Even During the Pendency of Your Appeal. And That Is One of Our Most Powerful Tools for Those People Who Are Not Reasonably Incident And Those People Who Do Not Have Permits or Are a Threat or Are a Nuisance We Can Take an Action That Will, in BLM Terms, Virtually Instantly Get Them off The Public Lands. That's Important to Note That Not Everything Is an Immediate Threat to Health and Safety. If Somebody's Been Living on a Mining Claim for 15 Years and Hasn't Been a Threat to Health And Safety for the 15 Years, It's Doubtful They're Going to Be a Threat Tomorrow. We'll Go into Some Examples Later on Starting this Afternoon And Through Tomorrow about the Difference Between a Threat to Health and Safety and Just Not Being Reasonably Incident. Okay. Thank You, Matt. Now, We Had a Question That Came Up from -- What Office Was That. . What Was the Question? the -- We've Received a Stack of Faxes During the Break That's Astounding. We're Pleased to Get Them and Will Be Going Through a Lot of Them. and We Will Try to Get Back To Them as Quickly as We Can. The Question That I Had in Mind Was the One That Talked about Why the Forest Service Didn't -- Ah, an Excellent Question. The Question Is Basically Why Isn't the Forest Service Interested in Having These Rules Apply to Forest Service Lands. Well, from My Brief History Of the Rules, You Heard That the Forest Service Did Participate In this Rule Making Process. Unfortunately, for Whatever Reason, the Forest Service Determined That Our Level Of... Our Determination of When Occupancy Is Warranted Did Not Suit Their Needs. Our Standard Is One That's a Little Different, and It's Basically Laid out in the Rule At .2, and -- What Page Is That On? That's -- Bottom of the Sheet. I'm Sorry, Matt. In the Regs it Is the Regulars Itself -- Regs Itself, it Is Found in -- Beginning on about Page 22. Now, Here We Adopted a Standard That Is a Little Different from What the Forest Service Chose to Adopt. The Forest Service Chooses to Use a Needs Standard Based on The Richardson Decision, and We Actually Had a Comment During The Proposed Rule Comment Period That Said We, Too, Should Adopt A Needs Standard. We Chose Not to Do this. We Chose to Take a Standard That Essentially Says up Front, "Here Are the Bench Marks That You Must Achieve. If You Achieve These Bench Marks We Will Concur in Your Assertion That Your Occupancy Is Reasonably Incident and Ought to Go Forward." And That's a Different Form of a Test. We Have Laid out the Test and Said Meet it and We Will Agree With You. For That Reason, of Course, the Forest Service Said it Doesn't Meet Our Needs Standard. So It's a Difference Between Reasonably Incident and Reasonably Necessary? Yes. Now Back to the Grace Period. Before We Move onto the Grace Period, We've Had a Question From Idaho That Asks Do These Rules Apply to Mining Claims That Have Been Issued First Half Final Certificate? Yes, this Question Has Repeatedly Popped Up. These Regulations Apply to All Mining Claims and All Sites on The Public Lands, No Matter Where They Are in the Mineral Patent Application Process. Until the Secretary Signs the Patent and Says Good-bye to That Piece of Public Lands, These Regulations Will Apply. There Are No Escapes. Great. Okay. Now, I Mentioned the Grace Period. And I Also Mentioned the Notion That We Should Do Inspections in Grace Periods. Just Because We Have a Year, We Don't Stop Looking. We Don't Stop Observing. In Fact, It's to Our Advantage To Go out and Do a Surface Use Determination and Simply Sit With the Results of That Surface Use Determination and Talk to The Occupants. So Conceivably I Could Go out And Do a Surface Use Determination on a Mining Claim And If Portions of it Are Not Reasonably Incident, the BLM Office Involved Could Take That Out and Show it to Them and Say, Look, this Is What We Found, You've Got Eight More Months to Get this Cleaned up and Get Back Into Compliance or We're Going To Have to Do Something about You? Exactly and That's the Kind Of Customer Service We Want to Be Delivering. This Is Not Something That We Want to Spring on People on the Day after the End of the Surface Use or the Day after the Grace Period Has Come to an End. We Want to Make it Work for Us As a Tool, Not as a Weapon. There Are Times When Weapons Will Be Appropriate, but for the Moment What's Appropriate Is to Use the Time We Have as a Tool, To Get People to Understand That They Either Have to Be Reasonably Incident and Have to Meet All the Standards, and the Sooner They Begin Going down That Path, the Better for Them, The Better for Us and the Better For the Public Lands. At the Same Time, We Need to Then Be Able to Tell People, Look, There Is No Way That You're Going to Be Reasonably Incident and You Need to Either Think about Getting off the Public Lands or Finding Another Form of Authorization for Your Particular Operation, No Matter What it Is. Good. We Can Get Bogged down in Answering Questions Right Now, So Let's Move along. Okay. So, I Said Earlier That We Were Going to Deal with Two Kinds of Regs, Two Kinds of Folks, the New Folks, the Old Folks. We've Talked a Little Bit about The Existing Occupancies, and We've Said, Hey, If They Make Their Paper Filing and They Aren't the Subject of a Trespass Notice, and They Aren't Not Reasonably Incident and a Threat To Health and Safety, They've Got a Year to Work with BLM, to Work with the Local Office, to Get Right So That They Can Get On with Whatever Their Operations Are. What about the New Operator? What about the Person Who Now Walks Through the Door and Says "Hi, I Have an Operation and I Now Need to Know What I Have to Do?" Well, the Regulations Are Fairly Explicit. Along with the 3809 or 3802 Filing You Have to Give Us a Description of What You're Planning on Doing, How You're Planning to Do It, Where You're Going to Do It, the Location of Fences, the Location of Buildings and Describe How the Occupancy Will Relate to Your Mineral-related Activities. Having Done That, We Then Have a Job to Do. BLM Will Then Take a Look at the Occupancy along with the Surface Management Filing. You Say, Well, this Causes a Problem with Notices, Doesn't It? Ah, We Built in a Process That Deals with Notices. For Plans, It's a Relatively No-brainer. In Dealing with a Plan Level Activity That Involves Fencing Or Occupancy, We Will Examine The Use and the Occupancy for Reasonably Incidence and Does The Level of Activity Warrant Occupancy, Does it Warrant Fencing, Does it Warrant the Use Of a Watchman? When We Make Our Determination, We Will Make the Determination Of, Yes, We Can Concur Or, No, We Do Not Concur. At the Same Time We Approve or Reject a Plan of Operations. It's to Be a Separate Part of The Decision Record That Goes Out Associated with That Plan of Operations. And It's Fairly Important to Keep in Mind That We Need to Have Explicit Language in There That Says They Have to Maintain The Standards Set out in the Regulations. Otherwise, the Secretary Can Invoke Section 302c, and Guidance Will Come out from Headquarters on this as Soon as We Can Get it Roughed out and Pass past the Solicitor's Office. Tomorrow We Will Go into Some Detail on What Sorts of Uses Are Appropriate for What Kinds of Activities in Fencing and Residences and on and on and On. So Be Sure to Be Here Tomorrow For That. Okay. Now, as Part of Screening the New Guys, the Newbies, If You Want to Call Them That, We Are Going to Look at Them Not So Inch Procedure as We Have in Some of the 3809 Cases, We're Going to Be Looking at Them in a Substantive Basis, Sort of How Big, What Color, How Many, When And How. We Will Look At... Is this Appropriate, Is this Reasonably Incident, Is this the Time When You Should Be Conducting this Activity? And for Plan Level Operations, It's Not a Problem. But What about That Notice Level Activity? We Get about 1300 Notices a Year, down Unfortunately from Past Years, but There Still Is a Potential Workload That We Have To Address. Well, for Notice Level Activities, We're Going to Split The Review Process. When Somebody Comes in and Says "I'm Going to Engage in Fencing Or I'm Going to Engage in Occupancy, We're Going to Say, Great, Give Us Your Information, And at That Point We're Going to Tell Them, Sit Back, Don't Do Anything Related to Fencing or Occupancy until We Tell You to Do So. 15 Days after the Notice Has Been Received, However, the Notice Level Activity Can Go Forward Without Any Change in The Existing Process. The Process Changes When We Address the Use and Occupancy And Fencing Portion of the Proposal. Those Pieces of the Proposal Are Going to Be Segregated and Considered Fully and Completely By the BLM Office. That Means We Will Do Nepa. We Will Do Section 106 Compliance, We Will Do T&e Species and at the End of 30 Working Days, We Will Get Back To the Operator and Say We Concur or We Do Not Concur in Your Proposed Activity, or We Will Advise Them of the Need to Prepare an Neis or Do Consultation under Section 7 of The Threatened Endangered Species Act or Comply Fully with Section 106 So That the Review Of Occupancy at Notice Level Activities Becomes a Federal Action. The Notice Level Activities That Involve Mining, Milling, Processing but Don't Involve Use -- That Don't Involve Fencing or The Construction, Placement of Permanent Structures or Occupancy, They Can Proceed to The Extent That They Are Capable Of Being Going Forward Without The Other Structures. So Would this Mean That Someone Who Is Working on a Notice Level Operation Would Have to Get Authorization to Install a Double-wide Mobile Home? Yes. Scott, Do You Have Situations Like in That Folsom? Quite Often. We Have a Number of Folks Who Submit Notices and Is Also Combined with Occupancy at the Same Time. Under the New 3715s Now, as Rick Is Implying, We Would Be Breaking out -- Say We Have a Transition Notice That Came in a Week or Two after August 15th, 1996, the Implementation Date of These Regulations, the Information in That Notice May Be a Little Sketchy. It May Not Be up to the Standards We're Now Asking and At That Point in Time of Review We Would Ship Back a Letter Asking Them to Resubmit under 3715. Do You Think Overall It's Going to Make Your Work Easier? it May Not Make Our Work Easier, but I Think in the Long Run it Will Be a Benefit to Our Management of the Lands. Great. Thanks. Rick? Okay. That's What We Hope for Is Benefit of Management to the Lands. and the Health of the Lands. and the Health of the Lands, And Improving the Opportunities For Commercial Development of The Public Lands and All of Those Goals That the Director Has Placed on Us. Now, Having Done All of the Work, Having Approved a Plan of Operations, Having Approved or Concurred in a Notice, the Question Is, What Standards Are We Going to Be Using? Well, the Standards in this Particular Regulation Are a Little Different. The Standards in Previous Regulations Regarding Surface Management Were Pretty Much Procedural. These Are Pretty Much Substantive. The Standards of Regulation -- Standards That We're Looking for Compliance on Are Essentially That Vast Array of Permits. That Means You've Got -- You, If You Are an Operator, Have to Have in Hand the Necessary Permits for Clean Air, Clean Water, Whatever the Federal Environmental Laws Bring off Onto Your Operation, and Have Them in Hand for All of the Activities That Are Currently or Proposed to Be Underway. But We Don't Stop There. We Then Turn Around and Say, You Also Have to Meet State Law, and Here We Have Tread into Ground That Has Shocked a Few People, Outraged Them, Particularly Some Folks out of Idaho During the Comment Period, and We Have Had Other People Who Have Wildly Applauded It. One of the Point to Remember About Management of Public Lands Is We Are Not the Sole Managers Of the Public Lands. We Are Not the Sole Powers under The Federal Scheme out There. There Are Other Powers with Equally Legal and Equally Sovereign Powers, and These Rules Recognize Them, and Those Folks Are the State, and the State Has a Major Interest in Managing Mining Operations. I've Been in BLM 20 Years and I Can Tell You That When I First Came on Board, Most of the States Didn't Have Much in the Way of Management Schemes for Mining Operations. Now, by and Large, the States Have Management Schemes That Are The Most Robust and the Most Active of Any That You Can Find. And We Expect the Occupant and The Reasonably Incident User, So, in Effect We're Saying Everybody, to Have in Hand or Ready to Be Issued the Necessary Permits from the State Mining And Reclamation Folks. But We Don't Stop There. Just as the Home Stakes Mclaughlin Project Found out There Were 236 Permits, So Are a Lot of People Going to Find out That There Are a Scad of Permits. One Particular Area of Permits You're Going to Have to Address And We've Not Done this Before, Is Building Permits. To Put up a Building, to Occupy A Building You Generally Have to Meet Codes, National Building Code, National Plumbing Code, National Electrical Code, If Not The National, One of the Others. We Require of Every Person Placing a Structure on the Public Lands That They Meet These Codes. And Those Are the Codes in Place As of the Date the Building Was Put in Place. Now, this Is Going to Lead to Some Work on Our Part as We Develop Working Relationships With Folks That We Have Heretofore Not Had to Pay Much Attention To, the State and County Code Agencies. Now, I Know over in California They've Done a Pretty Good Job Of Keeping up on This, and It's Probably to Everyone's Advantage When You Get a Question to Search out Someone in California, Scott Murrellwright Sitting at My Left Would Be a Good Contact, and Ask Him, How Did it Work over on Your Side of The Fence When You Had to Deal With the County? in Fact, Scott Will Be Going Into Some Details on Just How to Deal with the Counties and What Kinds of Permits Are Required This Afternoon and Again in the Morning. Okay. Now, Having Had All of These Permits in Hand, We Now Have an Operator Who Is Very Close to Being Legitimate and on the Side Of Proper Behavior. Can We Give You a List of Permits? No, We Will Not Be Able to Give You a List of Permits. As You'll Find Out, Permits and The Number of Permits Will Vary County to County. We Have Listed Only Those Permits That Generally must Be Kept in Place and Maintained for An Operation to Meet the BLM's Standards. Now, What Happens When We Have Someone Who Doesn't Want to Meet The Standards? Well, We Have a Set of Prohibited Acts and Those Prohibited Acts Look Back to Our Standards, and We Have an Enforcement Mechanism. This Enforcement Mechanism Is Composed of Several Levels of Engagement. The First Is an Order. If We Find That You Are Not in Compliance, If You Are Not Reasonably Incident, and You Are A Threat to Health and Safety, We Can Order You off the Public Lands. We Invoke Section 302c of Flpma And We Say, "Get off the Public Lands During the Pendency of the Review." Where in the Regulations Can People Find Reference to the Orders? Oh, You Would Ask That. That Is -- Excuse Me, While I Shuffle Papers Here. Being from Washington, Rick Is Expert at Shuffling Papers. Oh, Matthew... 37 -- 3715.7. and You'll Find That on Page 27. 27 and it Basically Says That We Will Give Orders, We Expect Them to Be Complied With, We Will Give Notice of Noncompliance, and They Are Expected to Be Complied with. Now, Lots of Folks Have Said, Oh, Great, You Know, Here's an Order, Here's a Notice of Noncompliance, I've Been Giving These Things out in 3809 and They Haven't Done a Bit of Good. They Can Be Appealed. The Order to Quit the Public Lands During the Pendency of Your Appeal Has a Unique Twist To It. When You Are Thrown off the Public Lands, If You're a Bad Actor, and You Say, "I Don't Have to Take This, I'm Going to File an Appeal and Your Order Won't Have Any Effect," We Have An Interesting Surprise... That Order Is Not Subject to Being Stayed by the Board of Land Appeals. When an Order to Quit the Public Lands Has Been Issued and the Circumstances Have Warranted It, There Is No Appeal for the Quitting the Public Lands Order That Will Suspend It. You Have to Stay off During the Pendency of the Appeal and this Is Important. This Is the Big Hammer That We Will Have in Forcing the People Off the Land That We Don't Think Should Be There and Who Most People Agree Aren't Real Miners. If You Want to See What Can Be Done, If You Don't Comply -- People Don't Comply with the BLM Orders, It's at the Bottom of Page 28 in Your Handout, and That Is Section 3715.7-2 Entitled "What Happens If I Do Not Comply with a BLM Order?" at this Point We Then Move Onto the Substantial Amount of Teeth That We Built into this Regulation Remember That the Task Force Said We Didn't Want To Have a Set of Regulations That Looked and Acted like 3809 That Had One More Appealable Piece of Paper. We Built into it a Set of Criminal Penalties. If We Say "Get Off," We Have One Option: One Option Is to Ask The U.s. Attorney to Go to Court and Say to the Judge, "Please Enjoin this Person Permanently." Failure to Comply with an Order Also Carries with it the Potential for Being a Criminal Act. Dennis Mclane Our Chief Ranger Is Waiting in the Wings Here, and He Has a Presentation Later in the Week Which Is Well Worth Joining Us for and We Also Have Some Case Histories for of Cases That Did Complete Criminal Prosecution. We Will Be Getting to Those as The Week Progresses. Okay. Now, I Want to Stress, Dennis Is Going to Stress it as Well, Criminal Penalties Are the Penalties of Last Resort. We Do Not Encourage You to Immediately Rush out and Throw Criminal Penalties about in Discrim Nutly. I Said Before You Need to Work With People. I Focus My Comments There on the Existing Occupants. That Same Piece of Advice Applies to Those Folks Who Are In Noncompliance. And Who You Give an Order to and Say "Clean up Your Act." The One Time We to Not Tolerate Anyone's Activities Is When They Are Not Reasonably Incident and They Are a Threat to Health and Safety. Those Are the Folks That We Need Off the Public Lands and That's When We Issue That Order That Says "Quit!" Now, If You Would like to Ask Us Some Questions about What Constitutes Threats to Health And Safety, I Would Ask That You Would Probably Be Best off until Tomorrow Afternoon or Friday Because We Will Be Getting Deeply into Threats to Public Safety Then. Matt, We Have Some Questions. We Have, What, about 15 Minutes Left? Also, Do You Want to Go into The Interim Guidance? The Forms and What We Do with The Form That the Occupant Sends Us and So On? the Interim Guidance Is Pretty Plain. I Will -- You Will Find the Interim Guidance Instruction Memo on -- Starting on Page D as in Deery, 31 of Your Handouts. the Interim Guidance -- Question Here: for Those Folks Who Submit Occupancy Forms And During the Grace Period, Do We Have to Conduct Surface Use Determinations by the End of the Grace Period? No. No. And this Is a Point That Was Made by Nevada. When We Were Drafting the Final Regulations and We Were Bouncing It off Select State Offices, We Were Sort of Shocked by One of The Responses We Got, Which Was, Oh, My God, You Expect Us to Do All of this in One Year? We All Shook Our Heads and Said, No, No, That's Not What We Meant. What We Meant Was That We Expect To Have a Year's Grace Period For the Operator to Get Right With the Regulations, with the Code Folks and with BLM. We Don't Expect BLM to Take on 2,000 Surface Use Determinations In a Single Year. In Two Years. Or Likely in Three Years. What We Are Saying to the Public Is That You Should Be Ready to Receive an Inspection Within -- By the End of That First Year, But If We Don't Get to You, Then It's up to BLM and It's Not Your Fault. There Is No Penalty If -- for You the Operator If We Don't Come and Inspect You. Now, That Means We're Going to Have to Do Some Scheduling. That Means We're Going to Have To Do Some Juggling of Resources To Go out and Look at Things Over Probably about a Three to Four-year Period. These Rules Are Not the End of Occupancy. These Rules Are the Beginning of The End of the Illegal and Unmanaged Occupancy. Our Job in this Case Is -- as I Said Earlier Is Kind of like Herding Cats. The First Job You've Got Is to Get a Big Enough Line Around Them to Trap Them and Then You Have to Go in and Try to Move Them Around and Do Some More Cutting, and That's What We Will Do, Albeit, Just like Herding Cats, They Got Clause. You Don't Want to Get Scratched. We Don't Want to Get Scratched. So We Will Move Slowly on this. Great. I've Got a Couple of Questions Here I Would like to Deal with. As I Mentioned, We've Gotten a Large Number of Questions and We'll Try to Deal with as Many As We Can Before the Break, but Don't Hesitate to Send in Some More and We'll -- We'll Look at Questions over the next Break And During Lunch and Try to Work Them into Our Presentations. A Question Here: since Fencing Is Included in the Definition of Occupancy, Please Explain Why The Occupancy Notification Form Is Not Needed. Okay. In the Case of Fencing, Fencing -- the Determination Was Made That Fencing Was Not Likely to Cause a Problem on the One Hand. And It's Mainly the Issue of Finding out Who Has Somebody Residing. The Mere Presence of a Fence Has Never Obstructed Most People, Particularly If They Have a Fencing Tool and People Have Been Known to Get Around Fences Fairly Easily. The Occupancy Question, on the Other Hand, Is the Placement of Structures, the Presence of Watchmen, the Placement of Buildings, Physical Residence, And That, in Our Estimation, When We Drafted the Rule and When We Wrestled with the Policy Cuts We Would Have to Make and The Number of Cases We Would Deal With, Was Decided as the More Important Issue. Also I Would Want to -- I Believe We Would Want to Emphasize That Fencing Would Still Be Covered under 3809? Well, Fencing Will Still Be Under 3809 but at the Same Time Fencing Will Ultimately Come Under 3815. and We Would Encounter Fences That Are Given Us to Because They're Not Required on the Occupancy Form as a Normal Part Of Our Everyday Work. but I Think Possibly for the Claimants out There They've Got A Real Confusion Factor on a Lot Of These Forms -- or this Particular Form and My Advice Has Been Primarily to Them to Ship it In. If in Doubt, We'll Make a Decision on it Later. So... Fair Enough. Another Question We Have Coming up Is, as a Condition of Approving an Occupancy, Can We Require an Operator to Install a BLM-supplied Lock as Well as Their Own on a Gate Through Their Fence? If We Need to Get Through That Gate, Yes. You Bet. We Can Absolutely Require Them to Provide -- to Use a BLM Lock. That's Right. Okay. Another Question Coming That We Got Is, Is a Portal Occupancy, I Assume That this Particular Person Is Asking about a Portal To an Add it or a Collar of a Shaft, but the Question Is Not Really Clear. in One Sense, the Portal Is a Structure, but in Another Sense The Portal Is Mining. It Is a Reasonably Related, Reasonably Incident Activity That Is Actually Mining, and it Is, Thus, Not Occupancy Unless Somebody Is Sleeping Underground. in Other Words, the Portal Isn't an Occupancy; It's a Use. Exactly. It's a Reasonably Incident Use. So, Too, Would a Headframe Be a Reasonably Incident Use. this One Is an Interesting Question That I Think Will Apply To a Lot of Other Locations. I Know It's a Question I've Got. I've Got -- I Am Going to Paraphrase It. Suppose a Miner Does Not Live on His Claim, Does Not Have a House Or a Trail or His Claim, but Has A Large Storage Shed on His Claim in Which He Keeps Shovels And Tools and Suction Dredges And You Name It. Is He Required to Submit the Form? Understand the Shed Is Large Enough That He Could Pitch a Cot And Sleep in There If He Wanted To. the Short Answer Is, Yes, the Structure Is Capable of Supporting Habitation, Provides Shelter. in Other Words, If It's Big Enough for to You Get in out of The Rain, You Need to File the Form? Yes. Good Enough. 3715 and 3809 Are Obviously Intertwined. What Are the Chances of Merging The Two Sets of Regulations with The Goal of Combining Two Separate Regulations in One. Well, Regulatory Reinvention And Reg Redesign Is a Major Goal Of this Administration. We Are Going to Redo a Thousand Pages this Year, and There Will Be a Literal Flood of Revised Regulations Emerging from BLM And Going over to Omb. Whether They're Published or Not In this Calendar Year Is Another Question. We Raised That Same Question, And for the Moment We're Going To Leave the 3809 Regulations And the 3715 Regulations Exactly Where They Are. We'll Eventually Get Around to Blending Them into a Single Set Of Surface Management Regular Legs. We Shouldn't Be Looking for That Any Time Soon, Though? No. No. All Right. Not Unless You Plan on Volunteering to Do the Work. Not Very Likely. Good. I Have Another Question That Has Come in from One of My Colleagues in Arizona. It's Wonderful in Any Class We Give, Including Satellite Training, We Always Get These Loaded Questions from People in Town and this One Is No Exception N this One, I Won't Mention the Man's Name, He's Asked Us Basically to Define the Universe and Give Seven Examples But We'll Try to Answer this as Best We Can. If You Find Occupancy That Is Not Covered by a Notice or Plan, In Other Words, the Person Never Filed One, a Plan, Do You Establish a 3809 File at That Time and Notify the Occupant That He Is in Noncompliance with 3809 and must File a Notice and Plan? Why Not? Sounds to Me Pretty Straightforward. Scott, Do You Run into Cases Like That. . All the Time, Yeah. And They Would Also Have to Supply under 3715s Now Also. When I Was the Area Geologist In What Was Form You Arely Known As the India Resource Area, and That's Been Long Enough Ago Before There Was Dirt, I Would Say Fully Two-thirds of the Plans of Operation That I Dealt With Came in When I Stumbled Across Something on the Public Lands and Very Few Came in the Front Door and this Is Obviously No Exception. this Particular Circumstance Is Also One of Those That Would Lead You to Look to Ask the Question, Anyway, Of, Do We Want To Take an Enforcement Action Under 3715? Because Conducting Use or Occupancy Without Having a Properly Reviewed Plan or Notice Is a Prohibited Act and Could Be Subject to Criminal Penalties. That's Right. and We Have Changed the Universe a Little with These Regulations. We Have Redefined the Boundary Of Conditions of Matt's Universe And Seven Different Examples. Now There Is a Penalty for Conducting Activity Without Going and Getting Proper Authorization. That's an Interesting Point Because it Seems to Change the Prime Regulation That We Would Be Dealing with New Surprising Operations That We'd Never Heard Of and I Know as a Tool it Would Have Done Me a Lot of Good. It Would Have Made My Work a Lot Easier All Those Years Ago. Of Course, You Were There. Yes. One Other Question That Came -- this Is -- I'm Still Working Off of the Same Fax on this One, So this Is Great. Do Building Codes, et Cetera, And Local Zoning Apply to Public Lands? The Answer to That Right Now Is A Qualified Yes, Especially When It Comes to Building Codes and I Know, Scott, You'll Be Dealing With Those Later and I'll Be Dealing with Those in Some More Detail Tomorrow. And Does Granite Rock Apply? In Other Words, the Granite Rock Decision. Let's Just Hold the Answer on That One Because Our Exercise at Lunch Time Tomorrow in Many Respects Speaks Directly to the Granite Rock Issue. Okay. Well, Scott, Do You Have Any Observations on How We've Done So Far? So Far, Pretty Good. Have We Got Any More Faxes or Questions Coming In? We Do Have a Comment That Came in and it Seems to Have Disappeared So We'll Pick it up After the Break. I Think this Is Another Good Time to Break for Our Final Morning Break, and So When We Return, Scott Murrellwright Will Pick up the Topic of Use Authorizations and Occupant Submissions. His Notes Begin with Make M, M As in Murrellwright, 1. While You're out on the Break It's a Good Time for to You Think of Questions to Fax to Us And We'll Try to Work Them into Our Presentations for the Remainder of the Morning and Again Tomorrow. Remember That We're Planning a Telephone Question and Answer Session this Afternoon. So We'll Be Back in 15 Minutes And Be Sure to Leave Your Tv Turned On. Scad Intertwined. Welcome Back from Your Second Morning Break. Once We're Through with the Questions and Answers That Came In, and We Had a Few Questions That Came In, and We'll Have Answers for Most of Them, Scott Murrellwright Will Then Take Overuse Occupancy and Use Authorizations. Let's Deal with Some of the Questions First. We Have a Fuel That Are Really Straightforward. A Number of the Questions Actually Ask the Same Question, And That's Base Clay: What Happens If an Operator Fails to File the Occupancy Form? The Answer Is Really Straightforward. The Full Force and Effect of the Regulations Take Effect Immediately. Or at the End Of, What -- October 16th, 1996. This Individual Who Fails to File the Form Is Going to Have To Be in Full Compliance with The Regulations, and That's the Point That You Need to Make to Somebody Who Asks the Question. If You Feel You're Ready to Be In Full Compliance with These Regulations on October 16th, Don't File the Form. But If You Have Any Doubt in Your Mind, File That Form. the Bottom Line Is If the Person Doesn't File the Form, They Don't Have the Benefits of The Grace Period. I Have Another Question: since Technically a Mining Claim Should Not Be Staked until Exploration Reveals a Discovery, Would an Occupancy Used During The Prospecting or Exploration Process Would Be Regulated There Are 3715? The Answer to That Is Yes. The Examples Are Spike Camps in Alaska. I Know Years Ago I Used to Work For a Uranium Company and We Explored for Uranium in Wyoming And We Had Spike Camps, and That Sort of Thing Would Be Regulated. and It's Occupancy. It's Public Lands or Mining Claims and Mill Sites. That's One of the Important Facts That Exist out Here, Is That You Don't Need a Mining Claim to Go out and Explore and Prospect for Minerals. Another Question We've Received Is Do the 3715 Regulations Apply to Structures That Existed Before the Miner Filed the Mining Claim That They're Located On? Short Answer Is Yes. We'll Have a Lot More to Say About That Later. Also, Do the 3715 Regulations Stand-alone or Can They Be Used Along with the 9828 Regulations? You Bet! They Can Be Used Together and We'll Get into Fairly -- Pretty Fair Detail on and That Scott Has Quite a Lot to Say about That. Rick, You Have a Couple That You Want to Deal with. Okay. I Have a Question, One Came In, A Question on the Form. One of the Questions Asks the Mining Claimants, Do You Claim Fee Simple Title to the Lands? That's Got a Lot of People Puzzled. That Grew out of the Concern Expressed by the Nevada State Office That They Had to Deal With Town Sites, Either Formal Town Sites That Didn't Make it Or Town Sites That Grew up Informally Around Existing Mining Operations, and the Land Title Questions in Those Areas Are So Tangled That it Doesn't Make Any Sense for BLM to Attempt to Make a Determination Of Reasonably -- Reasonably Incident or Is Occupancy Justified. So We Said the Simple Solution Is to Build Another Box and Put These Folks in That Box If We Agree That They Have Some Kind Of Colorable Title Claim on the Land and We'll Get Around to Making a Reasonably Incident Determination Once the Department Has Concluded the Issue of Land Title. That's the Only Reason That's There. That Also Deals with Town Sites, I Understand. Yes. Yes. Okay. Another Question Comes Up, Says: Essentially That They View the Statement in 3715.0-1 C As Applying to Only the Public And Not to the Miner. Well, We're Sorry That It's Read That Way. The Express View of the Department of the Interior All The Way Through the Solicitor And All the Way Through the Assistant Secretary Is That it Is the Position of the Department of the Interior Acting Through BLM That with Respect to These Regulations the Mere Fact That a Mining Claimant Possesses a Mining Claim Does Not Endanger or in Any Way Interfere with Their Rights as a Citizen. What Section Is That Again, Rick. 3715.0-1c. Great. We Had a Further Fax That Came In. One of the Questions Has to Do With a Portal Which Appears to Be an Adit -- Which Is Basically An Adit into a Mountain, a Mining Adit this. Particular Portal Has a Chimney Coming out. Do They Need to File the Occupancy Form. If Somebody Is Living in It, They Need to File an Occupancy. the Fact It's an Adit -- Another Question Came Up, What's The Statutory Authority That Gave the Area Manager the Right To Issue the Cessation and Suspension Notice? Flpma, Federal Land Policy Management Act Section 302c of Flpma. And Section 302c of Flpma's Powers Are Further Delegated by The General Powers Granted to The Secretary under 43 Usc 1201. It Comes to the Area Manager Through the Many and Varied Secretarial, Departmental and Bureau Delegations, but There Is Plenty of Authority for It. Great. One Other Question: How Should We Handle Winter Visitors? Claimants Who Are Not Occupying The Land on August 15th but Filed the Grace Period Form. Don't Tell Me. Let Me Guess, Rick, this Question Did Not Come in from Alaska? No, it Didn't! It Came in from an Arizona Office, and the Answer to this One Is Simple: They Had to Be Occupying the Public Lands on August 15th. The Fact That They Filed the Grace Period Form Doesn't Get Them the Grace Period. So They Will Be Treated like Any Other New Occupancy, and Have to Go Through the Process Just like Anybody Else Does. So When the Winter Visitors Come Back to the Colorado River Region on November -- in November and December, They Need To Be Getting Their Paper Work Right down to the BLM Office to Be Legal? Exactly. Okay. Good to Know. Scott, I Think It's Time to Move Along. All Right. So Take It. Okay. Thank You. Good Morning. My Portion of the Program Today Begins on M1 and Covers Use Authorizations under the New 3715 Regulations. If You'll Bear with Me for a Second Here, this Is Kind of a Compaction of the Regulations. So this Is Not Verbatim and in Each Particular Section I Have Lumped Them up Given the Time Constraints We Have Here Today. So I Will Try and Point out the Individual Sections That I'm Referring to as We Go along. So Let's Give Ate Try Here. -- Give it a Try Here. Hopefully at the End of the Session the Training Will Be Able to List the Standards and Requirements Appear Use or Occupancy must Meet to Be Authorized, Determine If a Proposed Occupancy Will Meet the Concurrent Standards, Be Able to List State and Local Building And Safety Standards and with The Understanding That All Jurisdictions Will Be Different, Explain Generally How to Go About Determining Local Standards. You'll Also See a List of Handouts There. I Need to Draw Your Attention First off to Number 10. You'll Notice Mine Is Probably Different than Yours. If You Would -- Notice You're on Make M as in Murrellwright, 1, That's M1 of Your Handouts. If You Haven't Already Found Page M1, You Probably Ought to Do So Now. Thank You, Matt. If We're All into the Handout Section Now, Look at Number 10. If You Look at the Screen, the Television Screen You'll See "Letter of Authorization." If You Would, If You're Looking At Yours Now, You Will See on Number 10 "Certificate of Occupancy." Cross That out and Replace That With "Letter of Authorization." You Will Also Find on Page M14 This Letter of Authorization or Certificate of Occupancy That Is Stated Here. If You Want to Do the Same to That, or Just Make a Note Right Now, You Can Take Care of it Later On. Anyhow, We Have 10 Handouts Listed Here. If You've Already Had a Chance To Breeze Through the Packet There You Will Notice There Are More than 10. It Will Be Unlikely That We Even Cover What We've Got Listed Right Here Today, but They're For Future Reference. They Would Be Good Things to Look at to Help You Guide You Along in Your Future Activities Or Your Future -- Trying to Implement These New Regulations. Use Authorization. Written Authorization Is Required for Occupancy or Use of A Mining Claim If it Exceeds 14 Days in a 90-day Period. This Is Something New. This Is Not Something That We've Had Before at Our Disposal. We Now Do. It's Important to Mention That the 14 Day Ins a 90-day Period Is Not a Nonconcept. It Has Been Used for Years In, I Believe It's 43 Cfr 8360. You Camp -- You Can't Camp on The Public Lands for More than 14 Day Ins a 90-day Period and Putting Them Together Makes Them Consistent with Other Subparts. the 14 Day Limit Also Applies To Uses Related to Storage Facilities, Fences and Gates. Some of the Standards and Requirements under 3715.5, the Use and Occupancy must Be Incident. Avoid Unnecessary or Undue Degradation. Must Conform to All Applicable Federal and State Environmental Standards. And the Claimants must Also Obtain All Required Permits Under 43 Cfr 3800 and 3710. It's Important to Note That Key Word Applicable under Federal and State Environmental Permits. And Applicable Also Would Apply To Permits That the County Might Require. It Is Not Reasonable of Us to Require a Claimant to Get a Permit Only to Have Them Go to The County and Have the County Person Say "You Don't Need That!" That's Correct. So We Need to Educate Ourself As to What Permits People Are Likely to Need. I'll Be Getting into That in Another Minute or Two Here. Please Note That Permanent Structures Are Not Permitted If Exploration Only -- Exploration Only Involves Surface Activities. And Temporary Structures Are Permitted During Exploration Activities. Permanent Structures Are Permissible If Subsurface Exploration Is Proposed. Now, We Might Want to Mention The Sort of Permanent Structures That Are Envisioned with Subsurface Exploration and Those Are the Permanent Structures Required for Health and Safety. Anything That Requires a Poured Foundation Is Going to Be a Permanent Structure, and If You're Going Underground, Especially in a Shaft, You're Going to Need a Headframe, a Hoist House and to Meet Safety Requirements You Will Have to Pour Permanent Foundations. But You Can Still Tow in Other Things. You'll Need a Change Room for Miners. You'll Need Storage of Equipment. You Can Get Change Rooms for Miners with Showers and Lockers And So on That Are Built on an 8-foot Wide Trailer Platform. So Can You Still Use a Temporary Structure for Most of the Ancillary Facilities During Underground Exploration. Thank You. And, Again, All Structures must Conform with Applicable State And Local Building, Fire and Electrical Codes and Occupational Standards. Those Are the Standards That Were in Effect at the Time the Structure Was Built. at the Time the Structure Was Built. Right. Correct. Some Localities May Require a Certificate of Occupancy Indicating That the Building Has Met Health and Safety Codes. This Particular Certificate of Occupancy Will Be -- If it Is Issued -- Will Be Done by the County at the Completion of the Facilities or Structures That Have Been Permitted on the Public Lands. And Some Indication That the Proposed Structure Can Be Approved by BLM May Be Requested By the Locality. In Other Words, at the Completion of a Review of a Proposed Occupancy Mining Operation, There May Be Some Instances Where BLM Will Have to Write a Letter of Written Authorization to the County Authorizing Them to Process the Permits. You'll Find an Example of One Of Those Letters Inside Your Notes, Even If Scott Doesn't Get To It, I Believe There Is at Lest One in There for Format. Which Case Is That. I Believe That Is -- this Will Be the Golden Eagle Proposal. the Golden Eagle Proposal. If You Want a Good Example of What Those Could Look Like, Go Into the Go Ahead Uneagle Propose You. Remember, a Lot of the Handouts We Handed You Are Intended for Future Reference and Things Can You Pattern Your Work after and We May Not Talk about All of Them Here Today. Scott? and Back to Me. Also Sewage and Sanitation Permits, Which We've Pretty Much Touched on Already. What These Regulations Require Is a Closer Working Relationship With Local Agencies. In California, Given Today's Tight Budget Constraints, Which Go Across All State Lines Concerning the Counties, Too, We Need to Work Hand in Hand with The County. It's up to Us Now as Specialists To Contact the Counties and Find What County Codes Are Applicable. If They Have the Work Force to Implement Them along with this Requires Us Getting on the Phone And Finding out Just Who Wants To -- or Can Work with Us in Implementing These Regulations. I Work in the Folsom Resource Area and We Manage BLM Lands in Roughly 11 Counties. Our Land Pattern Is a Patchwork Quilt Covering Approximately 250,000 Acres with Numerous 10 To 40-acre Parcels and in Some Cases Surrounded by Private Property. I Would Describe the Counties in Which I Work in as Proactive When it Comes to County Codes Applying to BLM, Apply to Go BLM Land. It's Not Too Unoften We Have an Adjacent Land Owner Who Calls Us And Also Contacts the County Boards Who Is Building a $250,000 Home Adjacent to BLM When They Have a Trailer and Septic Hole That They Can See Out Their Kitchen Window. It's Cases like That That in 1991 to Help Implement Our Policies over There That the California State Director Ed Hastey under 8365 Implemented Supplemental Rule. It Went Through the Review Period and Was Finalized in 1991. If You Look at Your Handouts You'll See the Farthing Case and In That We Used the 8365s, Which The County Assisted BLM in an Inspection and the County Determined That this Occupancy Site Was in Violation of County Codes and the Trailers Were up On Slabs Without Permits, Wood Stoves Without Permits and There Was No Septic System. In -- Scott, Did We Provide Them a Copy of the Farthing Case in the Notes? There Is a Copy. about What Page Does That Start On. They Should Find That on M21 Through 64. If You Would like to Read the Case Sometime During Lunch or After Hours, It's a Good Read. I Do Recommend It. Yes, I Tried to Provide a Good Majority of the Case in That Description There. That Is One of the Things That Helps the Case to Get Concurrence or Affirmation by Ibla, That Is Having a Case That Is Put Together and Things Are Documented. Without Documentation, Things Just Don't Happen. If it Isn't Documented, it Didn't Happen. it Didn't Happen. Correct. So the Bottom Line Is Here, in Terms of Implementing Our Regulations in the New 3715s, We Need to Work Hand in Hand with The County. BLM Is Not Qualified and Does Not Have the Authority to Inspect or Issue Violation Notices for County Codes, and How That Generally Works Is When We Go out and Do a Joint Inspection, the County Will Write up a Violation Notice, Which You Will Also Find in Your Handouts and I Will Reference That a Little Later, They Write The Violation Notice and Then BLM as Land Owner Is Issued That Letter and Then We in Turn Write Notices of Noncompliance to the Mining Claimant Citing the County Codes That They're in Violation of and Then We Give Them the Appeal Process. This Is a 3809 Case. It Is Applicable Also to 3715. So That's Why It's in There to Help You Use it as a Guide. Some Typical State and Local Ordinances That You'll Be Using Are Health and Safety Codes Where Any Structure Used for Habitation Requires Appropriate Sewer, Power and Structural Stability. And You'll Also Run into Uniform Building Codes, Which Require Valid Permits to Elect, Construct, Enlarge, Modify. And Also a Code That Some People May Not Be Aware of That We Can -- That Is Applicable to Public Lands, Especially in California, Is Vehicle Codes, Especially When it Comes to Vehicles out There That Have Not Been Registered for a Number of Years, If You're Looking at a Site That Looks like a Junkyard. in Other Words, this Is a Great Way to Abate What Ends up Looking like an Auto Wrecking Yard but Is on a Mining Claim? Correct. Also the Handout, Maricopa County, Again, it Reinforces What Was Happening There in Mass Placer County, the Ibla Case There. You Will Notice There Is a Response to a Joint Infection by BLM and County Code Inspectors. No Running Water Again. No Sewage Disposal in the Dwelling. They Also List the Uniform Building Codes They Are Not in Compliance with. You Will Be Able to Find That on Page M113 for Your Review. You Will Also Find Mariposa County Codes in There to Give You an Idea What You Can Be Expecting down the Road. This Particular Case Now We Have Before the U.s. Assistant -- District Attorney's Office, and We Are Seeking -- We Have Seeked A Court Injunction, Are in the Process Now of Going Through a Settlement Agreement. Again, to Give You Another Illustration of Counties, We Have Placer County Handout. You'll See a Different Style of Warning Notice, Code Violation. Again Dealing with an Occupancy Where Permits Are Required Due To Land Classification and That's One Thing You'll Be Asking the County, How Are We Zoned out There? Is it Zoned Forestry, Residential? Do Your Codes Apply? Do They Not Apply? What's Going On. You'll Be Able to Find the {Zoin}ing on Page M69 and Trailer Occupancy Regulations on Pages M71 Through 76 to Give You An Idea. Moving onto Claimant Submissions, under 3715.3, Consultation Is Now Required. If You Are Going to Be Residing On Public Land for Exceeding the 14 Days in a 90-day Period. If a Mining Operation Exceeds Casual Use as Defined in 43 Cfr 3800 a Notice/plan of Operation Needs to Be Submitted According To 3802 and 3809 for Review Concurrently with Materials Under 3715.3-2. Information Required to Process The Proposal under 3715.3-2 Includes a Detailed Map That Identifies the Site and the Placement of Structures, Fences, Gates, Signs, Enclosures and Location of Reasonable Public Access Through or Around the Mining Site. by a Detailed Map, Does That Mean That the Occupant Will Have To Have it Prepared by an Engineering Company? Not Necessarily. Where I Work in the Mother Load, Ideal More with the Small Miners Out There, and as an Example, You Could Look on Page M112 at The Golden Eagle Map. That One Is a Fair Representation of What Is -- It's Acceptable. It's Not the Standards of a Mining Company, but for Our Purposes it Gives Us an Idea as To What the Intentions Are with The Claimant. As Long as it Clearly Depicts The Information We Need, It's Good Enough? Yes. And If We Do Have Problems with It, We Can Always Get in Contact With the Claimant and Correct Anything We Need To. Good. Thanks. A Written Description and Detail Is Also Required -- Description Is Also Required as to How the Occupancy Is Reasonably Incident, How it Constitutes Substantially Regular Work, Observes Observable on the Ground Activities Would That Lead to the Development of an Economic Deposit, and Also the Use of Appropriate Equipment That Is Presently Operable Subject to Reasonable Repair, Maintenance, et Cetera. Occupancy May Also Involve One Or More of the Following: Protecting from Loss or Theft Valuable Minerals or Regularly -- I Have to -- Protecting from Loss or Theft Valuable Minerals And/or Regularly Used Equipment. I Have to Learn How to Spell Here One of These Day Snooze I Have to Defend Scott on this One. I Put Those Elmo Cards Together For Him and I Ran Them Through My Spell Check and I Have an Awful Feeling Added to the Custom Dictionary. Also the Occupancy must Involve or Can Involve Protecting the Public from Equipment or Surface Uses Which If Unattended Create a Hazard to Public Safety. We'll Go into Some More Detail on Public Safety Hazards Tomorrow. and Located in an Isolated Area That Would Prevent Workers From Working a Full Eight-hour Shift. And this You Can Find under 3715.2-1. The Proposal must Demonstrate a Need for Enclosures, Fences and Signs to Exclude the Public. Could I See Slide 109, Please? As an Example, as to What Some Of the Proposals May or May Not Come up With, this Is a Gate That We Encountered on One of Our Inspections, and the Question Here Is, Is this Appropriate? The Gate May Be Appropriate, but Is the Construction of it So? Is it Intimidating, Threatening? That's a Good Question and I Think Maybe We Ought to Reserve Further Discussion of this One Until this Afternoon When We Have Dennis Mclane with Us. Anyhow, That's an Example of What Many of You May Very Well Know We Encounter out There. Also the Proposal must Also Provide an Estimated Period of Use of the Structures, Enclosures, et Cetera, as Well As the Schedule for Removal and Reclamation When Operations Cease. Temporary Occupancy May Be Extended Beyond the 14-day Limit To Secure the Site Provided Consultation Has Begun and this You'll Find under 3715.2-3. A Watchman Can Also Be Included In Your Proposal and Is Justified under 3715.2-2. For the Use of a Watchman, it Must Be Reasonably Incident and Continual, and must Be Shown That the Presence Is Required Whenever the Operation Is Not Active or When the Claimant or The Workers Are Not on Site. Another Way of Saying That, Scott, Is the Need for the Watchman Can't Disappear When The Miners Go to Town. The Watchman's Got to Be There At All Times. Good Point. That's Correct. It's Not a Case of Some Guy On the Day Crew Is Appointed Watchman and Gets to Live on Site, and When Everybody Goes to Town He Goes with Them. That Guy Has Got to Be There for The Full Time. We Have a Designated Named Individual in the Notice or Plan Of Operation? Exactly. Well, If They Have a Mine Crew of Eight People, Could it Be Any One of the Eight. I Mean, That One Guy Has to Go To Town Once in a While to Do Laundry. You Don't Necessarily Have to Specify Who the Watchman Is. Those Are the Kinds of Details That Are Best Worked out at the -- on the Ground Level. the Bottom Line Is There Needs to Be a Physical Presence At All Times. the Physical Presence and the Need for the Physical Presence Cannot Go Away When the Operation Closes for the Week, For the Weekend. It's Also Important to Note That the Underlying Use That Requires the Occupancy in Itself Needs to Be Reasonably Incident. I Remember a Case Not Far from Blythe, California, Where the Miner Asserted That He Needed a Watchman Because Eed Swimming Pool Slide and a Lot of Antique Cars and Kept Firearms That Had To Be Guarded. It Wasn't Mining but Needed a Watchman to Look after All the Stuff Not Reasonably Incident. That's What We Regulations Are About, Is Presenting Situations Such as That. Right. That's Right. Proposal Review... BLM Has 30 Business Days or Cyst Weeks to Review All Occupancy And Use Submission from Date of Receipt of the Materials, Unless BLM Concludes a Determination Cannot Be Made until 30 Business Days after it Prepares the Necessary Environmental Documents or Has Complied with The National Historic Preservation Act, the Endangered Species Act And/or Other Applicable Statutes. The Bottom Line Is Today Occupancy Cannot Be Initiated Unless the Claimant or Operator Possesses the Written Authorization from BLM and Has Obtained All Other Applicable Approvals and Permits. At the End of the Review Period For -- That Does Not Include a Plan of Operation, a Written Determination Will Be Sent to The Claimant, and under 3715.3-5, He Will Be Required to Continue to Comply with 3715.2, 3715.2-1 and 3715.5-5. That Will Be a Paragraph in There That Is Required in Our Response to It. I Would Also Recommend Attaching A Copy of the Regulations Again Also. Scott, I Think I Ought to Dive in with a Question That's Come In, Because I Remember this Being a Long-standing Argument I Had with Miners Who Said I'm Not On a Mining Claim, My House Is On a Mill Site Claim and We Have A Question in That Says, Do These All -- Do the Regulations Also Apply to Mill Site Claims? I Would Say Yes. Absolutely Yes. Without Question, They Were Intended to Apply to Mill Sites. Great. Okay. For Operations Conducted under a Plan of Operations, the Determination Will Be Concluded In a Decision That Approves or Rejects the Plan. For Letters of Nonconcurrence, The Letter of Nonconcurrence When BLM Does Not Feel That the Information Supplied Justifies Concurrence, it Will Describe How it Failed to Meet the Conditions and Also We Have the Opportunity to Give the Claimant Or Operator the Chance to Modify The Plan or If We Feel It's -- Warrants an Appeal, Then We Would Mention That to Him under 3715.9. Submissions... I Think Due to the Time Constraints Here, Matt, We'll Skip this Which Is on M4 and Also M5. So We Are Skipping Sections In M4 and 5 and We'll Move to Where. We'll Move to M12 to the Golden Eagle Placer. The Names and Faces Have Been Changed, but this Proposal Here That You'll Be Looking at Is a Operation That Is Now Underway. What We Have Here Is the Golden Eagle Placer. The Claim Sundt Max Sands. And He Is Located in Eldorado County. Again, the Map for this That We're Referring to Is on Page M112. Mr. Sands Says I Am Propose to Go Conduct a Placer Operation About 300 Yards North of the Green River. I Intend to Mine the Old River Banks on a Daily Basis for the Next 20 Years and Currently Plan To Disturb less than Five Acres. I Intend to Process the Material On Site and Will Be Setting up a Trommell, Crusher, Screens and Sluices. Of the. I Will Also Be Using a Generator, Dump Truck and Backhoe. Water to Run the Processing Plant Will Be Pumped from the Green River and I Am Currently Pursuing Obtaining a Water Rights Permit from Regional Water Quality Control. I Estimate the Wash Plant Can Process up to Nine Cubic Yards Of Material per Hour and My Intention Is to Eventually Apply For Patent. Given That this Is to Be a Year-round Operation, I Will Need to Set up Residence on My Claim. My Wife Will Be the Only Other Full-time Occupant. Presently My Residency Will Consist of Temporary Structures. I Need to Place a Camper Trailer, Tent House, Shower and Chemical Toilet at the Location Marked on the Attached Map. I Also Require a 10 by 12 Foot Metal Storage Building, a Mill Building and a Water Storage Tank. Gasoline and Diesel Fuel Will Be Stored in 55-gallon Drums 50 Feet from Any Structure and Chemical Fire Extinguishers Will Be Available and the Ground Will Be Cleared from Flammable Debris. Existing Holes Will Be Fitted -- I Think I Meant Filled on That One. That's Not Matt's Mistake. One Is Mine -- Will Be Filled With Tailings. Trash Will Be Brought to the County Dump. Any Disturbance in Contour Will Be Filled to a Natural-looking State. And Areas Will Be Reseeded and Replanted and All Equipment and Structures Will Be Removed When The Operation Is Completed. Based on His Submissions, the Consensus at the Time, and Even Today, Is That He Would Get a Letter of Concurrence, and... A Letter of Concurrence. We Have Completed Our Review of Our Proposal -- to Your -- Oh, Boy. Excuse Me. Hang on a Second. We Have a Question That Just Came in and I Think this Might Be a Really Good Time to Dive in And Deal with It. It's, Again, from Our -- My -- One of My Usual Suspects Here in Phoenix. I Think He's Going to Owe Me a Beer or Something When this Is Over with. This Is Addressed Really to Rick. If I Remember the Definition of Casual Use in 3809, Occupancy Is Not One of Those Items That Can Push an Operation above Casual Use. Are We to Assume That Now? If the Operator Is Doing Pick And Shovel Work, It's Clearly Casual Use, but Eye Doesn't Justify Occupancy. Will We Then Require a Notice or Just Require the Occupancy to Cease? There Seems to Be Some Inconsistency. Well, That's a Good Point. You Get to this by Saying: Are You Doing Occupancy? If You Are Doing Occupancy at Casual Use Levels and it Is Possible to Do Occupancy at Casual Use Levels, and Let Me Take as an Example a Spike Camp In the Middle of Alaska, People Doing Geologic Reconnaissance, People Doing Mapping and People Doing Backpack Geophysics -- I Have Done All Three of Those in My Career, Checkered as Though It May Be -- Would Be a Casual Use Level Activity and Would Involve -- Could Involve Occupancy in Excess of 14 Days Based out of a Tent Camp and So The Rule Would Apply to Casual Use Level Activity. I Think It's Important to Note That the Kind of Occupancy That a Casual Use Activity Is Going to Warrant in Most Cases Will Be Almost in Distinguishable from a Recreational Camp. You're Going to Be Hard to Able Them from the Ordinary Elk Hunter Using a Wall Tent. That's Correct. That's Why We Adopted the 14-day Standard. and That Leads Us to Another Question That Came In, Which I Think this Is a Good Time to Cover. Most State BLM 43 Cfr Supplemental Regulars Are 14 Daze Within a 28 Day, Not 90 Days. Will this New Use Authorization Interfere with Existing Camping Regs? the Answer to That One Is We'll Look at It. I Doubt That it Will, but -- Pay Attention to the Information Bulletins. Pay Attention to Information Bulletins When They Come out. and He Will We' Have That Answer in Due Time. Scott to Sorry to Interrupt -- Back to Your First Question There, Just So It's Clear, an Occupancy Can Be Proposed on a 3715s and under a Casual Use Operation, Which Means No 3809 Notice Would Necessarily Be Submitted. There Would Be No 3809 Notice But There Would Be Some Written Concurrence in the Paper Trail Somewhere. Right. There Would Be a 3715 Case File. Right. and the Requirements of 3715 Would Apply, and the Advantage To this Is the Casual User Has Still Got to Clean up the Site When They Leave. That's Correct. This Also Speaks to Why You're Asking Pour Separate Case Files For Basically the Same Operation? Exactly. And -- it Will Sure Make Things Easier for Record Keeping. I Think Also Maybe in Some of The Cases We Will Also Receive Notices That Are Actually Casual Use. That's Right. Especially in Some of the California Desert Areas. The Difference Between Casual Use and Notice Level Is Very Hard to Disearn at Times. Just Be Aware. Back to Our Letter of Concurrence Here for Max Sands. We Have Completed Our Review of Your Proposal to Occupy Your Golden Eagle Placer Mining Claim. Camc 34512 Submitted under 43 Cfr 3715.1. -- I'm Sorry. Under 3715. I Concur with Your Occupancy as Long as You Continue to Comply With Subparts 3715.2, 3715.2-1 And 3715.5 (Attached). This Is the Paragraph That must Be Included in All Levels of -- Letters of Concurrence. Prior to Establishing Your Occupancy, You must First Obtain Building and Sanitation Permits From Eldorado County. I Have Enclosed an Authorization Letter for to You Submit to the County So They Will Process the -- Process the Required Permits. When You've Obtained the Necessary Permits, Please Provide BLM with Copies for Your Case File. If You Have Any Questions, Contact Rock Pit at and a Sample Authorization Letter, I Would Do This Differently Today. I Would Probably Recommend Instead of Giving the Copy or The Letter to the Claimant, Ship It Directly to the County Itself. Then, Again, That's All Going to Depend on the County and the Personnel You're Dealing with There. I Would Say in That Case They Definitely Want to Send a Carbon Copy to the Claimant Who Should Be Keeping Records of this as Well. Yes. Letter of Authorization... S.crammer, Your County Planning Department. Max Sands Is the Owner of the Golden Eagle Placer Claim Located on BLM Lands. It Is Our Understanding That Before Eldorado County Will Accept an Application for a Building Permit the Land Owner Must Provide Documentation That Authorizes the Proposed Construction on the Lands Involved. Mr. Sands Has Demonstrated the Need to Build a Storage Shed With a Bathroom at His Occupancy Site in the Green River Canyon. He Plans to Connect Gray Water And Sewer Lines from the Build To Go a Septic System. Mr. Sands Is Conducting Gold Mining Operations under 43 Cfr 3809. Notice of Operations and Is Currently Authorized to Occupy His Claim under 43 Cfr 3715. The Proposed Septic System and 200 Square Foot Structure Is Considered to Be Consistent with Mining and Occupancy Notice as Approved. You May Regard this Letter as Authorization from the BLM to Issue and Process Permits Necessary for the Construction Of the Structure and Utility. Sincerely, Area Manager. I Think Another Question Comes Up Here Is Regarding Exploration Activities. What Do We to about Septic Systems There? We Have Found, Number One, I Don't Think Septic Systems Fall Under the Level of Activity That Would Require a Septic System or Something That We Would Necessarily Want. We Have Worked it out with a Number of Counties Where If the Claimants Who Intend to Occupy, Obtain Approval or Obtain a Contract for a Portable Toilet From a Licensed Septic System Within the Area, We Can Accommodate Them under That Process and Still Meet the Guidelines and Codes. That Would Be One of Those Forest Green Plastic Things That You Open the Door of and Latch It Behind You. the Hard Plastic. Johnny-on-the-spot Basically. along with the Contract to Empty It. It's Important to Note What We Mean by a Portable Toilet Is Not A Folding Stool with a Bag. Correct. And If You Want to Look a Little Farther into That, There Are in Your Handout You Will Look on Pages M91 Through 103 and this Again Is in Mariposa County, Not To Be Picky on Mariposa County, This Is Where the County Has Approved a Portable Toilet Use For Six Months Provided the Claimant Provides Copies of Contracts for Local Septic Service. Every Six Months That Has to Be Renewed. That Is a Casual Use Operation Out There. It's Hand Tools. What Page Was That On? That Was on Pages M91 Through 103. It Is Notices Supplied in There And Also Correspondence Back and Forth from the County and BLM. That's a Good Read. I Recommend People Have a Look At It. Just Read it after Lunch. and I Have -- What Else Have We Got? Any More Questions? We Have a Couple Faxes in Here. We Have a Little Time for Questions, and One Question Here Is, Well, Rick, Why Don't You Deal with the One You Have in Front of You. the Question Came to Us from The Butte District Office, and That Question Says: Who Gives The Order to Quit and What Authority Does the Average BLM Person Have to Issue That Quitting Order? Well, Folks, My Suggestion to You Is That the Person Signing That Order Better Be the Line Manager, and Wherever the Line Delegations End, That's Where That Order Ought to Be Signed. In Scott's Case, It's the Area Manager. Good. I Think We Have a Few Minutes, If You'd like to Phone in with a Call, and We'll Try and Handle Your Question on the Air. Again, Send Us a Fax, and We Have Another Fax Question Here To Deal with. Does the Permanent Structure Prohibition Mean That No Permanent Structure Is Allowed For Open Pit Mines or Placer Mining as These Are Surface Activities? Basically When You Are Doing Mining, You Are Allowed to Place Permanent Structures. It Is Only Exploration That We Begin to Look Askance at the Placement of Permanent Structures. So the Answer Here Is, Yes, You Can Place Permanent Structures At Placer Mines and at Open-pit Mines. I Think We Can Also -- We Can Bring up a Good Example of Why We're Asking People to Meet These Local Codes If We Would Just Have a Look at Slide 101 as A Beginning. And That's, I Think, a Marvelous Example of What Some of the Problems Are We Can Encounter That People Could Just Kind of Happen into Without Really Any Knowledge. If You Look Carefully There, That's Scott Murrellwright's Left Arm -- or Is it Your Right Arm? That Looks like My Eye Right. and There Is No Power Going To That Wire. That Is Actually the Power Supply for That Operation Coming Out of the Ground, And, Rick, Do You Think You Could Call That a Public Hazard or a Nuisance? Without Question That's Probably a Public Hazard. And Here We Want to Get into a Little Something. I'm Certain That If There's a Solicitor Listening, They're Probably on Their Way to Low Polar Orbit about Now. We Are a Land Owner. Make No Mistake about It. We Will Be the Possessor of the Deep Pockets. It Is Incumbent on Us to Ensure That All of Those Folks Who Are Using BLM Lands for Legitimate Purposes Are in Compliance with The Police Powers of the States, And That Means That They Have to Comply with the Willedding Codes, Sewage Codes, All of the Things Scott's Talked about. If We Don't Ensure That They Are In Compliance, the Liability Rebounds on Us, and We Have a Significant Burden to Shoulder. And at the Risk of Angering the Solicitors Even More, I Will Let -- No Longer Angering the Solicitors, I Will Let That Matter Go and Simply Say That We Are Now in That Unknown Terrain That We Have Consistently Tried To Avoid, Which Is the Question Of Where's the Liability? Who's at Fault? If Someone Goes Out, Occupies a Cabin or a Facility on BLM, it Does Not Meet Code, the Thing Burns to the Ground and Someone Is Killed and Injured, Who's Going to Get the Tort Filed Against Them? The Person Operating the Mining Claim, Who May Have No Money Whatsoever? Absolutely Not. It Will Undoubtedly Be the BLM. And it Is in Our Best Interest To Make Sure That We Don't Have That Circumstance Happen. That's Why We Want Structures to Meet Code. this Sort of Situation, I Think, Could Get Us Between a Rock and a Hard Place. It Might Be Worthwhile, Rick, Spending a Moment Explaining What We Go Through When We're Looking at an Abatement and the Building Is Potentially Historic Building Covered by the National Historic Preservation Act. the Problem Arises in the Creation of an Attractive Nuisance. As a Land Owner, If You Allow a Structure to Sit out on Your Back 40 and You Have Children Playing in It, It's an Old Half-beat-down Barn That You Haven't Posted, You Haven't Told People to Stay off of it and You've Made No Definitive Effort To Keep Kids out of It, If a Wind Comes along and Blows That Thing Flat to the Ground While Some Grade School Kids Are Playing in It, You Have an Attractive Nuisance, and You Have Bought Yourself a Lot of Liability. That Means That We're No Different. We Have Buildings out There That, Though They May Be Greater Than 50 Years Old, May Constitute an Attractive Nuisance. They May Be a Threat to Health And Safety. They -- Simply Because They're Falling down Around Your Ears. Or They May Be a Place Where Illegal Activities Are Occurring. We Have the Same Duty That Falls On Every Other Land Owner in the Country to Abate Attractive Nuisances, and That May Include Removal of the Structure. Or at Least a Decision to Remove -- Proposed Decision on Our Part To Remove the Structure. And Those of You Who Deal with 106 Are Probably Inwardly Groaning or Some Outwardly Groaning. There Is No Way Around That. Still, If We Are Dealing with Section 106 Compliance in Our Discussion, it Is Important to Note That this Building or Situation May Constitute a Hazard or a Nuisance. If We Could Look at Slide -- Where Did it Go? Slide 149, We Have a Good Example of a Situation That Was Very Much like That. The Slide That's about to Come Up, this Particular Residence No Longer Exists, I Have to Emphasize. This Is Formerly in Riverside County, California. The Building Was -- Portions of The Building at Least Were in Excess of 50 Years Old. It Was Being Used as a Weigh Station for Illegal Immigrants And Used to Cooking -- for Cooking Methamphetamine. In this Case Fortunately the Area Archaeologist Looked at it And Said this Has No Significance and I'm Not Sure It's over 50 Years and Left. So Moving to the next Slide, We Can Show What Actually Came out Of That Situation. Can We Move -- the next Slide Would Be 151 -- Not 151. 150. We Were Able to Abate That Situation. Understand, it Was under a Different Regulatory Regime. However, If You Have a Public Hazard or Nuisance, or If, for Example, Cooking Meth, the Shpo Needs to Know That. If There Is Going to Be Responsibility, We Need to Share It. Rick? You've Covered it All, Matt. We Have a Call Coming in Now From Randy in Las Vegas. Hello, Randy? You're on the Air. Caller: Can You Hear Me on The Phone. We Can Hear You Just Fine. Caller: Twice Now I Heard Mr. Shumaker and Murrellwright To the Issue of Zoning on Public Lands. I Would like to Clarify Something Because I Think It's Confusing Us. It's Very Clear That County Sanitation and Building Codes Apply to Public Lands, to Structures on Mining Claims and Mill Site Claims and So On, but On the Zoning Issue, Zoning Applies to Land Use, and Congress Has Spoken on the Issue That These Lands Will Be Open to Mining. So If We Are Going to Say That These Lands Are Now Subject to Zoning as Well, You Know, We Are Allowing the County to Override A Federal Land Use Decision Made By Congress. I Think -- So I Would like to Clarify this Issue of Zoning on Public Lands. You Are Right about That, Randy. In Fact, If We Have Said this Is Causing Zone to Go Apply, I Think We Were in Error. This Is an Issue We're Planning To Get into in Greater Detail Starting Tomorrow, but in -- in Fact, Our Lunch Time Exercise Tomorrow Speaks Exactly to this Case. But, Granite Rock Versus the -- Versus the State of California And So on Applies. Rick, Perhaps You Have More. No, You've Done an Admirable Job Saying Exactly What the Policy Is. The Police Powers Cross Administrative Boundaries Within A State, Whether They Are Park Service Land, BLM Land or Forest Service Land or What Have You. The Zoning Laws Are Land Use Laws and Our Caller Has Correctly Said Congress Reserves To Itself the Right to Say What Uses Will or Will Not Occur on The Public Lands. That's Absolutely Right. I Think Most of Us Are Familiar With Situations Where a Mining Claimant Operates on an Unpatented Mining Land, Mining Claim -- I'm Sorry -- Where He Knows If He Filed a Patent and Obtained Patent He Would Have to Shut down Because County Zoning Would Not Permit Him to Continue If it Was Private Land. Randy, Thanks Very Much for Clarifying That and Calling. Caller: Okay. Thanks. Well, Rick. We Have Another Fax Question That Came in from Palm Springs. Basically It's: Please Explain Permanent Structures Are Not Permitted If He Can More Asian Only Involves Surface Activities. Does this Include a Fence or Gate to Keep out Trespassers for Claims Surrounded by Private Land or a Fence or Gate Around a Surface Trench? Okay. it Sounds like There Are Actually More Issue Here, We're Looking at Three or Four Issues. There Are a Couple Issues in This Question. The First Question Is Permanent Structures Are Not Permitted When Surface Activities -- Surface Exploration Activities Are the Matter at Hand. What We're Saying Is That If You Are Only Doing Surface Exploration, That Is, Drilling, Sampling, Geophysics, Mapping, Geochemistry, You Do Not Need to Place a Permanent Structure on That Site. The Driller's Shack Can Come in As a Skid Mount off the Back of A Trailer, Assuming He Needs One. You Can Sit in a Wall Tent for 14 Days. You Can Pull a 30-foot-long 8-foot-wide Trailer on the Site, And These Are Not Permanent Structures. If You Would Bring Something in That Has to Go in on a Slab, That Has to Be Moved by a Method That Looks like House Moving for Exploration Activities We Do Not Accept That as Reasonable. Now, Fencing or a Gate to Keep Out Trespassers from a Claim Surrounded by Private Land -- If There Is a Requirement for Gating or Fencing, It's Independent of the Question of Structures. Fencing May Be Required for Any Number of Reasons. In this Particular Case the Adjoining Land Owners May Insist On Fencing as a Condition of the Operation Going Forward. And If it Is, Indeed, Surrounded, Well, There's Not a Lot We Can Say about That. We Would Probably Approve the Fence. Fencing Around Only a Surface Trench Is a Safety Issue. It Is an Issue That Is Decided More on the Basis of What Would The Mine Safety Folks, Either at The Federal or State Level, Require. We Have a Question That Came In from Klamath Falls and We Have a Phone Question from Art In Salem. Art, Please Hold. We Will Try to Get to You Before We Break for Lunch. This Question from Klamath Falls Is in Reference to Casual Use Occupancy Equaling an Elk Camp, I Did Not Notice a Maximum Standard of Structure Allowed on The Claim. A Claimant Could Build a 2500 Square Foot Four-bedroom Ranch House on the Claim F We Disagree With the Size of the Structure, What Authority Is Used to Deny The Occupancy Request? Well, First Off, If There's Two Parts Here -- If You Put up A 2500 Square Foot Four-bedroom House, You Are Probably Putting Up a Permanent Structure. That's Not Going to Equal Casual Use. Casual Use Occupancy Generally Says Tent Camping. If We Need to Clarify with That Guidance, We'll Get That out. What Authority Do We Have to Deny the Size of the Structure? It Comes to That Question That I Spoke of Earlier: What Is the Position of the Operation in the Mineral Development Lifecycle? If It's an Exploration Level Activity, Then it Doesn't Need To Have a 2400 Square Foot House. On the Other Hand, If You're Talking about an Operation That Is on the Verge or on the Cusp Of Becoming a Mine and They Need To Have Administrative Support And Administrative Facilities And They Have to Have an Office That Looks Similar to Your Office, Then, Yes, There May Be A Need for a 2400 Square Foot Facility That Has Space for Typists, Xerox Machines and More Importantly the Coffee Machine. We'll Get into What Kinds of Occupancies Are Appropriate at What Level of Operations Tomorrow. I Don't Want to Jump Too Far Ahead Except to Say That You Have Three Examples of Surface Use Determination Reports, and They Are in the Section Beginning with S1. You Might Want to Have a Look at The Dreamer's Paradise Report. I'm Sorry about the Cutesy, but I Didn't Name the Mining Claim. Have a Look at That One. There Is a Discussion in There About Mineral Property Lifecycles. In the Meantime I Would like to Take a Call from Art. Hello, Art in Salem, You're on The Air. Caller: Yes, My Question Has To Do with Dredging. by Dredging Do You Mean Suction Dredging? Caller: Suction Dredging, Right. The Claimant Claims That He Has To Have an Outhouse and Then a Platform. Now, with the Surface Exploration, I'm Kind of Concluding That That Would Fall Under Surface Exploration and That He Doesn't Really Need this -- the Outhouse out There and The Platform. Well, the Question Is Really One of What Are the Sanitation Codes Going to Require? Caller: Right. We Haven't Gone That Far Yet. Okay. The Other Thing Is, You Know, How Permanent Is That Platform? Is it Permanent in the Sense That It's Going to Be on a Slab, Or Is That Platform Simply Going To Be -- Resemble More Likely a Deck? Caller: It's Actually Resembles a Deck at this Point. But it Is Attached to Trees. Is There a Suction Dredging Season on the River? Caller: Uhm... I'm Not Sure. I'm Sure There Is. I Think the State of Oregon or Deq Has a Certain Time Frame or Window There. So Primarily Determine, You Know -- We Would Have to Look at The Length of Time the Season Is And What Would Be Necessary in That Operation for That Length Of Time Also. it Sounds to Me like There Is Some Homework Needed Here in Figuring out What the Local Codes Are. Caller: Right. But it Sounds Like, from What I've Observed, and I'm Kind of a Part-time Mining Person Here, So I Don't Have a Lot of Time to Spend on Checking this All out And I Get it -- I'm Able to Do It Whenever I Can, but the -- it Looks More like It's a Recreational Operation. He Goes out There and He Spends The Weekend and He Pulls up His Camper and the Platform Is Just For Dining. More than Anything Else. I Think We Are Running Low on Time, Art, So I Am Going to Put You Back on Hold and We'll Try And Finish this off the Air. Thanks Very Much, Art, for Calling. This Is One of Those Situations, I Think, Where the Question Is -- the Answer Is in a Gray Area. Are We Looking at Mining or Are We Looking at Recreation? And We Come to a Standard Of, If You Can Put it into the Back of A Three-quarter Ton Pick-up Truck or into a Utility Trailer And Haul it Away at the End of Your Mining Operation or the End Of Your Weekend Operation, Then You Should Do So. Exactly. In this Particular Case, this Is An Issue That's Not Going to Be Resolved by One Site Visit. This Is an Issue That's Going to Take a Lot of Observation and a Lot of Documentation. The Regulations Don't Prohibit The Weekend Miner, and That's One Point to Remember. The Weekend Miner Still Has the Right to Use and Occupy and to Put up Structures. Now, We Have a Problem Here in Divining the Difference Between Somebody Doing Predominantly Recreation and Predominantly Mining and It's Going to Turn Pretty Much on the Observed Activity That's Going On. in this Specific Case in the Remaining Few Seconds We Have Before We Need to Go to the Exercise for Lunch, I Think That Art Might Want to Suggest That The Operator Start Using a Camper That Is Fully Self-contained, Has its Own Restroom Inside So the Point Is Not a Problem That Anyone Has to Deal With, and at the End of the Weekend, the Camper with its Bathroom Goes Home. Great. Okay. We're out of Time for Faxes, Although We Do Have a Large Stack of Them Right Now and We Would like to You Continue Sending in Questions. Remember That after Lunch We'll Have a Great Deal of Time, at Least by Comparison, for Answering Questions on the Air And We Don't Bite. Give Us a Call. We'd like to Hear from You. In the Meantime, We Are a Few Minutes Away from Lunch and I Would like to Introduce the Lunchtime Exercise. If You Move to Page M9 in Your Notes, on That Page You Will Find Mr. I.m.nobody's Proposal. His Proposal Is on Page M8. Scott Named All These and I'm Not Responsible for Them. You Can Thank Scott for Their Oddball Names. Once You've Found That, Look Forring the Following in Mr. Nobody's Proposal. Has He Provided Complete Information? Has He Demonstrated That His Uses Will Be Reasonably Incident? Will They Be Reasonably Calculated to Lead to the Extraction and Beneficiation of Minerals? Will He Use Appropriate Equipment? Has He Obtained the Necessary County Permits? What Does the Real Purpose of This Operation Appear to Be? What Is Your Strategy for Dealing with this Case? Now, During Lunch, and as Early As Possible, We'd like to You Fax Us Back Your Strategy Using The Form on Page M10. Now, the Fax Number Is Listed on The Front of Your Handout Packet. Get it Back to Us If You Possibly Can by 12:00 Pacific Daylight Time, 12:00 Noon Pacific Time, So We Can Review All the Answers and Go over Them After Lunch. Again, If You Come up with Some Additional Questions During Lunch, by All Means, Send Us a Fax. If You Don't Have a Fax, You Can Call in and We'll Write Your Message down. When We Come Back from Lunch, We Will Be on Transponder 17 of This Same Satellite. Be Sure Your Receiver Is Tuned To Channel 17 and Don't Forget To Fax Back Your Results. And If You Have Questions During Lunch, Fax Them to Us Then. Fax Them to Us Then. If You Haven't Sent Us a Groupwise Address for Your Site, Please Do So Now. A Moment of Clarification, We Don't Plan to Send Things to Your Groupwise Site. We Do Want to Send Updates Overnight to Your Office. So We'll Be Back in 90 Minutes. (Short Introductory Comment Missing Due to Edit Control Not Being Fed to Satellite.) ...A Question Came in Earlier, Will this Program Be Available Later on Videotape and the Answer to That Is, Yes, We Will Make this Whole Program Available on Videotape. We're Not Exactly Certain When It Will Come Out, Although We Are Shooting for 60 Days. Watch Your Instruction Bulletins Coming from the Training Center For the Announcement. Also When You Send Us Faxes, Just Send Us the One-page Fax. Please Don't Send a Cover Sheet. All We End up Doing Is Throwing It Away. Okay, Scott, What Did People Think of the Barrack a Proposal. First I Would like to Thank The Responses We Got. It Was a Considerable Amount. For the Most Part, the Class -- The Folks That Are Watching Us Came up with the Correct Answers. We Did Have a Few Folks Who Seemed to Have Missed the Point. But I Think Maybe First We Should Go Through the Exercise Or Through Primarily What -- Give Ate Brief Overview and Then Let's Go over What the Answer Should Have Been. Okay. First Off, the Exercise Here Was Intended to Have You Take a Look To Determine Whether or Not Enough Information Was Provided By the Claimant. Also, Has He Demonstrated His Uses Will Be Reasonably Incident And Will They Be Reasonably Calculated to the Lead to the Development of an Economic Deposit? And Are They Using or Do They Intend to Use the Appropriate Equipment? And Has He Obtained the Necessary County Permits? If You Have the Program in Front Of You and You Look at Page 8 And You Look at It, You Will See What He Has Proposed There. The Consensus Was That the Claimant, Mr. Nobody, and the Correct Answer Is, No, He Did Not Provide Enough Information. And Did He Demonstrate He Would Be Using Reasonably Incident -- Uses Would Be Reasonably Incident? No Was the Correct Answer Again. Will They Be Reasonably Calculated to Lead to the Extraction and Beneficiation of Minerals? No. And Do They Use Appropriate Equipment? Our Response Was No. And Has He Obtained Necessary County Permits? There's Nowhere in the Document That He Does Say That He Has. If You Would Look at Page M7 You Will See Our Response to That. You'll Notice We Have a Letter Of Nonconcurrence to His Proposed Operation. You Need to Also Take Note That The Letter of Nonconcurrence Is Certified Return Receipt Requested, and That the Document Identification Number Is Also Listed on the Letter. In Response to Mr. I.m. Nobody, We Received Your Notice of Operations and Occupancy on August 23rd, 1996. We Have Completed Our Review and Based on the Information You Provided, I Am Unable to Determine Whether Your Occupancy Is Reasonably Incident at this Time. You Described the Mining Operation Using Sluice Boxes and A Dredge. You Notice Lists Your Claim as a Lode, but Your Mining Claim Location Notice Filed at the BLM Office Lists it as a Placer. You Also Propose a Water Well. The Installation of a Power Line, a Large Storage Shed and a 40-foot Mobile Home. Your Proposal Fails to Demonstrate Conditions of 43 Cfr 3715.2, A, They must Be Reasonably Incident, C, Be Reasonably Calculated to Lead to The Extraction and Beneficiation Of Minerals, And, E, Use Appropriate Equipment. Therefore, Your Proposal to Develop a Site Is Unnecessary And Undue Degradation of Public Lands and Is Not Acceptable at This Time. I Suggest That You Redirect Your Efforts Towards the Exploration And the Development of the Mineral Deposit. You May Amend Your Proposal to Occupy. Enclosed Is a Copy of the Regulations under 43 Cfr 3715, Which Outline the Conditions That must Be Met. If You Have Any Questions, Contact Rock Pick At... Another Thing You May Want to Also Include in this Letter of Nonconcurrence Is the Appeal Paragraph. Which May Also Be of Some Use to The Claimant. It's Not Only Some Use to the Claimant, Scott, It's Actually Mandatory. It's Mandatory. So You Probably Do Want to Include It. So -- Questions? Great. As You May Have Surmised Joining Us Also this Afternoon Is Dennis Mclane. We Mentioned That Dennis Would Join Us. Dennis Is the Chief Ranger for The BLM, and He's Stationed in Boise. Good Afternoon, Dennis. Happy to Be Here. Good. We're Happy to Have You Here. We Would like to Invite Calls Now That We're Here this Afternoon. We Do Have a Number of Faxes That Came In, and We'll Invite Some More. Here Is a Good One, and this Came in from Oregon and That Is, What Legal Recourse Is the BLM Willing to Undertake in Counties Where the County Is Unwilling to Enforce Their Own Codes on BLM Mining Claims. I Think That's a Situation in More than Just Oregon. Well, the First Problem That Arises with this One Is What Are We Looking At? Are We Looking at the County Declining to Apply Codes to a Relatively Intact Structure That Is Being Used by a Mining Operator Who Is Otherwise in Compliance with All Other Pieces Of Regulation? In Which Case it Might Not Be That Major of a Deal. On the Other Hand, If We're Looking at a Circumstance Where You Have Someone Who Is Not Reasonably Incident, There May Be a Drug Lab, There May Be Marijuana Cultivation, There May Be Simply Residence, Then it Can Take on a Much More Important Aspect. It's One of the Vehicles and One Of the Tools We Use for Getting Rid of the Not Reasonably Incident Operator. If the County Is Saying They Don't Intend to Enforce Their Own Codes, Then It's Very Likely In the Circumstance, the Latter Circumstance, That There'll Be More Problems than Just Code Violation, and You've -- You Step Back and Take the Broad View. You Begin to Look at "Is the Place an Attractive Nuisance?" Dennis, Do You Want to Go into That? I Think We Have an Example of A Situation That Might Actually Fall under That. If We Could Bring up Slide 103 And We'll Have That on Screen as We Have Our Discussion. Dennis? What I Would like to Say About this Is, Even Though We Know All Too Well That this Is Perhaps, Indeed, a County Violation, Neither Our Law Enforcement Nor Our Surface Protection People Are Trained in Interpreting These County Codes As it Pertains to Health, Safety And Building, However, it Doesn't Negate the Fact That This Violation Could Clearly Be A Hazard or a Nuisance, and If It Is, like the Slide We Saw Before Lunch with the Exposed Electrical Service Connection -- Yeah, in this Case What We're Looking at Is an Electrical Service Connection That's Nailed To a Tree, Has No Covers on it And There Are Wires Going Every Which Way. That One, Too, I Don't Think It Takes a Trained Building Inspector to Determine That That Is, Indeed, a Hazard and Should Be Addressed in That Vein as a Hazard Rather than Perhaps Identifying the Specific Building Code That Was Violated. So in General I Think It's Safe to Say That Where We Have Situations like That, the Building Code Violations May Be The Least of the Problem, and If The County Is Not Willing to Enforce, There Are Probably Other Problems We Need to Deal With, and If There Aren't Any Problems, If Our Only Problem Is The County Isn't Enforcing, It's Not a Problem. Here Is One from Ridgecrest, California, and the Author Is a Good Friend of Mine, and this Particular Individual Has a Real Gift for Making a Short Story Long. So Let Me Just Read It. Many of Our Casual Users Here Only Come to Their Claims Sporadically, I.e., Six or Seven Weekends a Year, Yet They Have Cabins and Other Storage Facilities That Occupy 24, Full Time, Seven Days a Week. When the Casual Users Can Pack In the All the Equipment to Support the 14 Day Trip, They Can Just Easily Pack it out. I Believe Permanent Occupancy For the Convenience of a Casual User Is Not Warranted. I'm Leaving a Lot out of This, Believe it or Not. Is this True in Your Opinion? And I Think an Answer to That Is We Return to the Standard of If You Can Put it in the Back of a Three-quarter-ton Pickup and Pile More into a Utility Trailer And Haul it Away on Sunday Afternoon, You Don't Need to Leave it There. Which Is Probably the Right Answer. Especially If this Is a Casual Use Situation. We'll Be Talking about Casual Use and the Life Cycles of Mine Properties and So on Tomorrow And this Is Come up Again and Again but Basically the Bottom Line Is, If You Can Haul it Away At the End of the Day, You Should Haul it Away at the End Of the Day. Here's an Interesting One... This One Comes from Yuma. Occupancy must Also Be Involved In One or More of the Following, And Here We Have Protecting from Loss or Theft -- Protecting -- Oh, Boy, Protecting Valuable Minerals from Loss or Theft. Please, Folks, When You Send Us The Faxes, Write Real Legibly. We're Having a Hard Time with Some of Them, Especially this One. I Think it May Be Just the Fax That Did it to Us. Are We Authorizing in this Case A Claimant or Watchman for Each Mining Claim So That Nobody Enters the Claim with a Metal Detector? Here We Are -- I Imagine the Example in this Case Is Pretty Much Vacant Land, Nothing Much Going On, It's Just One in 500 Mining Claims or 50 Mining Claims Somebody Has Staked. Are They Authorized a Watchman To Keep People off. If You Go Back to the Standard That We Set as a Benchmark, and We Say When Can You Justify the Use of a Watchman? It Says That Somebody Needs to Be There 24 Hours a Day to Secure One of the Items That We Had Discussed a Little Earlier In the Rule, and That Is Keep The Public out of Workings, Keep The Public Away from Equipment, Keep the Public out of the Room In Which the Concentrates Are -- Concentrates Are Stores or the Gold Bullion Is Stored, Keep the Public Protected and off of the Workings. One of the Key Features of the Standard, the Benchmark That We Set, Is There Has to Be Observable on the Ground Activity. If You Have Simply a Barren Piece of Ground and You Want to Keep Treasure Hunters Off, That's Not the Intent of These Regulations. What If the Claimant Has Specimen Grade Material like a Commercial Grade Wolfonite, Where Somebody Could Walk in and Ship Away in Many Claimant's Opinion a Fortune in Specimens? Is it Exposed? Is it Readily Removable? Is There in Plain Sight for Someone to Pick it up and Take It Away? There Is a Logic to Having a Watchman Observe Those Exposed Valuable Minerals. Can the Watchman Charge Admission? We've Suddenly Gone Beyond Mining and off into Another Area That Involves Commercialization Of Collection and the Running of A Business, and There Is Some Other Guidance about Charging For Use of -- Allowing Public Use of a Mining Claim. There Is an Instruction Memo That Came out in New Mexico That Cut Some Very Interesting New Trail on this That Says That They Have to Have a Recreation Permit from Us Before They Can Allow or Begin to Charge People For this Extra Use Because They're Running a Commercial Operation. This Is Not a Mining Operation Anymore. This Is a Commercial Recreation Operation. So, Yes, I Suppose with the Proper Authorization it Could Be Done, but Not under the Mining Laws. Good. This Would Be a Good Time for You to Call In. We'll Be Happy to Take Your Calls. We Don't Bite. If You Have a Real-life Situation That You Would like Us To Discuss, We'll Be Happy to Hear from You. Even Rick Doesn't Bite. He's Promised to Keep the Jaws Closed as Far as That Goes. I'm on Good Behavior Today. That's Right. If a Claimant Wins an Appeal and This Is out of the California State Office, I Believe, If a Claimant Wins an Appeal from an -- from Ibla Concerning a Cessation of Activities Decision From BLM, Can the Claimant Sue BLM for Damages and for Loss of Revenue? Dennis? We're All Leaning Back -- Just Because I'm a Law Enforcement Officer Doesn't Necessarily Mean I'm Involved in All Lawsuits. However, the Answer to the First Part of That Question Is, Yes, People Can Sue You for Almost Anything. the Second Part of the Question Is, What Are Their Chances of Winning? I Wouldn't Think Too Good, You Know. I Would Think That Clearly We Still Have Some Responsibilities There That Need to Be Taken Care Of. If the Individual Who Sent Us This Fax Has Some Additional Facts or Some Background, I Think this Would Be a Good Time To Call and Maybe We Can Discuss It a Little Better. I Have Another Good Question Here from Las Vegas. When Proper Filing for an Existing Occupancy Has Occurred And BLM Has Reviewed and Determined That the Occupancy Is Not Appropriate, Does the Grace Period Continue for the Full Year? Yes. That's Part One. Yes. Part One. Absolutely. Now, We Can Use the Determination That We Made When We Came to the Conclusion That It Doesn't -- Isn't -- Isn't Reasonably Incident and Sit down With the Resident and Miner and Say, Look, You've Got Four Months Left, this Is What You Have to Do to Come into Compliance, Because If You Don't We'll -- We're Probably Going to Initiate Action Against You. In this Case the Occupancy Is Meeting Code, the Occupancy Is Not in Conformance Because There Is No Mining Going On. the Test for Throwing People Out of the Grace Period Is it Must Be Not Reasonably Incident, That Is, No Mining, and it must Be a Threat to Health and Safety. What We Have in Front of Us Says Nothing about the Two-prong Test. It Simply Says One Prong Has Been Satisfied, That Is, It's Not Reasonably Incident, and the Other Part, Health, Safety or The Environment Threats, Have Not Been Demonstrated. Thus, Based on What We've Got Here, I'd Have to Conclude That The Grace Period Would Continue For the Full Year, and as Matt Says, You Make Use of That Year As a Tool, to Lever the Individual into Either Leaving The Public Lands or Conducting a Real, Live Operation. I Think It's Very Important To Note That We Should Be out Doing These Surface Use Determinations Inside That One-year Grace Period and Not Starting on Them When the Grace Period Is over. Exactly. Right. Here's One from Oregon. Do the 3715 Regulations Apply to BLM Administered Surface with Privately Owned Mineral Rights? Ooh, Rick, You're the Headquarters Man. Thanks, Matt. You're Welcome. the Answer Is No. Very Simple. This Is User Occupancy under the Mining Law, and Privately Owned Minerals Do Not Include -- Are Not Included Within the Ambit of The Mining Law. So the Short Answer Is These Regs Do Not Apply. This Is a Realty Issue, and Don't Let Them Make it a Mining Issue. Tell the Realty People It's Theirs. It's My Understanding -- Here Is Another One from Oregon -- It's My Understanding That the Few Remaining Claims with Surface Rights Determinations Under Pl 167 Were Surface Management by BLM Is Excluded Are Not Regulated There Are 3809 And 3802. Without Another Surface Rights Determination to Would the 3715 Regulations Apply? I Think There Are Two Points That Need Clarification, Rick. this Is a Good One, and this Gets at the Heart of the Pl 167 Issue. Public Law 167 Did Two Things. It Said, First Off, Anybody Who Uses -- Locates a Claim Hereafter Can Only Use it for Mining Purposes, Purposes Reasonably Incident. It Also Said That BLM Could Administer the Surface Resources Unless the Claimant Filed a Verified Statement and Demonstrated the Existence of a Valid Claim. In Those Cases, Where We Have an Operator Who Has Filed the Verified Statement, Who Has Demonstrated the Existence of a Valid Claim, and Has the Rights To the Surface, We Will Not Go In and Try to Impose the 3715 Regulations on the Management of The Surface Resources. By That I Mean, Predominantly The Passage Across or Through by The Public to Adjacent Lands. This Is the One Major Issue. Obviously it Goes Without Saying They Have the Right to Manage The Grass, the Trees and the Other Surface Resources. We Will Not Go and Attempt to Force the Claimant to Accept Passage Across and Through. However, If the Claimant Says, "I'm Not Going to Let Them Across, Through, I'm Going to Continue Blocking the Access to Adjacent or Public Land Back Over My Shoulder," Then We're Going to Do Another 167 Determination and Come to a Final Solution. Now, There's a Question in Here About It's Excluded and Not Regulated under 3802 and 3809. That Is Not Correct. 3809 and 3802 Have at Their Core Requirement to Prevent Unnecessary or Undue Degradation. It Does Not Say Prer- or Post Flpma. It Does Not Say Pre or Post 1955. It Is a Statement Laid upon the Secretary and a Mandate That Covers Mining Claims -- in Fact, All Mining Claims, and So They Must Prevent Unnecessary or Undue Degradation. As to the Issue of Occupancy, Well, Earlier on We Said That There Is Only One Reason to Occupy, and That Is for Legitimate Mining, and Pl 167 Simply Took the Body of Case Law And Made it Federal Positive Law. Good. We Have a Question in from the California State Office, and I'm Not Really Clear. I Think the Question Here Is Asking That Are There Times Where We Would Perhaps Want to Request a Waiver on County Requirements If the County Requirements Would Tend to Cause Excessive Damage to the Public Lands? If I'm Not Getting the Gist of Your Question Correctly, Give Us A Buzz or Send Us Another Fax. Rick? Okay. If the Request for a Waiver Is Only to Reduce the Environmental Impacts That Arise from the Adherence to a County Standard, A Zoning Standard -- Not a Zoning Standard, a Building Permit Standard, Then It's Incumbent on Us to Say, Look, We Think There's a Better Way to Get Around It, and the Standard That You've Held out as Being Required Needs to Be Carefully Thought out and Reconsidered. That's Okay for Us to Request a Waiver. If It's Simply to Say, Oh, You Know, Fred's a Nice Guy and We Really Would like to You Give Fred a Waiver Because it Will Make Life Better for Fred, No, That's Clearly Wrong. So, in Other Words, If Fred Comes in to the Office and Says, Look, I'm Barely Making it Financially, If I Have to Comply With These County Regulations, I'm Going to Go Under, That's Not the Right Reason? That's Not the Right Reason. Fred, We're Real Sorry You're Likely to Go Under, but Every Prudent Businessman Inside the County Has to Meet Those Standards and If I Shave Those Standards for You, Then Every Other Prudent Businessman in the County Is Going to Expect That Those Standards Will Have to Be Shaved and We Simply Can't Be in That Business. I Think it Would Also Be Incumbent on Us, Though, as Land Managers, Having to Deal with Local Counties, to Play Square With Them. If We're Going to Request That Sort of Waiver, We Need to Keep In Contact with Them. We Need to Apprise Them of What We're Doing and Get Their Concurrence If We Possibly Can, Convince Them, as it Were. Scott, Have You Run into Situations like That. . There Have Been a -- a Waiver From County Codes? Yes. on a Particular Piece... Not That I'm Aware Of. The County Has Been Pretty Well -- Pretty Responsive and They've All Been Very Cooperative in the Majority of the Counties We Work In Working with Us in Enforcing And Having the Codes Apply. Have They in Any Cases Bent The Codes or Lessened the Requirements for Some of These Uses or Users. I Think We're down to the Case We Gave Before, the Downs Case in Mariposa County, Given The Size or Phase of the Operation, Instead of Going Through a Full Septic System They Have Aloud Loued a Johnny On the Spot Portable Toilet. and a Renewable Permit? Renewable. We Had a Question Earlier, Dennis, While You Were Waiting In the Wings, If We Could Bring Up Slide 109, I Think We Might Want to Have a Look at It. There Are Some Situations, I Think, Where, as We Work in the Field We'll Encounter Things That Are Gates on What May or May Not Be Reasonably Incident Operations. This Particular Gate We Saw Earlier this Morning. Dent Us, What Can You Tell Us About this from a Law Enforcement Standpoint? That's Quite a Gate, Matt. First of All, If this Was Something That the BLM Was Going To Authorize, Certainly I Hope We Would Be Involved with the Operator in Helping Them to Determine Exactly What Type of Gate That They Needed. To the Point of Maybe Doing What We Can to Eliminate These Large Spikes That Appear to Be Something Maybe Designed to Puncture a Radiator Perhaps. But it Doesn't Negate the Fact If this Is a Well Used Road or Gate That Leads to the Gate and Children on Four-wheeled Atv's Or People on Motorcycles -- Even Adults on Atv's. Oh, Yes, this Is Certainly a Hazard We Would Have Responsibility for and Certainly We -- Regardless of the Mining Claim Situation, We Still Have An Obligation to Provide for Public Safety and We Need to Keep in That Mind When We Work With These Folks That We Have Sort of a Dual Responsibility Here. We Have to Provide for the Mining Use on the Public Lands, But We Still Have to Provide for Relatively Free Access to the Public and a Safe Environment For the Public to Use. Scott, What Became of That Gate? it No Longer Exists. Ahh. We Have a Question in from Wherever Area Code 801 Is, I'm Willing to Bet That's Utah. The Question Is If Due to Geography a Claimant Cannot Put Even a Temporary Structure on The Actual Mining Claim, must He File a Mill Site in Order to Legitimize His Occupancy? I'm Not Sure What's Being Asked Here, but it Would Appear -- Well, the Bottom Line Is That The Mining Law Allows the Claimant to Use Whatever Land Is Reasonably Necessary to Get the Job Done. Now, Why Someone Would Need to File a Mill Site Claim in Order To Legitimize an Occupancy Escapes Me. It's Important to Note That the Regulations Treat Mining Claims All the Same, Whether You're Occupancy Is on a Lode Claim, a Placer Claim or Mill Site Claim, You Still Have to Comply with 3715, and If a Residence or Occupancy Is Necessary, or Reasonably Incident to the Mining Operation Here, it Could Be Put on Adjacent Land Assuming It's Not Withdrawn. and Assuming That It's Not Subject to a Mining Claim. You Know, You Don't Have to Have Everything Occurring on the Mining Claim as Long as the Lands Would Be Open to the Operation of the Mining Law. So You Could End up Putting a Spike Camp Away from a Claim on Unclaimed Ground. That Would Be a Spike Camp Without a Spiked Gate? Yeah. in Fact, We Covered That Sort Of Situation Earlier During Exploration Normally You Haven't Necessarily Gotten Your Mining Claims Filed Yet but You Are Spending a Large Amount of Time Out in the Field from a Base Camp and the Occupancy Might Be Reasonably Incident. Exactly. No Formal Documentation -- Another Question from Oregon -- We're Getting a Lot of Response From Oregon and Again this Would Be a Good Time to Call in If There's Something You're Not Clear On. We Would like to Hear from You. No Formal Documentation for Gates, No Trespassing Signs, Fenced Enclosures That Exist as Of 8/15/96 Are Required by These Regulations, And, Therefore, No Grace Period Exists for These Uses. These Are Questions. Rick, Can You Kind of Talk to That? Well, There Is No Formal Documentation on Gates, Signing And Fenced Enclosures. We Assume That You'll Deal with These as You Get Around to Looking at Them. These Are Mainly Questions of Public Access and the Need to Control the Casual Trespasser, What Msha Refers to as the Casual Trespasser Who May Drift Onto a Mining Operation. We Have Not Set These as Subject To a One-year Grace Period Because We Fully Expect That You'll Work with Them over this First Year. If There's Significant Problem, Then We Want to Deal with it This First Year. Good. In Fact this Kind of Question Sort of Leads into this Question We Just Now Got in from Palm Springs. It's Two Questions, Actually. What Procedure Should We Use If We Know a Mining Claim That Is Occupying but Does Not File the Appropriate Form? And If That's -- and the next Question Is Does 43 Cfr 3715 Apply to Minerals under Stock Grazing Homestead Lands? We Can Handle Those Probably in Reverse Order. The Answer to the Second Question, Rick. it Does Not Apply to Lands Sun to the Stock Grazing Homestead Land. Does Not Apply Itself -- the Regs Don't Apply Themselves to Minerals That Are Reserved to The United States but Are Owned By Some Other Agency or Some Other Entity. Simple as That. Now, the Other Question, What Procedure Should We Use If We Know a Mining Claim it Is Occupying but Does Not File the Appropriate Form? Well, the Very First Thing You Might Want to Do Is Ask the Mining Claimant to Give Serious Consideration to Getting That Form in by October 16th. I'm Sorry, by October 15th, the Close of Business. Because on October 16th, If the Mining Claimant Doesn't File the Form, Then the Full Force and Effect of the Regulations Comes To Bear, and the Mining Claimant Has to Be Not -- Has to Be Reasonably Incident, Has to Meet The Tests for Justifying Occupancy, and Has to Be in Compliance with All County Permits, Federal Permits, State Permits and That Might Be Just a Lot More than this Individual Is Prepared to Accept at this Point. Okay. Here's One That Just Came in From Nevada -- at Least Someplace Within Area Code of 702. The Claimant Uses Existing Buildings as a Residence and for Storage. -- I'm Sorry. Storage of Equipment. He Agrees to Stop Using the Facilities. Do We Make Him Remove the Equipment and Seize the Occupancy? What Do We Do about the Buildings? under What Circumstances Does He Agree to Cease Operations? Is it Because it Was Not Reasonably Incident? I Guess That's a Do Loop We Don't Need to Go down. Let's Assume the Operation Is Now Being Closed Down, That There Is No -- There's Nothing Wrong with the Operation, It's Just Completed, and You're Now Left with a Set of Historic Buildings out There. What Do We Do about These Buildings? Well, First Question We're Going To Have to Ask Ourselves Is Do We Want Those Buildings? Do You Want to Speak to That? Yeah, I'll Talk a Little Bit About That. I Do Plan on Friday Dealing with The Issue of the Administrative Procedures Related to Property Impoundments, but in this Case The Way I Understand It, We Have A Couple of Buildings That the Mining Operator Did Not Place There; They Were There When He Arrived? Do I Understand That Correctly? Yes. So Basically When He Is Leaving He's Leaving the Buildings as He Found Them, Basically. I'm Not Really Clear on this From the Question. This Is What We Got. This Question Came in from Gordon Pine in Tonopah, and Gordon, If You Can Get to a Phone, I Think You Ought to Call Us. it Basically Says the Claimant Is Using Existing Buildings. I'll Base My Answer on the Assumption That the Buildings Existed at the Time He Took over The Claim or Filed on it or Made His Location. In this Particular Instance, If He Decides, Okay, I Didn't Put Up These Buildings, So I'm Not Taking Them down and I'm Not Going to Bear That Burden, I Think What We First Need to Do Is Say, Okay, Would You at Least Like to Sign a Relinquishment to Us, on Those Two Buildings to The United States. Then Once We Take Possession of That Property, We must Take Very Affirmative Possession in Terms Of Locking Doors, Putting Signs On it Saying Property of the United States and Then We Need To Get with the Historic Preservation People to Determine If We're Going to Keep the Buildings, What Are We Going to Do with Them. At the Point He Decides He No Longer Needs the Building, We Need to Seek Relinquishment or Seek Abandonment of the Buildings and Deal with That Appropriately. Here's One from Here in Town. A Question from Phoenix. If an Occupancy Request Requires An Environmental Review, Number One, must the Review Conform to Nepa Policies and Procedures or Can it Be Informal. Number Two, If Nepa Is the Occupancy Request Categorically Excluded? Okay. Is There Any Such Thing as Informal Nepa? No. There Is Not. You Have to Do and Follow the Formal Nepa Process. And There Is No Way Around That. It May Lead You an Eias. So Be It. The Proponent of the Operation May Have to Rethink the Operation. If Nepa Is to Be Applied to an Occupancy, the Second Question Is, Can We Get Some Categorical Exclusions? There Are Certain Circumstances Now under Nepa Which You Can Categorically Exclude an Action Because it Has Some Degree of Analysis Done Already or That The Actions Aren't Significant But There's an Immediately Adjacent Preexisting Analysis. You'll Have to Talk to Your Nepa People to Get the Precise Set of Circumstances. But, We Know, and We'll Try to Work Through the Office of Environmental Policy and Compliance in the Department That We Ought to Think Seriously About Getting a Categorical Exclusion in Place for Certain Occupancies, Not All, Just Some. If I Understand it Correctly, Categorical Exclusions Before They Can Placed into the Departmental Manual Require Some Experience? Yes and We Need a Little Bit Of Experience Here First. That's Right. Okay. One Speaker Said We Should Set Up a Separate 3715 Case File. Is this the Case? Should We Set this up in Addition to a 3809 Case File? Also, There Is No 3715 Case Type In Our -- in Our Case Orca -- Case Rec. -- We'll Bounce over That One and Assume It's Case Something or Other. How Do We Handle a Separate Case File for 3715? I Think Rick Can Answer Part of This but the Rest of it We'll Defer until Friday Morning When Bob Gibson Comes on Stage with Us to Talk to Case Recordation And File Management. Incidentally, Bob Gibson Has Arrived, He's Waiting in a Back Room. We Know We're All Here Now for The Week. Yes, There Is a Requirement For Setting up a 3715 Case File. The Current Directions Say a 3715 Case File of a Separate Sort Ought to Be Created for All The Existing Occupancies. And the Existing Occupancies Will Then Be Kept in a Separate Case File until We Have Rendered A Determination and We Have Received a Final Action. That Is, They Didn't Appeal Our Determination of Noncompliance, Or They Did Appeal it and it Went to the Department, the Board of Appeals Upheld Us and They Didn't Go to U.s. District Court. We Can Then Close That Particular Case File and Send it Off to Archives. For New Occupancies, Our Objective Is to Do as Many of The 3715 Actions in the 3809 Case File. We've Got Some Action Codes Set Up and Bob Will Go in Greater Detail in All of That So I Will Punt to Bob for Case Rec. Guidance to You Guys on Friday. If We Don't Get this Question Answered Well by Friday, and This One Came in Anonymously, That's Fine, You're Welcome to Send Us an Anonymous Fax and If You Check off the Spot That Says Don't Mention My Name on the Air, You We Won't Do It, Unless You're Gordon. If We Haven't Answered Your Question on Friday Morning, Be Sure to Ask it Again and We'll Be Sure to Take Care of It. Let Me Interrupt and Interject Here. There's a Reason We Adopted this Dual Case File System for the Existing Occupancies. Keep in Mind That Matt Mille Nba Ch Has Determined We're Going to Reduce the Levels of Review and Appeal Within this Rule and Every Other Rule. So We Have a Rule Here Where the Appeal Is Directly to the Board Of Land Appeals. Now, What this Means Is That When Someone Appeals a Decision, That Case File Is Going to Be Bundled up and Shipped off to The Interior Board of Land Appeals. It's Well-known to Any Adjudicateor That When You Have An Appeal, the Case File Is Closed. If You Want to Put So Much as a Piece of Kleenex in That Case File, You're Going to Have to Serve a Copy on Your Lawyer, Their Lawyer, the Board of Land Appeals and Just about Everybody Out There. Now, the Existing Occupancies -- No, Thank You, I Don't Have Any Case Files I Need to Serve That On. The Case Files That We're Going To Be Dealing with Are in Many Cases Going to Have an Existing Occupancy in Parallel to a 3809 Or 3802 Case Plan or Notice, and We Cannot Stop Doing 3809 and 3802 Jobs Just Because We've Taken One Piece of the Case File And Shipped it off to the Interior Board of Land Appeals Where We Wait for Three Years For the Board to Catch up with All of These Cases. We Still Need Live Cases That We Can Operate out Of. And Rather than Shut down That Particular Case So That We Can Wrestle with the Appeal on an Issue That May Only Be a Small Part of an Actual Ongoing Operation, We Made the Decision, We Will Create a Separate Set of 3715 Case Files for the Existing Occupancies. Can I Ask a Brief Question? Sure. Back to the Appeal Here Where They Are Appealing Directly -- You Say to the Ibla, Do They, The Area Manager, Ships out the Decision, They Appeal That Decision, Does Their Appeal Come Back Through the Office That Issued That Decision? Yes. and Then from There it Goes From the Office That Issued the Decision, Does it Go to the State Office or Directly to -- No, it Goes Directly to the Board of Land Appeals, Just as The 3802 Appeals Process Was, And Fraught with All the Danger. Now, They Add -- the Added Aspect of That Is That Means at The Area Level You Have to Do The Job Right. You Have to Get it Done Right, And If the Case File Isn't Done Right, and Much More Will Be Said about this on Friday, and By Matt and Other Folks, the Board Isn't Going to Be Shy About Turning it Around and Giving it Back to You. To That End, You're Going to Have to Turn to Your Adjudicateors at the State Office and Say I Need Help, I Need Guidance from You on How Good a Case File Has to Be, What It Looks Like, Where Things Ought to Be and What We Need to Be Doing to Keep Our Case Files Up to Snuff. The Fact That We're Jumping Straight to the Board Shouldn't Give You Carte Blanche to Ignore The State Office Adjudicateors. They're a Valuable Resource and You in the Areas Ought to Be Using Them. That's Right, Rig, and a New Program like this We Can't Afford to Be Lew Losing Cases. The Case Files Have to Be Thoroughly Documented. They Have to Be Kept Separate as Necessary. Everything Has Got to Be There. Every T Has to Be Crossed, Every I Has to Be Dotted. Yes, it Doesn't Take but One Major Loss That Goes to U.s. District Court to Lose this Entire Set of Rules. We Don't Want to See That Happen. I Don't Want to See That Happen Because I've Spent the Last Six Years Trying to Get These Things Out the Door. I Think We Can Safely Make an Offer and I Know That I Can Speak for Myself and Rick Would Probably Agree, If You Have a Case like this That Looks like It's Approaching Appeal, and You'd like an Outside Opinion, Give Either of Us a Call, Give Scott a Call, Give Someone Who Has Been Working on this for Some Time a Chance to Look at it And See If You've Met All the Requirements Before it Gets Really Ugly. We Have Another Question That Came in from Wyoming, and I Just Don't Feel Qualified to Ask this One. I'll Have to Recuse Myself from It Not So Much Because of the First Question but Because of The Last Two Questions And, Rick, You Can Use Your Judgment On Whether or Not We're Going to Deal with Those. Is There Any Way to Waive -- Waive -- Wave -- County Decision Fitzsimmons They Conflict with BLM Compliance? If the Claimant Met BLM Compliance but the County Feels Visual Impacts May Be Significant. Well, this Is a Land Use Issue As It's Described Here, and Unfortunately the County Cannot Do Anything That Takes Away the Federal Right, Even If it Doesn't Look Pretty. There Is Nothing That We Can Say To the County Other than We're Sorry it Doesn't Look Pretty in Your Identifies, but the Federal Right Is a Federal Grant and a Grant from the Sovereign Cannot Be Demeaned or Defused by the County. Love the Tie. Well, Okay. It's Cool. I Kind of like It, Too. It's Not as Brilliant as Matt's In Spots, But, Hey, Matt's a Master at That. If I've Answered this Question Fully, Okay. If Not, Why Don't You Give Us a Call and We'll Talk about It. Actually There's a Question About Visual Quality. We've Got a Slide, for Example, Slide 131, for Example, Shows Something That's Clearly a Visual Problem, and What's a Visual Problem to the County and What's a Visual Problem under Our Regulations May Be Two Entirely Different Things, and This Is Clearly a Visual Problem, but It's Also, Well, Dennis, Would You Call Appear Threat to Public Health and Safety or Just Ugly? Well, I'd Include That. I'd Probably Include the Word Eyesore to Go along with the Visual Impairment. Certainly this Detracts from What the Public Lands Are Supposed to Be in Terms of Us Protecting the Resources and Providing for Public Safety. Rick, Can We Deal with Eyesores? Yeah, If They Come under the Heading of a Nuisance. One of the Things That You Cannot Do Is Maintain a Nuisance On Public Lands. And If You Have Trash Littering The Landscape, Yeah, That's a Nuisance, and it Has No Business Being There. On the Other Hand, If the Objection Is Simply We Don't Like the Whole in the Ground, or The Presence of the Headframe Because We Think it Spoils the Pristine Beauty, Well, We're Sorry, That Goes with Mining. Trash Dumps Don't Go with Mining. Yeah. Right. We Have a Question in from Oregon. In Oregon it Often Takes Years To Obtain a Water Right. Would We Not Concur with That Portion of the Occupancy Requiring Appropriate Water Until the Water Right or Any Other Permit Is Granted? Ooh. I'm Going to Punt on this One. John Leshy Likes to Play with Water Law. Maybe We'll Send this One up to Big John and Let Him Wrestle With this One. I Personally Would Have Little Comfort in Tying Anything to Water Rights, but That's Just Me. I Have Very Little Comfort in Water Law. Matt? I Don't Know What Else to Say On That One. As We Said this Morning, this Is A New Program and it Doesn't Have a Lot of Easy Answers. I'm Not Even Sure We Have All The Answers. As a Matter of Fact, I'm Sure We Don't. A Lot of the Answers We're Going To Come up with as We Go along. Well, the Faxes Seem to Have Dried up -- Are Those Two That You've Dealt with? We've Dealt with These. Scott, in Our Remaining Five Minutes, Can You Give Us a Five-minute Overview of the Farthing Case? Well, I'll Make an Attempt Here. The Slide We Saw Previously, If We Could Get Back to it for a Second, That Is the Farthing Residence. There. and That Is the Ibla Case That I Mentioned Earlier this Morning, and Basically What We've Got Here, We Have an Occupancy with a Number of Problems. The County Went out with Us to Do an Inspection. We Were Brought into this Because this Particular Piece of BLM Land Is Within 100 Yards Roughly of an Adjacent Land Owner Who Just Got Through Building a $250,000 House. So the County and BLM Went Out, Did an Inspection, and -- Let's Jump Ahead to Slide 143. You Have the Slides There? Yes, this Particular Case Had A Number of Problems. a Number of Violations Here, And this Was the One Primarily That Got the Adjacent Land Owner Really Upset. Why Should I Be Spending $250,000 on a House, Septic System, When this Mining Claimant over Here, Who Isn't Mining, Can Get Away with Stuff Like this? This Is What We're Trying to Stop. Let's Go to Slide 144. This -- and During the Inspection We Did Not Prompt the Dog, but He Went over to Do His Normal Daily Thing, I Guess, Having a Brief Bite. Anyhow -- this Clearly Constitutes a Public Hazard. Very Much So. If Not Cruelty to Animals. Not to this Particular One, But -- What Was the Final Outcome in Farthing in the Few Minutes We Have? the Final Outcome Was We Issued Two Notices of Noncompliance. He Appealed Both. That Decision Covers Both of Those. Mr. Farthing Left for Arizona. He Abandoned the Site and Is Now Here in Your Territory. Do You Know If He Has Moved Onto a Mining Claim Here? I'm Not Too Sure about That. Good. Al Burch, Take Note. Looks like We're Start to Go Run Out of Some Time Here. We Will Leave the Fax Machine Loaded with Paper Overnight. If You Think of Questions after We're Through, Fax Them onto Us Any Time During the Night. If You Have Insomnia, You Can Fax Us a Question about 3715. We Will Try to Answer Them Tomorrow. We Do Have a Reading Assignment For You. We Have Three Surface Use Determination Reports for You to Read Tonight. We'll Go over this Type of Report and What it Can Do for You in the Morning. Now, All Three Cases Are Real, And They Range in Age from Six Months to Nine Years. The First of Them, the Dreamer's Paradise Is -- Report Was Written Just after the Crawford Decision. It Doesn't Fit the Current Report Manual Writing Format Exactly. That's My Understanding. We Use That Particular Report to Build the Manual Standards. I've Heard That. I've Heard That. But it Is a Good Example of What To Do When the Only Guidance You Have Is an Ibla Decision. And It's Also a Good Example How To Use Photographs to Document Nonuse and a Good Idea. Another Good One Is the North Star Report from Montana. It's Kind of an Intermediate Age. The Last of Them, the -- Is the Popcorn Shrimp Report. That's Not Really It's Name. It's a Current Case and I Had to Heavily Sanitize it to Change The Names and Locations to Satisfy the Office of the U.s. Attorney. Now, Some of You from Northeastern Utah May Recognize It, but Keep Tight Yourselves. Anyway, Pay Special Attention to The Way the Authors Tabulated Their Observations and Conclusions. It's a Very Powerful Technique And It's Borne Some Very Good Fruit. I Think We Have a Call Now and This Is Al in Phoenix. Hello, Al, in Phoenix. Caller: Hi, How's it Going, Guys? Well, Pretty Good. Caller: I Wanted to Thank Scott Murrellwright for Sending Mr. Farthing Our Way. You're Welcome, Al. Anything I Can Do to Help. Caller: Maybe We Can Reciprocate in a Year or So. I Am Looking Forward Tight. He Has Not Abandoned His Claims, Only the Occupancy Site. Caller: Good Job, Guys. We'll Talk with You Tomorrow. We'll Expect to Hear from You. We Have One Last Fax That Came In Before We Go off the Air, and Do You Really Mean BLM Should Take the Responsibility of Contacting Everyone to Ensure That They Get the One Year? It's Their Responsibility Not Ours. If We Tell Some but Miss Someone Would We Be Potentially Liable? the Answer to That One Is Simple, No. We Should Make an Effort. If for No Other Purpose than Good Customer Relations. Yes, You Can Ignore Some People And Not Say Something to Them And Be Pretty Much Assured They're Not Going to Get the Message from Somebody Else, and The Only Thing You're Very Likely Going to Do Is Have a Lot Of People Nod Their Heads and Say, Hmmm, Thought That about Them All the Time, Just Can't Learn to Live with Those Folks And Can't Learn to Trust Them. You Know, You're Better off Believing in Customer Service Than You Are in Not Believing in Customer Service. Well, Denver Service Center Did Send out to All Mining Claimants Notices What this Was All About, the 3715s and Notifying the BLM. It's Also the Claimant's Responsibility to Keep the Records up to Date. Absolutely. No Question about That. But Nothing's Lost If We Go out And Take That Extra Step. No, Nothing Is. It's a Question of Time. Yeah, Absolutely. That's Right. Okay. Well, That's it for Today. Now, Remember That All Day Tomorrow We'll Be on Satellite Galaxy 9, Transponder 2. We've Double Checked. It Will Be Galaxy 9 and Transponder 2. And I'll Wear a Different Tie. So We'll See You Then. This begins the transcript for the 2nd day of the telecast (Sept 12, 1996). The Bureau of Land Management Satellite Network Presents Live From the BLM National Training Center in Phoenix, Arizona: Today's Instructors Are: And Now the Host of Your Program, Matt Shumaker. Good Morning, Everyone, and Welcome to the BLM National Training Center. Today's Telecast Is the Second Day of Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Management. Yesterday Gordon Pine from Tonopah Sent Us a Fax and Asked If My Tie Was a Tie or a Color Test Pattern. I Wasn't Quite Sure What He Meant until I Saw the Tie after We Were All Done Yesterday on a Monitor. Apparently You Could Have Turned Your Television Brightness Way Down and Turned the Lights off In Your Room and You Still Would Have Been Able to See Very Clearly. So Today I Have Tea Side to Do Wear Something More Sedate. Gordon, the next Time I'm Through Tonopah I Will Buy the Hamburgers. Also, If Sending Faxes, Be Sure To Give What You Are Asking Some Thought. Some of the Faxes Had Questions We Really Couldn't Figure out. We Weren't Able to Answer Them At All. Others We Did the Best We Could On What We Thought People Were Asking. And Remember to Use a Dark Marker, Not a Fine-point Pen. Our Instructor Panel this Morning Will Be Rick Deery and Scott Murrellwright. Good Morning, Rick. How Are You? I'm Toing Fine. And I Appreciate the More Sedate Tie. Well, it Was Awfully Warm in Here Yesterday. Scott, Welcome Back. How Are You this Morning? Pretty Good. Slowly Getting Used to this Chair. Ooh, That's Scary. This Afternoon, We'll Have Dennis Mclane and Bob Gibson Available to Answer Questions as They Come In. So They May Be Joining Us. We Sent You Some Overnight Updates via Groupwise, These Includes Updates on Mine Safety, Health and an Instruction from The Nevada State Office on the Contents of a Successful Realty Case File. We Will Be Get to Go All of Those Later Although the Case File Material Will Probably Be Dealt with in the Morning Tomorrow. If You Don't Have Them You Should Check with Your Site Coordinator. There Will Be Two Ways to Participate Today. We Will Ask for Telephone Calls During the Day. Again, When You're Asking Questions on the Air We Ask You Stand Away from Your Television Or Turn the Stand down. Steve Fetchner and Michael Horn Will Be Our Phone Operators and Get to You as Quickly as They Can. You Can Send a Fax Question at Any Time Using the Form in Your Course Notes. Understand When You Send Us a Fax Question We May Not Get it On Paper Here on the Stage. We May Hear about it Through the Intercom and Will Work the Answer into Our Discussion If at All Possible. Remember to Print Your Question With a Dark Marker. Telephone Numbers for Your Fax Questions or for Your Call-ins Are in the First Few Pages of Your Notes. Before We Get Going, We Had Some Faxes That Came in Overnight and I'd like to Deal with Those Now Because They Primarily Clarify Things We Were Talking about Yesterday. We Had a Couple of Questions Dealing with Fences and Signs, And We'll Postpone Dealing with Those until Just Before Lunch Today. Rick, You Want to Deal with Some Of the Questions? Okay. We Had a Couple of These. One Question That Came in from The -- Some Folks at the Mine Expo '96, the Toy Show, Welcome Aboard, Folks, Says How Come the Regs Are No Longer on the Internet. I Assume Here We're Talking About the BLM Home Page. If You Can't Find the Regs on The Internet on a BLM Homepage, Go to Ww W.access.gpo.gov. Find the Subpage Known as Gpo On-line and Do What's Known as Known as a Wais Search on Federal Register Volume 61. And You Can Use 43 Cfr 3715 and The Rin Number as Your Search Standards. And While I Don't Guarantee That Works, That's an Awfully Large Site That Uses a less than Intuitive Search System. You Should Have Some Luck There. We Have Another Question That Came in from New Mexico. The Question Reads: Is it Considered Use If a Miner Has Equipment and Other Stuff on His Claim but He's Not Living on It? Yes, it Is Use. Anything That Happens on the Public Land Is a Use. What We're Dealing with Is Essentially the Test of Whether The Use Is Reasonably Incident, That Is, Mining Related, or a Nonmining Use. And That's One of the Sorting Tools That These Regulations Give Us. The Second Part of the Question Says, Can We Use 3715 to Require A Miner to Remove Selected Nonmining-related Equipment? Absolutely. Anything That's Not Mining Related Is Not Reasonably Incident, and Either Has to Have Another Form of Authorization or Has to Be Removed, and That's One of the Points, I Believe, Matt in the Popcorn Shrimp Exercise. That's Correct. That Exercise Deals Directly With That Issue and Also the Format of the Report Is an Excellent Way to Deal with What Is, What Isn't, What Is, What Isn't and the Various Things That Should Be Taken off a Claim. We Will Come Back to That Report Later, but If You Haven't Looked At It, You Need to Spend Time Witness. It's a Powerful Report. Now, We Have One Other Question That Came in from Idaho Falls and If We Are -- Said Something That Resulted in Some Confusion, We Apologize. Apparently We Did. We Were Confused Yesterday about What State or County Building Codes Were Applicable. You Said Two Different Things. One, That the Codes That Were to Be Used Were Those Applicable at The Time of Our Occupancy Determination. Two, Those Codes That Were Applicable When the Structure Was Built. How about Someone Occupying a Structure That Was Built in the 1890s? Well, If You Turn to Page 13 of The Regulations in Your Handout And Look in the Preamble Language, We Discuss That, and Essentially What We Are Saying Is That the Occupancy Needs to Comply with the Applicable Standards, and in Most Cases the Circumstance Is Going to Be That The House Has to Comply with Code at the Time it Was Built And Residency Began. Some Counties, Some States Have Retrofited Their Codes to Make The Most Updated Codes Apply Backwards in Time to Older Structures. California Is a Classic Example Of this. In Particular, California's Earthquake Standards. In Which Case the Word Applicable Code Means the Most Current Code. With Respect to Something Built, Say, 1880, 1890, 1900, If You Are in the First Circumstance That the County Has Chosen Not To Make Old Structures Retrofit To Meet New Codes, Then the Applicable Code Would Be 1890 Code, and If There Was No Codes In 1890, Then There Is Simply No Code Requirements to Be Met. Matt? That's Right. The Bottom Line on this Is You Need to Be Talking to Your County People. If You're Not Talking to Your County People, Then You're Not Learning the Stuff. Yogi Berra Once Said, Which Is a Close Paraphrase, It's Amazing What You Can Hear by Listening. In this Case, It's Amazing What You Can Learn by Reading the Regs. If You Haven't Done it Yet, You Really Ought to Be Doing That. Another Question Here from Montana, and I'll Just Let You Take Care of It. Could You Explain the Scope Of a 3715 Nepa Analysis? Does the Analysis Apply to More Than Residential Occupancy and Proposed Enclosures That Prevent Public Access? Well, the Second Half of the Question Is One That We Feel We Need to Deal with Quickly. It Appears as Though this Rule Has Elevated 3809 Notices to Federal Actions. If We're Looking at All Proposed Uses in Terms of Reasonably Incident and Unnecessary or Undue. We Are Looking at Occupancy and Fencing as Part of the Proposed Action. The Other Stuff, the Nonoccupancy, Nonfencing Stuff, Is Running in the Background. It Does Not Need BLM's Review or Approval to Continue. It Simply Has to Conform to All Standards, Including the Need to Be Reasonably Incident. Nothing Has Changed the Status Of a 3809 Notice. The Only Thing That You Are Looking at Is the Use and Occupancy and the Background Is The Activity That Is Occurring, And it Occurs Regardless of What We Do. It Is Still a Nonfederal Action From a Nepa Perspective. I Hope That Answers That. Matt, We Had Another One Just Come In. Yes, this Just in from Yuma, Arizona. It's an Interesting Question, Rick. Okay. You Have Mentioned Several Times Of the Need for Surface Use Determinations, Yet I Can Find No Mention of this in the Regulations. Where Does this Requirement Come From? If You Look in the Old 3893 Manual, Matt, Which Has Not Yet Been Taken down from the Directive System, You Will Find A Requirement for a Surface Use Determination. The Surface Use Determination Is Essentially That Point at Which All of the Arguments for or Against the Occupancy Are Put Into Some Form of Report So That The Management Will Understand What's Going On. That Surface Use Determination Requirement Will Continue to Exist in the Regulatory or Guidance Scheme That Accompanies This Regulation. It Is a Useful Tool. It Is a Good Place, Particularly When You're Going to Make a Not Reasonably Incident Determination to Put All Your Ducks in a Row and Place Your Arguments Carefully on Paper and Think about Them and We Intend Particularly for Those Cases That Are Going to Involve Not Reasonably Incident Outcomes to Have a Surface Use Determination Prepared for Them. It's Also Important to Note, Rick, People That Prepare the Surface Use Determinations Understand What Mining Is Supposed to Look like. A Surface Use Determination That's Prepared by Somebody Who Doesn't Have a Clue What a Mine Will Look like Will Have No Credibility. and Will Get Us in an Awful Lot of Trouble. Yeah. One Last One Overnight from New Mexico. Okay. Remember the Miner Who Is Not Living on His Mining Claim and Who Does Not Plan on Living on His Mining Claim but Has a Large Shed Capable of Being Lived in -- I Think We've Answered the Question at this Point -- on His Claim, Who Is Required to Submit An Occupancy Form. Okay. The One -- the Question Goes: The One-year Grace Period Is Over and Nothing Has Changed. Does this Occupancy Need to Be Approved under 3715 as a Large Shed Capable of Being Lived In? The Answer Is the Question. It Is Capable of Supporting Occupancy. It Is a Permanent Structure. We Need to Have a Determination Of Concurrence or Nonconcurrence. Great. That's it on the Faxes for Now. We'll Be Getting Back to More of Them Later. Scott's Back this Morning and Has Some Clarifications and Follow-up on Yesterday's Bear Cave Exercise and Then He'll Pick up Dealing with Existing Occupancy. Scott, Take it Away. Thank You, Matt. As Matt Said, I Would like to Preaddress the Bear Cave Load Exercise. I Thought That Was a Little Abrupt Yesterday. Just Gotten Back from Lunch, and After Lunch Jitters, and So Bear With Me. You Don't Need to Go Back into Your Notes at All. If You Would Look at Your Monitor Right Now. The Explanation and the Reasons For the Answers Were No Lie in The Question: Do They Use Appropriate Equipment? Well, He Identified a Lode Deposit and Said He Was Going to Be Using a Suction Dredge for It. That Is Why We're Saying No. In Regards to the Has He Obtained the Necessary County Permits, There's None Mentioned. We Would in this Particular County Need to Write a Letter of Authorization from BLM. And What Was the Real Purpose of This Operation Appear to Be? Most of You, Just about All of You Got It, It's a Home or Retirement Home. This Particular Mining Claim Is Located Behind a Locked Gate, Which You Have to Access Through Private Property, and Sandwiched Between Two Private Pieces and Just a Little History Here, We Got a Call from the Adjacent Land Owner, and the Claimant Was Bragging about What They Were Going to Be Doing and Building On Site. Anyhow, Your Strategy Was Correct. Letter of Noncompliance. List the Standards and Requirements Not Met and Give Them the Opportunity to Resubmit And Also Have the Appeal Paragraph in There. So I Would Also like to Take a Moment to Make a Response to a Question That We Had Yesterday Regarding the Golden Eagle Proposal. The Question Was: the Notice Did Not Address Needs per Regulations for Occupancy. Why Concur Without Further Need? Well, Maybe I Should Give You a Little More of a Background Here Regarding That Particular Case. The Mining Claim Is Located in a Recreation Section of a Wild and Scenic River, and the Mining Activity, Settling Ponds and Equipment and Occupancy Is less Than 200 Feet from the Campground, and There's Also -- We Also Manage Commercial Rafting on this Particular River, and the Rafting Takeout Is on the Opposite Side of the Road Which Is Also Part of His Mining Claim. So it Was BLM's Consensus That The Claimant's Residency Is Necessary for the Operation for The Protection of His Equipment And Also the Safety of the Public. And We're Also Scheduled to Do a Patent Exam on That Particular Case next Year, Which Brings a Question to Mind to Me, Rick, in This Particular Case, We've Got A First Half of the Final Certificate Has Been Issued, We're Scheduled to Do a Mining Claim Validity Exam next Year. If We Were to Go out and Do a Surface Use Determination Right Now, Does the Mining Claimant Need to Be Actively Engaged in Mining Operations? In Other Words, If the First Half of the Certificate Has Been Issued, Does the Mining Claimant Need to Be Actively Engaged in Mining Operations? Well, it Makes Your Determination of Validity a Little Easier, But, No, There Does Not Have to Be Actual on The Ground Operations, And, Further, with Respect to this Particular Case, as You've Laid It out to Us, He Still Has to Have a Notice, an Occupancy Notice, with Us, or He's Got to Face the Full Impact of the Regs On October 16th of this Year. But, No, There Is No Real Need For Him to Be Actively Mining While You're Doing the Surface Use Determination. He Certainly Ought to Be Mining Or at Least Demonstrating What He's Doing in the Way of Mining When You Are Your Examiners Get Out There. Right. Okay. Thanks. Also If There Are Any Other Questions on That Particular Proposal, You Can Give Me a Call At the Office next Week When I'm Back in If You Still Want to Discuss It. Okay. Moving On, Use Authorizations And Existing Occupancies. Basically What We're Going to Try to Cover Here Is Explain the Process and the Time Frame for Adjudicating Existing Occupancies and Hopefully Give a Description of an Existing Occupancy and Determine If It's Reasonably Incident Use. What We'll Be Looking at Primarily Is Regulations on Page 25, Roughly 3715.4. Handouts, If You Notice, We Have An Example of an Immediate Suspension Order, Another Order, Partial and Converting a Mining Claim Occupancy to 2920 Lease Letter. All Existing Use and Occupancies Must Comply with the Regulations By August 18th, 1997. If Not, BLM Will Issue a Notice Of Noncompliance or Order Any Existing Use or Occupancy Failing to Meet the Requirements To Suspend or Cease under 3715.7-1. a Quick Question. Maybe We Could Address this to Rick. At the Beginning of Business on The Day of the Deadline, Should We All Be in Our Parking Lots With Our Engines Warmed up and An Arm Load of Notices of Noncompliance Ready to Go So We Can Blanket the Countryside with Them? Or Should We Just Work Them into Our Normal Course of Business? Well, Our Advice Is Work Them Into the Normal Course of Business. Your Adjudicaters and Your Office Staff May Well Be Ready To Throttle You If 150 Appeals All Arrive in the Office at More Or less the Same Time and That's The Circumstance That Will Probably Confront You. Basically the Idea Is to Proceed To the Worst Case Known to You, Work on That Case, Work on as Many Other Cases as You Have People and Money and Time Available For, and Then Move to The next Case. Remember, We Have on this Rule Three Years of Authority for Information Collection. That Means That We Don't Have to Justify this Rule and Go Back Through Any Processes for Three Years. And When We Got That Justification, We Said, We Didn't Expect to Solve All These Problems in the First Year or in The First Year plus Day One. We Said it Will Probably Take Us The Full Three Years to Pull This Together and Have No Doubt About It, We Will Probably Go Beyond That Three-year Period. So If You Want to Rush Right out And Throw out 150 Notices of Noncompliance and Get 150 Appeals and Go Through the Process of Boxing up 150 Copies Of Case Files and Sending Them Off to the Interior Board of Land Appeals, with the Expected Result from Both Your Staff and Likely from Your State Director, Go Right Ahead. I'm Not Going to Tell You Don't. I'm Simply Going to Suggest That Prudence Dictates You Deal with What You Have the Dollars and The People to Handle. There's Another Issue Involved in That, and We Have an Example of What Can Happen to You on Slide 127. So If We Could Have a Look at Slide 127, this Is the Fate That Befall You If You Start Doing Things Altogether Too Quickly. This Is Not Necessarily Bad. If You Look at this Particular Instance, It's a Television Crew And It's Interviewing Someone Who Has Been Told to Leave and If Suddenly in Every BLM State There Is a Swarm of These Things, It's Going to Get Ugly. Scott, Do You Have Any Observations on That Particular Instance? That Has Happened on Occasion To Us. In Fact, That Is One of Our Slides. I Know. That Has Happened on More Than One Occasion. and Dennis Mclane Will Have Opportunity to Revisit That Tomorrow. Dennis and I Have Been Featured In the San Diego Union, but Fortunately We Were below the Fold, So it Wasn't Quite as Bad As it Could Have Been. and this Raises -- Matt Raise As Point That's Well Taken. If You Want a Public Relations Disaster, this Is a Sure Prescription for It. If You Are Going to Do It, Be Sure to Check with the Opa Folks First. Thanks, Scott. Carry On. Be Ready for the Hot Seat. the Hot Seat Hotter than These Seats? Hotter than These Seats, Yes. The Use or Occupancy under the Mining Laws That Existed on August 15th, 1996, May Continue For One Year after That Date Without Being Subject to the Procedures of this Subpart Provided That, One, an Existing Occupancy Form Is Filed with BLM By October 15th, 1996, And, Two, BLM Has No Pending Trespass Action Against the Use or Occupancy. The One-year Grace Period Will Not Apply If BLM Determines That The Use or Occupancy Is Not Reasonably Incident and the Continued Presence of the Use or Occupancy Is a Threat to Health, Safety or the Environment. In this Case BLM Will Order an Immediate Temporary Suspension Of Activities under 3715.7-1 (A). If No Existing Occupancies but Uses Exist under the Mining Laws, They, Too, Are Subject to The Standards in 3715.5 and Will Be Determined During the Normal Inspection and During Review of Notices and Plans Filed under 43 Cfr 3800. After BLM Receives the Occupancy Notification Form an Inspection Will Be Conducted to Obtain the Information Described in 3715.3-2 and That's Located on Page 24. The Requirements There. Based on the Exam, BLM Will Make A Determination of Concurrence Or Nonconcurrence, and the Claimant May Provide this Information in Writing or Verbally on Site. I Have a Question on this Right Now in Regards to Specialists Going out There, Geologists, Mining Engineers: What If We're Out There on Site, and I Have on Occasion Had the Opportunity or Have Had to Sit down with a Claimant and Help Them Write Their Notice or Plan of Operation, and in Some of Those Cases It's Because They Haven't -- Don't Have the Skills or the Tools to Do it Themselves. Are We Putting Ourselves in a Position Here of Taking -- We're Talking Verbally Here, Verbal Information from the Claimant in Regards to Their Operation, and We Are Actively Writing this Down, and If We Come up -- We Determine That It's a Nonconcurrence in this Operation, and They Appeal, and The Instance Could Come Back and The Operator or Claimant Could Say, Well, BLM Wrote this for Me? Well -- Where Are We? We're Where We're Supposed to Be. The Claimants Have the Positive Duty to Get Us the Information. If They Don't Get Us the Information, Then We've Said We'll Go out and We'll Gather It. We'd Much Prefer That You Provide it to Us, but If We Have To Generate it on Our Own, Then We Will Do So to Make That Determination, and in That Sense It's Not Remarkably Different From a Validity Exam. The Validity Exam Can Result in A Claimant Saying, Ah, Back over That Way, Go Take a Sample, and We Craft up a Plan Based on That And the Guy Comes into the Courtroom and Says, No, No, No, You Have No Idea What You Were Talking about. Well, You Had the Opportunity, Mr. Claimant, to Say What Was Happening, What Was on Your Mind And We Made the Prima Facie Case Based on What We Thought You Were Going to Do. Now, We're Not Talking Quite Prima Facie Case, but the Parallel Is Strong. We Are Going to Go out and See What Is Going on and We Are Going to Say, this Is What We Think. Before You Leave, When You're Writing this Up, it Helps to Sit Down and Review What You've Acquired, What You've Divined From the Discussion and Say, Look, Based on What We've Talked About over the Last 15 or So Minutes, Here Is What I See You Planning on Doing. Is this Right? If So, Let Me Know. If Not, Tell Me Now. and That's Where Documentation Comes In. Exactly! Documentation Is Also Important -- Also If the Claimant Is Someone Who Will Sit Down and Let You Write Things Down for Him to Sign, it Implies To Me You've Got a Pretty Decent Working Relationship, at Least For That 15 Minutes, and as a Public Servant, If You Will, You Owe it to Him to Say, Because You Know Pretty Well What's Going to Look like a Reasonably Incident Work and Not, You Owe It to That Man or Woman to Say, You Know, I Don't Think These Things Are Going to Fly, and You Need to Be Prepared for Us to Say No. And Maybe You Can Get an Agreement from Them on the Spot To Clean up That Before it Ever Becomes a Problem. If We Can Avoid a Problem, We're Far Better off than Trying to Solve a Problem. in My Experience, I Found That a Face-to-face with the Claimants Discussing the Operations and What's Going to Take Place Is -- You Can Determine an Awful Lot and Cut Off a Lot of Problems Right Then And There. That's Right. One of the Things I Remember Is That in Many Cases I Had Really Good Working Relationships with People, and They Cleaned up Their Act or Kept Their Act Clean Not So Much to Comply with The Regulations but Because They Didn't Want Me Mad at Them, and I Know You've Got People in the Same Situation. Yeah. Okay. Moving On, under 3715.4-3, If it Is Determined That All or Part Of the Existing Use or Occupancy Is Not Reasonably Incident, an Order or Suspension -- Order a Suspension or Cessation of All Or Part of the Use or Occupancy Under 3715.7-1. We're Still on Page 27. And Also 3715.4-3b, BLM May Order the Land to Be Reclaimed And Specify a Reasonable Time For Completion under 3800. And BLM May Order the Claimant To Apply Within 30 Days after The Date of Notice from BLM for Appropriate Authorization 43 Cfr 2900. Priorities. Denver BLM Informed All Mining Claimants by Postcard of the New Regulations and That a Notice of Occupancy Is Required to Be Filed with BLM. Denver Apparently Never Did Distinguish Between Claims Located on BLM and Forest Service. So the First Question out of the Box Is to Ask What Agency Manages the Service That Your Mining Claim Is Located On. Scott, in Defense of the Folks at Denver, We Put on There Language That Said Administered By BLM, and as Usual, this Looks To the Notion That We Speak a Language Inside the Agency That Is -- Makes a Lot of Assumptions On Our Part. When You Say Administered by BLM, We Inside the Agency Know, Oh, That's the Yellow Ground on The Maps. The Community at Large Thinks Administered by BLM, BLM Administers the Mining Law, So BLM Administers That Land, and We Had an Awful Lot of Inquiries At the Headquarters Level as Well of Folks Calling in Saying, I'm on the Lo Lo National Forest. Should I File One of These Forms? And We Then Got a Greatly Relieved Citizen Who Said, No, You're Not Required. That's What I'm Finding, Too, With a Lot of Phone Calls. We Also Got a Lot of Kudos Over the Phone from Folks Who Said I'm Awfully Glad You're Trying to Get Rid of the Nonminer. I Can Ditto That. The Main Point Is Trying to Cut Down the Workload We've Got on This. Can You Ditto That? I Can Ditto That. Is There Any Truth to the Rumor You Are Rush Limbaugh's Stunt Double? I Can't Say, Top-secret. Where Was I -- Never Mind... When Sorting Through Those Existing Occupancy Forms You Will Probably Find That Some Have Been Submitted Even Though No Use or Occupancy Exists on Site. When in Doubt, Call the Claimant. The Main Point Is Here Is Try And Reduce Your Workload as Possible and When You Can Use The Phone to Talk to the Individual Who Has Sent in the Form, I've Found Some of My Forms Are Even Missing a Few Details Such as Cmac Numbers, Notice Plans, Give Them a Call, And Look Them Up, and Fill Them In. it Also Helps to Build a Working Relationship with Some Claimants You Might Not Have Had A Relationship with in the Past, And as Matt's Pointed Out, That Working Relationship with an on The Ground Claimant Can Be Worth A Lot More than Mere Compliance With the Rules. That's Right. One Thing I Would Want to Mention, If You Are Adding Things to Something the Claimant Submitted to You, Send Them a Note Back or a Letter Back with A Copy of What They Sent and the Additions You Made to it Saying, Thanks, it Was Missing this Information, but We Had it on File, So I Added It. Is it All Right with You? I -- Yes, I Agree. with New Regulations Comes More Work. To Determine Who Floats to the Top, a Review of the Current 3802 and 3809 and 2920 Case Files Should Be Conducted for Pending Actions Such as Notices Of Noncompliance, Appeals, Litigation Through Usada Office, Trespass Notices, and Any Surface Use Determinations in Progress. Those Cases That BLM Has a Pending Action Against Should Receive Top Billing. Scott, Some Folks Might Not Know What a Usada Is. That's Us Assistant District Attorney. Okay. When an Existing Occupancy Notice Is Submitted, the Claimant or Operator Should Be Notified as Soon as Possible Whether They Qualify or Not for The Grace Period. If the Record Shows Had He Do Not, an Order May Also Be Appropriate. You Will Notice in There on Page M16 That There's a Grace Period Example, and the Individual Involved Is Casey Jones, and Casey Jones Received a Certified Receipt Notice of Noncompliance On June 4, 1995. He Was Required to Register His Vehicles and Provide Copies of His County Building and Sanitation Permits Within 30 Days of Receipt. On August 16, 1996, He Had Still Not Complied with BLM's Request Or Appealed the Am's Decision. An Immediate Suspension Order Would Be Deemed Appropriate in This Case Because Due to the Sanitation and Still Not Coming Into Compliance with County Codes Regarding the Septic Situation, the Area Manager Determined That Immediate -- That -- I Just Said It, a an Immediate Suspension Order Should Be Sent out. Again, on Any Kind of Order We Need to Remember to Send Them Certified Return Receipt and Also as Matt Said, Include the Certification Number. Scott, We Have about 10 Minutes Left until We Go to Our Morning Rake Break. How Are We Doing on Occupant Submissions? I Can Briefly Run Through These. It's Important to Note -- Let Me See If I Can Move Forward Here. It's Important to Note, I Believe, You Have Copies of the Things Scott Is Slipping Through. So You Can Look at Them Later. Maybe a Point Worth Noting Here That We Might Want to Cover Is Conversion of a 29 -- of a 3809 Case to a 2920 Case. this Would Be in a Situation Where There Just Isn't Anything That We Can Do to Make it Reasonably Incident to Mining And Give Them Authorization to Live There Anyway? Correct. In Our Resource Area, and I'm Sure Many Others, You Will Find That You Have Got Some Folks Who Have Been Living out There for 25, 30 Years, You Know, When They Went out There -- the World Was Different Then. What Can We Do? I Call These Mom and Pop Cases. Would this Be a Conversion of 3809 or 3715 Case. this Would Be a 3809 Case. But the Question, Is They Have Sent in 3715 Occupancy Forms. What Are We Going to Do? You Know. And Basically for What Happens In These Cases, We Would Have The Claimants Relinquish the Area Their Site Sitting on and Issue Them a 2920 Permit Where There Is No Advantage to the Government Here. It's Too Much of a Hardship. this Seems like it Takes the Place of the Old Mining Claim Occupancy Act. It's a Version of It. and it Was Specifically Built Into the System When the Rules Were Being Devised. We Early on Decided That We Didn't Want to Have Front Page News above or below the Fold or On the 5:00 News in Sacramento Of Old Folks Being Driven off Their Mining Claims When There Was No Percentage in It. So We Built into the Rules a Simple Requirement. All We Have to Do Is Give Them An Order to Go Get a -- an Appropriate Authorization under Part 2900. That's the Trap Door. It's Also the Thing That Lets You Say, this Is No Longer a Minerals Case. This Is Now a Case to Be Dealt With by the Lands Folks and this Is Also a Vehicle for Keeping You out of Bad Press. Don't Use it Indiscriminately But Be Prepared to Make Use of It as They Have Done in the Folsom Area. It's Important to Note with The 2920 or Even the O Leases It's Not a Fire and Forget Exercise. If You Are Just Leasing the Land, You Have to Maintain Your Compliance Examinations on it Because What Will Happen Is Instead of Having a Noncompliance or a -- an Inappropriate Use under 3809 or 3715 You Will End up with an You A Inappropriate Use under 2920 Which Is Just as Bad. How this Happens Is under the Lease, the Lease Expires upon The Passing of the Claimants. Once They Are Gone, They Cannot Will the Structures to Their Relatives or Anything Else. At That Point in Time There's a Time Period There, Minimum Usually of a Year, for the Relatives to Clean Off, Dismantle the House, Remove it Or Quitclaim it or Relinquish it To the U.s. with Those Cases It's Important to Note the File Remains Active until after the Death of the Occupants and the Buildings Have Been -- Have Had Whatever Their Final Disposition -- I Was Going to Say Demolition. That's Not Always the Case. I Have Had Almost a Bad Experience with this with an Old Moca, Where the People Died and The Docket Clerk Looked at the Origination Date and Said, Oh, That's Seven Years Old and it Went to the Archives and We Had No Idea That Was a Situation. So the People Died, the Widow Moved to Los Angeles to a Rest Home, the Building Was Vacant And it Was Used for Illegal Uses Such as a Drug Lab and it Was Very Bad News. You've Got to Stay on Top of These. The Average Residence Time of an Area Geologist Is Between Five And 15 Years. These Things Can Go on More than 15 Years. So You Have to Keep Those Files Active. You May -- We Do Have -- We've Had a Few Discussions in Our Office with the Realty Folks And Some of Them Are Not Happy About It, but That's the Way it Goes. That's Right. It's the Area Manager's Decision. You Can Look at a Letter We've Prepared to Gabby Hayes on M19 To See How We Kind of Works That Thing. I'm Pretty Much Done. Well, Actually, We Have about Six More Minutes Before the Break. If You Would like to Go into Some of the Detail on the Items You Just Skipped over. Oh -- Which I Think Would Be an Excellent Use Right Now. Okay. Because You're Catching Me a Wee Bit by Surprise. You Caught Me by Surprise There for a Moment, Too. Here We Go. Looks like We Have a Question in Here. Is this a Correct Interpretation Of 3715.7-1, Nonconcurrence, I.e., Trespass, Immediate Suspension -- Ahh -- Scott Has Just Been Handed a Flowchart. It Should Appall -- I Apologize For the Color. It Will Tend to Swim and Smear On Your Television. We Won't Have it up for Long. Let's See. Is this a Correct Interpretation Of 3715? If You Look in Your Book There On Page M149, There Is a Flowchart, and -- Let's Take a Look. Again, What Page Are You Looking At? We Are on Page M149. M149 Is the Place to Be Right Now. Not Quite Is I Guess My Answer to this Particular Breakout, but Nice Try. Scott, Why Don't You Put Your Flowchart up and -- I'm Not Too Sure How this Will Work, but We'll Give it a Try Here. Oops -- Zoom it -- Never Mind, We'll Get Back to Lucy this Afternoon with That Answer to That Question. We're Sorry. We Tried, but Diagrams and Little Boxes Don't Work on Little Boxes That You're Staring At Across the Room. So We'll Try Again with That One. Essentially It's a Question of What Is the Sequence That One Follows in Dealing with Suspensions. Suffice to Say That Immediate Suspension Is the Highest Level Of Activity That You Don't Want To See Going On. It Means That There Is a Threat To Health and Safety and the Actions on the Ground Are Not Reasonably Incident. That Is a Suspension Order That Can Be Appealed but the Appeal Does Not Stay the Order. A Lesser Case Involves Not Reasonably Incident Activities But That Are Not a Threat to Health and Safety and There You Give an Order Saying Suspend, Stop, Quit. That Order Is Appealable to the Interior Board of Land Appeals And That Order Is Stayed When it Goes to the Board. The Third Tier or Lower Most Tier Is a Notice of Noncompliance. It's More or less Reasonably Incident but There's Something That Needs to Be Tweaked That Isn't Exactly Right, and Those Are the Corrective Notices That We're All Sort of Familiar with. Remember, the Difference Is We've Backed These up with a Substantial Teeth of Criminal Penalties. Scott? Okay. If You Have Got Time Here, You Could Take a Look at Some Nonauthorized Uses Under, I Believe it Is, Mr. Pickle? Ah, Yes, Mr. Pickle. Mr. Pickle. And I Have Thoroughly Messed Up. You Have Lost Mr. Pickle. I Have Lost Mr. Pickle. Well, There's No Point Shuffling Looking for Mr. Pickle. in Mr. Pickle, the Situation There Is an Inspection Was Done After He Was Approved under 3715 And the Inspector Went out and Found That Mr. Pickle Was Pouring a Concrete Slab Foundation and He Was Also Building a Pigpen. Which Is Not Authorized under The Mining Law or the 3715s, and If You Look at That, There Is an Order There for Him to Cease and Desist in Part to Remove Those Improvements That Are Not Authorized under the 3715s. Or under the 3809s. Scott, Cases like That Are Fairly Common. Before We Go to the Break, If You'll for Give Me for Diving Back into a War Story, I Had a Claimant That I Had to Deal With, for Him the Route to the Mine Claim Was past the County Dump. The Dump Was Closed on Saturdays And Sundays. People Would Get There and Say, The Dumb Is That Closed and Leave Stuff by the Gate. So this Claimant Had Everything From Swimming Pool Slides to Plastic Drums and Mannequines And That Was a Bit Difficult to Deal with. And When He Sent Us His Plan of Operation He Did Include the Residences and the Structures, But We Didn't Expect the Swimming Pool, Slide and Water Skis. We've Had Numerous Situations Like That. We've Had Buildings That Have Been Used for Storage for Ski Supplies, Boots, Poles, the Works. It Was Listed as a Mill Building. Ahh. Perfect Sense, of Course. Well, It's Time for Our Morning Break. We'll Be Back in 15 Minutes Exactly. So Be Sure to Leave Your Television Turned On. And We're Taking Critiques on Ties Today on a Scale of 1 to 10 Who Has the Worst Tie. So You Can Fax That in with Your Questions Later. So We'll Be Back in 15. Welcome Back. I've Agreed to Take over Hosting The Program for a Few Minutes. Now, Some of You Were Wondering What Happened to Poor Mr. Pickle. Well, We Found Mr. Pickle, and He's Still with Us. Now, Matt Will Be Doing Some Talking about What Legitimate Uses Are, but Before We Go to Them, We Will Have a Few More Questions That Have Come In, and We Want to Jump Right into Those. On Page M19, First Paragraph, Why must a Mining Claimant Relinquish Their Claim Occupancy -- the Occupancy Embraces Prior To the Issuance of a 2920 Lease? Scott, You Want to Take a Shot At That One? Well, Right off the Top, 2920 Regulations Don't Apply to Mining Claims and If a Mining Claim in Encompassed by It, We Need to Have it Relinquished Prior to Issuing a 2920 Lease -- Occupancy. this Is a 2920 for Occupancy, Not Incidental Use or an Auxiliary Use That Isn't Incident to Mining. Okay. Another Question Here That Came in from Idaho Falls, and That Question Says, in the Case Of Authorizing a Long-term Occupancy under the 2920 Regs We Now Charge an Annual Fee as with New Leases under 2920, or Would We Waive it Because of the Mom And Pop Hardship? Scott? They Would Still Be Required To Pay a Fee under That. If You Look at the Letter That Was Drafted There, I Believe it Mentions That. And, Yes, a Fee Does Apply. and We Have an Observation Here from Somebody at Ntc That Says an Ada Is the Incorrect Use Of Terminology. It Is Assistant U.s. Attorney Or Ausa. We Stand Corrected. Thank You Very Much. Actually We Sit Corrected. We Sit Corrected. Thank You, Matt. And at this Point I Think It's Time to Go to Matt to Talk about What You Want to Talk about. Well, What I'm Talking about Is Evaluating Occupancy and Use, Rick, and this Is Kind of a New Thing for Me. Usually I Sit Where Rick Is Sitting, and Now I Am in the Position of Going Through Elmo Cards and Trying to Teach on Camera, So If I Collapse in Fear, You Will Know Exactly Why. Anyway, at the End of the Session and this Session Should Run until Just Before Lunch, We Are Going to Be Looking at Evaluating Occupancy and Use, And When It's over We Would like You to Describe in General the Types of Uses That Are Legitimate and Not Legitimate And, of Course, That's Going to Depend Where the Property Is in Its Mine Lifecycle. We Will Want to Also Look at Ways to Reduce Interagency Conflicts and That Speaks Directly to Msha Regulations and Some of the Things We Sent You Via Groupwise Overnight. We're Also Going to Hope That You'll Be Able to Describe the Life Cycles of a Mineral Property. They Actually Have Them. It's Not like Butterflies but Not Too Far Different Either. We Would Also like You to Make a Preliminary Evaluation of a Surface Use or Occupancy Given a Set of Facts. You Have to Understand Mine Operators Are Entitled to Use as Much of the Public Lands Is Reasonably Necessary for Them -- As Much as They Reasonably Need For Their Legit Operations. We Have an Example on Slide 155. Some of These Necessary Uses May Appear to Be in Conflict with BLM Goals N this Case this Looks To Be a Cement Plant, Whether or Not this Would Be on a Mining Claim Remains to Be Seen or a Mill Site Claim but a Terrible Thing Happened Here a Few Weeks Ago, and That Was We Moved from Office to Office, and Moving Just 400 Feet I Managed to Lose A Career Accumulation of Slides Of Mining Claim Occupancies and Mining Claim Uses. So I'm Kind of Depending on Stock Footage, and this Is Stock Footage. Also must Be Understood That Mine Operators Are Subject to a Myriad of Regulatory Demands Other than from BLM. Some of Them Carry Greater Pebble Tease than BLM Regulations. We've Got to Be Sure We're Not In Conflict with Other Agency Requirements. Some Examples: These Are Really Near and Dear to a Lot of Mine Operators and Mine Foremen. The Mine Safety and Health Administration, for Example, Msha Has Rules That Establish The Pit Bench Width and Height. Say That Four Times Rapidly. The Size, Width and Surface of Haul Roads. The Required Ancillary Facilities like Change Rooms and Ambulance Station and All Sorts Of Things. Protection of Health and Safety Of the Public by Fencing or Signing. The Work Hours of Mine Employees. For Example, You Can Work Longer Hours in a Surface Mine than You Can Work in an Underground Mine. The List Just Goes on and on and If You Want to Get a List of Them, Talk to Any Mine Manager And They'll Grown and Say, Ohhh, And Wonder How Long it Will Take. You Need to Have a Copy of this In Your Home Office. You Need to Have this Available. It's 30 Cfr Parts 1-199. These Are Msha Regulations. In Many Respects Msha Is like a Local Government Agency. We've Got to Meet Their Requirements. We've Got to Allow the Miners to Meet Their Requirements. Sometimes Msha Requirements May Appear to Be in Conflict with Our Requirements. This Is an N-a Nutshell What Msha Requires. Now, I Tried to Contact Msha to Get Information We Could Give You Today and I Played Phone Tag For Two and a Half Weeks Trying To Get Information and I Finally Got it in Writing on Monday, Which Is Why You Got Your Groupwise Overnight Update. Basically Msha Does Not Require That the Mine Property Be Fenced, So If Somebody Comes to You and Says Msha Requirements Say I Have to Fence My Property, That's Not Strictly True. However, Msha Does Require That Dangerous Areas Be Posted Against Entry and That the Area Be Barricaded. Well, Sounds to Me like in Many Cases a Fence Is the Right Answer. So Although Msha Is Not Requiring Fencing, Fencing Seems To Be a Pretty Good Idea at Times. Emsaw Does Not Require a Full-time Guard Be Posted at the Mine Site a Lot of Major Mines Do Have a Full-time Guard, and If You Go down and Say -- Take a Tour, for Example, of the Mission Complex South of Tucson, You'll Stop at a Guard Gate. The Guard Is There Primarily to Make Sure You Belong There and Make Sure You Have Safety Equipment and Make Sure That They Know You're Coming. Msha Also Has Roadway Standards. You Don't Need to Be Keeping Notes. If You Didn't Get this in Your Overnight Updates, Contact Us Via Fax and We'll Resend Them to You. Also Check with Your Downlink Coordinator and See If They're In for Copying and You Don't Have Them Yet. If You Want to Look up Msha Road Standards Look in 30 Cfr 56.900 And 56.9313. Msha Standards Requiring Training Requirements for Personnel at Mine Sites Are at 30 Cfr 48. So If You Have Been Told by a Mine Operator That Even the Ups Delivery Driver Has to Have Msha Certification to Enter the Property, You Might Want to Look That up in this Location. Although You Have to Understand The Mine Operators Are -- I Won't Say at the Mercy of the Msha Inspectors Because That's Not the Right Terminology, but The Local Msha Inspectors Do Have a Large Say in the Way Things Are Enforced. Okay. Suppose You Want to Contact Somebody at Msha to Find out What the Real Story Is? Here's What You Do. For Training Things You Can Contact the Msha Academy at Beckley, West Virginia. Here's the Phone Number. You Don't Have to Write this Stuff down. It's Coming to You via Groupwise. If You Didn't Get It, Let Us Know. For District Office Type Information, There's a District Office in Denver. There's a District Office in Dallas. And There's a District Office in Vacaville, California. Why They Have Offices in Dallas And Vaca Villascapes Me, but There They Are. If You Want to Talk to the Source, Call Michael Sheridan. Michael Is a Mining Engineer in Denver and His Phone Number Is -- You Might Write this One down Because this Is the Man I Played Phone Tag with. His Phone Number Is 303 231-5430. If You Have Specific Questions. And Actually, Most People Will Welcome Communication Between Agencies. Don't Be Afraid to Call. Just Don't Waste Other People's Time. The Environmental Protection Agency Also Has Some Requirements That Mines Have to Meet, and this Is by No Means an Exhaustive List. Your Haz-mat People Will Have Better Answers than I Ever Will, But Basically They'll Have Things to Say about the Location And Size of Mine Facilities, the Use and Storage of Chemicals, Disposal of Wastes and on and on And On. Understand That in Many States The States Have Taken over Enforcement of Some of These Things. You Should Have Someone in Your Office That Has a Pretty Fair Idea of What Is Required. All Right. State and Local Government Agencies Have a Big Say. They May Require Some Permits. If They're Going to Require the Permits, BLM must Allow the Operator to Comply with the Requirements of the Permits. We've Talked about Some of These Things Earlier Such as Getting Waivers If Meeting a County Requirement Would Be Worse than Not Meeting a County Requirement And So On. Scott Went into this in Some Detail. There Are Septic Tank Permits, Access Road Standards, Electrical Service Standards, Dust Control and on and on and On. We Need to Be Talking to Each Other. Matt, along Those Lines, We Just Got a Fax That Came in That Reminds Us That Msha Will Only Apply Their Standards to Working Mines. They Do Not Apply Their Standards to Exploration Operations. So We Have to Bear in Mind That There Is a Distinct Point Where Msha Becomes a Player, and That Is When a Mine Is Proposed or Comes into Existence. The Exploration Phase, You Will Probably Not See Msha out There. You'll Probably Find Some Other Agency out There. That's Right. That's a Good Point and I'm Glad We Got That Clarification. Also, Msha, for Some Reason, Doesn't Seem to Get to All Operating Mines, and One Thing That Has Been Used in the Ridgecrest Resource Area When Someone Claims to Be a Mine Operator and Truly Legitimate And Saying I Have to Do These Thing for Msha, They Call the Msha Inspector and Say, Hey, This Guy Somebody You Inspect And He Frequently Says, "Who?" You Can Document That Sort of Stuff If You're Building a Case Of Not Reasonably Incident Mining. the Other Point, Too, Is That That Will Help Msha Get a Handle On Folks That Maybe Haven't Been Giving Msha Required Notification. So Both Agencies Benefit. That's Right. It's a Good Idea. If We're Going to Require Mine Operators to Obtain Permits from A Local Government, We Have to Be Prepared to Allow Them to Meet the Standards. We Can't Just Brush off the Local Government. If We Establish a Requirement That Are in Opposition or Conflict, We're Going to Lose on Appeal, We're Going to Lose Big On Appeal. We Had a Question Yesterday About Waiving County Requirements When it Looked like It Would Better Protect the Environment and We Agree That's A Good Idea. But We Can't Have it Both Ways. If We're Going to Want to Work With the Counties We Need to Treat the Counties Decently So They'll Want to Work with Us. We Can't Just Arbitrarily and Capriciously Say County We Are Going to Ignore That and Go Our Own Way. We Need to Be Talking to Each Other. Another Important Issue Is Protecting Public Safety. We Have to Allow Operators to Fence or Sign Areas to Protect The Public Safety Where There's A Demonstrable Need. We Don't Need to Have the Area Fenced or Signed When All We Have Is Mining Claims That Blanket 50 Square Miles of Antelope Pasture. In Fact, 50 Square Miles of Antelope Pasture Reminds Me of a Time I Worked out of Riverton, Wyoming, but I Wasn't Working For the BLM and There Wasn't Uranium There, Either. Another Story for Another Time, Rick. Yes, I Hope So. it May Be Necessary to Allow An Operator to Post No Trespassing Signs in Specific Instances. Early this Morning We Received a Fax in from the Ridgecrest Resource Area -- in Many Respects He's Ahead of the Curve On Good Signage Requirements and Lynn Pointed Out, and I Have His Fax Right Here, Ridgecrest Only Allows No Trespassing Signs on The Structure That Is Used Exclusively for Residence. Remember, this Is Public Land. It's Not Private Land. And Nowhere Are You Going to See Me Recommending That We Put up Signs That Say Private Property Keep Out, Because it Isn't Private Property. We Have to Be Really Careful About That. Anyway, Ridgecrest Only Permits The No Trespassing Signs to Be Used at the Point of the Residence. They Have Perimeter Fence Signs Stating Other Things. We Recommend the Use of Signs That Are Very Descriptive. Just Keep out with No Reason Doesn't Really Explain That If You Go in There You're Going to Be Eitheren Alive or Fall into Shafts. We Will Come to Some Descriptive Signs in a Few Minutes. Our Intent Is to Protect the Safety of the Public. Part of the Intent Is to Avoid Tort Liability. Dennis Mclane Can Talk More About Tort Liability Tomorrow. However, Our Intent Is to Protect the Public Safety. If We Will Better Protect the Public Safety by Posting Bilingual Signs or Trilingual Signs, Even, Then We Should Do So. Almost a Radical Idea but One That Really Bears Thinking about Is When We Have Areas That Are Really Hazardous, When There's An Industrial Mining Activity Going O You Might Want to Consider a Notice of Realty Action, Closing a Buffer Zone Around the Area. Your Notice of Realty Action Would Close the Area to Only Authorized Personnel or BLM Employees, in Other Words, People That Need to Be There. That Way We Can Post Official Closed Area Signs. If You Have Immediate Problems You Might Want to Consider an Emergency Closure. There Are Some Useful Language For Some Signs in Hazardous Areas and I Have a Couple Examples. Slide 145 Is, of Course, One of My All-time Favorites. Slide 145 Shows Probably the Best Example of a Sign That Tells You Exactly What's Going To Happen to You If You Trespass. Now, this Wasn't Really on Public Land. This Is near Blythe, California. But I'm Willing to Bet the Families That Posted this Sign Did Not Have a Serious Problem Of Trespassing. There Are Some Signs That Are Not a Good Idea. For Example, Slide 158. Slide 158 Is Not What We Would Want to See. This Is Mining Area, No Trespassing, on and on and On. Somewhere in the Fine Print -- This Isn't the Sign That Says, We Serve Our Own Justice. That's Not a Good Idea. When You See These Things, It's Worth a Visit to the People That Posted Them to Come up with Something That Is More Appropriate. Another Lousy Example Is Slide 159. This One -- I Didn't Knock this One Down, Honest, I Didn't. This One I Came upon it this Way. It's Private Claim, Camc, Whatever the Number Was, Keep Out. They're on the Right Track. Tass Mining Claim and There Are Some Signs Available for Mining Claims. If You Subscribe to the California Mining Journal, There Is an Outfit That Advertises in The Classifieds and They Sell a Mining Area Sign or Mining Area Warning Sign That's Really Pretty Good. If You're Going to Develop Language for Signs in Hazardous Areas You Need to Give Them Some Thought. You May Want to Contact -- the Solicitor's Office. You May Want to Contact the Solicitor's Office Prior to Posting and Figure out What an Appropriate Language Is. The Sort of Signage Has to Be Limited to Truly Hazardous Situations Where We Really Need To Protect the Public's Safety. Again, You Don't Want to Be Putting up a No Trespassing or Private Property Sign. Here's an Example. This Is Pretty Generic. Keep out. Hazardous Conditions. It Explains You Shouldn't Go There and Basically Why. Here's Another Good One Coming Up. I'm Not Sure If in Today's Environment it Would Be Either a Good Deterrent or an Invitation For Somebody to Come in and Steal the Explosives, but You Really Ought to Consider If You Have Explosives, There's an Explosives Haserd and You Ought To Post That. Here's an All-time Favorite. Keep out. Not Particularly Descriptive. But Appropriate in Other -- in Some Instances. This One Is Available from the BLM Sign Shop. At Least it Was the Last Time I Looked. And You Can Post it Anyplace There Are Open Mine Shafts. It Doesn't Generally Serve as a Really Good Deterrent, but it Does Warn People If They're Not Watching Where They're Walking They're Likely to Fall In. This One Is a Little More up to Date. Danger, Open Mine Shafts. Stay out and Stay Alive! A Lot of States Are Doing Public Relations Programs on Stay out And Stay Alive and this Would Dovetail Nicely with What They're Doing. Another Possibility, Danger, Hazardous Chemicals. No Trespassing. Used by the Ridgecrest Resource Area in the Residential Areas And That Seems like an Awfully Good Use. Rick, Where Would You Suggest Putting a No Trespassing Sign? it Seems to Me That Ridgecrest Is on the Right Track, That the Only Place You Really Want to Assert the Right To Privacy Is in the Residency And No Trespassing Asserts a Right to Privacy. Scott, What Have You Been Doing with Signs in Folsom? Our Signing out There Is the Standard Signs That You're Using Right Here. We Do Encounter a Lot of the Signs, No Trespassing, That We -- as Exhibited on the Entrance To Actually BLM Land. Those We Remove Automatically And Contact the Claimant and Have Them Place Appropriate Signs Closer to the Operation. That's a Fair Approach. I Think That Will Work. Here Is One That's Useful If You've Decided to Go with a Notice of Realty Action and Close an Area. This Is Closed Area Entry Proceed Behind. If Need Be You Can Post a Copy Of the Notice of Realty Action. I Know Folsom Has Been Good About Posting Realty Actions at Sites. I Think It's a Good Idea. This Is One Coming up That Ridgecrest Developed for a Mine Currently in Development and I Really, Really like this One. This Is Danger, Active Mining Operation. Authorized Personnel Only. And in the Fine Fuzzy Print at The Bottom, I Regret It's There, But That Says, this Is Used at The Briggs Mine, and I Would Like to Think Lynn Gum from Ridgecrest for Sending That Earlier in the Week and this Should Have Been Included in Your Overnight Updates. How Are We Doing for Time, Rick? If I Can Find the Clock. The Time on Our Clock Says 9:18. Ooh, Coming Right along. So Weary Moving along. We Had Another Fax Come in That Also Sought to Remind Us That One of the Other Players in this Case That We Haven't Spoken of Is Osha, and I Can Hear the Hackles Raising as I Mention Osha, but There Are Going to Be Safety Requirements Put in Place By Osha. That's the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Yes, and Their State Clones. We Have Been Focusing So Far on Federal Agencies. Remember That There Are in Many Cases State Agencies and Federal -- and -- at the Mining Level And at the Health and Safety Level That Also Have State Requirements, and They Are Every Bit as Important. There May Be No Fencing Requirement on the Part of Msha, But the State Mine Safety Folks May Come in and Say, Ah, but We Have a Fencing Requirement. So You Need to Be Aware That There Is a State Mine Safety Agency, Their Requirements, You're Going to Have to Look to Them as Well. And You're Going to Need to Talk To Those People. Actually Those People Can Be Some of the Best Allies You'll Ever Have in Getting Hazardous Circumstances Corrected. Because Very Often the State Mine Inspector Can Move with the Swiftness That Is Remarkable by The Standards of the Federal Bureaucracy. Would the Osha Standards Apply to Exploration Operations? I Don't Know, but I Will Make A Wild-ass Assumption and Say, I Bet They Do. Probably So. If You're Employing Somebody in A State and Paying Them Money, You Are Probably Paying Them Money, You Are Bound by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. If Anybody Has Any Real Knowledge, Send Us a Fax. We Would Appreciate Knowing So We Can Pass That Word Back on When We Get Back to Headquarters And Matt and Scott and I Several Other People Begin Working on The Longer Term Guidance, We'll Begin to Look into Some of These Questions and Try to Get Them Answered as Well. If You Do Have That Kind of Information, We Would like to Hear from You, and If You Can Call in and Tell Us about It, I Think That Would Be a Good Thing To Do Right Now. Yeah. We Would like to Hear from You. In the Meantime, I Have Another Fax Here That Has a Question, And That Is: Although I've Searched the 3715s to Find a Section, I Can't Seem to Get the Citation Other than Just 3715.7. Is There Direct Language That States That We as BLM Inspectors Have the Authority to Enter and Inspect All Structures Other Than Those Used Solely for Residential Purposes? And Wouldn't That Mean That No Trespassing Signs Should Be Limited to Structures Used Solely for Residential Purposes? The Citation Is Question Is Looking for Is 43 Cfr 3715.7. it Basically Says BLM Field Staff Is Authorized to Physically Inspect All Structures, Equipment, Workings And Uses Located on the Public Lands. Plain and Simple. We Are Authorized to Inspect. Basically. And as a Policy or Not Going to Go into a Residential Structure Without Really Written Permission. and We Say That and Rule in The next Paragraph, Paragraph B, BLM Will Not Inspect the Inside Of Structures Used Solely for Residential Purposes Unless an Occupant or a Court of Competent Jurisdiction Gives Permission. That Means You're Either Invited In by the Occupant or You Have a Warrant. Scott, Go Ahead. Are You Saying Here, Then, That If We Have a Storage Shed Out There or an Enclosed Shop That We Can Enter That Premises To Inspect? That's Right. Okay. Also the Claimant Says, No, No, I Live in There, and Then You Stay out. However, for the Purpose of Going on the -- on These Properties for Evaluating the Uses and Eventually Writing a Surface Use Determination, One Of the Things You Need to Determine Is Is this Building Residential? And If the Claimant Says, That's My Residence, Please Don't Go in There, That's All You Need to Know. You Don't Need to Know If He Has A Seally Posturpedic or Sears Mattress. If the Claimant Says That's My Residence to about Six out of Seven Buildings, You Have a Good Idea Something Is Not Being Played on the Square. Let's Revisit That with Dennis. I Think That Falls into a Law Enforcement Aspect. Certainly Brings That into It. Causes Us to Ask. Moving Along, I Want to Go into The Life Cycle of Mineral Property. Mineral Properties Have Life Cycles, Believe it or Not, and If You Look into the History of The American West and the History of Mining in the American West, You Find, Pick For an Example, the Getchel Area Of Nevada, it Was Heavily Prospected and Had High-grade Mining in Around the 1880s, and The Miners Went in and They Sniped out Everything They Could Afford to with the Technology And Prices of the Day, They Abandoned, and They Left. Now, Those of You That Are Familiar with Getchel Will Probably Want to Correct My Dates Because I Am Pulling this More or less out of the Sky. If I Have it Wrong, Let Us Know. Then Back in the '30s During the Depression, People Came Back in With Improved Technology and There Was Some Work in the Teens Around 1918, 1919. The People in the '30s Removed And Mined as Much as They Could With the Prices and Technology Of the Day and When That Particular Ore Was Depleted, They Left. Remember That Ore Has a Distinct Legal and Economic Meaning. Ore Is a Rock That Can Be Mined And Marketed at a Profit Today. Now, Tomorrow Technology May Change and Allow Lower-grade Material to Become Ore, Which Is What Causes Us to Have Mineral Property Life Cycles. After the '30s Getchel Was Abandoned Again and It's Back up In Operation Recently and People Were Mining Very Low-grade Gold Deposits. The Lifecycle of a Mineral Property Recognizes That. The First Phase of a Life Cycle Is Prospecting or Exploring for Ore. Now, Each of These Phases Has to Be Successful for the next Phase To Begin. It's Possible for Prospecting to Not Be Successful and People Just Go Away. Okay. Suppose We're Prospecting for Ore and We Find an Ore Body. We Need to Find out How Big it Is. Now Here We're Using the Term Ore Kind of Loosely. We Should Perhaps Be Seeing We're Prospecting or Exploring For Mineralized Rock. We Delineate It. We Try to Figure out How Big Is It? What Does it Amount To? And Then If It's Large Enough And of a Large Enough Grade We Will Develop a Mine. But If it Isn't Large Enough or High Enough Grade, We Won't. We'll Go Away and Prospect Somewhere Else. So We'll Develop the Mine and Ultimately Will Produce Some Sort of Mineral, and When We're Done, We'll Reclaim It. This Is Kind of an Ideal Life Cycle. At Any Point We Can Give up and Say, "Ah, it Didn't Work" and Go Away. The Kind of Uses That Will Take Place at Each of These Phases Will Be Different from the Other Phases. Each of These Phases Requires Surface Uses Which Are Necessary And Reasonably Incident to Operations. They're Going to Depend on the Phase. These Reasonably Incident Surface Uses Are Normally Lesser At Prospecting Stages and Greater at Development and Production. Makes Perfect Sense, If You Think about It. During the Exploretation You Have a Few People on the Ground Walking Around with a Rock Pick And a Bag and Collecting Samples. They Wander off. That's Really Indistinguishable From a Rock Hound on Vacation. At the Upper End During Production, off Large Facility, You May Have a Pit a Thousand Feet Deep and a Mile Across. That's a Rather Extensive Use of The Land. At the Earlier Stages, Reasonably Incident Uses May Not Be Noticeable by the Casual Visitor to the Public Lands And, In Fact, They're Really Indistinguishable from Recreation and Recreational Camping. A Mineral Prospect May Be Abandoned by One Operation During the Exploration or Delineation Phase Only to Be Picked up by Another Operator Later. One of My Favorite Stories Has To Do with Lead and Zinc Prospecting in the Tristate District in the Midwest Where One Company Left, Another Company Came in Just to Be Spiteful They Put Their Exploration Drill Hole Where the Office Trailer from the Previous Company Had Been, and That Was Their Discovery Hole. So Because One Company Wasn't Successful Doesn't Mean Another Company Won't Be Successful Later. Numerous Operators May Reject a Property Before Somebody Finally Figures out a Way to Make it Go. Only a Very Tiny Fraction of Mineral Prospects Ever Become Successful Mines and Ever Move Into Production. Early Phases of Prospecting or Exploration Involve Operations That Normally Result Only in Negligible Disturbances to the Surface. A Prudent Operator, and Here's The Boil You Are Plate -- Boilerplate, a Prudent Operator In the Usual, Customary and Proficient Early Prospecting or Exploration Operations Would Undertake Geophysical Surveys, Removal of Small Rock and Soil Samples for Testing. The Area That Would Be Used for This Kind of an Exploration Project Would Typically Be Small. You Would Be Looking over Several Townships and You Would Be Doing Overnight Lodging in a Nearby Town or Portable Base Camp. I Know When I Was Working in Uranium Exploration We Hated Camping Overnight. The Reason Is We Had to Cook Our Own Food, We Lost Field Time and It Got Plain Miserable Because We Couldn't Take Showers. Believe Me, Camping Overnight in The Gas Hills Isn't as Nice as Staying in an Apartment in Riverton. The Equipment Required for this Phase Is Very Minimal and Can Normally Be Carried in the Back Of a Pickup Truck. At the End of the Day Can You Put it in the Pickup Truck and Haul it Away. Later Stages of an Exploration Project May Involve Exploration Drilling. In Such Cases, More and Larger Equipment Is Required Such as Mechanized Earth-moving Equipment. Drill Rigs Can't Go Everywhere Although There Are Drill Rigs That Are Pretty Good at Handling Rough Terrain. Delineation of an Ore Body May Require Drilling on a Larger Grid or an Irregular Grid or Doing Tunneling under the Subsurface. The Surface Uses in this Phase Cause Due and Necessary Degradation of a Greater Magnitude than Exploration or Prospecting. Notice I Said the Terms Due and Necessary Degradation. If You Dille Dig a Hole, That Degrades the Surface. But If It's Appropriate at That Phase, it Is Due and Necessary. Understand, However, That this Is to Be Reclaimed at the End of The Project. If the Project Fails. If the Project Doesn't Fail and It Moves onto Mining, That Hole Will Eventually Become a Mine And Then That Would Be Reclaimed At the End of the Process. Now, When You Start Getting into Delineation Phases, It's Normal To Expect the Placement of Temporary Buildings and Limited Storage of Appropriate Equipment And Supplies. What Is Limited and What Is Appropriate? What Kind of Equipment Is Appropriate? What Kind of Temporary Buildings Are Appropriate? It's Very Hard to Say Because Everything Is Kind of Situational. In Most Cases, During Pilot Mining or Delineation, Everything Comes in as an Office Trailer. They May Have Several Pieces of Office Trailer That Get Stuck Together. Whether or Not You Want to Call These Temporary Structures or Permanent Structures, They're Still Relatively Uneasy to Unbolt and Move Apart, Move Away. Sometimes a Pilot Mining Project Will Be Undertaken to Test Ore You a Mean Bill Tea While Continue to Go Delineate and It's Still Common for a Mine Project to Fail at this Point. Development of a Mine and Production Require the Most Intensive Uses of the Surface. Development of an Open Pit or Underground Mine Requires Substantial Earth Moving. I Know it Sounds Self-evident, But It's True. If You're Going to Dig a Hole, You Have to Move Dirt. You Frequently Have to Move a Lot of Dirt. You Have to Build Roads. At this Point You're Probably Going to Be Covered by Msha. You May See Mine Infrastructure Starting to Be Put Together. Now, Why That Whole Talk on Mineral Property Life Cycles? Well, When Things Take Place That Are Excessive for That Part Of the Cycle, or out of the Cycle, Unnecessary and Undue Degradation May Take Place. Basically If Things Are Being Done Improperly or out of Sequence, You're Going to Get Degradation Worse than What You Would Normally Expect? And I Have an Example. For Example, Constructing a 70-foot Wide Road Where a 25 Foot Wide Road Is Appropriate May Constitute Unnecessary Degradation. Msha Will Have Something to Say About the Size of the Road and You Need to Be Sure It's Appropriate. But You Should Be Suspect If Someone Who Is Just Prospecting Proposes to Put in a Wide Road. There's Something Wrong with This Picture. This One Is Obvious. Establishing a Tailings or Holding Pond Without Proper Lining May Constitute Unnecessary Degradation, as May The Placement of Structures When Not Really Need to Do Support Actual Operations. Something We Called the Hefty Bag Heap Leach or Lining a Pond With What Looks like Trash Bags Is Really Not Appropriate. That Would Be an -- Probably Unnecessary Degradation. Undue Degradation Takes Place When Operations Inappropriate to The Mineral Properties Life Cycle Occur. And by That We Mean Building a Mill Before You Found the Ore Body. Now, There Are Thousands of Cases Where That Took Place in The West in the 1880s Through The Present and If You're Familiar with Mining Scams, You See a Lot of Show Mining Where People Bring in Equipment and Stuff and Build Roads and Take Movies and Try and Get Investors Involved. That Would Probably Fit under The Category of Undue Degradation, When Undue Degradation, in Other Words, Operations, out of Sin Crawnization with the Mine Property's Life Cycle Take Place, the Property Often Fails. Another Point Here, If You Go Back to the Definitions We Spoke About Yesterday, It's Probably Not Reasonably Incidental. One of the Requirements for Reasonably Incidental Is That The Activity must Be Appropriate For the Geological Terrain, the Mineral Deposits Being Sought, And the Sage of Development That The Project Is In. I Know Las Vegas District Had A Case like this about Eight Years Ago Where the 3715s Would Have Been Very Helpful to Them, Where Somebody Proposed to Come In and Do Something Completely Out of Line for the Phase They Should Have Been In, Which Was Prospecting. When Somebody Is in a Prospecting Phase and They're Proposing to Come in and Collect 80 Truckloads of Material to Be Hauled off to Somewhere When Really They Should Be out Doing 83 Yo Chemical Surveys, You Should Question What's Going On. Matt, We're down to about 10 Minutes. We've Been Getting Some Questions. Do You Want to -- How Are You Situated for Time Here? Let's Have a Quick Look Here. Give Me about Two More Minutes. I'll Talk Fast. You Know I Can Talk Fast. Then Let's Field Those Questions And We Can Go on Our Break. Okay. If You're Going to Construct A Road Where Only a Way for Access Is Required, That So Should Get Your Attention. The Excavation of an Open Pit Is Not Appropriate When All You're Doing Is Exploration, Although Understand That Sometimes a Pilot Mining Operation Is Necessary. Failure Usually Results When a Mineral Property Is Developed by Bypassing the Necessary Early Phases. If That's a Problem for Private Investors, it Doesn't Affect Us Directly Except Here, the End Result Can Be an Abandoned Exploration Project That the Taxpayers Have to Pay to Clean Up, and That Is No Fun at All. Anyway, Shall We Go onto the Questions, Rick? I Suppose We've Flogged this Horse Sufficiently. We Had a Question That Came to Matt and Scott from Las Vegas. Said That We Should Take down Perimeter No Trespassing Signs When Discovered We Are Creating A Situation Which Will Cause the Claimant Not to Be Willing to Work with Us. Would it Not Be Better to Meet With the Claimant and Work with Them to Remove or Change the Signs? You Guys Want to Take That One On? I Think It's a Case by Case Situation. Absolutely. All Depends on Where It's Located, What Area, What the Access Situation Is, What the Public Use Is. But, Yes, the Ideal Way Would Be To Meet with the Claimant on Site and Discuss It. I've Dealt with Situations That Had to Be Handled Both Ways And in Some Cases Where the -- Somebody Has Posted a No Trespassing Sign Immediately Impeding Regular Transit, It's Got to Come down Right Away. Other Times, I Know I Can Go in And Talk and Say, Look, You Can't Do That. Do Something Else. Okay. Another Question, this One Likewise Comes from Lynn. Lynn, You're Being a Busy Boy. We Congratulate You. Don't Know If You'll Get a Reward for That, but Keep -- No, Usually the Reward Is More Work. Matt Stated If the Claimant States That's My Residence, We Don't Go In. Let's Assume the Claimant Has an Attached Garage/work Shed. We Know That the Structure Is Not Used Solely for Residential Purposes. Just Take a Look at Matt's Garage, as per the Regulations. Do We Go Ahead and Enter the Structure to Inspect Equipment And Use In. Actually My Garage Is Often Used for a Residence but Usually It's When I've Had a Fight with My Wife. Gosh, Rick, I Was Hoping You Would Answer the Question, Not Just Ask It. You're Talking about this One. This One Is a Gray Area. It's Going to Depend Pretty Much On the Physical Circumstances. If Enough of the Residency, like The Washroom and Food Storage And Pantry Storage, Spills out Into the Garage, Probably We'd Be Justified in Considering That To Be Part of the Residence. Might Not Necessarily Be Required to Make Your Surface Use Determination. That's Correct. Generally If You've Got a Situation Where the Claimant Isn't Being Particularly Cooperative and Saying That's a Residence, That's a Residence, That's a Residence, Don't Go in Any of Them, There Are Going to Be Other Problems That You'll Find, and Can We Peek in the Windows? Maybe We Need to Ask Dennis That Later. Yeah, That's a Good Question. We'll Come Back to That One. Now We Have Another Question From Northern California. At What Point in 3715 Flowchart Is the Surface Use Determination Report Necessary? In 3713.3-3 Would a Surface Use Determination Report Have to Be Completed During the 30 Working Days or Is it Considered Part of The Nepa Documentation in Which We Have 30 Days after All Documentation Is in to Review The Occupancy? Well, Basically this Is One of Those No Matter What Answer You Give It's Not Going to Be the Right Answer. A Surface Use Determination May Be a Major Document, and If You Look at Pop Scorn Shrimp, You Have in Your Hands a Major Document. Do You Know How Long it Took Them to Prepare That? That Was a Fast Track Issue. I Believe That They Started on It in September and Ended in -- Just a Few Month Ago. Perhaps the Author of the Popcorn Shrimp, If You're Listening, from Northeastern Utah Could Call and Tell Us a Little Bit about It. That Would Probably Help Us On this Case. It Is Going to Depend on Precisely the Circumstances Surrounding the Actual Case. If You're Going to Make the Determination at the End of 30 Days, You're Going to Have to Have That Surface Use Determination Cranked out and Ready to Support You in the Nonconcurrence Determination. It's less Important to Have a Surface Use Determination When You Say It's Reasonably Incident And It's Appropriate and Proper. The Surface Use Determination Becomes a Major Factor When You Are Going to Say It's Not Reasonably Incident. That's Correct. However, I'd Be Really Hesitant To Say That We Could Do a Lesser Job on a Surface Use Determination That Says That It's All Right Because We're Going to Have People Looking Over Our Shoulders. Yeah, That's the Other Unknown Here. Is We Don't Know What Kind of Over the Shoulder Coverage this Program Is Going to Generate. Play it as it Lays, as They Say In the Golf Business. the Bottom Line Is on a Surface Use Determination, Whether It's Good or Bad, You Need to Do a Credible Job. Okay. If That Doesn't Answer the Question, Well, the -- Afraid The Circumstances Are Such That That's Not Got a Fixed, Firm, Fast One. It All Depends on the Circumstances Surrounding the Case. as Long as We're on Surface Use Determinations, I Would like To Throw out a Pitch Right Now That as You Complete Them and as They Can Be Released for Internal Use, Please Send Us Copies of Surface Use Determinations to the Training Center. The Other Side of That Coin Is If You're Starting out on One And You've Never Done One Before, Contact Us. The Three We Gave You Are Just Three. We Have Other Examples We Can Give You, and They Can Help You Get the Format and Content Figured out and Save You a Whole Lot of Work. Yeah, Keep in Mind That the Most Powerful Tool You've Got Is Groupwise and Your Telephone, Because it Puts You in Touch With Everybody Else Who Is Doing The Job. Let Me Also Add Something in Here. When I Get Back to the Washington Office, We're Going To Finish Setting up a List Server in Groupwise for Use and Occupancy and We Will Send out a General Groupwise Announcement. We'll Have Space on That Groupwise List Server for about 200 People. If it Gets Any Bigger than That, The Irm Folks Will Have My Head. Those of You Who Are Working in The Program, We're Going to Ask You to Sign on the Irm List Server -- or to the List Server On Groupwise Because it Will Be A Place to Post a Question and Have Maybe 100, 150 Folks See The Question and Maybe Feed You Back an Answer. Well -- We Will -- 150 Different Opinions. That's True. I Mean, It's a Place to Talk. It's Not a Place to Find Policy. The Policy Will Come out Through The Normal Channels. In this Respect, the List Servers Function the Same Way The Old Shared Folders in Fts 2000 Used to Work. We Have Calls Coming In. Why Don't We Go to Johnny. Push a Little Harder. You're On. Caller: Yes, Matt, I Would Like to Ask a Question about Checking out the Surface Use Determinations on a Mining Property When the Claimant Is Not with You. What Are Your Rights as Far as Entering Buildings When the Claimant Is Not There? Your Rights Entering the Buildings and this Is Something We May Want to Revisit When Dennis Mclane Joins Us for Questions this Afternoon, and Rick and Scott Stop Me If I Have This Wrong, but Your Rights Are The Same as If the Claimant Is There. If it Looks Residential Stay Out. But You Need to Make an Affirmative Effort to Get the Claimant to Go out There with You. Yeah, You Very Clearly Need To Contact the Claimant. That's a Critical Feature. Caller: Okay. So Are You Saying That You Should Not Enter Buildings That The -- If the Claimant Is Not With You. You Should Not Enter Anything Clearly Residential and If You Inadvertently Go into Something Residential, Turn Around and Go Out. Caller: That Clears That Out. Push Hold and We Had Call Two. Call Two Dropped off. Okay. That Was Al in Phoenix. So -- Let's Go to Another Question. What Criteria Do You Use to Make A 2920 Determination Versus Remove the Building? Scott? Matt? it Looks like at What Point Are We Going to Say, Yeah, We'll Issue a 2920 Lease Versus Get The Building out of There? Okay. Well, Let Me Just Respond to Another Question, Too, That Kind Of -- to Follow up on this. Hopefully I Can Answer this Question Here. The Issuance of a 2920 Lease. We Are Charged Here with -- We'll Take the Mom and Pop Situation Again, Which Is What I'm Trying to Work with Here at The Moment. We Are Charged Now with Doing Surface Use Determinations. Where We Have a Situation Where We've Got Mining Claimant Where Activity and Mining Has Ceased For Say a Good 20 Years -- Roughly and They Have Been Residing on the Claim for a Good 50, It's Unlikely We'll Come up With a Determination of Concurrence. So That Leads Us down the Road To Having These People Removed Who Have Spent Virtually Most of Their Lives on BLM Land and on a Mining Claim. So in Order to Put the Record Straight Here and to Help Make Things Easier for Them Without Them Sitting There Thinking, Oh, My Gosh, Now I'm Going to Have To Move Off, What We Do under The 2920 Lease Situation Is We Have the Claimants Release or Relinquish the Portion of the Mining Claim That Their Occupancy Encompasses or Embraces. It May Only Be an Acher and That's It. We Are Not after the Whole Mining Claim. So We're Looking at the Occupancy Residency Site for the Lease Itself and That Is It. Those of You Who Were Around During the Mining Claim Occupancy Act Will Remember That's the Way the Mining Claim Occupancy Act Worked as Well. It's Time for Our Morning Break. When We Return, Matt Will Talk About the Fascinating Use and Surface Use Determination Subject. He Will Show You a Video Case Study in the next Segment. So Have Your Vcr Ready to Record. You Will Need this Video to Work The Lunch Time Exercise. We Will Tell You When You Should Start Recording. Welcome Back from Your Break. Now, Before We Move on to Surface Use Determinations, We Want to Address Some Questions That Came in over the Break. We Also Want to Add That All of These Questions Are Not Being Sent to the Circular File When We're Done with Them. All These Will Be Bundled up and The Three of Us plus a Couple Others You Haven't Seen Will Be Using Them as Part of the Tools We're Going to Have at Our Disposal When We Develop a Document or an Interim Operating Guide for this Program. We Will Have the Opportunity to Take More Questions from You Before this Course Is Over, and When this Course Is Over, We Will Ask That You Continue to Groupwise Us Questions as They Arrive to One of the Four of Us, Matt, Myself, Scott or Dennis Mclane or Bob Gibson, and We Will Attempt to Take Some of These Questions and Plug Them Into the Operating Guidelines That Will Be Coming out Through The Directive System. Absolutely. Matt, You Want to Address Some Questions That Have Come Through? We've Had a Number of Questions and Comments That Came In During the Break and I Want To Deal with a Few but I Also Want to Amplify What You Said. Even If You Send Us Questions We Can't Answer, Those Will Go into Interim Operating Guidelines and We Encourage You to Send Questions. We're Keeping Track of Them. We Did Have the -- Some Initial Results of the Necktie Competition Coming in on -- and We Have a Really Good View of it Here from Las Cruces, New Mexico, and We Weren't Expecting Quite an Excellent Tabulation of It, but So Far, at Least in New Mexico, Rick Deery Is the All-time Loser and in One Case He Is Being Asked Is That a Necktie or a Used Napkin. Rick, Is That a Necktie or Used Napkin. It's a Neck Tie. a Winnie the Pooh -- I See Tiger, I See Pooh, Eor And Piglet but I Haven't Seen Owl. I'll Keep Looking, Though. There Is Another Comment Here That Someone Is Telling Me I Should Smile. I Am Smiling. Although I've Been Told That My On-camera Demeanor Is Sort of Someone Who Reports on a Funeral During an Earthquake. So Bear with Me. We Have a Question in Our Discussion about the Lifecycle Of a Mine. You Gave the Example of a 75-foot Road Versus a 25-foot Road. If the Proposed Action Is Just The Construction of the Road to Get Access Beyond the Two Track That Leads to the Area Is this Subject to the 3715 Regs? I'm Not Sure I Fully Understand That. Rick, Maybe You Can Work on That One. Well, While We're Talking About Roads, Yes, Roads Are Partially Covered by the 3715 Regulations If You Take a Look At the Definitions Found in the Regulations. Under Mining Operations. That Definition under Mining Operations Says it Includes Building Roads and Other Means Of Access to Mining -- a Mining Claim or Mill Site on Public Lands. So Road Construction Is a Use, And It, Too, must Be Reasonably Incident. Remember That the Use and Occupancy Regs Are the Large Umbrella under Which We Are Working on All Uses. We Tend to Focus on Occupancy, But We Have Changed the Boundary Conditions of the Universe a Little Bit in That We Are Also Assessing All Uses, Not Just Occupancy. All Uses Have to Meet the Reasonably Incident Test to Be Allowed to Go Forward. We Have Another Question in From Wyoming, and Rather than Read It, I Think, Rick, this Is Probably Best Addressed to You. It Includes a Number of Twists, Although at No Time Does Anyone Cross the International Dateline. the Claimant Has Submitted an Existing Occupancy Form for His Residency. He References an Unapproved Plan. His Mill Site Was Ruled Invalid By a Validity Exam. He Has Appealed to Ibla. He Is Still on the Site Because Ibla Granted the -- a Stay Pending the Appeal. The. Should BLM Accept His Occupancy? Your Prior Decision Has Been Stayed. There Is No Action until the Board of Land Appeals Reaches a Decision. You Accept His Occupancy Form. It's as Simple as That. When Ibla Turns Around and Does Something, it May Be Time to Then Consider Your Options. Good. Rick, Is Nepa Required to Bring Existing Facilities into Compliance? Yes. Nepa Is a Requirement for All Determinations, Whether Existing Or the New Occupancies That Will Come Through the Door. What If the Facilities Were Previously Covered by an Eia or A Large Ea or Even a Small Ea, Could You Just Refer to That Document. Yes, and We Will Try to Have Guidelines out in the Operating Guidelines Addressing Those Particular Nepa Questions. That's the Point Where a Cx Seems Pretty Appropriate. Great. If We Have Existing Trespass Case Files with Initial Reports Of Trespass, Preliminary Investigation Reports And, in Some Cases, Documentation of Contact with the Cabin Owner but Have Not Yet Issued a Notice of Trespass, Would These Be Considered to Be Pending Trespass Actions? No, You Have to Have Had a Formal Notice of Trespass Delivered to the Occupant. and in That Case it Would it Need to Be a Certified or Personal Service -- it Would Have Had to Have Met The Standards for the Test Pass Abatement Manual or Handbook, And So it Would Have Had to Have Been the Personally Served Notice of Trespass. Good. Okay. So You Can't Just Go to the Trespass Register and Pick out All the Names and Say These Are Existing Cases, You Don't Qualify. No, You Can't. You Have to Go to Those Which Have the Formal Notice of Trespass Sent to Them, and this Is Found in the Interim Guidance That Came out as an Instruction Memo and Is Found Immediately Following the Regulations Somewhere about Page D31. Now, That -- I'm Not Sure That Was Copied in the Written Material That Went out to People. Is That out as an Ib. That's an Ib. I Don't Have the Number Handy. We'll Find it for You and Give It to You this Afternoon. Also, If You Requested -- Rather If You Did Not Receive Your Overnight Update via Groupwise, Make Sure That You Sent Us Your Groupwise Address And Asked Us to Send Them to You. We Are Getting Requests from People for Overnight -- Groupwise Updates That They Didn't Receive, and We Can't Find Them on Our Mailing List. So Whether or Not We Lost it or It Didn't Get to Us, Send it to Us Again and We'll Get You up to Date. We Have Another Question That Came in from Somewhere in California. It Says to Scott's Page M 149, Unless Use Is Not Reasonably Incident or a Threat to Health, Safety and the Environment, I Believe Is What They're Quoting, The Board of Speakers Keeps Saying, and What Is It, And, Or, Or? In the Case of the Immediate Suspension of Activities, the Requirement Is Not Reasonably Incident "And" a Threat to Health and Safety and the Environment. Must Be the Two. And I Will Send this One out to You, Bill, in New Mexico. I Agree, it Is Cumbersome. Why Don't You Give Us a Call and We'll Talk about it on the Phone And Maybe Everybody Can Pick up On Where this Fax Colloquy Is Going. And We Have Another Question From the Garnet Resource Area. If There Is an Inhabited -- Inhabitable Structure on a Current Claim but the Claimant Does Not Use it and Has No Intention of Using It, the Claim Exists from a Previous Use, Why Would it Be an Existing Occupancy? We Don't Believe That it Is, and That the Claimant Should Not Have -- Should Not Need to File A Notification of Occupancy. Please Explain. Thanks. Okay. If the Claimant Is Not Making Use of It, Has No Claim on It, Then You're Right, the Claimant Probably Doesn't Need to Claim Or Send the Notification of Occupancy. What That Has the Effect of Doing Is Saying That Everything About the Operation Is Going to Be up to Snuff on October 16th, 1996. We're Going to Ask Some Pretty Tough Questions about the Cabin, And at That Point We're Going to Have to Have a Positive Declaration from the Claimant That the Cabin Is Not Part of His Operation, Is Nothing He Wants to Deal With, and We're Going to Have to Take Some Affirmative Actions as Dennis Discussed Earlier and We'll Discuss Again Later. Good. and That's it for the Questions That Have Come Through That Are Germane to the Moment. Matt, I Understand You Want to Say Something about Surface Determinations. Well, I Can Go on for Hours And Hours and Hours on Surface Use Determinations -- I'm Sure You Can. We Only Have about a Half Hour in Which to Do It. Speaking of Hours, How Long, By the Way, Did the Popcorn Shrimp Take? I Think We Had a Message up on One of the Computer Screens That Said Something in the Order of 220 Hours. We Did. We Got That Message. The Popcorn Shrimp Exam, and the Author of the Popcorn Shrimp Exam Did, in Fact, Call In, but Because We Had Sanitized His Report So Heavily, He Didn't Want His Name Used on the Air. So We'll Respect Him. However, the Popcorn Shrimp Exercise from Beginning to End, Including Law Enforcement and Support Time, Required 224 Hours Of Work, Which Is Actually Surprisingly Good. Some of These Can Take a Lot More Time. Matt, That Just Got Faxed Into Us, It's Another Sign. Perhaps You Would like to Share It with Our Viewing Audience and Make Comments on It. Okay. Again, We Have to Apologize for The Orange Paper. It Tends to Swim a Little Bit on Your Screen. Here We Have a Warning Sign That Says Mining Claims, Extreme Danger. Remember, You're Looking at a Picture of a Fax Here. So Excuse Me for a Moment While I Make You a Little Sea Sick and Let's See If We Can Come in Closer. Warning. Mining Claims. Extreme Danger! Anyone Asserting Rights in Contravention of the Rights Claimed under These Mining Claims Will Be Considered a Trespasser and Will Be Prosecuted to the Full Extent of The Law! Kind of an Eery Sounding Thing But Actually It's Not Bad. it Does Tend to Sound Foreboding. I'm Not Sure That Prosecuted Under the Full Extent of the Law Is the Proper Term, since If You Assert Rights Against a Mining Claimant It's Mostly Private Party Litigation, and That's Not Prosecution in the -- That's Litigation. it Is Litigation. I Would Be a Little Concerned About this Particular Sign Going Up That Has a Bit of a Constitutionalist Ring to It, And it Doesn't Tend to Serve Any Purpose Other than Seemingly to Say to Rival Mining Claimants, Stay off. I'd like to Hear Some of the History of this Particular Sign, If the Person Who Faxed it to Us Could Give Us a Call and Explain What the Story Was and What People Were up to Where They Photographed It. I Assume this Is a Photograph. We'd like to Hear More about it But this Is a Really Interesting One. With a Little Tweaking this Sign Could Be Put to Some Pretty Good Use and Be Informative Enough to Warn People They Are on a Mining Claim and They Can't Contravene The Mining Claimant's Rights, Although They Would Be Welcome To Go and Hunt and Fish and Do The Things as Allowed by Law. Matt, I Think That about Covers All the Faxes That Came In. Let's Hear it about Surface Use Determinations Now. And Not in Terms of Hours and Hours. No, I Wouldn't Do That to You. I Wouldn't Do That to Anybody. Just Before -- Just During the Break I Did Manage to Find Dennis Mclane and Asked Him Can We Peek in the Windows, and the Answer Is, Sure, Peek in the Windows, and in the Example Rick Was Using, If the Garage Door Is Attached and the Pam Pull of the Attached Garage, You Can Look Inside, If They Say It's Residential Don't Go In. Peek. But You Don't Want to Break the Glass to Slide the Curtains out Of the Way. That's Not a Good Thing. In Fact, That's a Very Bad Thing. Dennis Can Go into Greater Detail on That this Afternoon. Anyway, on -- When Working on Surface Use Determinations, It's Important to Remember That Documentation Is an Essential Part of Any Surface Use Examination. Actually, You Could Take off This Last Sentence and Say Documentation Is an Important Part of Anything We Do Because Realistically If it Isn't Documented, it Didn't Happen. If You're Going to Go out and Do Work, You're Wasting the Taxpayers' Money If You Don't Document It. If You're Not Going to Thoroughly Document Your Work, Don't Even Bother Beginning the Work. If You're Not Going to Do the Job Right, Don't Do the Job. Have Somebody Else Do the Job Who Wants to Do the Job. Now, in Your Overnight Update Via Groupwise You Would Have Received an Instruction Memorandum from the Nevada State Office That Lists the Essential Parts of a Case File. These Essential Case File Parts Are Really Intended for Realty Actions, but It's Very Much Applicable to What We're Doing With Surface Use Determinations. Have a Look at That. If You Have Questions, Bob Gibson Will Be Able to Deal with Them in the Morning, and If You Look at it During Lunch Today, We Can Talk about it More this Afternoon. Documentation Is Essential. I've Had the Good Fortunate Many Years Ago of Having an Ibla Case, a Case I Worked On, Was Appealed, We Did as We Were Supposed to Do, We Sent the Case File off to the State Office, Which, in Turn, Shipped it to The Internal -- Interior Board Of Land Appeals. I Got a Photocopy of a Letter From the Solicitor's Office to The State Director Saying They Were Not Entering a Brief Because the Case File Was Complete. That's a Compliment. If You Do Your Documentation to The Point Where the Solicitor Does Not Need to File a Brief, You've Done a Fine Job. And I Might Add, We Won That Case on All Points on Appeal. That's the Sort of Work We Should Be Doing. Something That Really Needs to Be in Every Case File Is a Case Chronology. Here's a Sample of a Case Chronology. You Can Find this in the Baird Case History Which Starts in Section L of Your Report. Now, Scott Has Some Cases Very Much like -- a Case Chronology Very Much like this in One of His Handouts. I Don't Have the Page Numbers in Front of Me. Scott, Have You Memorized Those Pages. I'm Afraid, I Haven't, Matt. It's Well Worth Looking At. It's in There. This Is a Sample. What You Need in Your Case Chronology Is Date and Event. Here We Are 2/15/83. BLM Sends Notice of Noncompliance under 43 Cfr 3809 To Six Claimants for Performing Unauthorized Operations with Earth Moving Equipment... Now, That Should Tell You That Somewhere in the Case File Is a Copy of the Notice of Noncompliance. This Sample Case Chronology Needs to Be in the Case Where You Can Get to it and Add to It. You Can Keep it on Your Word Processor and Add to and it Print Another Copy. Scott's Case Chronology Is on Page M33. You Don't Need to Get to it Right Now, but It's Another Good Example. The next Entry Here in the Case Chronology Is a Few Days Late -- A Day Later, BLM Staff Goes out To the Site, Photographs the Occupancy, the Trash and the Mess. The Geologist Notes All Equipment Could Be -- That Could Be Used for Mining Is in Old and Poor Condition. In Other Words, it Didn't Run. It Couldn't Be Made to Run Without Putting an Engine Back In It. One Occupant Shouts Murder Threats to BLM Staff but Then Disappears. Things like That Definitely Need To Be Documented. Now, Your Case Chronology Absolutely must Have Some Things In It. It must Record All Events Associated with the Case. Whenever Possible, it Should Refer to a Document in the File. If All You're Doing Is Mentioning Went Out, No Change, On That Date, That's Fine. But If You're Talking about a Notice of Noncompliance, If You're Talking about an Order, You Need to Refer to it in Your Case Chronology. It Has to Be as Chronological as Possible. Now, When I Started Using Case Chronologies, I Was Using an Olympia Portable Typewriter. I Eventually Graduated to an Ibm Selectric. I Couldn't Move Things Around With Block Move. Word Processors Came Later. It Has to Be Free from Erasures And Alterations. If You Put in Something New, Cross it Out, Initial it and Date It. Your Case Chronology must Be Absolutely Positively Objective Much. It's Essential. I Know It's Sometimes Difficult To Be Objective about Someone Who Threatened to Kill You. If They Do That, Though, You Need to Be in Touch with Your Law Enforcement Officer. But That Needs to Be Documented And it Needs to Be Played Straight. The Reason for it Is That Documents That Are Straight Neutral Add Tremendously to Your Credibility. If Your Dislike for the Individual Comes Through the in The Document, Your Credibility Goes into the Toilet. Now, Surface Use Determination. What Is It? We've Been Talking about Surface Use Determinations All Morning. In Essence, a Surface Use Determination Is a Professional Report Written by a Certified Mineral Examiner. Here We Go with the Certified Mineral Examiner Stuff. I Know That with the Patent Application Backlog We Have and So on Having to Use Certified Mineral Examiners Gets to Be a Problem Because They Have a Large Backlog of Work. Why to We Want to Use Them? It's Because -- Because Certified Mineral Examiners Have Sufficient Education and Experience to Recognize What Mining Looks like and What Mining Should Look like. The Last Thing You Want to Do Is Have Someone Go out and Look at One of These Occupancies and Be Fooled. The Last Thing You Want to Do Is Have Somebody Go out and Look at These Occupancies and Not Know What They're Looking at and Say, Well, this Is All Bad and When In Reality It's Good. We'll Lose and Lose in a Big Way. Additionally, a Surface Use Determination Receives Quality Control from a Certified Review Mineral Examiner. This Means That the Final Product That You Have in Your Hand as a Manager or a Worker on One of These Cases Will Be Reviewed and it Will Be, at Least in Theory, a Good Report. Now, I've Seen Probably 15 Surface Use Determinations Coming Across My Desk in the Last Eight Years. I Know There Are More That Have Been Done. You Have Three Good Examples in Your Notes. I Have Seen Only One Really Bad Example. That Really Bad Example Resulted In Really Bad Direction from the Judicial System. So You Need to Do These Right And You Need to Do Them Right The First Time. If You Find Yourself in the Position of Having to Write a Supplemental Report to Fix a Surface Use Determination, You Need to Throw it Away and Start Over. What Do You Look for When You Go Out onto an Occupancy and Try And Determine If Things Are Reasonably Incident? If We Can Bring up Slide S -- Page S39 -- Actually We Can't Bring up Page S39. Sorry. If You Look on Page S39 in Your Notes, What We Have There Is a Really Dreadful Photograph of a Suction Dredge. I Apologize. I Wanted to Make These Available As Slides for Us to See, but I Mentioned Just Before Break That A Terrible Thing Happened When We Moved I Lost My Career Accumulation of Photographs. So It's Gone. The Very Best We're Going to Be Able to Do Here Is Look at Some Photocopies. Bear with Us. On Page S39 Is a Photograph of a Suction Dredge. That Suction Dredge Is Located On a Lode Claim. In the Middle of the Desert. And the Occupant Said, We Use The Suction Dredge in Our Mining Operation. Well, We Wondered Where the Water Came from Because the Water Had to Come in in the Back Of Their Truck. Things to Look for. You Need to Look for the Wrong Kind of Equipment. Are They Using a Suction Dredge In the Desert? That Doesn't Make a Lot of Sense. On a Recent Trip to California I Saw a Floating Bucket Line Dredge in the Middle of the Desert. In a Dry Lake. A Dry, Artificial Lake. It Was One of the Silliest Things I Think I've Ever Seen. That's Something You'll Want to Look for. You Want to Look for Wrong Kind Of Equipment That's Inoperable. You Want to Look for the Right Kind of Equipment but Inoperable. Look on Page S38. On Page S38 of Your Notes Is a Picture Taken of a Box of Tools. Now, Those of Us That Work on Cars and Do a Lot of Mechanical Things Call These Tools with a Shelf Life. Their Brand Name Is Taiwan, Indonesia. Who Knows. You Get Them for There Are 3 at A Discount Store. Be That as it May. Look Closely at the Caption. These Tools Are Covered with at Least a Six-month Accumulation Of Doggy Bon-bons. That Shoe Should Tell You How Often the Claimant Our Occupant Was Using Them. It Will Also Go to Good Faith. You Want to Look for the Right Kind of Operable Equipment with No Activity. If We Could Look at Slide 160, Perhaps We Can Use That as an Example. Slide 160 Is an Actual Piece of Mining Equipment, and Without a Lot of Work, this Piece of Mining Equipment -- It's a Trommel. This Probably Could Be Refurbished and Put to Use and Would Do the Job. This Was Located at an Occupancy Trespass. Scott Is Probably Familiar with The Location of this One Because It's in His Area. Scott, Is That -- Has That One Been Taken Care Of? Excuse Me Throat Here. That Has Been Resolved, Yes, and The Claimant -- Excuse Me -- My Throat Is on the Way out. The Cabin No Longer Exists and The Claimant Has Moved off and We Have an Agreement Where He Is Living on Another Claim Upriver. Another Claim Upriver? Another Claim Upriver for X Amount of Years. this Is a Piece of Real Mining Equipment. It Can Do a Real Job. But If We Can Look at Slide 161, This Is Where You Need to Start Looking More Closely. Slide 161, I Believe, Shows the -- Let's Back Up. Well, I've Lost That One. Sorry. It Should Be the Slide Right After the Trommel. Yes, Slide 161. Let's Bring That One Up. Okay. This Is the Operating Area, in Other Words, this Is the Motor Of the Trommel. It Looked Great, like a Piece of Equipment That Was All There. But Has it Been Used Recently? You Want to Look at and it See Where the Belts Run on the Pulleys. Are the Pulleys, Rusty, Corroded Or Are They Shiny like They Have Been Operating. Is There Gas in the Gas Tank? Or Is There Just Jelly or Is it Empty? Is the Spark Plug Missing. Does it Look like All You Have To Do Is Pull the Handle and Make it Go. If the Property Is Littered with Stuff That Looks Great but Doesn't Look like it Will Quite Run, You've Got a Problem with The Right Kind of Equipment but No Activity or the Right Kind of Equipment but Just Inoperable Equipment. Another Situation You Have Is The Right Kind of Operable Equipment but the Wrong Kind of Activity. With the Right Kind of Operable Equipment and the Wrong Activity, it Returns to the Suction Dredge. If You Have a Suction Dredge on The Mining Claim in the Middle Of the Desert. It Doesn't Matter How Well it Works, It's Not Likely to Do the Right Kind of Job. More Things to Look for. When Someone Gives You a Proposal and Says I Need to Establish this Occupancy to Use As a Base of Operation for My Prospecting Activities, That Should Cause Your Antenna to Come up and Say, Wait a Minute, Wait a Minute, Why Do You Need To Establish an Occupancy to Go Prospecting? Remember That in the Life Cycle Of a Mineral Property, Prospecting or Exploration Is Something That's Pretty Low Level and Really Looks a Whole Lot like Recreation. Maybe What They Need to Be Using A Is a Self-contained Trailer or Self-contained Camper and Moving 25 Miles Every 90 Days or less. Another Thing to Watch out for Is a Seemingly Appropriate Occupancy with an Incompatible Second Use. What Does That Mean? Well, Maybe They've Got a Mine Operation Going, Maybe They're Actually Mining, but There's a Sign up That Says, Fortunes Told, Palms Read. That Isn't Normally Something You Expect to See on a Mining Claim, and You Might Want to Wonder about That. Another One Is a Seemingly Appropriate Occupancy with a Secondary Use That Has Become a Primary Use. We'll See Situations like this Coming up in Our Video in a Little While, and That Is Where, For Example, the Miner Has Mining Equipment but He Is -- Seems to Be Making More Money Buying and Selling Mining Equipment than He Is Just Actually Mining with It. That's Something You Want to Watch for. Another Problem Is a Seemingly Appropriate Occupancy with the Right Kind of Operable Equipment But with an Accumulation of Junk. If We Could See Slide 157, We Have an Example There. In Slide 157 -- this Is a Lousy Example and If You Look Closely, You Will Notice the Sign Says "Hahnest Ron's Used Cars." That's Not Likely to Give Him Many Sales, but That Was on a Mining Claim. We Can Move to Slide 162 as the Next One, and Here We Have Clearly a Sluice. Could Be Used, Could Be Put to Use, but We Have a Junk Motorcycle. In the Background Is an Engine From a Datsun. Hoses Going Nowhere. We Have Possibly the Right Kind Of Equipment but it Sure Isn't Being Used and It's Start to Go Look like Junk. Okay. Let's Go to Slide Un46 for a Moment. Slide 146 Is Still Another Example. These Should Mean a Lot to Scott Because He's Seen Them. This Is a Good-looking Cabin, Looks like -- it May Even Meet Code, but If You Look Closely, There's a Lot of Stuff There That Really Doesn't Belong There, and If You Look a Little More Closely, it Looks like the Whole Purpose Is to Just Have a Residence. Scott, You Want to Tell Us How This Went? How Is Your Voice Doing? Better at the Moment. This Particular Cabin Is Located In a Wilderness Study Area, and All Improvements Were to Be Removed By, I Believe it Was, June of 1989. We Actually Had to Go Through The Assistant U.s. Attorney's Office -- I May Have Said That Wrong Again -- but We Have an Agreement Where the Claimant Has Removed the Structure from the Wsa and Has Moved onto the Other Side of the Line Where They Also Have Another Claim, and Is Presently Occupying His Claim Over There. For the next Five Years. Okay. Good. Now, When You Are Preparing a Surface Use Determination, the Determination Needs to Explain Why You Came to the Answer You Came to Rather than Just Saying, Yes, this Is Reasonably Incident, No, It's Not. There's a Report We Didn't Send You Because We Wanted to Limit The Amount of Paper That Was Being Mailed out and Copied Everywhere, That Use Uses a Lot Of the Explanation from the Mineral Property Life Cycles. If You Would like to Have a Copy Of That Report, Send Me a Groupwise Message and I'll Send It to You. I Have Started Using That Thought Process a Lot in the Surface Use Determinations Lately. Incidentally, I Do a Pretty Large Amount of Field Work on Surface Use Determinations and I Try to Keep up on It. So I Do Have a Pretty Good Selection Available for You to Look At. If You Would like a Copy, Let Me Know. They Generally Aren't Very Long. A Surface Use Determination Does Not Have to Be a Long Report. In Fact, it Should Be Fairly Short. But You Need to Show Your Rationale and Your Conclusions Have to Follow from That Rationale. I Would like to Move Now to the Mineral Peak One Case Study. We Will Be Rolling this Video in A Moment, and I Think We're a Little Ahead of Schedule. Have We Had a Question Coming In. Actually We Did, and We Actually Had Somebody Call Us, And it Never Moved over to the Appropriate Box on the Screen in Here, So We Never Picked Up, and We're Sorry for That. If You Want to Call Back, Please Do. This Is from Doug up in Roseburg. He Asks, We're Rapidly Approaching the Point Where Many Abandoned and Possibly Existing Claims Have Structures or Dumps On Them Protected by Arpa. What Types of Conflicts Do You Anticipate in this Area, I.e., Attempts to Refile on an Arpa Protected Site. Well, You Have to Keep in Mind What Arpa Does. It Says You May Not in an Unauthorized Fashion Go out and Destroy Archaeological or Historical Sites. That Does Not Prevent an Authorized Operation, and That's One of the Reasons Why We Set Into the Rule the Requirement That All Determinations of Use And Occupancy Have to Contain Compliance with or Have to Include Compliance with Section 106. If We Have Complied with Section 106, and We Have Done the Proper Job in the 106 Compliance, We Have Several Choices. We Can Mitigate the Site. We Can Avoid the Site. Or We Can Simply Step Back and Let the Site Be Disturbed, Possibly Destroyed. We Do Expect Some Considerable Workload. There Will Be Cases, and We've Had a Colloquy with Gordon in Tonopah on Precisely this Issue Of Arguably Historical Artifact That Are in the Way of a Current Mining and Occupancy Operation. 106 Will Be the Process That We Go Through. This Will Create Long-time Lines Just like it Does at Any Other Part of the Operation, but That's the Way -- the Way the Program Is Set Up, and That's The Way We'll Have to Do It. We Had Another Question That Came In, and this One Relates, I Suppose, More to Dennis, and We'll Ask Dennis to Speak to This. It Says: There's Been a Major Problem with Getting Doj to Process Surface Use Cases Unless We Can Show Irreparable Harm. Is There Now a Change? Do They Have the Time, the People to Handle this? This Is a Potential Increase in Work. And along the Same Lines Is Another Comment from Arizona: a Minerals Person Who Has More Than Casual Use -- Casual Acquaintance with -- as a Mineral Person with More than Casual Acquaintance with Lands And Realty, I'm Concerned That Scott's So Goes it Comment about Lands Workload Increase May Have Dire Consequences. Seriously, How Much Coordination Was Done with the Lands Folks in Developing These Regs? Well, Yeah, They Were Involved In it from the Get-go, and They Surnamed off on the Original Proposal, and So We Are All in Agreement. The Director Has Signed It, and We'll All Go Marching off. There Are Going to Be Work Loads. Not Only Work Loads That Are Going to Increase for Us, but Work Loads That We're Going to Run into in Doj, and We Will Have to Deal with Those as They Arise. This Is What the Management of This Program Is All about. When We Begin to Run into Problems about Doj Doesn't Have The Time, Doj Doesn't Have the People, Doj Doesn't Have This, That, Then Those Kinds of Concerns Need to Come Back to The Headquarters Office So That We Can Deal with Them at a Bureau to Bureau Level or a Department to Department Level And See If There Aren't Some Mutually Agreeable Solutions. Forest Service a Few Years Back Paid the Wages of an Assistant U.s. Attorney to Get Some of Their Concerns Dealt with in the Courts. So If These Kinds of Things Occur, Yes, We Will Have a Problem, and They Probably Do Have Dire Consequences for You. Sorry about That, Ol' Buddy. Is That the Last Question? Yeah, That's the Last One That We Want to Take up Now. Okay. I Think We Can Go into the Mineral Peak Case Study and We'll Watch it as it Goes along. Anyway, What We're Going to Do Now Is Take You on an Armchair Field Examination on Television. You Are Now the Field Inspector, And You Are Going to Go and Look At a Mining Claim That Has an Occupancy and a Large Variety of Uses on It. This Would Be a Really Good Time For You to Turn on Your Vcr. This Video Runs Just under Four Minutes and It's a Mock Field Visit in Response to Receiving An Occupancy Notification from Mr. Smith, the Operator of the Mineral Peak Mine. Your Job Will Be to Determine If The Overall Uses and the Occupancies Are Reasonably Incident to Mining. Are There Any Uses or Residences That Are Not? You'll Need to Take Note of Them And Explain Why They Are Not or Why They Are. You Will Probably Want to Record The Video So You Can Review it During Lunch. Now, Some of You May Recognize This Property, Especially If You're from Northwestern Nevada. We've Done Everything We Can to Protect the Privacy of the Claimant, So Keep it to Yourselves. For Extra Credit, See If Can You Count the Number of Times the Claimant's Dog Appears in the Video. The Mineral Peak Is a Real Operation. We've Changed the Names and a Lot of the Location Data to Protect the Identification and Privacy of the Operators. The Exercise Is in Your Course Notes Beginning on Page S49. Please Get Together at Each Downlink Site and Try to Come up With an Answer. Then Fax Your Brief Answer Back To Us Using the Form on Page S51. Just as Soon as You Have the Answer. We'll Discuss it after Lunch. Now Let's Go to the Mineral Peak Number One. Welcome to the Mineral Peak Number One Placer Mine. This Is a Low-level Mine, and Mr. Smith, the Operator, Recovers Placer Gold at this Site in the Arid West. Just Last Week Mr. Smith Submitted His Occupancy Notification to BLM. We Are Here to Have a Look at Mineral Peak Number One. Mr. Smith Mines Gold from the Site. He Also Brings in Placer Material from Other Claims on BLM and Forest Service Planned In the Vicinity to Be Processed Here. His Operational Area on this Claim Is Just under Five Acres. And He Reclaims as He Mines. Mr. Smith Maintains a Variety of Mining Equipment on Site. Some of His Processing Facilities and Equipment Are in This Double-wide Workshop Trailer. Some of the Equipment Mr. Smith Has on Site Includes a Vibrating Screen Sluice, a Bulldozer with Ripper, Pumps for His Operation, A Small Tractor, and a Drag Line. Most of the Equipment Is in Pretty Good Shape, and He Has Spares on Hand. He'll Buy and Sell Equipment as Appropriate. Mr. Smith's Operation Uses Groundwater. It's Pumped into this Pond. And into Tanks on the Adjacent Hill. He Recirculates Water to the Extent Possible. He Powers Everything with this Ancient Surplus Electrical Generator That He Picked up at Auction. Mr. Smith Has All Necessary State Permits for the Use of the Groundwater. He Lives at the Site with His Wife and a High School-age Daughter. They Occupy These Medium-size Single-wide Trailers. The Trailers Are Old but in Good Condition. Two Can Be Moved on the Highways Without a Permit from the State. One Requires a Permit and Pilot Vehicles. He Has a Septic Tank and All Necessary State and Local Permits for the Residence and The Operation. Some of the County Permits Were Issued to Him Only after He Threatened Litigation. The County Wishes He Would Just Go Away and Has Asked the BLM to Make That Happen. The Smiths Have a Telephone. They Use Their Ancient Generator And Recreational Vehicle Batteries for Their Electricity. Mr. Smith Has Several Vehicles. Some Are Used by Mrs. Smith and Their Daughter. The Remainder Are Trucks Intended for His Mining Operation. Not All Run, but Some Are Kept Back for Parts. In Summary, the Mineral Peak Is A Small Mine That Combines Operations on and off Site with A Residence. Okay. You've Just Completed Your Armchair Examination of the Mineral Peak Number One Placer Mining Claim, and It's as Planned under 43 Cfr 3715.4-1. The Smiths' Uses and Residences On the Mineral Peak Are Long-standing and It's Clearly An Existing Use. Mr. Smith's Submission to BLM Was Complete. He Does Not Claim Fee Simple Title to the Land Nor Is There Any Color of Title Dispute of Any Kind. There Is No Trespass Action and No Noncompliance Action Current Against the Claimant. Now, Based on the Information in The Video, it Is Now up to You To Determine If the Uses and Residences on the Mineral Peak Number One Are Reasonably Incident. Use the Regulations at 43 Cfr 3715.2 and .5 as Your Guide. Now, in Your Assignment Yesterday, You Will Also Have Read the Popcorn Shrimp, the Dreamer's Paradise and the Northstar Surface Use Determination Reports. Use the Type of Rationale Found In Those Reports to Come to Your Conclusion. Now, When You Fax Us Back Your Answer, You Should Be Able to Answer These Following Questions:: Is There Any Clear And Present Danger to the Health, Safety or the Environment That Would Cause BLM To Order an Immediate Temporary Cessation of Activities? Does Work Appear to Be Substantially Regular? Does Equipment Present Appear to Be Appropriate and Reasonably Operable? Are There Any Items Present That Are Not Appropriate? Why Aren't They Appropriate? On an Overall Basis, Are the Uses and Residences on the Mineral Peak Number One Reasonably Incident? If They Are, Why Are They Reasonably Incident. If Not, Why Not? Are There Residences That Are Not Reasonably Incident? What Will Your Recommendation to Management Be? Now, as You Saw in the Video, County Officials Would Clearly Like to See this Operation Just Blow Away and Never Come Back. How Will That Affect You? How Will That Affect Your Recommendation? How Will That Affect the Outcome Of the Case on BLM's Side? Now, an Interesting Question... How Would Your Opinion Be Affected If You Discovered That Mrs. Smith Prepared Income Tax Returns in Her Spare Time in a Spare Room in One of the Trailers? And for Extra Credit, Again, How Many Times Do the Smith's Dog Appear in the Video? Please Fax Your Answers Back to Us Today During Lunch as Soon as Possible and We'll Go over Them Right after We Come Back. There's a Form on Page S51, I Believe, in Your Notes. You Can Use That. Get Together at Your Downlink Sites and Talk to Each Other. We Can Take Individual Answers Or We'll Look for Site Answers. We're Just Curious to See What You Have to Say. Dissenting Opinions Are Welcome. I Understand We Have Some Other Questions That Came In. There Was a Question That Came In, Matt, and It's on Your Side of the Counter There. Right in Front of Me. That's Why I Couldn't See It. If a Mining Claimant Has a Vegetable Garden on His Claim, Is this Reasonably Incident? That's a Good Question. and it Sort of Relates to One Of the Questions That You've Asked on this Study. As a General Rule Is the Underlying Activity Reasonably Incident? Does it Necessitate or Warrant Occupancy? And, Frankly, There's Nothing Better than Home-grown Tomatoes. I Thought it Was Truly Unamerican Not to Grow Your Own Tomatoes and Vegetables. Ditto. There Are Only Two Things Money Won't By, True Love and Home-grown Tomatoes. We're Told We Have More Questions Coming In. We Haven't Seen Them Yet. We Have a Question That Just Appeared on the Phone and it Dropped off. If You're -- If You're Calling Us on the Phone, Remember That There May Be Some Delay Time While the Computer Switches Your Call to Us, and We Have a Monitor Buried down Here That Tells Us When We Can Punch This Little Button Here and Not Cut You or Everybody in the Control Room off. So Bear with Us. It Takes a Moment for That to Get Here. Actually I Think We May Have Gone a Little Too Quickly on the Vegetable Garden Question. The Bottom Line Is the Underlying Use That Allows People to Have the Occupancy and Residence on the Claim Has to Be Reasonably Incident. This Is Similar to Asking a Question, If I Have a Residence On a Mining Claim and My Mining Operation Is Legitimate, Is it All Right for Me to Have a Basketball Hoop So I Can Unwind After Work? Of Course, it Is. Similarly If You Want to Grow Vegetables and Your Underlying Use Is Legitimate Do It. When You Start Looking More like A Truck Farm and less of a Mine, There's a Problem. That's True. You May Need Another Form of Authorization, after All, the Secretary Is Empowered to Authorize Cultivation on the Public Lands, but Not under the Mining Clause. He Can Do So under Flpma. So That Becomes a Possibility. We Have Some Questions That Came That Related to Mineral Peak, Matt, and They'll Have to Be Answered by You. First, What Is the Gentleman's Production Rate? Second, How Far Does He Haul Material? And, Third, Does He Have or Doesn't He Have Another Job? I Can Take Those One at a Time. First I Would like to Mention We Do Have Time Between Now and When We Break for Lunch Much. If You Would Like, Give Us a Call. We Can Answer Questions on the Air. We Don't Bite. We Would Love to Hear from You. Especially If You Tried to Call Us Earlier and Dropped off. Give Us a Try Again and We'll Get You On. The First Question Here Was... What Is Mr. Smith's Production Rate. His Production Rate Is Highly Variable. This Is, as the Videotape Indicated, in the Arid West, and It's Easier to Work in Winter Than in the Summer, So His Production Rate in the Winter Tends to Be Higher. He Produces Enough Gold to Have Put Five -- Correction -- Four Children Either Through College Or Trade School and His High School-age Daughter Is about to Go off to the University Fairly Soon. So His Production Rate Is High Enough to Do That. It's Measured in Cubic Yards per Day, but Not Hundreds of Cubic Yards per Day. How Far Does Mr. Smith Haul His Material? I Assume That Question Relates to How Far Does He Have To Bring in the Material from Other Claims. The Longest Haul He Has Is about 30 Miles. However, He Is an Excellent Amateur Geologist, and He Has Figured out Where He Can Dig to Get the Most Gold per Bucket. So When He's Hauling Material From the Other Claims, He Does It in the Back of a Pickup Truck. Okay. And Does He or Does He Not Have Another Job? Mr. Smith Works Exclusively At the Mine Except When He's Fixing Equipment That Broke down Or Trying to Locate Spares. Okay. And Those Are the Questions in Front of Us. We Have, Perhaps, Another One That I Will -- That Came to Us From Carson City, and Addresses Criminal Actions, and it Addresses Scott's Flowchart. What We Will Do with That Particular Question Is Defer That Question until Dennis Gets Here and Dennis Is Going to Discuss the Need for and the Use Of Criminal Activity -- or Criminal Actions on the Part of BLM Law Enforcement Personnel, And That's Simply a Better Time And a Better Place to Get to That. We Have Not Forgotten Your Question. We Will Get to It. And Our Phone Screen Is Blank. If You Have Some Calls, Particularly, Bill, out in New Mexico, We've Been Waiting for a Call from You Because, You're Right, the Fax Back and Forth, Is Kind of a Cumbersome Method Of Getting to an Answer. Why Don't You Give Us a Call. We Have a Line Ringing. Okay. In the Meantime, If You Have Additional Questions on the Case, If You Need Some -- or on The Case Study, If You Need Some Clarification, You Can Send a Fax Requesting Clarification or Get on the Phone. But We Will Probably Be Breaking For Lunch Pretty Soon. Can I Pick this Thing up Now? Not Yet. We Have a Call Just about Ready and Another Call Ringing In Now. So Stand By. Okay. When We Come Back, We Will Go Over the Mineral Peak Exercise, And We Have Answered -- We Have Al in Phoenix on Line 1. Go Ahead, Al. Caller: Hey, Guys, How's it Going Today? Pretty Good, Al. How about You? Caller: What I Heard a Little While Ago Is Somebody Could Grow Vegetables on a Mining Claim; Is That Right? Yeah, as Long as the Underlying Reasonably Incidental Activity Involves Some Occupancy And the Vegetable Gardening Is a Form of Recreation. Caller: Okay. At One Point I Thought We -- I Thought Ibla Told Us We Couldn't Grow Buffalo on Mining Claims. Buffalo -- Caller: and Raise Turkeys And That Sort of Thing. Are We Discriminating Between Carnivoors and Herbivors. I Suppose We Are. The Buffaloes Are a Site Specific Case. In That Case, Mr. Peterson Owned The Property next Door and the Board Pointed out the Proper Place for Mr. Peterson's Livestock Was next Door and Not On the Mining Claim. It's Also Important to Note In That Particular Case That the Occupant Asserted That the Buffalo Were Necessary Parts of His Reclamation Activities, Which I Don't Think Fooled Anybody. Yeah, That's -- There's More To That Tale than Meets the Buffalo Head On. Also the Impacts from a Small Vegetable Garden, Which Really Isn't Going to Be Much Larger Than a Little Tiny Backyard, Are Considerably less than the Impacts of Grazing Buffalo. Yeah, Rule of Reason. . Caller: but What I'm Hearing Is That at Least Small Recreational Gardening and Small Recreational Animal Husbandry Is Perhaps Okay? Yes. and Certainly You May Come to The Circumstances Where Professional Animal Husbandry Is Okay as Long as it Is Authorized Under a -- an Appropriate Authorization Such as a Trailer Manufacturing Site or 2920, and Several Cases in Alaska Come to Mind. Good. Caller: Interesting -- I Have One Other Question. Can I Ask That, Too. Get Right to the Point. . Caller: Okay. Right to the Point. Why Do We Have to Use Surface Use Determinations on Everything Single One of These? It Seems to Me That There Are a Number of Different Criteria That We Use to See Whether Occupancy Is Legitimate or Not. So it Makes More Sense to Me to Use Criteria That All Mineral Specialists Could Deal with Rather than Run out and Jump Right into a Reasonably Incident Determination Through Surface Use Determination. You Want -- I'm Not Sure How to Answer That. I'm Not Sure How to Answer That One, Al. We All Understand That If We Have to Go out and Do a Surface Use Determination on Everything, The Workload Is Going to Mushroom to Levels That We Haven't Seen Before and None of Us Want That. We May End up Coming One Sort of A Triage Method, Rick. I Think That's Exactly What's Going to Happen. If There's an Existing Operation, a Mining Operation Out There, That's a No-brainer In Achieving a Reasonably Incident Determination. I Think We Need to Focus Our Resources Where the Resources Need to Be Focused. and That We'll Take Home and Put in the Hopper When We Develop Our Guide Books. Thanks, Al. Caller: Have a Good One. Now We Have Something from Bill in New Mexico. We Still Have Both on the Line, Hello, Bill. Caller: Hello Rick. I'm on the Air Here? Yes, You Are. Caller: You May Recall My Question Faxed Earlier, We Have A Miner Who Has a Shed on His Claim, but He's Using it for Mining Purposes. But He Could Be Occupying it If He Wanted To, but He Isn't, and He Doesn't Plan on It, and You Said, Yes, He Should Give Us a Notification for the Grace Period Because It's Capable of Being Occupied. My Follow-up Question Was, Okay, It's a Year Later, Nothing's Changed, and He Is Not Going to Occupy the Shed, but Is Going to Remain There. Then You Said, Well, it Indeed Needs to Be Approved. So My Follow-up to That Follow-up Is, Is That Approval For the Shed or Is That Approval For Occupancy? it Is One in the Same, Essentially Because the Shed, as You Pointed Out, Is Capable of Supporting Occupancy, and as You Define Occupancy, We Define it As a Structure Capable -- the Presence of a Structure Capable Of Supporting Residency. It's Sort of a Chicken or Egg Thing, but We're Going to Say His Use of the Shed, His Placement of the Shed, Is Reasonably Incident Even Though He May Not Be Occupying it in The Sense That He's Residing it In. So We're Going to Make That Determination of Concurrence, But Not the Determination of Concurrence with a Residency. The Use out There -- Well, You're Going to Look at the Use And Say, Does He Need to Have The Shed? Caller: Can I Follow up on That Answer? Okay. Caller: We Would Answer it Here and I Think Maybe We Agree With You, but Here's My Proposed Answer to That, Is, Yes, the Shed Is an Approval, but It's Approved in the Context of a 3809 Plan of Operations, but Since He Is Not Occupying the Shed and Doesn't Want To, There Wouldn't Be Any Approval as to Occupancy under 3715. You Could Probably Take That Approach or Put a Proviso in Saying it Will Not Be Used for Occupancy at Any Time. Send Me Some More Groupwise Stuff at the Office. We'll Try to Work this One into The Existing Occupancy Guidance. After All, We Have Got about a Year to Fool with this One, Bill. Caller: Okay. I Mean, this Isn't It? Oh, No, Oh, Heck, You Asked The Question. We Get to Play with this for Quite Some Time. Part of the Beauty of this Particular Media for -- Medium For Getting the Initial Training Out Is That We Can Hear from Everybody All at Once on Where The Questions and What the Confusion Is. So, You Know, Give Us a Call, by All Means. I Think Bill Is Gone. Push the Hold Button. the Hold Button. It Is Now Clear. We Have a Couple Questions That Have Come in Asking for Clarification on the Mineral Peak Number One Exercise. The First Question Is Why Does The County Want Mr. and Mrs. Smith to Disappear? And the Reasons Are Very Simple. The Area They're in Is Not Zoned For Mining, the County Thinks That Mining Is Ugly, and it Is Possible to See the Operation From the Highway. What More Reasons Do They Need? Another Question Is: How Interested Is the Irs in Assessing Income Generated by Our Mining Claimants? Mere Mention of the Irs to Some Claimants Is Enough to Resolve Some Occupancy Cases. Won't Work this Time. This Claimant Is Very Well up on The Irs, and He's Mining Placer Gold, and He Knows How Taxation Works on Placer Gold. Basically You Produce Gold, but Don't Produce Income until You Sell the Gold. Then You're Taxed on Income from The Sale of the Gold. So He's Well Aware of That. Okay. We Have a Couple More Faxes That Have Come In. We Have Another Question Coming Around. Bear with Us. We're about Three Minutes out From Lunch. And We Should Be Ready to Go Quickly. Owe. Okay. Question: One to Matt. Is the Wife Being Paid for the Tax Work? How Many Returns Does She Process? Is There a Sign on the Claim Advertising the Work? Well, I Heard Three Questions, and One of Them Is Absolutely Excellent, and the Sort of Question That Needs to Be Asked. She Does Probably, Oh, Three or Four Dozen Every Spring. She Doesn't Do Very Many after April 15th. She Is Paid for Them, but There Is No Sign at the Gate Advertising. But Now That You've Asked the Question, How Would it Be Different If There Were a Sign At the Gate Advertising Them? Well, If There Were a Sign at The Gate Advertising, it Would Be That Secondary Use Within Underlying Reasonably Incidental Mining Operation, and the Regulations Allow for Us to Say Stop or Get Another Form of Authorization from the Authorized Officer, and We Have Built That Explicitly into the Regulations. Good. What's this Last One. the Last One Says -- It's From Montana, and Says, Does a Large Operating Mine with an Approved Plan of Operations and An Operating Permit from the State Have to Apply for 3715 Authorization for Facilities That Could Be Used as Residential, I.e., Large Office Buildings, Water Treatment Buildings and Such That Are Remote and Could Conceivably Be Used for Overnight Stays? Okay. They Don't Have to Apply for 3715 Authorization -- Well, Let Me Step Back. I'll Assume the Question Focuses Here on Do They Need to Send Us A Notice. Rick, I Think We Ought to Hold it There and Pick it up After Lunch. You Are Right, Matt. I See a Minute and a Half. So, Montana, We'll Get Back to Your Question as Soon as We Get Back on Line, And, Matt? Okay. It's Time for Lunch. We'll See You Back on this Same Satellite and Channel in 90 Minutes, and We'll Be Watching For Your Mineral Peak Answers. So Fax Them into Us Just as Quickly as You Can. And If You Have Alternate Scenarios That You Think Had Are Appropriate for the Exercise, Let Us Know. Welcome Back. We Hope That You Had a Good Lunch. Joining Us Now Is Dennis Mclane, As He Was Yesterday, and Remember, Dennis Is BLM's Chief Ranger and He Has Been Working With Mining Claim Occupancies For a Number of Years. Before His Time in Boise and Washington -- or Washington and Boise, Dennis Did Considerable Occupancy Work in San Diego. Welcome Back, Dennis. Thanks, Matt. Happy to Be Here Again. Great. We've Had a Good Response to the Class Exercise and We'll Be Going over That in a Few Minutes. We've Also Received a Pretty Good Thick Stack of Fax Questions and We'll Also Get to Those Once We're Through the Class Exercise. In the Meantime, We Had a Phone Call from Tonopah, Which Has Dropped off the Screen. Gordon in Tonopah, Please Give Us a Call Back and We Would Love To Get Right with You. And We Would Also like to Encourage to You Give Us a Call Now If You Would like to Ask Questions on the Air. It's a Good Way to Get Your Question Thoroughly Clarified And a Complete Answer. We'll Do the Very Best We Can With the Fax Questions but Sometimes We Can't Exactly Figure out What You're Really Asking and We're Not Sure We're Giving You a Correct and Full Answer. Although You Have to Keep in Mind Not Everything That Has a Complete and Full Answer Yet. In the Meantime, Let's Have a Look at the Mineral Peak Exercise. We've Had a Lot of Response, a Good Thick Stack of Them. On the Whole Just about Everybody Has the Right Idea, Although There Were a Few Points That Were We're Not Sure Of. Let's Start at the Beginning. If You Look at Page S51 in Your Notebook, Let's Go to the First Question. Is There a Clear Danger to Health, Safety or the Environment Present That Would Cause BLM to Order an Immediate Temporary Cessation of Activities? And the Correct Answer to That Is No. And I Don't Recall Seeing a Yes Answer to That Anywhere. Whoop, There's One. We Have a Yes Answer in from El Centro. If You from El Centro Can Explain What You Saw That Was a Clear Danger to Health and Safety and Give Us a Call, We'd Sure like to Know, Because We Didn't See It. Maybe There Was Something off in The Background That We Completely Missed. You've Marked That One. Rick, My Arm Doesn't Fit All the Way over to the Elmo, So Rick Is Doing the Marking for Me Right Now. Number Two, Does the Work Appear To Be Substantially Regular? Most of the Answers We Got Were Yes and It's a Probable Yes, Although Based on What We Showed You in the Video You Really Can't Tell, and If You Had Done A Real Exam, You Would Have Looked at the Equipment, Looked At the Pulleys, the Condition of Things, but You Would Have Been Able to Tell That, Yes, the Equipment Is Operable and it Does Look like You Get in and Turn the Key and it Would Go. Does the Equipment Present Appear to Be Appropriate and Reasonably Operable? Sure. In Most Cases -- in Fact, I Really Didn't See Any Equipment There That Didn't Belong There. If You Looked in the Background Behind the Tractor and You Might Want to Look at That Later Because We Don't Have That to Show You Right Away, Behind the Tractor Was a Radial Stacker for Stockpiling Material. Whether or Not That's Reasonably Incident, Ah, It's Hard to Say, But It's Probably Okay. Are Any Items Present That Are Not Appropriate? And Why Aren't They Appropriate? Well, Rick, That's -- the Probable Answer to That Is a Yes And No. If We Could Go to Slide 165, There's a Good Example of Something There That's Kind of Equivocal, Whether It's Appropriate or Not. So Slide 165 Basically Shows a Pile of Used Lumber. I Wandered Around There for Some Time and I Really Couldn't Figure out What That Was for. That May Be Something Where You Would Want to Sit down with the Resident and Explain That this Doesn't Appear to Be Reasonable. What's Going On? So in this One, Probably an Answer of Yes and No Is Appropriate. We Didn't Give a Maybe Possibility. So Check Yes and No and I Think That Covers It. Which One, Matt? this Is Are Any Items Present That Are Not Appropriate. That's a Yes and No. Does Equipment Present Appear to Be Appropriately -- Appropriate And Reasonably Occupant. Let's Look at Slide 166. We Just Answered That Question, But this Is a Good Example. Slide 166 Basically Shows That, Yes, Not Only Is the Equipment Operable, but it Is, in Fact, Operating, And, Scott, How Many Times When You Get out on a Residential Occupancy Do You Actually See the Equipment Operating? It's Pretty Rare. I Can Count Maybe Once or Twice A Year. How Many Times Do You See Equipment That Actually Could Operate? That Could Operate? Maybe Three or Four Times a Year. That's Not a Whole Lot Better. No. So These Are Things You Do Want to Be Looking for. The next Question Is on an Overall Basis Are the Uses and Residences on the Mineral Peak Number One Reasonably Incident? For That We Can Look at -- Oh, Let's Look at Slide 168. Are These Uses Reasonably Incident Overall? The Answer Is, Yeah, Really, This Looks Pretty Good. Scott, Don't You Think this Looks Pretty Decent in Comparison to Most of Your Occupancies You Deal with? First Glance Here, It's Neat, It's Clean. It Looks More than Acceptable. I Agree. So Overall it Looks Pretty Good. Now, There Are Some Things That May Be Maybe Need Attention. That Question There, Rick, Is Yes, Yes. Are There Uses or Residences That Are Not Reasonably Incident? Let's Go to Slide 167 and Have a Look at That. This Shows a Large Single-wide Trailer, but It's Not Currently Being Occupied. We Had a Number of Answers Back From Field Offices Saying That This Is Probably Not Reasonably Incident, and in Some Places on An Overall People Said in Response on an Overall Basis Are The Uses and Residences on the Mineral Peak Reasonably Incident I Got a No but Usually with Clarification. I Think, Though, on the Whole Most of it Is Pretty Reasonably Incident. But We Had Some Question about The Number of Trailers. We Also Had Some Questions about The Number of Cars on Site. We Have on Slide 178, this Shows A Problem with Vehicles. Slide 178 Is Basically a Couple Of Trucks, One in the Foreground And One in the Background, Just Out of View on the Right of this One Is Another Pickup Truck Just Like That One Which Is the Same Make, Year, Model, and the Parts Are Interchangeable. This Is Kind of an Arguable Situation, Is this Reasonably Incident, Is it Not, or Is this Junk Stuff That Needs to Be Removed. What Would You Say? I Think it Would Depend on How Long It's Been in That Condition, and That You Could Determine over Your Course of Inspections. If You Find after Six Month Nothing Has Changed, Then it Needs to Be Addressed. Currently Registered -- Currently Registered, Yes. Rick, Any Observations on That? Generally If the Trucks Are Being There -- Kept There for Parts Purposes, it Is Really a Question, as Scott Puts It, of The Residence Time. If They're Scavenging the Parts Relatively Quickly, It's Not There 24 Months from Now, It's Probably Okay. All Right. and in Particular in Some of Your Remote Locations. A Lot of the Folks Who Work in The Placer Mining Business Are Noted for Their Ability to Grab Parts and Pull Them Together Into Some Kind of Operable Piece Of Equipment, and We Have to Recognize That That Kind of Mining Is Going to Be Different Than When You Buy Something Completely off the Shelf, a Full Physical Plant, and You Need to Take into Account That it May Take Them Six, Eight, Nine, Ten, Twelve Month to Assemble Something. That's Particularly So in Places Like Alaska. Especially Where It's Remote. Last Month Burt Clay and I Did An Assist in the Ridgecrest Area In a Pretty Remote Area, Something That Very Similar to What You're Describing and There Was a Pile of Stuff There That Really Looked Almost like Junk, In Fact, If You Didn't Understand What You Were Looking At It, it Would Have Been Junk, But Standing There We Saw Things That Could Have Been Used to Repair a Sluice and Were, in Fact, Pieces of a Sluice, and They Seemed to Be Perfectly Reasonable to Us. But You've Got to Be Real Careful What You Are I Looking At and It's Been There for a While, You Really Are Not Doing Anybody a Favor by Saying it Has To Get out Right Now. Spend Some Time and Find out If It Really Is Reasonably Incident, Although That Doesn't Apply to Litter and Junk and Things like Scott Showed Us Yesterday on the Farthing Case. I See Gordon's Back. We Will -- Gordon, Don't Go Away. We Will Be with You as Soon as We Can. There Were Also Some Questions About the Trailers, and Rick, Do You Have an Observation on What Kind of Residences People Should Have to Live in on a Mining Claim? Well, Yeah. Just Because They're Residing on A Mining Claim Doesn't Mean They Have to Live in the Worst Possible Set of Circumstances. If There's a Choice Between Living in a 12-foot Wide Versus An 8-foot Wide, It's Not Unreasonable to Say Have a Little Creature Comfort and Live In Something Slightly Bet for You're Going to Reside There as A Watchman. It's Sort of like Saying That All BLMers Have to Hold Meetings In Hanksville Because Nobody Will Have Fun in Hanksville as Opposed to Holding it down the Road in Vegas Where People Might Possibly Have Fun. We Don't Want to Get into That Position. It May Also Be More Efficient For Them to Hold a Meeting in Vegas Where Dollar per Visitor Expended Is Going to Be a Lot Less Than, Say, Hanksville. That's Right. That Same Sort of Philosophy Ought to Be Applied to the Miner In this Case or the Watchman. They Probably Are Going to Wake Up and Be a Heck of a Lot Better Rested and a Lot More Fit by Sleeping in a Comfortable Place Rather than Something That You Wouldn't Want to Turn into a Dog Kennel. That's Right. Absolutely Right. In this Particular Case, You Didn't Really Have the Benefit Of, as Paul Harvey Would Say, "The Rest of the Story." And the Two Trailers That Were In the Background, If We Could Look at Slide 168 Again, the Two Trailers That You Saw Here Really Aren't as Big as They Look. They're a Lot Smaller than They Look. They Are Eight Feet Wide and One Of Them Is 22 Feet, I Think, and One of Them Is 25 Feet. Imagine, If You Will, Three People, a Father, Wife and Daughter in a Space That Small? And Can You Immediately Understand Why They Might Want To Bring in Something Larger. And for All We Know, and We Didn't Give You the Information, Perhaps They Were about to Haul Out the Older Smaller Ones and Just Live in the Large One. So Cut Some Slack in Situations Like this and Get Some More Information. Okay. We Also Had an Extra Credit Question Which Is How Many Times Does the Smith's Dog Appear in The Video? And Our Answers Ranged the Whole Spectrum from the Dog Isn't Reasonably Incident and Should Be Gotten Rid Of, Which We Just Can't Agree with at All -- it Comes Back down to Creature Comforts or Creatures, as Rick Was Mentioning a Moment Ago, All The Way to -- We Had One Answer With Six Sightings If We Could Bring up Slide Number 171. This Is the First Sighting of The Dog. The Dog's Name Is Abby and the Dog Is a Queensland Heeler and Exactly the Opposite of a Dog That Dennis Will Show You Tomorrow. Yuma, However, Reports Five Dog Sightings, Four of the Whole Dog And One of Ears. So this Is Four Dog Sightings And One Dog Sighting from Yuma, And When We Put this Tape Together, We Found Three. So If We Could Go to -- Back to Slide -- We'll Find It. Back to Slide 166, We'll Show You the Second Time the Dog Shows Up. Bear with Us. We Have to Get a Little Levity Into this. The Dog Is about to Climb into The Sluice, and I Will Not Tell You the Pun That Burt Suggested I Give out over the Air. It Is That Bad. Is That the Golden Flees? I Didn't Say It. The Third Siting of the Dog, We're Not Going to Show You. Once We Got on it a Still, but There Were Three Guaranteed and Government Certified Sightings Of the Dog in this Video. Since Gordon Has Been Waiting a Tremendous Amount of Time, Let's Go to Gordon in Tonopah. Hello, Gored 91. Caller: Hello, There. A Nepa Question for Rick. You Keep Saying You're Going to Try to Get the Occupancy Things As a Cx. What Is Their Status Right Now? And If Somebody Comes in Tomorrow with an Occupancy, Do We Have to Do a Full-blown Nepa Analysis on It? Yes. If Somebody -- Caller: I Was Afraid You Were Going to Say That. I Know. Everybody Cringes at That. Your Nepa People Should, I Stress, Should Be Able to Give You Some Decent Guidance on Those Cases Where You've Got an Existing Operation That Is Bringing in an Occupancy and Setting up a Watchman and Getting All That into Place, and You Ought to Be Able to Make Use Of Preexisting Nepa Documents. Caller: but If We Do a Nepa Analysis it Means That We Route It Through Basically the Entire Staff and Look at T & E and Look At Cultural and -- Absolutely. Caller: Look at Soils and Riparian and the Whole Ball of Wax? Absolutely. There Is No Way Around That. Caller: Oh, Boy. Now, the Point to Remember, Gordon, Is That the Nepa Analysis Is at the Same Time One Of Your Most Powerful Tools, and You Need to Treat it as That. It's Only a Problem If You Regard the Process as a Problem. Rick, Would it Be Different If Someone Is Coming in Reporting an Occupancy on Something Where There Is Already A Plan of Operation on File That Has Had Nepa Documentation That's Come and Gone That Also Included Those Buildings? it Would Be Simpler, it Would Be More Minimal, and You Probably Could Find among the Departments Categorical Exclusions Reason to Use a Cx. We'll Have to Get Guidance out To You on That. Can We Assume, Rick, as Soon As You Get Back to Washington You're Going to Get Right on That? Oh, Yeah, All Four of Us Here, plus Bob Gibson, Will Be Getting Copies of Various Things, and We'll Be Starting to Put Together the Interim Occupancy Operating Guides. It's less of a Task than it Sounds like Because We Have Some Drafts That We Worked up Prior To the Revision into Plain English. Okay. G Anything Else, Gordon? Caller: No, That Answers It. Thanks Very Much. Next Time I See You in Tonopah, Remember, the Hamburgers Are on Me. Okay. Let's Finish up on the Mineral Peak Exercise and That Is, What Would Your Recommendation to Management Be? And in Most Cases the Recommendation Was, this Appears To Be Overall Reasonably Incident and Not a Problem. County Officials in the next Case, as We Said, Have -- Would Like to See the Smiths' Operation Be Closed by BLM and How Would this Affect Your Recommendation? Well, People Kind of Danced Around this and a Few People Cut To the Chase. Basically it Doesn't Affect Your Recommendation, Although There Will Be Some Other Things You Have to Do, like Explaining to The County Why You're Not Going To Make Them Go Away. Remember, County Zoning Doesn't Allow for Mining in the Area, But They're Still on Mining Claims. One Thing You Can Be Sure of in This Case Is Mr. Smith Is Never Going to File a Patent Application. Now, How Would Your Opinion Be Affected If You Discovered Mrs. Smith Prepared Income Tax Returns in Her Spare Time in a Spare Room in One of the Trailers? We Had Some Spirited Disagreements in the Faxes on This. Maybe We Ought to Discuss Exactly What the Right Answer Is On this One, Because We Had Everything from Prosecution to Make Them Stop To, Okay, So What, If They Don't Put up a Sign. Somebody Else Said, Which Is Really the Right Answer, I Suppose, If it Gets to Be Really Commercial, it Needs to Have a 2920 Permit. That's Exactly the Right Answer, Matt. The Regulations Take into Account this Circumstance Where You Go Out, You Find That a Person with a Reasonably Incidental Operation and Justified Occupancy Has Someone There or Is Engaging in a Part-time Activity That Is a Commercial Activity. For That Activity to Be Allowed To Continue, That Person Ought To Have Authorization from the Department under 2920, and That's the Right Answer, Is That Mrs. Smith Would Have to Come in And Seek a 2920 Permit from Us. Good. Okay? Okay. Do We Have Any Closing Observations on the Mineral Peak Before We Move onto Some of the Questions? Just -- Let's Take this As, Say, under 3715.4-2 and this Was Our Inspection We Just Conducted. Would Knee -- Need to Do a Surface Use Determination after This. I'm Not Sure the Mineral Peak Warrants a Surface Use Determination. I Know Earlier Before Lunch We Probably Put Fear of Workload Into People by Maybe Sounding Like There Were Going to Be a Lot More Surface Use Determinations Required than There Really Are, but this Case Looks Pretty Straightforward. I Think in the Few Instances Where There Isn't Something Quite Right, the Thing to Do Is For the Field Person to Talk to Mr. and Mrs. Smith to Say, Look, Everything Looks Okay Except for These Few Things, and Explain Why this Is Needed and Get it Hammered out in Advance and Work Out an Agreement Between People. If That Doesn't Work, Then Maybe You Would Want to Go to a Surface Use Determination. But Definitely You Would Probably Want to Write a File Memorandum, I Think, That Documents Your Visit, Why it Seems to Be Reasonably Incident And Your Rationale for Not Doing Anything More. Which You've Got to Have the Documentation, Even If All it Is A Three or Four Paragraph Memorandum, it Just must Be Documented, and That's All There Is to It. Rick? That's a Pretty Good Assessment, Matt. We Did Earlier on Seem to Imply That Every Time You Did One of These Things There Was the Need For a Surface Use Determination. That's Not Quite Correct. Particularly When You've Got a Case That's Reasonably Incident Where They Are -- Their Occupancy Is Justified and There's No Reason to Say We Don't Concur. Now, There Is a Circumstance That We Have to Be Aware Of. There May Come a Time When Somebody Is Looking over Our Shoulder and Saying "We Disagree." We Will Have to Be Prepared to Come One the Information That Would Otherwise Be in a Surface Use Determination When We Defend Our Decision in Front of the Board Should the Party Looking Over Our Shoulder Say We Object. Remember, We Have Changed the Appeals in this Program from Only Parties Affected to -- Only Operators Affected to Any Party Aggrieved by the Decision. So the -- the Number of Players In the Game Has Suddenly Has the Potential to Get Much Larger and At a Certain Point We May Have To Justify a Yes, and We Will Have to Have the Information That Would Have Otherwise Gone Into a Surface Use Determination. This Does Not Mean That We Go Out and Do One Each and Every Time. These Will Be Done Only Occasionally. Dennis, What to You Think of That from a Law Enforcement Standpoint? Do You See Any Problems at the Mineral Peak? No, Not at All. In Fact, it Looks Relatively Clean to Me in Comparison to Many Mining Claim Sites I've Seen. Good. Excellent. At this Point I Think it Would Be Good If You Disagree with Us, If You'd like to Call in and Amplify Something, or If You Would like to Ask a Question About the Mineral Peak. We Purposefully Put a Large Number of Things That Are Gray Areas, That Are Equivocal into The Mineral Peak Exercise, and We're Hoping That We Can Use This Exercise as a Means of Developing These Fine Points That We're Going to Be Discussing Throughout the Course. These Are Serious Problems. The Workload Is a Serious Problem. We Don't Mean to Imply That We Need to Go out and Do a Surface Use Determination Every Time. But We Want to Have a Level Idea, an Equal Approach Everywhere as to the Way These Are Being Handled. So this Is Probably Your Finest Opportunity to Call in and Talk To Us, Get it out on the Table And If It's Something That Needs Guidance from Washington, this Is Your Opportunity to Tell Us. Anyway, We Do Have Some Fax Questions That Came in During Lunch, and I Would like to Go Through Some of Them. The One That Just Came in from Worland District Is an Excellent Question and I Don't Think It's Something We Touched on and I Should Have Touched on it Before Lunch. Does Distance from a Town or City Have a Bearing on the Determination of Reasonable Incident. In Other Words, If a Claim Is Only Five Miles from Town, Couldn't the Claimant Drive Back And Forth from His Claim? Excellent Question. Rick? Yes, it Could Be That the Ideal Solution Is the Claimant Drives Back and Forth from Town To the Mining Claim. On the Other Hand, If in the Process of Traversing That Five Miles the Mining Claimant Has to Go into a Designated Wilderness Area and Drive Back and Forth, Back and Forth, Back and Forth On a Daily Basis, Through a Designated Wilderness Area, it Makes Sense. From a Management Standpoint to Reduce the Environmental Impacts To the Wilderness Area and Say, Put up a Base Camp and Stay There, and Reduce the Number of Transits in and out. T&e Species Are a Logical Place Where this Can Occur, And, Indeed, this Has Already Happened in Scotchman's Peak, Grizzly Bears Versus R. Max Peterson Which Was Decided by The D.c. Circuit Court and One Of the Decisions Rendered by the Forest Service Was to Reduce the Number of Flights in and out by Keeping People -- I Don't Know That They Kept Them on Site, but They Spent Some Time Jiggling The Number of Contact Hours That The T&e Species Had with Human Beings. That May Be What We Would Have To Do. This Is Not Just for the Miners' Convenience, this Is Not Just For Controlling Mining Activities. Remember What the Title of this Course Is -- Managing Use and Occupancy. And We May Find for Our Management Purposes That Saying To Somebody, Go out and Reside There and Don't Go Back and Forth Across an Otherwise Pristine Area or a High-value Area, Don't Make That Traverse Every Day, We Would Rather You Stay out There. There Is Another Side to That Coin, Too, and If People Read The Dreamer's Paradise Report, Again, I Hate That Cutesy -- Have a Look at the Dreamer's Paradise Report. That's an Example. They're Only a Four Miles from Town. They're Not Mining. Do They Need to Live There? No. If the Underlying Use Doesn't Support an Occupancy, 10 Miles From Town it Doesn't Support It, 40 Miles from Town it Doesn't Support It, but the Closer to Town, the More Likely it Is and The More Reasonable it Is to Commute, Unless You Have a Hazard or Something That Does Require an On-site Presence and That's Something We Would Want To Look at on a by Case Basis. You Have to Balance the Notion the Closer to Town You Are the More Likely You Are to Come into Contact with the Public and the More Likely the Opportunities You Have for Vandalism, Which Then Warrants The Use of a Watchman. That's Right. We Have a Call In. This Is from Walt in El Centro. Hello, Walt, Welcome. Welcome. Go Ahead. What's Your Question? Caller: We Were Kind of Questioning the First Question Here on the Mineral Peak Case Study about Clear Danger to Health and Safety on the Environment. We're Curious. What Did You Find We Didn't See? Caller: There Wasn't Anything Wrong to Cause a Temporary Cessation of Activities, but We Thought He Could Store His Fuels a Little Safer and One of the Other Members Thought There Were Some Electrical Problems with His Wiring. Those Are Good Observations. I Didn't See the Fuel Storage. If You're Referring to the Water Tank That Was Early in the Video, the Tank on the Hill, That Was Actually for Water, Not Fuel. Was There a Fuel Storage That We Didn't -- Caller: There Were Several 55-gallon Drums, a Couple of Them Were Set on Pedestals and a Couple Sitting on the Ground. They Weren't Marked and Didn't Look like They Were Stored Properly. That's an Excellent Point and Something You Definitely Want to Bring up with Mr. Smith. Again, as We Noted in this One, His Relationship with the County Isn't Really Good, So It's Unlikely He Would Get Good Advice from County Code Enforcement. This Is a Problem, Especially in Areas That Are Riparian or near Riparian Areas Where If You Have One Drip Every Five Minutes of Diesel Fuel, Eventually You've Got a Nasty Problem. A Very Good Point. Caller: the Other Question I Had Was about the Zoning. How Does That Conflict with BLM's Policies There? it Really Doesn't. Rick Can Quote off Chapter and Verse of the Supreme Court Decisions That Tell Us That the County Zoning Doesn't Apply Although We Do Need to Be as Diplomatic as We Can When Talking to Counties. the First Decision Is, of Course, the Granite Rock Decision. Granite Rock Stands for the Proposition That a Zoning Decision That Absolutely, Utterly Excludes a Federal Activity Would Not Be Reviewed Favorably by the Court. There Are Other Cases of Ventura County and Several Others That All Focus on the Notion That Land Use Decisions Are the Decisions That Rest with the Sovereign, the Land Owner, the United States. That's Basically the Sum of the Case Law. If You Want to Go Back and Look At the Case Law, U.s. Vkleppe Is a Good Place to Start. There Are a Number of Cases That Apply. Ventura County Versus Gulf Oil Is Another One That Hits. Although There Are Some Argument That Ventura County Was Modified by the Court in Granite Rock. and I Believe That it Was. and in Ventura County, the Mere Existence of the State Program Was Seen as Being Preempted by the Federal Government. The Court in Granite Rock Said, No, the Mere Existence Is Not Preempted. There's the Test of Reason and The Test of How the State Will Execute its Duties under its Program That Has to Be Looked At, and If the State Then Begins To Tram Pull upon the Federal Right, Then the State Has to Step Back. Okay. Good. Walt, Did We Take Care of Your Questions and Comments? Caller: Yes, You Did. Thank You. Thanks Very Much for Calling In. Okay. We Have a Report in Now from Wyoming. Let's See. This Appears to Be Casper. And We Have an Update on the Tie Situation. We Have Some Votes in from Wyoming. We Have Votes for Worst Tie. Scott Gets One-third of a Vote. This Is a New Way of Voting. Deery Gets One and a Half Votes. Yesterday's Gets One Vote. I'm Not Sure What We Mean by Yesterday's Tie. And Matt's Tie Today Gets One Vote as Worst Tie. We Took a Pole of the Camera Operators in the Studio and All Think Rick's Tie Is the Best. Did We Just Get a Good Close-up Of Your Tie? There it Is. This Is a Really Wonderful Winnie the Pooh Tie but It's Not Reasonably Incident to the Program So We Can't Allow It. Anyway, in Addition to the Tie Tally from Wyoming, We Have a Question, and That Is: in the Example in the Popcorn Shrimp in Yea Who Number One Mining Claims Was the BLM Asked to Conduct Surface Use Determinations by The Claimants or Was this Done As Part of a Patent Exam and Does the New Regulation Give Us The Authority to Do So. I Will Answer These Backwards. We Have Always Had the Authority, at Least since 1955 And Probably Before, to Examine The Legitimacy of a Surface Use Of a Mining Claim. And the Chances Are the Claimant Did Not Ask Us to Do It. In Fact, I Can't Imagine Any Circumstances under Which a Claimant -- an Occupant Would Want Us to Do a Formal Exam of Their Occupancy. this Raises a Question in My Mind Here. There Are Areas in California Where a Surface Use Determination Hasn't Been Done On a Particular Township and Range. You're Speaking of a Pl 167 Determination? Correct. So Where Do We Stand in Light of That? Rick Is a Better Person to Answer That Question than I. Well, the Effect on Reasonably Incidental Use and Occupancy Is Nil. Po 167 Simply Codified the Preexisting Body of Case Law and Said, Okay, You've Got to Be Part of a Legitimate Mining Operation Before You Have the Right to Set up Shop. Setting up a Saloon, Setting up A Brothel Simply Doesn't Qualify. Curio Shops Don't Work Either. Curio Shops, You Name It. Now, in the Case of Managing the Surface Use, the Use of the Surface Resources, That Has an Impact on Us, Scott. Congress Said, Okay, You Pre'55 Claimants Who Are out There Who Claim You Have the Rights to the Surface Resources, There's a Way For You to Get Your Rights, and You File a Verified Statement. Now, Is There a Difference in This Case Between Managing the Occupancy and Managing the Surface Resources. Yes, There Is. like Selling Gravel and Selling Timber? Yes, It's Completely Different. If Somebody Says I Have the Surface Rights in this Particular Case, Then They Can Turn Around to Us and Say, You Cannot Allow Recreationists to Cross Over, Around or Through My Mining Claim Because I Own and Manage the Surface by Dent of Having a Valid Mining Claim. Now, What's Our Response to That? Our Response Is Going to Be a Surface Use Determination under Pl 167 on That Particular Incidence. We Have a Call Coming In. Brent in Wenatchee. Welcome? Caller: You There? We're Here. Caller: the Question I Have Is It's Not Quite Clear, I Guess, of When a Surface Use Exam Is to Be Used in Basically A Nonoccupancy Case. I've Got a Building out Here and I Think We Alluded Tight, Maybe Somebody Else Called in from the Spokane District Yesterday, About the Claimants Claiming it Is Used as a Tool Shed, but the Build Something Approximately 25 By 50, and Principally Used as a Meeting Hall. a Meeting Hall? That Sounds to Me like a Nonreasonably Incidental Use. That's When You're Going to Do a -- a Determination, Because the Structure You Cite Is the Size Of a House. Caller: Right. Could it Be Used for Supporting Somebody to Live in It? Yeah, it Could Be. You Know, Another Contention Is That the Claimant Owns Private Land Within Half a Mile. He's Got Some Patented Property That He Could, You Know, Store The Tools. He Claims He's Got Shovels and Picks and Lanterns and Stuff, And I Basically Asked Him, You Know, Why Do You Need Such a Huge Building to Store Such a Small Amount of Materials? Why They Couldn't Be Loaded in The Back of His Truck and Hauled To His Property. and You Have to Keep in Mind The Definition of Occupancy. The Definition of Occupancy Catches Even the Placement of Structures That Aren't Being Resided In. So We Would Make a Surface Use -- a Concurrence or Nonconcurrence Determination and At this Point You Would Also -- Sounds like You Would Have to Back this One up with a Surface Use Determination and Maybe Some Long-term Observations by the Ranger. Now, Brent, What I'm Hearing You Describe in this Example Seems to Me, Based on What You've Told Me, to Be a Pretty Flagrant Use of a Mining Claim That Isn't Reasonably Incident To Mining, and Surface Use Determination Is Probably Going To Be Needed. However, Don't Let the Thickness Of the Popcorn Shrimp Report Scare You Away. Caller: but the Problem Is There Is Nobody in Washington Right Now That's Certified. That's Easily Doable, and If You Have Any Problems like Brent Has Where You Don't Have Certified People on Hand, There Are Ways Where You Can Borrow a Certified Person for a Short Period of Time And, You Know, Brent, or Anyone Who Has a Problem like this and You Don't Are a Certified Problem, Give Me A Call, Give Rick a Call, and We Can Arrange Help for You. We're Not All Alone in this. and Keep in Mind That Everybody Doing the Report Doesn't Have to Be Certified. That's Right. I Won't Say There Are Ways So Much Around It, but There Are Ways to Work Within it to Make It Work to the Advantage of Everyone, Except, Perhaps, the Misgrant. Caller: Now, the Claimant I Have Talked to on the Phone and He Indicated He Is Going to Submit One of These Forms. Then He Should Do So and You Definitely Need to Go out Sometime During That Year and Have a Look at It, but He's Got That Grace Period Unless He Has A Hazard to the Public Health And Safety. Caller: It's Already Been There like 15 Years, So -- What's Another Year Going to Matter? What's Another Year Going to Matter, and You Spend the Year Basically Talking to Him, Advising Him and Working with Him and Say on October 16th of -- or August 18th of 1997, Here's What -- Here's Where You Have Got to Be. Brent, You Won't Need to Have Your Surface Use Determination Done Right Away. As a Matter of Fact, If You Do As Rick Is Suggesting, You May Not Need One at All. If Can You Sit down and Say, Look, this Doesn't Cut It. It's Going to End up off the Public Land One Way or Another. You Can Go Easy or You Can Go Hard. Sit down with Him. That Might Solve the Problem. Caller: We Thought We Had an Agreement with Him That He Was Going to Tow the Thing to Private Land, Tear it Across the Forest Service and So Forth, but He Didn't -- Latest He Called up And Said, Well, I Think it Still Is Incident to What I'm Doing Out There, and I Want to Keep The Thing. Brent, this Sounds like Kind Of an Interesting Situation and I Would like to Hear from You on This. Give Me a Call in a Few Weeks. I Will Be in Montana next Week And Be in Commuunicado. This Sounds Interesting. Caller: I'm Going to Get Pictures Inside of the Benches And So Forth. That Was a Good Call. I Think That Helped Clear up Some Problems. It Brings Us to Another Fax Question I Have Receipt Here That Fits into It. You Mentioned Earlier Surface Use Determinations Has to Be Done with Cme. Does this Mean Only Cme's Can Only Deal with Surface Use Determinations from Start to Finish? Absolutely Not. The Cme Needs to Be the Principal Author and Has to Be There During the Main Investigation but a Lot of Work Can Be Done by the Noncertified People. The Whole Reason for Having a Certified Mineral Examiner Involved in this Is You Need to Get Somebody with the Qualifications That You Can Depend on That You Can Take to The Bank, That You Can Take to a U.s. Attorney, as Dennis Will Describe, That Really Knows What Mining Looks like and That Their Opinion Will Be Respected. Dennis, Do You Have an Observation on That? I Know Early On, Matt, When You and I Were Working Together The Thing I Found Most Handy With the Surface Use Determination Is it Became a Briefing Document for Me When I Talked to an Assistant United States Attorney Looking at Criminal Prosecution, That When They Asked, Well, What about This Mining Issue, I Was Able to Go to the Surface Use Determination and Show Them Mining Was Not an Issue in the Case and it Would Ultimately End That Being a Guide to the U.s. Assistant Attorney as to What Testimony the Geologist Would Give on the Stand in Terms of Being a Professional Witness for Mining or Not Mining. and There Is Another Point to Be Remembered Here That's Being Driven Most Recently by the Budget Act: the Congress Has Recognized in Report Language The Existence of Cmes and Crmes, And Said That All of Them Will Be Pulled on and Sent in the Direction of Resolving the Mineral Patent Issue by Making That Recognition Congress Has Placed Sort of a Seal of Approval That Will Be Recognized By the Judicial Branch on the Certification Process, and the Notion That a Cme Has Some Kind Of Role to Play and Has Congressional Recognition Is Not Going to Be Lost on a Court When An Ausa Is Standing There Making A Presentation. And Probably it Won't Be Lost on The Ausa If You Raise this Point With Him That, Hey, Congress Recognizes the Existence of These People. What We're Looking at Here Is The Worst Possible Case Where We Have to Go to U.s. District Court. To That End, You Clearly Want to Have Cmes Involved. Does That Mean as Matt Put it Cmest Are the Only People Involved? Absolutely Not. They Are Spread Dime Thin in Some Places and Some Places Thinner. To Manage Occupancy It's Going To Take a Village. Everybody Is Going to Have to Work on this from the Managers Through the Adjudicators Through The Realty People and It's Not Simply the Cme's Job. It's Everybody's Job in That Resource Area and It's Everybody's Job in the State. That Means the State Office Is Going to Have to Provide Support To Those Area Offices When They Get Themselves in a Bind or They Need Information, and I Pass This Word on to You 12 Folks out There Who Have Been Designated As the State Office Contacts. This State -- the State Office Folks Are Going to Have to Be Pipelines for Information Flow To Those Areas and at the Same Time Going to Have to Be a Place Where Those Folks Can Come and Say Help. That's Right. We Still Have a Big Stack of Fax Questions Ahead of Us, but If You Would like to Call in for Clarification on Something, this Is a Good Time to Do It. Rick, as I Pass this Question Over to You, I Want to Point out We Just Heard from Yuma and Your Tie Is Voted as Best Tie of the Day. At Least from Yuma. Okay. For Nepa Analysis this Comes out Of Butte. If Occupancy Is Reasonably Incident, It's Not Discretionary, What Are the Alternatives? Well, One -- We'll Have to Work On That. This Is Sort of like What's the Alternative of Approving or Not Approving a Plan of Operations? What Is the Decision and -- What Is the Decision and How Are the Mitigating Measures Applied? This One Needs a Little Bit of Thinking. It's Not Going to Be an Off-the-cuff Answer. I'm Not Going to Shoot from the Hip or the Lip on this One. You're Right. If it Is Reasonably Incident, it Isn't Really Discretionary under The Mining Law. They Have -- and under Our Regs. Assuming it Meets the Test. So Bear with Us. We'll Come up with Some Alternatives and We'll Have to Work out the Alternative Scenarios with the Nepa People, And What's the Decision? Well, the Decision Is Going to Be That You're Going to Approve The -- or Concur in the Activity. You May Have Some Mitigating Measures That Turn on Getting Permits? I've Identified Four New Permits That Have to Be Gotten Because We Didn't Know about These Last Week and We Stumbled Across Yet Another Piece of the County Bureaucracy That Says You Have To Have These Permits. This, Too, Will Develop as We Develop this Program. Good. this Will Be the Sort of Thing That Goes into the Interim Operating Handbook Many. If That's from Butte, I Suspect That's Dave Williams. Thanks, Dave. Question on That. If it Is Reasonably Incident, Wouldn't Be We Concurring Anyway? Yes, We Will Concur with It. That's Our Decision. Our Decision to Concur in the Occupancy. Nonconcurrence Is Not a Decision. Now, Are There Other Alternative Nepa Decisions That Are Driven By the Nepa Process? We Will Have to Talk -- Sit down And Talk with Some Nepa People And Get Some Guidance out for Them. We Thank You for the Question. Good. We Have a Question from He Will Co-which I Think Is Probably on A Lot of Other People's Minds. Rick, Can You Explain Simple Fee Or Fee Simple Title? Yes, Fee Simple Title, this Is One of the Questions in the Use And Occupancy Notification Form. It's There Because Right Before The Final Regs Got Ready to Go Tom Called Me up and Said, Rick, What Do We Do about Virginia City and Some of the Old Mine Camps Where the Land Title Is So Fouled up That We Have No Idea Who Owns What and Even the Nevada Delegation Won't Touch It? And I Said, Well, Thanks, Tom, I Really Appreciate this at the 11th Hour. How about If We Simply Say We Will Delay Processing These Operations until We Have Made a Determine as to the Land Title Question. So What We're Talking about Is a Claimant Comes in and Says, I Have -- or a Person Comes in and Says, I Have Fee Simple Title to This Land Because I've Been Living on It, it Was Given to Me By My Grandfather Who Got it on A Handshake Deal in 1898, and It's Always Been Part of the Townsite. That's the Kind of Circumstance We're Looking At. We're Not Looking at Somebody Who Is an Article 10 Constitutionalist Saying of Course I Claim Fee Simple Title, You Have No Rights as the Federal Government. We Are Ignoring That Argument. We Are Looking at the Person Who Believes under Color of Title They Have a Scintilla of Ownership and Those Are the Folks this Language Is in There For. The Effect Is If We Agree with That Assertion, We Put Them in a Holding Bin until Such Time as We Get That Question Answered. Great. In Fact, You Have Led in Perfectly to this Question That Came in from Veil District and I Couldn't -- I Couldn't Have Asked for a Better Prep, Thanks, Rick. You Can Wash My Car Now. Ralph, Rick Is Doing a Marvelous Job Leading into Your Question. We Have a Constitutionalist Who Has a Residence Developed on a Mill Site Claim, an Independent Mill Site Claim for Which He Has Failed to Pay the Rental Fee. He Received a Decision Declaring The Claim Null and Void. He Is Appealing That Decision. In His Appeal, He Has Asserted Ownership of the Land Based in Part on His Legal Theory That The Government Cannot Own or Manage Land. Do We Wait to Apply the 3715 Regs until after Ibla Makes a Ruling? Also, What Do We Do If He Checks The Fee Title Box on the Form? I'll Pass That down. Okay. Well, this Is One Who Has Got -- I Assume That the Board Has Stayed the Decision. Then I Don't Have -- I Don't Have an Answer to That. I Will Make the Assumption as Most Decisions the Board Has Stayed It. His Claim of Ownership of the Land, the Board Will Probably -- Again, Here We Don't Know. If He's Making this Claim to the Board, the Board Will Probably Dismiss It. If He Files the Occupancy Form And He Checks the Box, We Don't Have to Agree That He Owns the Land, and There Is a Firmly Held View with BLM and in the Solicitor's Office That, First Off, for Box Number 4, Whatever That Is, to Apply, We Have to First Agree There Is an Issue. If He Checks the Box, it Doesn't Mean Anything If We -- If We Don't Agree with it and We Can Take Actions on August 18th, 1997. I Think All it Means Is He's Checked the Box. Yeah, it Means Nothing. And So, Yes, He'll Get the Grace Period If He's Not a Threat to Health and Safety and He's Not Unreason -- Not Reasonably Incident and There Is No Threat, No Immediate Shutdown Action, Then We Wait, and at the End of The Year, this Looks like a Guy Who We Talk to First. That May Very Well Be. We Have Another Question That Has Come in from Salt Lake City And It's Address to Do Me, but I Think We're All Going to Want to Answer this One. With All of Your Arm Waving About Surface Use Determinations, My Understanding Is That They Are Often, If Not Always, Shot down by Ibla. Is this True or Not? Well, I'm Unfamiliar with Any of Them Being Shot down by Ibla With the Exception of One out of Colorado That Was So Appallingly Written That it Should Never, Ever Have Left the State Office. Now, There May Be Others I'm Not Aware Of. However, My Experience with Surface Use Determinations Is They Don't Generally Get as Far As Ibla. What Normally Happens Is the Area People Take it out to the Miner and Say, Look, or the Miner or Occupant I Should Say And Look, this Is What We Came Up with. Our next Step Is to Initiate Some Sort of Prosecution or Litigation. Wouldn't it Be Better If You Got Up and Left? Generally They Get up and Leave. Scott, What's Been Your Experience? That's How We Have Done it on Occasion, Also in Our Resource Area. And Sometimes That Approach Works. Sometimes it Doesn't. It All Depends on the Individual. But... Have You Had Surface Use Determinations That Were Reversed as it Were by Ibla? I Can Think of One Case, it Would Be the Doherty Case and I Believe That's Also in the Handouts. and on the Doherty Case You Were Beaten on the Record. Simply Put, the Case, If You Read Both the Alj's Decision and The Administrative Judge's Decision at Ibla Says You Lost On the Record, Guys, Sorry. Just Not Complete Information In the Case File? and That's When You Have a -- A Need for a Surface Use Determination to Make Sure You Build the Record. It's Important to Note There Really Haven't Been a Lot of Surface Use Determinations Done When You Compare the Number of Surface Use Determinations with The Number of Patent or Validity Exams the Bureau Has Done over The Years, There's No Comparison And There's Not a Lot of Case Law or Experience to Draw On. One of the Problems I've Seen With Some of the Surface Use Determinations Is They Don't Answer the Question. They Spend Four Pages Being the Definitive Work on the Regional Geology of the Area and Then Go Into the Whether or Not the Surface Use Is Reasonable in Two Or Three Paragraphs and That's Backward. The Review Wasn't Always Done Properly. And They're Just -- There Haven't Been That Many Done to Begin with. Again, We -- Scott or I or Rick Would Be Happy to Review Any Just as a Peer Review Before They Go out for Technical Review. There Is a Format for Them in The BLM Manual. It Is Worth Having a Look At. Comments, Rick? Fair Enough. You Covered the Waterfront on That One. One More Thing on the Surface Use Determinations. It Takes a While Sometimes for These to Make Their Way Through The Judicial System, Whether Through Ibla and the U.s. Attorney or to Federal Courts or Just to Federal Courts. There Are a Number of Them out There and a Number I Have Written That Don't Have Final Disposition. I Don't Know If They've Been Shot down Yet. Also a Well Written Surface Use Determination Can Easily Be Turned into an Affidavit for Use In Court, and I Think Dennis Has Had That -- We've Done That with Dennis Before. I'm Not Sure I've Answered the Question, but We Probably Said More than You Want to Hear, and If You Want to Have That Clarified, Give Us a Buzz. It Didn't Hit My Hot Button. Really, it Didn't. Okay, We Have a Call from Randy In Medford. Hello, Randy? Caller: Yes, We Were Wondering Why There Wasn't Anything Included about Mandatory Bonding in the 3715 Regs? Ah, Very Simple, Because Bonding Will Be Covered in the 3809 Regulations. And Those Regulations Are on Their Way to Omb. Caller: Thank You. Great! Thanks for Calling In. Well, That Just Goes to Show We Don't Have to Talk for a Long Time. If You Would like to Give Us a Call, We Can Make it Short. Thanks Very Much for Calling, Randy. We Have Another Fax Question Here That I Think Scott Can Answer, and it Is in Great Detail and it Has to Do with When We Decide When to Approve a 2920 Application. What Kind of Criteria Do We Use? Whether We'll Do it or Not? We like or Don't like the Claimants, Length of Occupancy, Potentials for Public Relations Disaster, Potential for Illegal Activities, Age, Mined in the Past, Health Doesn't Allow It? What Kind of Criteria Do You Use? I Go Out, I Do an Inspection Of the Mining Claim, I Come Back With My Findings, and I Do Not -- I Only Make a Recommendation. It's up to the Area Manager to Determine Whether or Not We Go To a 2920 Application on a Mining Claim. Nice Weavin' Bob. I Admit. There Is Very Few We Have Really Accepted or Gone Through the Process on out There. For the Most Part, It's Not a Common Thing, at All. It's in Rare Cases. Again, When Do We to It? I Can Only Think of Possibly Three or Power over the past Eight Years, And, Again, These Are Generally -- Generally Have To Do with Mining Claims Where The Folks -- There's Usually -- There Are Reasons for Them Not Working the Claim. They're up in Their 80s, or They're Handicapped and They Just Don't Have the Means to Move On, Shall We Say. It Would Be a Hardship. And They're in a Certain Area Where It's Not a High-use by the General Public, and So There's a Lot of Different Factors It's on A Case by Case. It's Not Something That We Look Forward to Doing, Nor Do We Normally Make a Normal Routine Out of It. as Another Side of this Coin, It Is Generally Going to Be a Decision Made by the Area Manager as to Whether or Not 2920 Should Be the Preferred Route and Whether or Not Someone Should Be Granted Something. I Hate to Say -- this Is a Lands Case and Somebody with Whom You May -- You May Be in Trouble With Somebody with Whom You Have More than a Passing Acquaintance, but It's Really Going to Fall in the Hands of The Lands People to Make this Kind of Determination, and We're Going to Have to Look to Cooperation with the Lands Folks. So You're Going to Have to Coordinate with Them. Okay. What the Decision Boils down To or What the Surface Use Determination That Scott Makes Is Essentially That this Is No Long Ear Minerals Problem. It Ceases to Be a Minerals Problem and a Lands Problem. If You Really Want to Get Compartment Mentalized. the BLM Should Operate as a Team and I'm Hesitant to Use the Word Team, but it Fits Really Well Here. It's Not a Lands Problem, a Minerals Problem. It's a BLM Problem and We Need To Work with Each Other and Get This Worked out. And If We Happen to Use Regulations in the 2,000 Series Or the 3,000 Series, Either Way We Can Make this Happen. the Problem Arises When Somebody Says It's the Geologist's Job and They Dump it Completely on the Geologist, and This Option Says, Hey, It's Not Just the Geologist You Dump this One On. You Got to Bring in Your Realty People. We Have Another Question in And I Think It's a Good One Because the Nepa Issue Is a Problem That People Are -- a Problem People Are Having Understanding and I Think I'd Like to Make a Pitch. Next Week Ntc Will Be Doing a Satellite Broadcast on Nepa. I'm Not Really Clear on What the Content Will Be, but There May Be Opportunities for You to Tune In and Perhaps Get Some of These Questions Answered That We're Dancing Around Largely Because We Don't Know the Complete Answer. But this Question Here Says, If The Eis to an Rmp Has Determined That the Total Mining Activity In a District or Mining District Or a Region or an Area, Including the Occupancy of the Claims Is Not Significant, Do We Need an Ea for a New or Existing Occupancy Covered by 3715? That it Is Not Significant -- I'm Not Sure What That Means. If They Say That It's No Big Deal to Have an Occupancy under The Rmp and the Eis Has Looked At it in That Way, I'm Going to Make Some Assumptions Here That Occupancy Is Not a Major Deal, It's Not -- It's Not Something That We Would Say No To, Then, It's Possible under Nepa That You May Be Able to Tier off of That Document and Do an Ea That Looks to It. Again, You Need to Talk to the Nepa People. One of the Things We -- I Want To Stress Here Is That for Far Too Long Nepa Has Been the Province of Guys Who Can Shuffle Five Pieces of Paper Together And Say this Is What the Proper For Format of the Document Looks Like and You Go Away in a Blind-stinking Rage Because No One Has Told You How to Use the Document. That's Our Job. It Is a Tool, and So Use the Tool for Problem Solving. Don't Look at it as Yet Another Damned Hurdle I Have to Get Over. Think of the Nepa Component of This as a Tool to Get Me Further Down the Road to Making My Decision. Good. We'll Get Back to You, Obviously, with More Guidance on Nepa in this Process. for Those of You That Are Watching the Clock, You May Have Come to the Conclusion We're About to Dump out and Have the Satellite Turn Us off in the Middle of a Word, and That's Not The Case. Our Wizards in the Control Room Have Managed to Locate Another 15 Minutes of Air Time, So Don't Go Away. We've Got 15 More Minutes to Take Care of Some of These Questions. So We'll Be with You for a Little Bit More and If You Want To Call In, We've Got a Little Time. Let's Keep at this. I Think We Have Some Good Questions We're Dealing with. Here's Coming In, a Fax Question Asking, Basically, I'm Confused. On New Proposed Occupancies Within 30 Days Do We Need to Complete a Surface Use Determination Mineral Report Even If There Is Presently Nothing Developed on the Ground? Well, Matt, You Want to Run That One? Well, I Can Give the Nickel Answer or Give the $5 Answer. Try the $5 Answer. I Think I'll Start with the Nickel Answer Because They Always End up Being $5 Answers. The Nickel Answer Is No. Basically You Need to Look at The Proposal and Determine If it Looks like it Would Be Reasonably Incident to Mining And Then If it Is Document it in Your File Through a Case Report Or a Memorandum or However You Want to Do It, and You're Done. If It's Not, You Need to Do the Same Thing Just in the Other Direction. But a Surface Use Determination Is Generally Limited to an Existing Problem. Yeah, That's the Point That Needs to Be Kept in Mind. Surface Use Determinations Are Going to Be Done on Those 2,000 Or So Existing Occupancies. When You Get a New One, You're Going to Evaluate It. Now, You May Be in the -- Find Yourself in the Position of Doing a Whole Lot of Evaluation In Detail That May Get Close to A Surface Use Determination, but You Don't Have to Do a Surface Use Determination in a Formal Sense on That New One. What Do You Do in a Situation Where You've Got Rival Claimants, Both People Assert The Rights to Occupy or Use the Same Piece of Ground? I Suppose We Could Default to The Rangers and Tell Them to Keep Them Apart. I've Been There. That's Only Temporary. and That Doesn't Really Work Either. You're Going to Have to Process As Expeditiously as Possible Both of Them and at the Same Time Tell Them That They've Got To Resolve Their Differences in A Court of Competent Jurisdiction. It's an Unpleasant Place to Be. Well, That Doesn't Solve Our Problem. No, it Doesn't Solve the Problem. The Problem Is Unsolvable Unless We Decide to Take on the Burden Of Determining Who Has Precedence, and That Raises a Burden That I Don't Think the Department, at Least Right Now, Want to Absorb Absent Mining Law Reform. Okay. Now, If Mining Law Reform as The Secretary Supported Goes Through, We Would Make Those Determinations, We Would Pull Those Back into at Least an Hr 322, but until Congress Modifies The Law, They Still Go out to The Courts of Competent Jurisdiction, and We Still Essentially Play Something of a Referee's Role. Okay. I've Been in a Situation Where -- Dick God Win, If You're out There, I Remember this Vividly, I Felt like Hiding in Your Truck, in Fact, You Got it Defused So Quickly, I Didn't, But, Anywhere We Got Between Two Claimants, Both Were Asserting The Rights to Be There and Dick Got it Defused. But the Ranger Is Going to Go Home, and the Problem Is Going To Remain. So, If We Issue an Authorization To One Concurrence -- We'll Play This One off as the Program Grows. I Hope It's Not Going to Be a Widespread Problem, However. I Have Another Question In, and That Is Where You May Allow Raising Animals on Mining Claims. We Would Not. Do You Believe an Rmp Restriction Enforceable? There Are a Number of Questions On this One. Let's Start Right Here. We Have a Case in a Northern State Where an Individual Raised Dogs on a Mining Claim. That Individual's Occupancy of The Mining Claim Was Legitimate. There Was a Legitimate Underlying Mining Operation. The Individual Was a Watchman And Happened to Raise Dogs. Now, it Is Possible, it Is Allowable under a 2920 Permit to Allow Co-location of the Dog Farm and the Mine, Provided That The Watchman Gets a Permit under 2920 or Any One of the Various Authorities That We Have for the Secretary's Development of the Land. The Very First Question Has to Be Asked Is, Does the Underlying Rmp Allow That Use? That Use Has to Be Allowable. So, Yes, Those Secondary Uses Have to Be in Conformity with The Rmp. If the Rmp Says You Can't Do That, Well, Then, You Can Think About Modifying the Rmp or You Can Simply Smile and Say, Sorry, You Can't Do That. And the Other Part of the Secondary Use Is One That it Has To Be Legal. If It's an Illegal Use, Well, You Can't Allow That to Happen, Anyway. Okay. The next Question -- Okay. I Just Answered the Rmp. Call -- That Wasn't a Question. The Statement Was, Call If You Don't Want to Discuss over the Air. I Guess We Did Want to Discuss This One over the Air. We Did. Remember, the Rmp Does Say, You Know, We're Not Going to Allow Dog Raising or Animal Raising Other than in this -- in This Area. Fine. You've Set the Boundary Conditions for a 2920 Permit. The Authority in this Case Is Going to Be a 2920 Permit. I Think It's Important to Point Out, Though, Because this Issue of Growing Vegetables, This Issue of Raising Rabbits or Dogs, Is an Issue That Going to Continue Recurring, and it Emphasizes a Continuing Need for Inspection and Enforcement. Once We Approve an Activity on The Public Land Doesn't Mean That We Can Just Forget about It. It's Not a Fire and Forget Exercise. If We're Authorizing Something, If We're Keeping an Eye on Something, We've Got to Get out And Stay on Top of It, Because These Things Can Get out of Hand If We Don't. If Somebody Has Two Dogs Because They Keep Dogs or They Want a Dog to Sit Around and Bark like the Dog in Our Video, Okay, That's Fine. But If Suddenly this Guy Decides He's Going to Raise Sled Dogs, Then You've Taken on a Whole Different Aspect. It's Become a Commercial Enterprise, and When We Find Those Additional Commercial Enterprise, We Have to First -- We Have to Make the Cut. Do We Want to Co-locate Those Commercial Enterprises? Does it Make Sense from a Management Point of View? Could We Authorize That Commercial Enterprise on a Piece Of Adjoining Public Domain? Does it -- Is There Money That We Could Perhaps Be Earning for The Treasury by Getting a Piece Of That Operation? Those Are Some of the Questions That the Management of this Activity Brings Forward. Good. Speaking of Dogs, We Have Our Dog Sightings in from Redding. Redding Reports Four Dog Sights, One We Showed, Two We Showed, Three by the Drag Line on the Left Side of the Screen and You're Absolutely Right, but They're Reporting in Front of The Drug at the End of the Video. I Don't Recall That. We'll Have to Look at That Again Tonight. Thanks, Redding. Okay. We Have a Comment in from California from Len Gum, and Thanks for Staying with Us. Even Though the Eis May Say That Current Levels of Mining Are Not Significant, it Does Not Relieve You from Needing to Make an Identification. The Threshold -- to Identify the Threshold of Where Significance Occurs. So You Need to Do an Ea to Address Cumulative Impacts. This Was the Issue That Was Dealt with in Sierra Club V. Penfield. No Problem. Significance, Fine. That's What Nepa Is All about. It Could Lead You -- You're Right, Len, You Could End up With an Occupancy That Prompts An Eis. One Occupancy Doesn't, Two Doesn't, Three Doesn't. The Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, 10th, 12th and Then up Comes Number 13, and 13 Is the Magic Number. You May Be Pushed into Writing An Eis. Sorry about That. That's Just Part and Parcel of Managing Our Program. If it Wasn't the Occupancy That Pushed You into the Eis, Something Else Would Have Come Along a Short Time Later. Yeah. Here's a Question Just in and I'll Pass it over. If We're Notified of an Upcoming Occupancy in the Form of a Mining Notice and Being Notices Are Exempt from Nepa How Could a Nepa Document Such as a Categorical Exclusion Be -- I Think We Plowed this Ground. We'll Do it One More Time. The Analysis of or Review and Handling of Nepa Level -- I'm Sorry, of Notice Level Activities Is Bifurcated. I Will Use One of Matt's $5 Words. That Is, it Comes along and it Splits. This Part over Here Is the Notice Level Activity. It Gets a 15-day Review Around The Office, and If it Doesn't Cause Unnecessary or Undue Degradation, Well, It's Allowed To Proceed Unmolested. On this Side the Mining the Occupancy and the Fencing Goes Into an Entirely Different Review Process, Which Involves The Preparation of Nepa. It Involves the Preparation of An Ea or an Eis. It Involves Section 106 Compliance. It Involves T&e Species Compliance. Plus Anything Else That We May Have to Go Through. And it Is Examined on a Time Line That Says 30 Working Days Plus Any Extra Time We Need to Comply with Nepa, 106 or the Threatened and Endangered Species Act. We Have about Four Minutes Left and I Have One More Question in Front of Me. This Is from Wyoming. The Question Is, a Claimant Has A State Mining Permit Covering His Placer Claims, but the State Has Not Authorized the Associated Mill Site. The State Demands a Reclamation Bond Before They Will Authorize The Mill Site. And the Claimant Disputes Their Authority to Ask for a Bond. He Won't Pay. The Site Has Habital Buildings. No Permits Have Been Considered. Does the BLM Consider this a Risk to the Health, Safety or Environment? We Would Need More Details on This One. I Think We Need More Information. We Would Need a Lot More Details on this One. Particularly since the Guy Is Disputing the Notion of the State's Police Powers. This One You Would Want to Tread Very Lightly Around It. So If You've Got More Details, Send Them into Us. We'll Look at It. in Fact, Randy, If You Would Send Us Some Information, Some Background on this Overnight by Fax, I Think We'll Have -- We Can Have a Look at and it Probably Get a Better Answer in The Morning. Or Maybe Just Give Rick or Me a Call. Groupwise it to Matt. That's Another Alternative. That's Right. Groupwise Tight Me. I'm the Only M. Shoe Make Inner Groupwise. You Won't Have Any Trouble Finding Me in the Address Book Although You Have to Spell Shumaker Correctly. Dennis Do You Have Anything You Would like to Add Before We Head Out. Just a Minute? Do You Have Any Easy Ones. I Can Answer These Fairly Quickly, Matt. Let's See If We Can Get to One. the First One, There Has Been A Major Problem with Doj to Process Surface Use Cases Unless We Can Show Irreparable Harm. The Question Is, Is There Now a Change? The Answer to That Question Is The Threshold of Irreparable Harm Is Provided in the Rules of Civil Procedure, Provided by the Judiciary Branch, Not the Doj. That Threshold Is, Indeed, Mandatory for Injunctive Relief. So There Is No Change. but it Would Be Incumbent on Us in Our Documentation to Show That There Is Irreparable Harm Taking Place Unless Something Is Done, and Perhaps We Could Change That Pie Improving the Quality of Our Work. Yeah, and I Intend to Talk a Little Bit More about Those Thresholds Tomorrow. Great. Scott Do You Have Any Observations Before We Have to Shut down for the Night? No. I May Say it Tomorrow but Not Tonight. Real Good. Rick? Ditto. Well, That's about it for Today. If You Weren't Able to Get Your Fax Answered or Your Question Answered, Send Us a Fax Overnight. We'll Leave the Fax Machine Loaded with Paper on this End. We Have Another Reading Assignment for Tonight. Please Read the Baird Case History Starting on Page L18. It Is a Very Interesting Case From 1984 in San Diego. It Broke a Great Deal of Legal And Operational Ground and it Contains Examples of Some Really Good Working Tools. Dennis Will Be Referring to it Quite a Lot Tomorrow. Also, Read the Notes on Pages G1 Through 8. These Will Help You Understand Bob Gibson's Presentation First Thing in the Morning Well, That's it for Today. We'll See You Tomorrow! This begins the 3rd day of the telecast - (September 13, 1996) The Bureau of Land Management's Satellite Network Presents: Today's Instructors Are: And Now the Host of Your Program, Matt Shumaker. Good Morning, Everyone and Welcome to the BLM National Training Center. This Is the Day We've All Been Looking Forward To, Our Final Day of Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Management. I Know We've Been Looking Forward to It. Joining Our Panel Today Is Bob Gibson. Bob Is a Geologist in the Nevada State Office. Bob, Welcome to Phoenix. Thank You. Back with Us Today Is Dennis Mclane. How Are You this Morning, Dennis? I'm Doing Well. I'm Happy That It's the Last Day. So Are We. And Also with Us Is Rick Deery To Help Us Start Things off this Morning. Good Morning, Matt. Later Scott Murrellwright Hay Return to Give Us a Hand. He Will Be Available for Questions, Though. We Didn't Send Any New Groupwise Overnights. If You Didn't Get Any New Ones, It's Because There Weren't Any. We'll Also Ask for Telephone Calls During the Day. If You Like, You Can Make Your Call Anonymously. And If We Recognize Your Voice, We Won't Tell Anyone Who You Are Or Where You're Calling from. When You Do Call, Remember to Stand Away from Your Television Or Turn the Sound down. Steve Fetchner and Michael Horn Will Be Our Phone Operators and Will Get to You as Soon as They Can. You Can Send a Fax Question at Any Time. Please Print Your Question with A Dark Marker, Not a Wide-tip Marker, Just a Dark Marker. Remember, the Telephone Numbers Are Listed in the First Few Pages of Your Notes. A Lot of Nepa Questions Have Come up in the Last Few Days. Next Week the National Training Center Will Broadcast Course 1600-2, an Overview of BLM's Nepa Process. This Will Be an Interactive Course and You Will Be Able to Ask Questions for Further Clarification. For More Information Call Gregg Simmons: to Help Your Office Participate in These Satellite Training Courses, See the BLM Satellite Downlink Guide. Your Office Should Already Have A Copy or Visit the NTC Home Page on the Worldwide Web. Our Temporary Address Is www.starlink.com/~ntc. We Have a Number of Questions That Came in Overnight and There Is One Thing We Ought to Deal With and That's the Bagwell Situation, Rick. A Lot of People Think about Using the Bagwell Case as a Means of Abating an Occupancy Trespass, and as a Result We Did Give You a Copy of the District Court Decision in Bagwell in Your Notes and it Is in Section D as in Deery. We Didn't Cover it Yesterday or The Day Before, but It's Worth a Few Words Now. The Bagwell Situation Was a Very Narrow Case That Dealt with an Occupancy on a Mill Site. It Dealt with Bad Faith and Uses Which Go Directly to the Validity of a Mill Site Claim. The Bagwell Case Has a Lot of Potential Pitfalls If You Want To Use it in a Case in Your Office, So Be Very, Very Wary of It and Read the Case over Thoroughly, and You Definitely Need to Talk with the Solicitor's Office and with the U.s. Attorney. Rick? There's Another Thing to Remember Here... What We Did With this Regulation Was Essentially the Same Thing Congress Did with the -- with Public Law 167. They Codified the Preexisting Case Law and Put it into Law. We Took Our Rules and We Codified the Existing Set of Circumstances That Were out There. We Took All the Existing Case Law to the Extent That We Agreed With It, and We Put it into Regulation. The Primary Tool You're Going to Be Using for the First Couple of Years Here until We Begin to Build Case Law under 3715 Is the 3715 Regulation, and the Interpretations and the Guidance That Comes out of Headquarters. Why? Because Essentially Most of the Regulationed That -- Most of the Cases That Went Before Are Now Moot. We Have Now Set into Rule a New Standard and We're Going to Use These Standards. Now, Let Me Say a Word about the New Standard. We Got a Call from -- a Groupwise Message from Someone Who Said, Hey, I Don't See the Big Deal. This Looks like All You've Done Is Taken Every Authority That We've Had and Kind of Put it All In One Place. Exactly the Point! We Are Not Embarked on Anything Here That We Couldn't Do at Any Time in the past 41 Years. There Is No New Authority Involved Here. There Is No New Ground-breaking Case Law. There Is No Radical Change in The Way We Do Business. What We Have Simply Done Is Taken the Scattered Pieces of Policy, of Case Law, of Guidance And Just Plain Ol' Practice and We've Put it in One Place, and When We Put it in One Place, We Decided to Add Some Teeth to It. So Don't Think of this as Something That You Couldn't Already -- Couldn't Already Do. You Could Have Done this. It Would Have Just Been a Little More Difficult. We've Simply Put it in One Spot And Tried to Make it Easier. It's Important to Note Also That the Teeth Have Always Been There, at Least since Flpma and Late They Are Morning Dennis Mclane Will Be Going Through a Situation Where We Will Demonstrate That There Were Teeth Even Before These Regulations. We've Been Getting a Flurry of Faxes in Regarding One of Our Conversations Yesterday Having To Do with Our Example of the Mineral Peak, and That Is the Situation Where the -- Mrs. Smith Was Doing Income Tax Returns in a Back Room and Would We Allow Vegetable Gardens as Long as the Underlying Use Was Legitimate. Well, We've Gotten a Lot of Faxes Back That Say We're Wrong, That's the Wrong Approach, and They Certainly Wouldn't Allow it At Their Office. You Have to Understand That the Standard We're Using Is Reasonably Incident. It's Not Reasonably Necessary. The Standard of Reasonably Incident Is in the Statute 43 U.s. Code 612. It's in the Regulations. Not the Reasonably Necessary Standard. Rick? and That's a Deliberate Determination on Our Part. We Looked At, We Evaluated the Arguments for Reasonably Needed, And We Rejected Them, and If You Want to See Those, You Can Take A Look in the Pream Tubal Your Regulations on Page -- Preamble To Your Regulations on Page 13 And You Will See a Discussion Why We Said We Do Not Believe We Want to Adopt the Reasonably Required or Reasonably Needed Standard of Richardson. Rome Has Spoken, the Matter Is Closed. Matt? I Don't Know How I Can Possibly Follow That. But I'll Try. Well, You Kind of Threw Me off My Stride There, Rick. Sorry about That. That's Okay! That's Fine. We Got a Fax in from Ridgecrest From Buzz Todd, and Buzz, I Want To Thank You for Sending This, And I Want to Pass it down and I Would like for Bob to Stick it On the Elmo, and Buzz Sent Us Several Pages of the Types of Permits That People Who Want to Operate Mines May Be Required to Get in California. Now, Some of These Permits Will Also Be Appropriate in Other States. Tonight Even Try and Look at it On Your Tv Screens Except to Realize It's Big, Long, Heavy, There's a Lot of it and There Are Five Pages. If You Would like to Get a Copy, I'm Sure Buzz Would Be Happy to Send You One by Groupwise. If He Has on it Groupwise. It Looks like It's Been Photocopied from a Publication. Buzz, Also, Would You Be Good Enough to Send Us a Copy. Another Point on That. This Is a Useful Tool for Not Only the Public but for Our Own Internal Management. We Need Ourselves to Know How Many Permits Are out There? Who Have We Got to Talk To? By Assembling Lists like This, We Have a Notion of Who We've Got to Call and Who We've Got to Learn to Work With, and for Our Own Internal Purposes and for Sound Public Participation and Sound Public Service, We All Ought to Think about Assembling These Things Either on a Statewide Basis to the Extent It's Possible, Virtually Impossible in California, as I Understand It, or to Do it on an Areawide Basis. Or a Districtwide Basis. This Is a Good Tool. You Ought to Think about Seriously Taking Someone, Sending Them Off, and Sitting Them down and Saying Build Me One of These Lists. This Is a Real Good Idea. Thanks Very Much, Buzz, for Sending it to Us. We Do Appreciate it More than You Know. So No Good Deed Goes Unpunished, So You Will Get a Couple Requests for It. We Have a Couple Irrelevant Things to Discuss. We Are Continuing Our Tacky Tie Contest and a Couple of Us Have Taken Great Pains to Have Something That Will Horrify You And Make Your Television Screens Bleed. I Know Chip Was Pretty Good About Saying, Oh, He Loves it And I Felt That Dilbert Was Appropriate for a Friday. And, Rick, What Can You Say? Donald Duck. Donald Duck. Dennis Is Plain Jane Standard In the Uniform. I Don't Think Dennis Would Ever Hear the End of it If He Wore a Donald Duck Tie on His Form. So It's Probably Just as Well. So, Anyway, as You're Sending In Questions and Comments to Us Today, We'd Appreciate Yet Another Tie Tally and See Who Wins the Tacky Tie Competition. We Didn't Worn Bob Gibson We Were Going to Do this. In Fact, We Didn't Know We Were Going to Do it until Yesterday. So Bob Has a Pretty Nice Tie on And I'm Sorry to Hear That, Bob. Also We Got a Number of Observations of Dog Sightings in The Mineral Peak Video Yesterday And There Were More Dog Sightings Reported than We Knew Of. So Last Night I Got My Vcr to Work on the Television and I Discovered There Are, in Fact, Four Certified Dog Sightings of The Whole Dog and at Least One Ear Sighting. So If You Saw More than We Did, You're Probably Right. Anyway, We Got a Number of Questions in Overnight on Overnight Faxes. Here They Are. There's Just a Big Pile of Them. We're Going to Try to Deal with Some of Them Before We Go to Bob Gibson. When We Finished Yesterday on My Voice Mail at My Desk We Had a Rather Lengthy Message from a Realty Specialist Who Had Some Comments on Our Approach for 2920 and Basically Giving a Larger Workload to Realty Specialists for 2920 Authorizations. I Appreciate Your Phone Call. You Raised a Lot of Excellent Points. You Need to Call Us. Don't Leave on it My Voice Mail. If These Are Questions You Have, These Are Questions Other People Have, and We Need to Deal with Them out in the Open and Put Them to Bed. Rick? Exactly. Now, Let's Keep in Mind One Point, Matt. When We Say 2920, and We Repeatedly Turn to 2920 and Say, Well, We're Looking at That as a Potential Solution, You Need to Remember That 2920 Is an Option. It Is Not a Requirement. The Decision to Issue or Not Issue a 2920 Permit Rests Solely With the Manager's Discretion. When We Are to the Point Where We Are Talking About, Yeah, Maybe One of the Solutions and One of the Options Is a 2920 Permit or a Rec. Permit or Some Other Special Authorization Under One of Our Pieces of Authority, That's Optional. You Don't Have to Give That to Somebody. You Don't Have to Use That as a Tool. You Can Say, Please Leave the Area. That Is Your Ultimate Option. Because Once You Have Determined That it Is Not Reasonably Incident, That it Is Not a Mining-related Use, Then That Person Has No Right to Occupy The Land. It Then Becomes Our Discretion To Decide Whether or Not They Should Be There. So, Yes, We Are Putting an Additional Burden on the Realty Guys. Sorry about That. But, Keep in Mind, it Is a Choice That You Have to Make, And it Is Not a Mandatory Choice. You Can Say, Please Leave. Matt? We Had Another Question That Went along Those Lines Last Night That Was -- Well, It's From Baker, Baker, Oregon. It's Fairly Lengthy and Fairly Convoluted. Basically Our Answer Yesterday Appears to Them to -- I Can't Even -- I Can't Read it Because It's Convoluted. The Bottom Line Is, Because Things Can Be Authorized on 2920 Doesn't Mean That They Have to Be Authorized on 2920. This Doesn't Mean That We're Going to Say, Okay, Give Every Squatter and Every Unauthorized And Unauthorizeable Use a 2920 Permit. Nope, That's Not What We're Saying. I Agree, Matt. Another Question That Came In, Our Insistence on a Cme for Surface Use Determinations Is Short-sighted and Discriminatory. I Think this Is More of a Comment than Question. As a Mining Engineer with 19 Years Experience in Leaseable Minerals I Am More than Qualified to Do this Work Even Though I Don't Have Certification. If You Require Certification You Need to Change the Requirements To Allow People with Leaseable Experience Who Tend to Be More Qualified on Mine Production, Equipment, Bonding, Reclamation And So On. You Are Excluding an Entire Group of Qualified Professionals This with Arbitrary Classification. If You Have 19 Years Experience Doing All These Things, Then it Shouldn't Be Difficult to Get Certified. The Bureau Is in Dire Need of Certified Mineral Examiners, and It Occurs to Me That Given the Case Loads That Are out There, Asking Management to Allow You To Get Certified Shouldn't Cause Too Much Difficulty. We Have a Call in from Ridgecrest. We Would like to Take It. We Are Postponing Bob Gibson for A Little Bit, but this May Be Worthwhile. Good Morning, Mike, in Ridgecrest. Caller: this Is Mike Hogan. I Appreciate You Having the Time To Have Me on Here. Your Course Is an Excellent Course. I Am Really Pleased with the Format and the Information That's Coming Across and I Would Like to Pass That on from the Realty End, at Least, as Far as What I'm Receiving Here in Ridgecrest. What I'm Calling about Is That, And I Was the Culprit on Your Voice Mail Yesterday, Because What I Was Really Trying to Do Is See If You Could Get a Realty Specialist Knowledgeable in 2920 On the Panel Today and I Know it Was a Short Notice Point, but What I'm Concerned about Is That The Reference Keeps Being Made That 2920 Seems to Be the Catch-all for What Doesn't Fit In the Old and the New Mining Regulations, and It's Discussed Sporadically, but for Those of Us in the Lands Program That Could See at Least Knowing Len Gum Being in the Minerals Chief In this Office, I Know That He Really Loves to Keep Him and His Staff Passing off as Much Work To the Lands Program as Possible, and I'm Concerned That We're Going to Get into a Situation Where in Other Offices Or Wherever in the BLM That We're Looking at the Way to Legitimize Mining Claims Could Be Through 2920 If They're Not Mining Claims after the Surface Use Determination. I Personally Think That My Favorite Part of the 2920 Regs Is the Unauthorized Use Section And I Think it Should Be Actually Strengthened to Incorporate Some of the Fallback From the Mining Claims Stuff That You've Already Changed. The Last Thing That I Think We Really Want to Do Is Legitimize Operations That Have Been Compliance Nightmares for Mining Under Some Type of 2920 Authorization. The Authorizations Are, You Know -- They Do Encompass Anything Like Residential or Commercial Or That Type of Thing, but If You're Looking at a Permit, That's a Three-year Situation Which NEPA Has to Be Done Every Three Years and Applications Have to Be Filed, and Although That's a Nonpossessory Interest, We've Got the 2920 Leases Which Provides a Possessory Interest To Whoever Holds the Lease, and It's Based on an Amortization Situation and Commercialization, So That We Could End up by Using The Word Lease, it Could Give The Connotation That We're Going To Give Some Type of Possessory Right. It's Important to Note, Mike, These Will Be Discretionary and If it Isn't Something That Is Approveable, If it Isn't Something That We Should Have on The Public Land under 3715 or 2920, Then the Answer Is Going To Be No in Any Event. Caller: Right. and What We're Simply Saying Is That We Don't Throw Widows And Orphans out of the Only Place They've Got to Live. We Don't Burn Cabins in the Dead Of Night after the Rangers Have Restrained an 80-year-old Lady And They Don't Have Anyplace to Go. This Was the Guidance That Cy Jamison Gave to Us Six Years Ago When We Started this Exercise, And Nothing Has Changed That Guidance since Then. What We've Tried to Do Is Build Into Our Tool Kit a Sufficiently Large Selection of Options. 2900 Is Simply One More Option. One of the Other Options Is to Simply Say "Get off and Here Is Our Friendly Ranger to Escort You to the Boundary of the Public Land." That's Right. And Just Because Somebody Has Established, Say, a Convenience Market on Public Land to Undercut His Competition with Lower Cost Rental Doesn't Mean We Should Legitimize That under 2920. In Any Event They've Got to Go. Rick, Do You Think We Could Use Mike's Input When We're Putting Together the Interim Guidance. No Good Deed Goes Unpunished. Mike, What Do You Think? Caller: I Would Be Willing To Lend a Hand. I Don't Mind Doing That. I Just See it Could Be a Workload for Lands and Realty And the Smoother We Can Make the Process up Front as a Transition Process to Where If the Movement Is Unauthorized Use All the Way Through, Let's Get Rid of Them. We Can Do So. Absolutely Right. Caller: a Life-term Easement For the Elderly or Handicapped For One of Those Type Decisions That We Do it as a Life-term Easement and Not as a Lease or As Some Type of -- by the Same Circumstances, We Do Have Cases out There Where We May Have a Profitable Enterprise That We Don't Want to Shut down. Caller: and That Would Be -- That's Where I Think the Staffs Have to Work Together to Get Recommendations Across That Just Because We're Handing it to You To Take Doesn't Mean We Want You To Trespass -- and What We Want to Emphasize As I Said Earlier Is That Isn't The Geologist's Problem and it Isn't the Geologists Flipping it Over to the Lands Guy's Desk and Saying, Hey, It's Your Problem Now. For the 20 Years I've Been in The Bureau, That's Been the Historic Way to Approach It. It Comes in on a Mining Claim, Oh, It's a Geologists Problem. He Does It. Now What You're Calling for and What We're Calling for Is a Team Approach. Thank You for Calling, Mike. Caller: Well, Thanks a Lot. By the Way, on the Ties, I Think That the Disney Tie Is the Busiest but the BLM One Is the Ugliest, I'm Sorry. Thanks Very Much for Calling, Mike, and We'll Be in Touch. Thanks Very Much. We Also Have Word from Ridgecrest. Apparently it Came in by Fax While Mike Was on the Phone. Their Vote for the Tackiest Tie Is the One Dennis Is Wearing, And If You Look Closely, it Is The Only Tie That Has a Tie Tack. We Would like to Move on Now. We Spent Some Time on the Phone. Bob, I Think It's Your Turn, and Let's Get Rolling on Case Recordation and Case Management. Thank You, Matt. What -- I'm Going to Talk about Today Is Three Issues. First of All, We're Going to Talk about Data Management, and Then We're Going to Talk about Case Management as it Relates, And Finally We'll Go into Appeals a Little Bit, and That Will Lead More into What Dennis Is Going to Talk about Later in Law Enforcement Issues. First Thing Is Data Management, And the Question Came the Other Day as Far as What We're Doing With Case Recordation to Track These Things We're Doing, and What We Did Is We've Gone to the Service Center and We've Asked For Some Codes to Be Put into The Current Case Recordation System. There Are Four of Them. They Are Found on Pages G10 -- I Will Put it on the Elmo Here and Briefly Talk about Each One. The First One Is Occupancy Form Filed. What That Is Is for These Existing Occupancies That Were On the Ground as of August 15th When the Regulations Went into Effect. The Forms Are Now Being Filed With Our Offices, Various Offices. Some of Them Are Going to the Wrong Office, but They're Being Forwarded to the Proper Office For Their Use. Some of Them Are Being Sent to The Denver Service Center. The People Are Confusing the Language for the Omb Requirement. If You Have Any Comments on How To Fill out the Form, Send it There. The People in the Service Center Are Nice Enough to Send it onto The State Offices. What Is Critical When Your Office Receives it Is to Have it Date Stamped When it Comes into The Mail Room, and That's One of The Things That Is Where the Code Is Defined. It's a Very Simple Code. All it Requires Is Having the Code in the System, and All You Have to Do Is Enter the Date That it Was Date Stamped Coming Into the BLM Office. This One-time Form must Be Postmarked by October 16th. That Is the Last Day That We Are Accepting the Forms for -- That Is the End of the 60-day Period That Was Allotted in the Regulations for the Forms to Be Filed with Us. After That, Any Form Filed Will Be Treated Just as -- They Will Be Ignored -- Well, Not Ignored, But Basically It's Going to Be Treated as a New Occupancy with New Information Required. Excuse Me, Bob. It's October 15th. The -- it Has to Be Postmarked By October 15th. 15th. 15th. Close of Business. Correction on the Slide Here. We Want to Make Sure of That. You must Notify, I'm Reading From BLM -- I Am Reading from 3715.4b1. You must Notify BLM by October 15th of the Existence. On October 16th -- If You Haven't Done So, the Full Force And Effect of the Regs Will Fall On Your Head. I'll Get Ahold of the People In Denver to Alter That Definition. We've Already Had Some Changes In the Definitions. A Memo Will Be Going out When The Codes Are Available for Use In the System. Right Now it Says No Forms Will Be Required after the 16th. That's Where They Got the 16th In There. Initially They Also Said "Accepted" but That Did Not Allow for the Acceptance of Something That Was Postmarked Prior to That Time. Now, for the Codes -- for the Occupancies That Are Coming in New, the Code to Use Is Associated Occupancy, and That Is, Once Again, the Same Simple Format, Allowing to Enter the Date That Is Postmarked, and These Codes Are to Be Used in -- Right Now They Are Being Used in The 3809 or 3802 Case Types. After I Discuss the Codes Here, I Will Talk to You about What We're Doing as Far as the Issue Of Keeping a Separate File for The Existing Occupancies, What We're Going to Have Is a Difference Between the Automated Record and the Paper Record Right Now. I'll Get into That in a Little Bit Here. This Is What You Use for Associated Occupancy. Once You Have Either of Those Two Situations, Your next Step Is Going to Be to Determine Whether That Occupancy Meets the Regulatory Requirements, and When You Make That Determination, You're Going to Have to Issue a Letter or a Decision to the Operator, Claimant, Filer of the Occupancy Whether You Can Concur with His Occupancy or Not. If You Concur, We've Got a Definition, We've Got a Code for Occupancy Concurrence, and Once Again It's a Simple Enter the Date That the Letter Is Signed By the Authorized Officer Determining That the Occupancy Does Meet the Regulations and Standards of Being Reasonably Incident in 43 Cfr 3715. Once Again, this Is Being Used With the 3802 and 3809 Case Types. Conversely, on the Other Side, If You've Determined That the Occupancy Is Not Reasonably Incident, What You Use Is Occupancy Nonconcurrence and the Date the Decision Is Signed by The Authorized Officer Saying That the -- it Has Been Determined That They Are Not. In That Decision Also You Want To Give the Reasons Why and Any Remedies You May Have for How The Claimant, Operator, What Have You, Could Bring the -- If It's Possible to Bring the Occupancy into Compliance with The Regs. If It's Not a Total Case of There's No Way That it Can Be Authorized. Now, the Case Type, Initially We Had Decided to Put These Things In 3802 and 3809 Case Types in The Case Recordation System, and That's Why We Had the Four Codes There. But Then it Became Apparent with The Existing Occupancies That it Was Necessary to File Them Separately Because You Could Have an Appeal Going on with That Case Separate from the Issue of What Is Happening with Your 3802 or 3809 Case. We Are Currently in the Process Of Trying to Get a Separate 3715 Case Type, but the Problem There Lies in the Fact That in the Spring of 1997 We Will Be Putting the Initial Operating Capability up in the State Starting with New Mexico. That System Has Been under Construction, as You May Well Know, for over Five Years Now, And We're Getting Real Close and It's Very Hard to Make Any Last-minute Changes to the System Because of the Effects it Will Have on Other Parts of the System. It's a Lot like Acupuncture. You Can Put a Needle in Someone's Foot to Cure Pain in Their Head, and the System Here Entering a Whole New Case Type Has a Lot of Ramifications That They're Not Prepared to Deal With Right Now. The Problem with Creating a 3715 Case Type in Case Recordation That Is Possible, but Then When That Is Converted over into Almrs/ioc, it Goes into an Area Called the Post Cleanup Conversion Area Which Is Basically an Area Where Everything That Doesn't Have a Home in the New Ioc Will Reside And There's No Way to Get Any Kind of Reporting Capability off Of That. But There Are Other -- We Will Work on Trying to -- We're Going To See What We Can Do. I've Got the People in the Service Center Working on Trying To Make the Changes to the System. In the Meantime, Rick Has Talked About the Possibility of Having Some Sort of Maybe Pc-based System Where We Will Track These Things Where That Is in the Works. We Will Be Discussing That as Time Goes on and We Will Keep You Informed as to What We're Able to Come up with and as Far As Keeping Track of What These Things Are. One of the Neat Things That You Can Do Is Use -- If You Have a Unix Box There Is a Piece of Software Called Arcview and It's The Geographic Information System Software and Allows to You Depict and Plot Various Information. On Pages G10 Through G12 Are Examples of Something That I Put Together for the 50th Anniversary of BLM to Depict Where the Minerals Were in the State of Nevada. It Is a Little Bit Blurry on Your Copy. I Sent a Color Copy of This, And, of Course, Once it Was Xeroxed it Doesn't Xerox Real Well. This Smudge Area You See Here Is Actually Yellow and Is the BLM Land Pattern That We Had. I've Put -- Located Each of the Cities Where BLM Has an Office In Nevada. This Particular One Is for Salable Minerals. I've Prepared One for Salable Minerals, One for Leaseable Minerals and One for Locatable Minerals. The Legend Is Such That You Can Prepare it to Make it Anything You Want. You Can Use Any Color Scheme You Want. You Can Use Any Kind of Symbol You Want. There Are Certain Symbols That Are Already in the System and We're Working as We Get Later Releases to Try to Get Other Symbols Put into the System. It's Just a Tool That You Might Want to Use in Showing Where Your Occupancies Are. It's One of the Tools That They're Using Right Now in Conjunction with the Abandoned Mine Land Program Where They Take a Gps Unit Out, That's Geographic Positioning System, And Plot up Exactly Where These Things Are At, and If You Can -- You Can Take That Data That You Get from Gps, Plug it into Arcview, and You Can Create a Nice Map for Presentations When You Want to Talk about Where the Occupancies Are in Your State. Now I Want to Talk about Case Management. This Is the Area Where We're Talking about the Paper Record. We've Just Talked about What We're Doing with the Electronic Record. Because of the Unavailability Right Now of the New Case Type, We're Going to Be Handling the Paper Record Slightly Different, But It's Very Important, as Has Been Stressed over the past Couple of Days, and Cannot Be Stressed Enough, Is the Importance of Keeping this Record in the Proper Order and Keeping Everything Right in the Case, Not Leaving Anything out Or Putting Anything That Is Not Necessary into the Case, Because If You Do, as Was Brought up the Other Day, it Could Affect Us in Such That You Would Lose the Case Before Ibla Because You Do Not Have the Information There, Or You May Have Some -- Have Put Something in There That Could Have a Deleterious Effect. Once Again, to Use Matt's Slide From the Other Day, If it Isn't Documented, it Didn't Happen. So Whenever You're Going to Start Going out to These Occupancies and Look at Them, Start Documentation Right Away Of Everything You Do. What I Want to Talk about in Order to Illustrate this Better Was Sent out to You by Groupwise The Other Day Is a Memo That Was Put Together by Ken Stauers of The Nevada State Office, and it Was a Memo Sent out to the Entire Bureau to All Field Offices and the Number Is Nv-96-156. I Would like to Dive in at This Point. This Is One of the Overnight Updates That You Would Have Received the Night Before Last. That Would Have Been Wednesday Night. If You Didn't Get It, Let Us Know, Send Us a Fax with the Groupwise Contact That We Can Send this to You At. Thank You, Matt. Although this Memo Is Entitled Realty Case File Documentation And Maintenance, It's Pretty Much Applicable to Any Case File That You Might Have. As I Go Through the Portions of This Memo, You May Notice Some Of the Numbers Will Be out of Sequence. There May Be Some Numbers Missing. What We Have Done Is Put the Entire Memo on Cards Here, and What I've Done Is Try to Choose Those Portions of the Memo Which Are Most Applicable to What We're Doing with Our Surface Use Determinations and the Reports We're Doing for Occupancy. First Thing That it Says Is That We Need, Therefore, to Take Our Records and Our Record Keeping Practices Very Seriously. This Cannot Be Stressed Too Much. Too Often by the Time the Record Of a BLM Decision Reaches a Point Where an Appeal or Lawsuit Is Filed, the Case File Contains Extraneous Material Such as Handwritten Notes That Were Never Intended to Be a Part of The Permanent Record. If You're Talking to the Occupants on the Phone and You're Documenting What You're Talking About, in the Meantime You're Scribbling Notes to Yourself, or Making Asides or Doodling, Whatever, You Don't Want to Include Those Kind of Things in a Case File. Ibla Is Not Going to Want to See That Stuff. And These Cases, Unlike the 3809 And 3802s That Go to the State Director First Where You Could -- Where There's a Possibility Of an Oversight from the State Office and Removing Extraneous Material from the Case File, it Is Not Going to Happen. The People from the District Are Going to Have to Send it Straight to Ibla and Whatever Is In the Case File Is the Official Record When it Goes to Ibla. So Before You Send it to Ibla, You Need to Remove Any Unnecessary Materials Inadvertently or Carelessly Left In the File, Because They Become A Part of the Official Record. Bob, We've Got a Concern About Removing Items from the Case File. Now, Once a Case File Goes Away From the Office, it -- My Understanding Is That it Goes Wherever it Has to Go, Warts and All, Even If We Have Doodles or Things and Even a 3809 Case That May Pass its Way Through the State Office on its Way to Ibla Shouldn't Be Purged of Anything, Even If There Is a Dollar Bill Stapled Inside. No -- and the Point Here Is That We Should Focus on If You've Got a Document and You've Been Sitting There Writing and Scribbling Down Notes on a Piece of Paper Saying Here's the -- Here's this Bozo Who Has Called Me Again, And You're Being Very Unkind and Very Unprofessional, and That Constitutes Your Record of a Phone Call, You Ought to Take The Time to Put it on a Piece of Paper, Type it into Your Word Processor and Document the File Properly. As Dennis Has Pointed out Before, Your Demeanor Is Going To Count, and If You've Gotten a Whole Bun of Place Placed in That Case File That Seems 'Say Your Demean Sir Flippant, less Than Professional, Your Words And Your Words and Views Are Going to Be Treated as less than Professional. So When it Finally Goes to the Case File, You Ought to Make Sure That it Is Something That, As We Say Inside the Beltway, You Don't Have Any Problems with It Being Published on the Federal Page of the "Washington Post," Because There Are Times When Things That You Write May End up There, and So When You Write Something for the File, And You Write Something for the Official Record, You Think about The Fact That it May End up in The Hands of a Supreme Court Justice. That's Right. If You Get to the Point Where You're about to Send off a Case File on Appeal and You Think That You Really Wish You Had Five Minutes Just to Take Some Things Out, You're Guilty of Really Rotten Case File Management. Bob? Yes. What this Goes to Speak to Is Generally When an Appeal Decision Goes Before Ibla for Review, There Is No One There to Back up or Explain What Is in The Case File, Why Something Is There, Why Something Is Not There. All They Have Is the Record That Is Before Them to Use to Render Their Decision. The Need to Defend an Action May Also Arise after the People -- Sometimes These Cases, Because Of How Long That They Can Take To Go Through the System, Maybe The People That Are Most Acquainted with Them Have Forgotten It. It May Be Several Years Before The Issue Before the Board Is Heard. Or in the Case of What We Have a Lot of Times Going on Now, There's a Lot of Flux in the Bureau. The Person That Originally Worked on the Case May Not Even Be in the Bureau Anymore, or He May Be at Another Office and Unavailable. So That's Once Again Why You Need to Work to Make Sure That All the Documentation in Your Case File Is Acceptable, Legible, Correct and There's Not Anything in There That You Would Not Want Seen as a Matter of the Record. In Order to Ensure the Bureau-wide Consistency of the Proper Documentation and Maintenance of the Case Files, Ken Stauers Has Developed Some Points Here in His Memo to Assist You in What You Need to Put into a Case File and What Not to Put into a Case File, What Way to Put Them In, Where They Should Be Stored. I Am Going to Go over the Points That I've Found Relevant in His Memo That Pertains to What We're Doing with Occupancy. Once Again, If You See a Number Up in the Corner the next Elmo Presentation Is Missing a Number, That's Because What Was Used in There Was Aimed at Realty Cases. There Were Such Things as Talking about Accounting Advise. There Are No Fees Involved in What We're Doing. So Those Were Taken out and Will Not Be Shown. Once Again, this Stresses, While This Documentation Was Put for -- Was Put out for Realty Case Files, it Does Applicability to All Case Files. We're Using it Here to Demonstrate What We're Doing for The 3715, but it Also Works for Your 3809, 3802 Mining Claim, Lands Realty, Forestry, Any Case File That the Bureau May Have. These Principles Apply to Them All. The First Principle Is That Case File Maintenance Is Every Users' Responsibility. It's Not the Responsibility of The People in the Central Records or If Your Case Files Are Stored Somewhere Else. It's the Individual User That Is Working on the Case File. It's Your Responsibility to Keep That Case File in the Proper Order, Keep the Proper Documents In There. It's Not -- You Need to Treat it Like Would You Treat Your Essential Records That You Treat In Your Private Life. If There Are Inappropriate Personal Notes, Duplicate Copies Of Documents, Torn Case Jackets, Case Jackets with Missing Bar Codes, If You Are Using a Bar Code System in Your Office, the Person Discovering the Situation Should Either Take the Necessary Corrective Action in the Case of A Torn Jacket to Try to Get a New Jacket or Bring it to the Attention of Someone Else If You Are Looking at Someone Else's Case File and You Notice Discrepancies or Problems with It, You Need to Bring it to That Person's Attention So That They Can Put the Case File in Proper Order So That If Ever the Situation Arises Where That Case File Has to Go to Ibla or in the Case These Case Files Are a Matter of Public Record, the Public Can Come in and Ask to See the Case Files. So Keeping That in Mind, Don't Put Anything in There That You Wouldn't Want Someone to See. Here it Talks about the Receipt Of an Application, but Basically What We're Talking about Here Is The Receipt of the Information On an Occupancy or the Form That Was Filed. As Far as Immediately Assigning A Serial Number to the Case Right Now, That's Where We Get Back to the Area That We Have a Difference Right Now in the Paper Record Versus the Automated Record. Bob, Can You Create a 309 Case by Putting an Occupancy Symbol after the Number? Can You Put a What -- Can You Create a 309 Case by Putting an Occupancy Symbol After the Number? No -- What Do You Mean by an Occupancy Symbol, Matt? I'm Not Really Sure. The Question Just Came into Us And it Was Forwarded to Me and I'm Not Sure I Fully Understand It. I'm -- I'm Not Sure I Understand What They're Talking about as Far as an Occupancy Symbol. If They Would like to Call In, Clarify That, or Send Us a Follow-up Fax on What They're Talking about. Right Now, as I Said, These Are Brand-new Regulations. We Are Working with the People In Denver to Get an Automated Mechanism Available. It May Be Possible, but it May Change. We Will See about Getting This by Fax in Writing, and We May Be Able to Do a Better Job On It. Go Ahead, Bob. Right Now What You Would Be Entering into Case -- Well, What You Will Be Entering into Case Recordation or Orca If You Are One of the Orca States Is One of The Four Codes I Showed You Earlier as Far as What Happens, And That Would Go into the 3809 Or 3802 Case File That the Person, If the Person Has an Existing Plan or Notice to Cover Their Mining Claim. In the Event That the -- They Are Doing Casual Use and They Are Occupying the Ground and it Is Determined it Is Reasonably Incident, We Do Not Have a Mechanism Right Now. It Has Been Talked about and Suggested by Several States in Order to Create Something. It Was Put in as a Request to Go Into Almrs/ioc. It Is Not Available in the First Release. It Could Be Available in Future Releases to Try to Track What Goes on in Casual Use Situations. The Problem Presented There Is That it Could Become a Record-keeping Nightmare and a Workload Nightmare Is Bad Enough In Such Areas Such as Nevada Trying to Keep up with the Plans And Notices Without Keeping up With All the Casual Use Operations as Well. It's Just a Mechanism in Case Someone Comes in and Says, Hey, I Saw So and So out There in a Tent on the Ground. What about It? If They're Not Disturbing Anything, They Have a Tent There, You May Want to Know Whether They Are Occupying a Mining Claim or They're on Unappropriated Public Land. I Don't Know If We Are Going Necessarily into Occupancy Case Files to Deal with Confidential Information, but If There Is Some Information That the Claimant Is Specifying He Wants To Remain Confidential, this Has To Be Stored Separately Outside Of the Case File. , and it May Also Be Appropriate To File a Serial Register Page On the Top of the Case File as Long as They Are Kept on the Top Of the Other Documents for Ready Reference. I Don't Think We'll Deal Much With the Issue of Confidential Information in this Aspect of Occupancy. Mostly That Arises When You Get Into the Areas Of, Say, for Instance, a Validity Exam, and Until Such Time as the Exam Has Been Finalized, the Marketing Data and Such Can Be Confidential. Bob, We Have about 5 Minutes To a Break. So Can You Summarize What's Needed for a Case File in the Remaining Five Minutes? Basically What You Need for Your Case Files Is You Need to Have All the Pertinent Information That Is Being Sent In. It Needs to Be in a Legible Format So That it Can Be Read, Not Only by Yourself, but by Others. If You Send it to the Board and All Your Notes Are Illegible and Can't Be Read, That Can Affect The Decision. Only Have Stuff That Is Pertinent to the Occupancy. Don't Have Extraneous Notes or Personal Opinions Unless You Want Those Personal Opinions Used by the Board to Come to Their Decision, as Was Expressed Earlier about the Demeanor of The Person Keeping the Records Will Come Through in the Decision. Absolutely Right. Another Thing to Be Aware of Is If You Are Using Photographs, The Photographs Need to Be Mounted and Captioned. I Remember Some Years Ago I Was Given a Case File to Review and The Author -- the Person Who Maintained the Case File Wondered Why it Has Been Rejected by the State Office. I Opened up the Case File and Things Fell on the Floor. That's Not a Good Case File. Go Ahead, Bob. That's about -- Well, We Had a Call That Just Dropped off. I Was Trying to Arrange for You To Have Some Time to Deal with That Call. Do You Want to Finish up with The Point by Point Issues That Need to Go into a Case File or Do You Think It's about Time for A Break, Bob. I Think It's about Time for a Break. I Think We Can Take about a 10-minute Break Now. It's Time for Our Morning Break. So We'll Be Back in 10 Minutes Exactly. Remember to Leave Your Television Turned On, and When We Return, Dennis Mclane Will Pick up Where We Promised He Would Pick up Yesterday. Welcome Back from Your Break. We Hope You Had a Good One. Joining Us Now Again Is Dennis Mclane. In a Few Minutes Dennis Is Going To Be Covering the Three Aspects Of Inspection and Enforcement, Administrative, Civil and Criminal. Criminal. In the Meantime, We Need to Do a Little Bit of Follow-up with Bob Gibson. We Have Appeals and So on That We'll Be Dealing With, and We Have a Quick Call to Take. So Hello, Jim, in Phoenix, We Don't Have a Lot of Time, So Get Right to the Point. Caller: Hello. This Is for Bob Gibson. I Was the One That Sent That Fax Down Regarding the Symbol. What I Was Referring to Was Case Parting. If We Could Use a -- We Had Discussed this Here, Using the Symbol Uo after the Serial Number, in Other Words, Parting It out from a 3809 Case, That Way We Would Be Able to Utilize All of the Codes That We Can Now Use for 3809. We Could Also -- and Maintain a Separate File. We Could Print Serial Pages. It Would Appear on the Orca Geo And We Could Work Closely with Law Enforcement as to What Went Into the Uo File, and When You Consider That Even Concurrences Can Appeal by Any Party Who Appears to Be Aggrieved, We're Talking about All Kinds of Possible Appeals. So, Jim, You Are Suggesting Adding a Suffix to an Existing Case File Number? Caller: to -- We Would -- it Would Be a 3809 Case If it Was Associated with a 3809 Action, And Then We Would Have an Associated 3809 File for a Notice. I Am -- Jim, That's a Possibility That I Will Raise with the People in the Service Center. It's Possible in the System Today, but What I'm Not Sure on Is That Is a Solution for What We're Dealing with Today, but Once Again, the Conversion of Those Files into Almrs/ioc May Present Some Problems. They're Not Prepared at this Point to Convert Those Suffixes, But it Is an Issue I Will Raise With Them, and Let the Field Know If That Is an Acceptable Situation and Something That They Can Work with. Thank You for Your Suggestion. Caller: this Is a Suffix on The Serial Number, Not on the Case Type. Yes. Great. Thanks Very Much for Calling, Jim. Okay. Looks like That's Also -- Would Answer the Fax Question That Just Came in from -- Was That Montana? Yes. No, this Is from Ridgecrest -- This One Was from Boise and It's My Understanding That Both Existing and New Cases That Involve Occupancy Are to Have Two Separate Files There Are New Standards/case Types Couldn't We Use a Suffix on the Serial Number to Separate Them. That Seems like the Same Question and Basically the Same Answer. Basically It's the Same Question, and Once Again, That Is a Solution I Will Raise with The People in the Service Center And See If That Can Be Accommodated More Easily When We Move into Almrs/ioc Here in About Six Months. Okay. Bob, in the next Three or Four Minutes Can You Summarize the Appeals Process? Briefly I Wanted to Touch on Appeals in the System. Dennis, If You Would Put on the Elmo, Please, and Section 3715.9 Of the Regulations Give You What Appeal Rights That You Have. If You Would Go to the next One, Please. It Says, If You Are Adversely Affected by a BLM Decision, Order or Determination Made Under this Subpart, You May Appeal the Decision, Order or Determination to the Interior Board of Land Appeals Subject to The Procedures in 43 Cfr Part 4, Which Is the Administrative Procedures Act for Appeals. That Was the Reading Assignment Given Last Night for You to Read Over. That Gives You All the Information You Need as Far as How to Treat an Appeal. Would You Put on the next One, Please? One Question Is Whether -- Does An Appeal -- Appeal to Ibla Suspend a BLM Decision? Next One, Please. And an Appeal to Ibla Does Not Suspend an Order Requiring an Immediate, Temporary Suspension Of the Occupancy under the Occupancy Regulations, Even Though -- next One. And the Provisions of 43 Cfr 4.21 (A) Apply to All Other BLM Decisions, Orders and Determinations under the Part. Basically You Do Have a Right to Appeal, and You Appeal Directly To Ibla. If the Appeal Is Timely, You Have 30 Days to Appeal. If it Comes in in 40 Days, Send It to the Ibla Anyway, Let Them Make the Determination That the Appeal, Whether the Appeal Was Timely or Not. Anything over 40 Days, Write a Decision Denying the Appeal as Filed Untimely. That's Basically it for Appeals. We Have a Quick Question That Just Came in from Butte. It Has to Do with 2920 Trespass Cases. What Do We Do with Existing 2920 Trespass Cases for Mining Claim Occupancies? Should We Close Them out When 3809 or 3802 Case File Is Opened? No, Don't Close Them out When a 3809 or 02. We'll Work Further on How to Distinguish Between the Ones You Already Have Right Now -- There's an Area Fortress Pass, And There Are Some -- for Trespass and There Are Some Commodity Codes Being Used Fortress -- for Trespass in the System. We Will Have to Work on How We're Going to Merge this Information Together. Further Guidance Will Be Coming Out. as Bob Is Finding, Just as Rick Has, this Class Is Being Just as Valuable to Us as it Is To You, Possibly Each More Valuable to Us, as We Return and Find Things We Need to Work on For Further Clarification and Guidance to the Field, and We Do Appreciate the Questions We're Getting In. We're Getting a Lot of Fax Questions In. Keep Sending Faxes. We Want to Hear from You. We're Not Going to Be Able to Answer All of Them on the Air Today, but Everything That We Get We'll Work on as Guidance as Needed and If We Haven't Answered Your Question by the End of the Course, Call One of Us. Call the Appropriate Person. We Will Be Happy to Talk to You. Dennis, Shall We Get Going on Inspection, Enforcement and So On. Might as Well, Matt. There Has Been a Great Deal of Build-up Towards My Presentation And I Hope Not to Disappoint Anyone. I Know You Won't. I Want to Start out Just by Saying Sort of What I Intend to Talk About, What I Intend to Talk about Is Enforcement, Not Only Criminal Law Enforcement, But Civil Enforcement, Administrative Enforcement as Well, and I Hope to Explain to You the Differences Between Those and the Relationships Between Those Enforcement Aspects and Maybe Use Some Examples to Illustrate That. I Also Want to Give You Some Helpful Hints on How to Keep Yourself Safe and Healthy When You're Carrying out Enforcement Actions, Not Only Safe and Healthy in Your Person, but Safe And Healthy in Your Own Legal Environment as Well When You're Doing Some of These Things. So to Start out Sort of with That Legal Groundwork, I Want to Start Very, Very Basic Here, and I Want to Start with the Constitution of the United States. This Constitution, of Course, Applies to All People of the United States. It Applies to Our Members of the Public. It Applies to Us. In Fact, a Lot of Us Are Sworn To Uphold this Constitution. A Lot of What the Bureau of Land Management Does for a Living Lately Has Been Called into Question Because of this Document. There Are Those Opponents out There That Are Carrying this Around in Their Pocket and Saying, Well, this Proves That The Bureau of Land Management Perhaps Not Only Doesn't Have The Authority to Have Mining Claim Occupancy Regs but Maybe Also Doesn't Have the Authority To Exist in Itself. Primarily Those That Would Make That Argument Point to Article X Of the Constitution, Which Basically Says That If the Constitution Has Not Reserved a Power to the United States, Then It Goes to the States. Then They Will Quickly Point to Article I, and in Article I There Is a Shopping List of Various Authorities of the Federal Government, and in Article I You'll Find the Postal Clause, the Customs Clause, the Immigration Clause, and the Various Other Things That Pertain to the Federal Government. One of the Others That You Will Find in Article I Is What's Called the Session Clause. This Sick Clause Was Written by The Founding Fathers I'm Sure to Take into Mind the District of Columbia Primarily, but They Also Said That When There Is Consent of the Legislature of a State, the United States May Also Have Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, Dock-yards, Other Needful Buildings. Quite Often the Constitutional Argument Will Say That Because The Public Lands Is Not on this List, and Because We, Quote-unquote, Don't Have the Consent of the State, That Perhaps the Bureau of Land Management Has No Reason to Exist. I Hate to Say This, but Based Upon That Argument Alone, the Constitutionalist's Argument Is Correct. The Bureau of Land Management Is Not Administered or Created out Of Article I of the Cession Clause. The Only Articles I Can Give You For Jurisdiction Are Things Liar Yellowstone National Park That Was Created Before Wyoming Was a State and Yosemite National Park Which Was Originally Created as A State Park and Then the State Legislature Creeded it Back to The Federal Government. In Those Examples, the Federal Government Has What's Called Exclusive Jurisdiction. That's Where the Federal Government Is the Only Law of The Land and the State Does Not Have Their Full Measure of Enforcement Authority in Those Areas. I Am Here to Sell You That Article 1 the Cessation Clause Does Not Apply to Bureau of Land Management Lands. Unfortunately, Quite Often Our Constitutionalists Arguers Will Not Go Back to the Back Part of The Constitution, and Back There We'll Find Article Iv, the Property Clause. There Are Several Important Things We Need to Know Here. First of All, the the Authority Is with Congress, and the Congress Can Make All Needful Rules and Regulations, and Here's the Particular Kicker, Property of the United States, And They Have the Authority over That. Okay? What's Important to Point out Here Is What We Get from the Property Clause Is Essentially The Authority of a Property Owner. In Law Enforcement Business That's Known as Proprietary Jurisdiction. We Have All the Rights of a Property Owner to Enforce Our Laws and Our Regulations on Those Lands. At the Same Time, in Proprietary Jurisdiction, the State and Local Government Has the Same Measure of Authority over Those Lands as They Do All the Other Lands of the State. So They May Also Enforce Their Laws and Regulations on the Land. The Kicker Is That the Constitution States in the Supremacy Clause When There Is a Conflict Between the Laws, the Federal Government Is Supreme. For Those of You as Matt Would Put it Want a Good Read, You Might Want to Read the Decision That Came out of United States Versus Nye County Because You Will Find the Principle of the Supreme Cy Clause Played out in That Case and the Bureau of Land Management Does Have the Authority to Enforce the Regulations That Relate to Public Lands and Resources. One of the Needful Rules and Regulations That Congress Came Up with to Manage the Public Lands as You All Know Is the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976. We Saw a Few Faxes Earlier in The Session That Were Sort of Grumbling about Our Comment That We Made on the First Day about Law Enforcement Being a Last Resort, and There May Be Some of You out There That Are Thinking Well We Just Invented this Phrase to Perhaps Be an Obstacle Or Perhaps Give You a Hard Time. However, I Want You to Know That We, Indeed, Did Not Invent this Particular Concept. What I'm Showing to You Now Is a Direct Quotation out of the Legislative History of the Flpma. This Came from the Conference Committee Between the Senate and The House in 1976 That Came up With the Final Version of the Particular Act. Now, Law Enforcement Authority For the Bureau of Land Management Was an Extremely Hotly Debated Issue. There Was Accusations That the Federal Government Was Now Setting up a Police Force That Was Going to Bring down the Law Of the Land and the Authority of The Federal Government on All of Our Public Land Users, and There Was a Great Deal of Hype about It and the Committee Did, Indeed, Put Forth Some Policy For Us to Understand. Basically Criminal Prosecutions And Penalties Should Be, and Remember, it Says Should Be, Doesn't Say must Be, Remedies of Last Resort. Emphasis Should Be Given to the Dissemination of Information and The Creation of a Law Enforcement Presence That Will Advise the Public and Administrative Resolutions Rather than Prosecution in the Courts. That Doesn't Necessarily Say That the Last Resort Cannot Sometimes Be the First Resort, And it Doesn't Necessarily Say That the Last Resort Won't Occur Fairly Quickly, and I'll Talk About Examples of That as We Move along Here. Now, the Committee Went on to Sort of Give Us Some Objectives For What We're Supposed to Do in Law Enforcement and There's Always a Great Deal of Debate Is Law Enforcement Really Meant to Enforce Mining Law, Really Meant To Enforce Grazing Regulations? I Think Certainly the Committee Has Encapsulated That When They Say the Committee Expects the Secretary Will Use, Will Use, His Law Enforcement Authority. Now, it Doesn't Say Will Use His Law Enforcement Authority for Just Recreation or Except When It's Dealing with Mining Claims. It Says the Secretary Will, Indeed, Use That, and the Objective of this Is Basically Protection of Public Resources And There's That Public Safety Phrase. Now, I Want to Point out That in The Actual Statute You Won't Find the Phrase "Public Safety," However, from the Legislative History We Have What's Called The Spirit of the Law, That the Committee, Did, Indeed, Intend For Us to Have a Responsibility For Public Safety on the Public Lands, and We Need to Keep That In Mind as We Go along. Now, I Want to Say That My Experience in Law Enforcement With That Last Resort Concept Before I Go on Here for a Minute Really Falls into the Category That When I Got Involved in Mining Claim Occupancy, One of Three Things Was Occurring, Either We Had Very Overt Signs Of Criminality, in Other Words, They Were Violating Other Federal Laws and Regulations, Or, Two, They Were Failing to Comply with an Order That We Had Issued, or They Were Refuse to Go Comply with That Order. And I Think Certainly the Congress Did Intend Us to Have Our Law Enforcement Authority in Order to Make Certain That We Did, Indeed, Assure Compliance With the Federal Laws and Regulations. Now, the Federal Law Enforcement -- Excuse Me, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act in the Enforcement Section, in Section 303, and this Is Something We Law Enforcement Officers Pay a Lot of Attention To, but Maybe Not Everybody Else Does, Briefly Provides Several Things. It Does Provide for Regulations That Have Criminal Penalties, And it Says Basically That Any Person Who Violates, Who Knowingly and Willfully Violates, These Regulations Can, Indeed, Be Held Criminally Liable or Criminally Responsible For That Act. Now, it -- it Says Specifically Any Person. That Doesn't Say Any Person Except Miners or Any Person Except Ranchers. It Says Any Person Who Knowingly And Willfully Violates. The Act Also Says That at the Request of the Secretary, the Attorney General May Institute Civil Actions for Injunctive Relief And/or Claim Collection And I Will Talk about Civil Procedure in a Few Minutes. It Also Gives the Secretary the Authority to Designate Law Enforcement Officers and in the Bureau of Land Management, Your Law Enforcement Officers Are Your Criminal Investigators and Law Enforcement Rangers. The Act Provides What Their Responsibilities Are. Each of These Officers Has the Authority to Carry Firearms, Has The Authority to Make Arrests And Has the Authority to Conduct Necessary Search and Seizure Actions Related to the Law Enforcement Function. The Act Also Says That Nothing In this Act Shall Be Construed As Reducing or Limiting the Enforcement Authority Vested in The Secretary by Any Other Statute. What That Simply Means Is That All Other Federal Laws Do Apply On the Public Lands as They Relate to the Resources. And it Closes Off, and this Is The Phrase That's Amplified in The 2920 Regulations and to Some Degree What We're Doing in 3715, The Use, Occupancy or Development of Any Portion of The Public Lands Contrary to Any Regulation of the Secretary or Other Responsible Authority or Contrary to Any Order Is Unlawful and Prohibited. The Statute Is Fairly Clear That It Intends to Bring to Bear this Enforcement Authority Should People Either Fail to Comply or Refuse to Comply. Now, Before I Move onto the Specific Three Aspects of Enforcement, I Want to Give You A Few Helpful Hints about Making Visits out There. Especially Those of You That Are Not Law Enforcement Officers and There's a Few Techniques I Want To Share with You That Hopefully Will Make You Safe. If I Could Bring up Slide Number 181, I Want to Say That this Most Probably May Be the Welcome Wagon to Your Site Visit for the Enforcement of 3715 Regulations. I Want You to Know That You Have Some Rights Here, and the First Right You Have Is to a Safe and Healthy Work Environment. What That Means Basically on This Site Visit Is If You Encounter Something like This, We Ask That You Please Stay in Your Vehicle until You've Got Ahold of the Operator and Had All Dogs Leashed or Other Hazards Eliminated Before You Exit. So Keep in Mind What You See as You Approach the Site. Now, If You Pull up to the Site And the Person You Intend to Contact Appears to Be Not Acting Quite Normal, Could Be under the Influence of Alcohol, Could Be Under the Influence of Drugs, Isn't Quite Comprehending What You Have to Say, My Advice to You Is to Come Back Another Day And Hopefully Make an Appointment to See That Person Later, Because, Number One, When A Person's in That State, They May Commit Themselves to Some Behavior That They Don't Ordinarily Do and Number Two, They're Probably Not Going to Listen to Anything You Said Nor Remember it Later, Probably Even Including the Appointment. Now, If You Also Show up at the Site and There Is a Large Crowd Of People There Because They're All There in Support of this Person's Cause Against the BLM, You Need to Avoid Persons That Are Extremely Argumentative, Especially to the Point of Losing Their Temper. If the Crowd Is Too Hostile, Again, Return Another Day, Perhaps Invite Your Law Enforcement Ranger to Come with You. Now, If You Do, Indeed, Need to Make That Contact in That Crowd Situation, the Important Principle Is Find the Person Who Is Really Responsible. Separate Them from the Crowd. Have Their Conversation with Only Them and Try to Avoid Side Conversations with Other People. Now, I Started out by Talking a Little Bit about the Constitutionalist Challenges. Another Thing You May, Indeed, Encounter Is Somebody Is Going To Challenge Your Authority When You Arrive on Site. Now, You Have Some Rights in This Particular Situation and So Do They. First of All, They Have the Right to Know That They Are, Indeed, Dealing with the Bureau Of Land Management. Now, If You're Not Wearing a Uniform or Not Driving a Vehicle With the Decal on It, Chances Are They Might Want to See Your Identification. We All Are Familiar with the Department of Interior's Official Identification Card, And I Want to Say That this Is The Only Identification That You Need to Provide Them in Terms of Your Official Presence There. You Do Not Have to Provide Your Private Driver's License. That's a Privacy Information You Have a Right to Privacy over. You Do Not Have to Give Them Your Home Address or Your Home Telephone Number or Any Other Privacy Information. You Are There on Behalf of the United States Government, and This Is an Official Visit, and This Would Be the Only Thing You're Obligated to Show Them. Now, Unfitchly, When this Card Was Designed -- Unfortunately When this Card Was Designed, it Included a Place in the Corner For Social Security Number. Social Security Number Is Another Thing That You Have the Right to Privacy over. Recently We've Issued an Instruction Memorandum That Allows for Your Clerks That Are Typing up These Particular Items To Keep That Section Blank. Now, the Reason We're Doing this Is Not Only to Protect Your Privacy, but We Have Had Some Known Cases Where Constitutionalists Have the Habit of Wanting to Use Your Social Security Number, Send it To the Irs with a Report of False Income, in Order to Trigger an Audit Against You, And this Can Cause You a Great Deal of Personal Grief. So We Want to Assure That Your Social Security Number Is Your Own Privacy Information. You Don't Have to Provide That To the Persons You're Making Contact with. Dennis, a Question. Should That Occur, Doesn't That Qualify as a False Statement to The Federal Government and Would We upon Discovering That Refer That to the U.s. Attorney's Office? We Certainly Should, Rick. However, It's Going to Be a Long Time Before It's Discovered Because Basically it May Trigger The Audit, the Audit May, Indeed Begin to Take Place and That's Going to Be the Moment When We Wonder, Why Is this Happening to Me? And as We Uncover Those Sort of Things, That's Something We Need To Keep in Mind. Now, People May Encounter Reluctance at Their Home Offices To Have a Government Id Card Filled out Without the Social Security Number Because Many People Look at a Form and Feel They Ought to Fill in Every Possible Plank. We Look for a Copy of the Im and It Seems to Have Gone into Never, Never Land, but Dennis I'm Sure You Have a Copy and If People Have a Question, Are You Willing to Send a Copy to Them? Certainly. Anybody Can Call Our National Office in Boise, and We Can Obtain a Copy of That for Them. That's Good. If I Could Have Slide 182 Up, Please. Now, One Thing That We Always Encounter Quite Frequently on The Public Lands Are Firearms, And I Want to Start out by Saying the Bureau of Land Management Has No Regulation in Itself That Prohibits the Possession of Legally Obtained And Legally Possessed Firearms. Firearms, as Long as They Are Legal in Themselves, Are Allowed To Be Possessed on the Public Lands. The Difference Comes in as to What They're Used for. Now, If You're Making Your Site Visit and People Have Visible Firearms on Them, Sort of Acting In an Intimidating Manner, Our Advice to You Is to Return Again On Another Day and Perhaps Visited the Site with Your Law Enforcement Officer. Another Helpful Hint Here Is That Firearms Are Kept by Most People on the Public Lands Either in Their Vehicle or in Their Home or Residence or Building. If You're Having a Conversation With Somebody and They Say, Hey, I Need to Go to My Residence to Get Something or I Need to Go to My Vehicle to Get Something, I'm Not Saying They're Going over There to Get a Firearm, but I'm Saying You Need to Be Aware of That. So If They Go in Their Building, Vehicle, Sort of Move Your Way In a Nonchalant Way Back to Your Vehicle, Get in Your Vehicle, Which Is a Safe Place for You to Be, And/or Stand Behind Your Vehicle Where You Have Some Degree of Cover Should They Come Out with Something a Little More Threatening than a Piece of Paper. We Ask That You Keep That in Mind. Now, If You Make the Visit with The Law Enforcement Officer, I Want You to Know That under Case Law Called Terry Versus Ohio, Law Enforcement Officers Have an Inherent Right to Keep Things Safe. In That Particular Right, They May, Indeed, Seize a Firearm During the Course of the Conversation Should They Have a Fear for Your Safety or Their Safety, and They May Possess That Firearm During the Conversation until the Conversation Is over. If the Firearm Is Something That The Person Is Allowed to Legally Possess, the Law Enforcement Officer Can Return That to Them When the Visit Is over. So If You Are Expecting Those Kind of Hostilities, Certainly We Invite You to Work with Your Law Enforcement Ranger on Maybe Nullifying Some of That. I Would Also like to Encourage People to Work Closely With Law Enforcement Rangers Whenever They Possibly Can. Back in the Dark Ages When I Was An Area Geologist in California I Used to Do Social Visits to Mines, Mine Operators and Occupancies, Where I Would Bring The Ranger along. Actualryly They Would Drive in The Ranger Truck and I Would Ride. The Purpose of the Visit Was to Make Deductions. I Would Introduce the Ranger to The Operator and Say this Is the Ranger Who Patrols Your Area. I Would like to You Meet Them. What That Message That They Were Getting from Me Was Is That We're Serious, We Mean Business, We're for Real, and We're Not to Be Trifled with. And in Three Quarters of the Cases, That Did the Trick. It's a Very Powerful Tool and It's Nonthreatening If You Make It a Social Visit on the First Trip. Now I Want to Talk about the Kind of Things That Can Immediately Cancel out That Last Resort Philosophy. If There Are Signs of Immediate Criminality and What I'm Talking About Here, There Are a Lot of Federal Laws That Don't Necessarily Have That Knowing And Willful Threshold, it Basically Says Any Person Who Violates and There's Also a Lot Of Other Things the Person Should Obviously Know Are Illegal in Themselves, the First Thing I Want to Point out If I Can Bring up Slide 183, We've Talked a Great Deal about Vegetable Gardens and There Is One Vegetable Garden That We Will Not Tolerate and That's the Cultivation of Marijuana. That Has, Indeed, Occurred on a Number of Mining Claims Throughout the Western United States. I Just Want to Give You a Word Of Caution. If You Work in Heavy Vegetated Areas That Have Fairly Reliable Sources of Water, Chances Are Your Mining Claims Could, Indeed, Have Something like this Going On. Dennis, We've Had a Number of Questions Asking Us over the Last Couple of Days Are Surface Use Determinations Required in Every Instance Where You're Going to File an Action Against A Mining Claim? Well, this Is Not a Mining Issue Shown on the Slide. This Is a Criminal Issue. You Don't Really Need a Surface Use Determination If the Mine Operator or the Occupant Is Growing Marijuana. Certainly, Matt, and I'm Probably Not Even Going to Ask Somebody Whether this Is Reasonably Incident, Too. Pretty Unlikely. the Kinds of Things to Be Aware of Visiting the Site That May Indicate That Marijuana Is There, Maybe Unbeknownst to You, If There Is like Water Pipes Lead to Go Nowhere or Not Lead To Go Something That Would Be a Mineralized Area, If the Site Appears to Be Overguarded with Rather Large Dogs, Vicious Dogs, People in Camouflage Clothing With Semi Automatic Weapons, These Are Good Signs Something Is Going on There Besides Mining, Especially If There Is No Gold Bullion Laying out on The Ground. You Might Also Keep in Mind Herbicide and Pesticide Containers Are a Sign of This, As Well as Certain Other Fertilizers, Stockpiled Chicken Wire, Other Materials That May Relate More to a Marijuana Cultivation Site than a Mineral Development. The next Thing I Want to Talk About That Is Definitely a Danger to Your Health and Safety Is Drug Laboratories. We Have Had Mining Claims That Have Been Used for Drug Labs Tories. The First Thing You're Going to Notice If Drug Laboratory Activity Is Going on Is Probably Strong Chemical Odors Emitted From the Building or the Place Where this Is Going On. We like to Say it Smells like Ether, but That's like Saying Rattlesnake Tastes Lie Chicken. Matt Tells Me Ether Smells a Lot Like Starter -- the Active Ingredient in the Starting Fluids We Use in Spring When We Want to Start Our Lawn Mower for the First Time Is Actually Ether. a Strong Unusual Chemical Odor Is a Sure Tip There Is Something Going on There Probably Besides Mineral Extraction. You Might Also See Very Unusual Laboratory Equipment, Rather Large Flasks and Beakers and Other Things Used in Conjunction With Heaters That Heat Certain Liquids to Make the Particular Drugs. And Some of the Typical Chemical Containers You Will Find Is Hydrochloric Acid, Red Phosphorous and a Lot of Used Empty Ether Canisters Strewn About. If You See These Kinds of Things, You've Probably Got a Drug Activity Going on There, a Drug Laboratory and Our Advice To You Is Get out of the Site Immediately and Notify Your Law Enforcement Officer Because If You Can Smell Those Fumes, You May Already Be in Some Degree of Danger in Terms of Your Own Personal Health. So Keep in That Mind in Your Particular Inspections. If I Could Bring up Slide 184. Now, If You Find Explosives Such As this One Laying About, I Don't Think That this Is the Typical Kind of Explosive a Miner Would Use for Mineral Extraction. This Is What's Known as a Pipe Bomb, and You've Heard about it Recently in the Olympics Affair And Other Places Where Pipe Bombs Are Being Used. A Pipe Bomb Is Designed Basically for One Purpose and That's to Hurt or Kill Human Beings. The Pipe Fragments, Sometimes They Stuff it with Nails. It's Basically Designed to Harm Other People. This Is Not Something That You're Going to See in a Kip Cull Mineral Extraction Operation. If You See These Sort of Things Coupled with Maybe a Lot of Firearms Present, Maybe Even Military Ordnance and Hand Grenades You Know You Have Something Going on Besides Mining and I Want to Make That Clear That Those Are Definitely Uses Not Reasonably Incident to And Should Be Moved on Pretty Quickly. When You Encounter Things Like That, You Don't Have a Mining Issue, You Have a Law Enforcement Issue. Don't Spend Any More Time than It Takes to Figure out There Is Something Dreadfully Wrong and Leave. Don't Worry about Mapping It. Don't Worry about Inventorying. Get out and Talk to Law Enforcement. Now, in These New Regulations We've Specifically Codified a Prohibited Act Called Obstructing Free Passage or Transit by Force, Threat or Intimidation. Now, a Lot of People May Think That We Came One a New Concept Here. However, That Comes Straight out Of the Unlawful Enclosures Act Which Has Been Around for Almost 100 Years. This Is, Indeed, an Illegal Act -- Actually, Dennis, It's More Like 115 Years Old. It's Quite Old. I Had One Occasion Where I Wrote A Warning for That and the Mining Operator Asked Me, He Said, When Did You Start this New Law? And I Said, Quite a While Ago. Yes. So You Need to Be Aware That If Somebody Is Doing That and You Can Definitely Articulate or Put Together the Evidence That They Have, in -- Articulate That You Have Used Force, Threatened, Intimidation, from Witness Statements, Complaints from Citizens, this Is Can Go Something Can That Cause the Last Resort to Become the First Resort Right Away Because We Have an Immediate Public Safety Concern We Need to Take Care Of. Another Loose Category in the Regs Is Causing a Fire, a Hazard Or a Nuisance. If Someone Causes a Fire, Number One, If They Intentionally Set It, That's an Act of Arson and That Needs to Be Dealt with as a Criminal Act. Number Two, If They Make a Mistake and a Fire Gets out of Hand and Burns up a Bunch of Public Lands, That's Still an Act of Carelessness and Still Can Be Addressed from a Criminal Standpoint and We Still Need to Approach it in That Particular Way. When it Comes to Hazards and Nuisance, I Have a Few Special Notes to Share with You Here. Basically a Nuisance Is Apparent When a Person Is Conducting Activities That Tend to Obstruct, Interfere With, Annoy Or Discomfort Other Members of The Public. A Nuisance Could Also Be an Act Prejudicial to Public Morals or Dangerous to Life or Injurious To Public Rights and Resources. But We're Asking That If You Are Going to Make a Case on this and It's Going to Make That Last Resort Become First Resort That You Have a Documented Administrative Record That Clearly Illustrates this. In Other Words, the Harm to the Public Should Be Real Rather Than Predicted. Again, the Best Evidence You'd Have for this Is Citizens' Complaints, Perhaps Reports and Complaints That You Received From the Sheriff's Department, The Building and Safety Department or Other Outfits That Are Going to Tell You There's Definitely a Hazard out There or There's Definitely a Nuisance Going on and We Talked a Little Bit about the Other Day That When, in Fact, the Building and Safety People of the Local County Aren't Willing to Enforce Their Regulations, That If it Is Clearly a Hazard or a Nuisance, And We Can Document That, Then We Can Proceed under 3715 in Order to Enforce That Particular Mesh Are. -- Measure. Now, When Your Law Enforcement Officer Comes with You, or If The Law Enforcement Officer Makes a Visit to the Site Themselves, They're Going to Take a Little Bit Different Tact Than Perhaps You Because Your Law Enforcement Officer Is Not Particularly Going to Be That Concerned about Reasonably Incident to or Whether Something Is Unnecessary or Unnecessary Undue Degradation. They Are Going to Depend upon You to Tell Them When Those Things Are Apparent. But When They Visit the Site, They're Going to Immediately Start Probably Identifying People, Identifying the Vehicles That Are Present and the Other Property That's Present There So That They Can Start Their Own Documentary Track Record Here. What I Want to Point out Here Is That in Their Patrol Log, Which They're All Required to Keep, It's Sort of a Record of Their Daily Activities and Because We Law Enforcement Officers Contact So Many People in Such Short Spans of Time, If We Don't Write It Down, Chances Are We're Not Going to Remember the Conversation We Had with That Person or Who it Was We Were Talking about. You Have a Copy of this Patrol Log Form in Your Handouts And It's in Section L. In Fact, Most of What Dennis Is Going over Can Be Found in Section L. The Slides Aren't There, but the Other Visuals Are. They're Basically Going to Make an Entry for the Time of Day They Were There. They're Going to Identify the Location. There's a Lot of Things Here That Relate to Their Management Aspects. They're Going to Enter Their Action Code Here That Has to Do With Whether or Not They Issued Any Written Warnings, Any Citations, Made Any Arrests and Those Are Going to Sort of Come Later When We Talk about That. In the Observation Area, They Will Probably Make Entries That Relate to the Information They Are Gathering. Law Enforcement Officers Can, in Deed, When They Have a Burden of Proof Calderoneable Suspicion Can Indeed Request Person's Identifications, They Can Identify All the Vehicles Present There and Start Itemizing What's Going On. In There They Will Write Things Like, I Made Comment with Joe And His Driver License Number Is 830689, Whatever it Is, Looked At Arizona Plates 459-xlt. They're Going to Write down All The Different License Numbers in There. They Will Sort of Record Who Is There and What's Going on at That Particular Time They Made That Particular Visit, and These Go on File in the Resource Area Office and Become a Documented Record or Documented History as To What's Going on out There and What Kind of Activities They Were Participating In. Now, While They're There They May, Indeed, Come Across Certain Violations. They May, Indeed, Already See That Something Is Going on That Shouldn't Be Going On. And the First Thing That They're Going to Want to Do Is Document With this Particular Operator or This Particular Person What Violations Are Being Committed And Basically Let Them Know That The next Time We See Them, These Could, Indeed, Be Considered Knowing and Willful Violations. In this Basically They're Going To Issue -- If They Don't Have What They Need to Issue a Citation, They Will Probably Issue a Warning Notice, and in The Warning Notice They're Going To Identify the Things That Are Happening out There. They Might Identify 3715.6j, Which Is Uses Not Reasonably Connected to Mining and Milling. They Might Even Go over to 2920 And in Here I'm Talking about 29201-2 (E) Which Is Basically No Person Shall Knowing Lil and Willfully Violate the 2920 Regulations. It Was Referred to with the Buzz Word Unauthorized Use. Then They Might Go to a Specific Code Section That Deals with a Specific Violation Such as this One Which Has to Do with Trash Dumping. Okay? They Are Going to Identify Those Things Already Right up Front With this Particular Person and Probably Tell Them, You Need to Clean up Your Act Before I Come Back Here Again, Because When I Come Back Here Again, this May Indeed Be a Knowing and Willful Violation. I Want to Point out What's at The Bottom of the Form Here. We Basically Let Them Know at The Bottom of the Form That this Is Not a Citation and No Court Appearance Is Required. It's Basically a Courtesy to Them. We Are Going to Assume on this First Visit They Didn't Know That They Weren't Allowed to Do Those Things and in Order to Document in the Future That They Did Know That These Things Were Violations, We're Going to Issue A Written Warning and Let Them Know What's Going on There. Now, Before I Move On, I Want to Talk about Some Things That Came Up over the past Couple of Days About What Gives Us the Authority to Go out There and Inspect. I Want to Reiterate a Fact Here That Even Though We Put in the 3715 Specific Authority for You To Inspect These Mining Claims That We Didn't Really Need to Do That. I Want to Make the Point That The Public Lands Are, Indeed, Public, and That's Exactly What They Are. Not Only Does the Public Have a Right of Access, but We as Bureau of Land Management Certainly Have Administrative Responsibilities to Be Anywhere We Need to Be to Carry out Our Duties on the Public Lands. So Public Lands Are Public. We, Indeed, Can Go There. We Talked a Little Bit about the Citizens' Right to Privacy and That's about the Aspects of Inspection, Especially If They Turn into a Search and Seizure Situation. We Talked about Residential Buildings. When a Residential Occupancy Has Been Authorized or When a Resident Is Demonstrating with Closed Doors, Locks or Signs an Expectation of Privacy, Those Residential Structures Should Not Be Inspected Without the Resident's Consent or Without a Search Warrant or Other Order of The Court. Dennis We Have about Five Minutes Before Our Scheduled Break. Do You Want to Stop in Five Minutes and Pick this up after The Break or Move -- Push the Break Back a Little Bit? Let Me Just Finish with These Legal Aspects of Searches and Then I've Got an Excellent Breaking Point. Excellent. Let's Do That. So We're Basically Saying You Can't Go in a Residential Structure to Inspect If They Don't Want You To. Your Law Enforcement Officers Know What the Exceptions Are to Search Warrant Rules. They Also Are Very Familiar with What Is Required to Get a Search Warrant. Even Our Law Enforcement Officers Have to Have a Valid Reason to Go in There. They Have to Have Probable Cause That There's Evidence Contained In That Building, and They Have To Be Able to Illustrate Before The Legal End, the Judiciary Branch That They Indeed Have Probable Cause Before a Search Warrant Issues. There Are Exceptions to the Search Warrant Requirement. I Won't Go into Those. You Can Contact Your Law Enforcement Officer If You Need To Know What the Exceptions to a Search Happen to Be. But When it Comes to Those Nonresidential Areas, the Land In and Around the Residential Structure, There Is No Reasonable Expectation of Privacy on the Public Lands. As We Said Yesterday, You Can, Indeed, Peek in the Windows. In Fact, in Peeking in the Windows, If a Law Enforcement Officer Peeks in the Windows and Sees an Item of Evidence in Plain View, Such as a Small Marijuana -- Indoor Marijuana Grow, That, Indeed, Can Lead to The Probable Cause We Need for a Search Warrant or Can Lead to Possibly Some of the Exceptions For for the Search Warrant Requirement. Now I'm at a Good Breaking Point. Well, Good. I Think this Is a Good Time for Our Final Morning Break. When We Return in 10 Minutes, Dennis Will Finish up with His Civil and Criminal Approaches. Welcome Back. We'll Return to Inspection and Enforcement in Just a Moment, But We Have a Couple of Small Irrelevant Matters and Then a Couple of Fairly Large Relevant Matters to Deal with. We Have a Necktie Vote in from Las Cruces District. We Have One Vote, Mclane, Three Votes Deery and 6 Votes Shumaker. Apparently Dillebert Takes the Day Today. And the Montana State Office With Thanks to Glen States That All Agree That the BLM Uniform Tie Is the Worst. I Have a Couple of Questions in That We Want to Deal with Right Away, and Then We'll Get Right Back to It. One Comes in from California and That Is Why Are We Taking the Stand of Authorizing Nonworking Claims under Any Regulation or Rule? If They're Not Maining and in Compliance, or at Least Working Towards Compliance, We Should Be Moving Them off Public Lands Before the Site Gets Really Bad. Why Is There a Grace Period? We're Not Advocating Authorizing Or Legitimizing Nonoperational, Nonworking Nonreasonably Incident Claims, Not at All! And the Grace Period Isn't a Year in Which We Take a Nap. The Grace Period Is When We Go And Find These Things and Whenever Possible Work with the Claimant to Get Them Either into Compliance and Operating or off The Public Land. Rick? the Other Thing That's Important to Know or to Keep in Mind about the Grace Period Is It Is the Time When You Get Your Ducks in a Row. You Get Your Documents Ready. You Get All of Your Case Files Ready, and If You Have a Bad Case, Then the Day after the Grace Period Ends, You're Ready To Move, and That's the Thing to Keep in Mind. The Grace Period Is a Time to Do Some Thinking, Some Planning and Some Working. There's an Old Statement about The Six P's That Can That I Can't Restate Here from Ol' First Sergeant Davis and it Is This Time That We Take Care of The Six P's. Keep That in Mind. Great. Another Question Comes in from California Also. Rick, I'll Just Drop this One in Your Lap. What If a Claimant Does Not Comply and We're Forced to Arrest Him or Her, Thank You, And We Take it to the Magistrate? He/she Demands a Jury Trial. We Then Ask the U.s. Attorney To Take the Case and Because He Does Not Feel That It's a Big Deal He Won't Take the Case. Aren't We in the Same Boat as Before the 3715 Regulations? Well, Okay, I'd Have to Agree With That. Also, Are We Going to Ask for a Legislative Change? I'm Going to Take the First One. If the Magistrate Says -- If it Goes up to the Magistrate, Heads For a Jury Trial, and the Ausa Doesn't Take it and We Don't Get A Report on That at Headquarters, Then the Same Thing That Bob Gibson Said Earlier Applies Here... If it Isn't Recorded, it Didn't Happen. For Us to Take Management Actions at the Headquarters Level or to Come up with Some Kind of Solution, We Need Names, Dates, Times, Places the Number Of Occurrences and the Probable Cost in Tolls and Fte That We Would Have to Come up with to Get to a Solution, and So the Answer Is, Yeah, There Are a Lot Of Things That Are out There That Are Not Part and Parcel of Our Control. We Need to Know about Those, Too, So We Can Try to Figure out Solutions. As to the Second Question about Asking for a Legislative Change, The Answer Is a Cat Gorecally Expressed Absolutely Not! Given the Tone, Given the 10 Or, We Could Go up and Ask for a Legislative Change in Flpma and We Could See an Outcome That Could Lose Us Law Enforcement Penalties or Law Enforcement Authority Entirely. This Is an Issue That the Department and the Administration Has Said Is Not Going to Go Forward No Matter How Many Times it Gets Raised at The Lower-most Level. So, Get over It. Matt? Great. Thank You. We're Still Getting Questions In. People Are Asking, Well, If We Get the Occupancy Form In, Does That Mean We Stop All Actions Against Them? Rick? it Depends on the Kinds of Actions. Are We at a Point Where We Have Gotten Together with the State And Deq Has Said, You Know, We've Got Enough Violations We Can Proceed? Well, of Course. If the County Comes in and Says, You Know, We Find a Violation, Then They Can Proceed. Remember, We're Dealing with the Sum Total of the Universe. We Are a Partial Player in That Universe. As Dennis Has Pointed Out, If You Go out and Find Evidence of Absolute Criminality, You're Sure Going to Take Actions Against Him, Period. Scott Has Put a Question in Front of Me. Deq? That's the Department of Environmental Quality. I Came out of Wyoming, and They Were a Pretty Useful Set of Folks to Turn to When There Was No Remaining Enforcement Authority. One of the Other Sets of Folks, The County Sheriff May Have a Beef with a Mining Claimant That May Arise under State or County Ordinance. So Use Those. Also the Regulations Themselves Are Pretty Clear. If You Have a Pending Trespass Action Against an Occupant on a Mining Claim, the Simple Act of Them Filing the Form Doesn't Mean You Have to Stop Cold. the Only Time That You Stop Cold Is Making a Reasonable Incident Determination to Somebody Who Does Not, One, Have The Notice of Trespass Formally Filed Against Them Or, Two, Is Subject to the Immediate Cease And Desist. That Is the Standard of Not Reasonably Incident and a Threat To Health, Safety and the Environment. During this Period, We're Going To Go over and Deal with Those Problems That Have Risen to the Top, Have Floated to the Surface, and We Knew Before the Date of the Regs That Were a Problem. Those Are the Ones We're Going To Focus Our Attention on Outside of the Grace Period. All the Rest, Well, We'll Line Them up in Accordance to What We Have Available to Us and Which Ones We Think We Ought to Move On First. Dennis, Do You Have Anything You Want to Add? No. Okay. We Have a Couple of Questions In. They're from Different Locations. One from Redding and One from Coeur D'alene. I'll Read the One That Puts it Most Succinctly and I Think We May Want to Address this to Dennis and Rick. What about the Court Decision We Were Told about Last Year, Which I Think May Be in Hawaii, Which If I'm Right Said -- No, Not in Hawaii -- in Violation of a Regulation like Exceeding the Camping Limit or Whatever, That Person, the Trespasser, Has No Expectation of Privacy in a Residency and We Can Enter in And Inspect. Is That Coming Up? I Have a Question Here I Was Intending to Cover That as Well. We Have Three of Them Now. So, Dennis, Let's Go Back to Dennis and Maybe We Can Deal With That. I Want to Point out in the Time We're Given, There Is No Possible Way I Can Discuss with You All Possible Legal Aspects Of Searches and Seizures, and That's Why I Really like to Defer You and Defer You to Ask Those Questions Specifically of Your Law Enforcement Officer, But I Will Get into That Particular Case in a Moment as I Answer this Question. This Question Is, What about the Curtilage, and I Will Explain in That a Minute, Around Residents Around Mine Sites. Does a Curtelage If the Residences Is on a Mine Claim. If it Exists, We Probably Could Not Look in the Windows Except If We Were in Open Fields. Their Assumption Is Correct. If It's Exists, We Could Probably Not Look in the Windows. Unfortunately, There Is No Definitive Case Law That Says That There Is No Curtelage on Public Lands, However, Inquiries With the Justice Department Is This, Public Lands Are Public, Not Private, Therefore, There Is No Curtladies and Gentlemen. Some of You Want to Know Does it Have Something to Do with Cottage Cheese or What? It's Described in Case Law as The Immediate Area Surrounding a Person's Residence. The Best Example Would Be a City Block. If a Person Lives on a City Block That's Fenced All the Way Around Their Yard and Their House Is in the Center, and Their Garage Is off to the Side, Everything Within Their Fence, Including the Garage and the House Is Their Curtelage and They Have a Right to Privacy in That Particular Area. Expanding That to Another Private Land Example, You Have The Example of a Farm. You Have a Farmhouse in the Middle of 400 Acres. Now, the Farmhouse Itself and Any of the Outbuildings Around It Could Be Considered Curtelage, However, All the Fields Surrounding it Would Be Considered under a Doctrine Called Open Fields and Would Be Considered Open Fields, Meaning That Law Enforcement Officers Could, Indeed, Enter upon the Open Fields to the Point of Viewing into the Curtelage or Residence in Terms of Looking For Evidence, and That's Called The Open Fields Doctrine. The Discussions We've Had with Justice Department Would Indicate That They Sort of Consider All the Public Lands to Be, Quote-unquote, an Open Field, Because as I Point out There Is No Definitive Case Law That States That, So I Am Going To Answer this Just like a Lawyer, it Depends. Dennis, I Think it Would Be Worthwhile Once Again, Two Days Later, for Us to Requote Part of The Regulations, and These Are Our Marching Orders to Ourselves. This Is the Policy That the Vast Majority of Us Will Be Working Under as We Work in the Field. Section 3715.7, How Will BLM Inspect My Use or Occupancy and Enforce this Subpart? A: BLM Field Staff Is Authorized to Physically Inspect All Structures, Equipment, Workings and Uses Located on the Public Lands. The Inspection May Include Verification of the Nature of Your Use And/or Occupancy to Ensure Your Use or Occupancy Is And Continues to Be Reasonably Incident and in Compliance with Sections 3715, et Cetera, et Cetera. Can You Read this. It's on Page 27 of Your Firsthandout. B: BLM Will Not Inspect the Inside of Structures Used Solely For Residential Purposes Unless An Occupant or a Court of Competent Jurisdiction Gives Permission. We Don't Go In. Matt, I Would like to Finish This by Two Pieces of Case Law That We Do Know That Were Fairly Defensive and I Think One of the Faxes That Came in Was Probably Pointing Direction at this Particular Case. It Came out of the 9th Circuit In Utah, and It's Called United States -- Ruckman Versus the United States. What We Had Was a Trespasser, Not a Mining Claimant, That Was Living in a Cave and the Cave Did Not Have a Door on It. It Had Simply Pieces of Lumber Piled up at the Entrance. Inside the Cave Were Hand Grenades and Various Other Explosives. The Law Enforcement Officers Working the Case, Entered the Cave, Seized the Explosives and Ruckman Was Subsequently Prosecuted. When the 9th Circuit Looked at The Case They Said a Trespasser, Quote-unquote, a Trespasser Has No Reasonable Expectation of Privacy. Now, We Don't Consider this Case As Being Definitive in Saying a Structure -- Definitive or Structure We Have Authorized Would Not Have a Reasonable Expectation of Privacy. What It's Say Something Somebody That Hasn't Exerted a Reasonable Expectation of Privacy Through a Locked Door and Somebody That Was Clearly a Trespasser, They Had No Authority, Even the Mining Law, to Be There, Had No Reasonable Expectation of Privacy. In Another Case That Involved a Tent and a Campground, and in That Particular Case, What the Courts Found Was That the Person Who Had Leased in -- in Their Mind Leased or Rented the Campsite -- Dennis, I Think We Can Hold For a Minute. We're Having Technical Difficulties with Our Satellite Uplink, So We Are Going to Pause For a Moment and If You Still Can Hear Us, Great, but We'll Be Back. Apparently Some Field Stations Have Lost Audio. We Don't Know If the Problem Is At Our End or the Satellite End, But We Will Be Back with You as Soon as We Can. So Please Stand By. Welcome Back. Things Had Been Going Altogether Too Well. We're Not Sure If it Was the Tacky Tie Competition or the Fact It's Friday the 13th, but I Think We're Back on the Air Now And Hope Can You Hear Us. If You Can't Hear Us, Just Read Our Lips. We're Not Quite Sure Where We Fell off At, So We're Going to Pick it up Here and Go Back to Dennis. Remember That Dennis Is Giving Basically an Overview and When We Start Getting Questions about Curtilage, I Think We're Getting A Little Bit More Detail than We Have Time for and We Don't Have A Lot of Time Left as You Might Imagine. We Are All on Groupwise, So Specific Questions and Philosophical Legal Arguments by All Means Give Us Messages on Groupwise. They're a Lot of Fun That Way. The Question We Were Dealing With When We Went off the Air Was How Will BLM Inspect Occupancies, Specifically Residential Occupancies. You May Have Heard this Before You Went off but You're Going to Get it Again and of Course We'll Get These Tapes out to You So Can You Figure out What Was Lost While We Are Losing Our Sound Feed. BLM -- this Is 37 -- Section 3715.7 of the Regulations (A) BLM Field Staff Is Authorized to Physically Inspect All Structures, Equipment, Workings And Uses Located on the Public Lands. The Inspection May Include Verification of the Nature of Your Use and Occupancy to Ensure Your Use or Occupancy Is and Continues to Be Reasonably Incident and in Compliance with The Regulations. (B) and this Is Important, this Is Our Guidance to Ourselves, This Is BLM Telling the Field Staff How They're Going to Work. BLM Will Not Inspect the Inside Of Structures Used Solely for Residential Purposes Unless an Occupant or a Court of Competent Jurisdiction Gives Permission. Period. That's Our Policy. We're Going to Stick with It. Dennis? Thank You, Matt. I Want to Definitely Start Moving Right into Enforcement Actions, and a Fax Question Came In Yesterday That Asked about Why Wasn't the Flowchart in Your Handouts on 3715 Including the Criminal Penalties Aspect and That's Because That's Flowchart Was Designed to Only Show Perhaps the Inside BLM Administrative Procedures Related to 3715. I Want to Assure You There's a Lot of Different Actions That Can Go on out There. What You're Going to Get Is, Once Again, and I Talked about Not Having a Whole Lot of Time For Detail, this Is -- the Rules Of Criminal Procedure and the Rules of Civil Procedure Are Rather Large and Complex. There's a Lot of Information There, and I Was -- I Was Just Going to Show to You How Large This Book Is. This Is Just the Rules of Civil Procedure. There's One Just like it for Criminal Procedure, and I Can't Go into Possibly All the Detail In the next 50 Minutes or So on This Particular Aspect, but I'm Going to Give What I Have Come To Call the -- Dennis' Common Sense Guide. Dennis, as You Are Just Now Reading, We Bought an Extra 15 Minutes of Satellite Time into Lunch. Relax. I Think We Can Handle this. Okay. You Are Going to Get Sort of My Abbreviated Guide to What's Going on in Unauthorized Use and Trespass and What I Am Showing To You Here and I Will Zoom in Some of the Particular Items, Is The Generic Unauthorized Use and Trespass Flowchart, in Other Words, Where Do We Go in Terms Of Our Enforcement Actions on These Three Things and How Do We Get from One to the Other or How Do We Stay Just Within One? And I Want to Point out Some Differences and Some Other Things That Go on with this Particular Thing Here. When We Discover an Unauthorized Use, Generally We're Going to End up Going Through a Determination of Trespass. We Might Even Have a Notice of Cease or Desist Warning or a Warning to the Trespasser, but Along These Lines We Are Going To Eventually Determine the Nature of the Trespass, and What I -- What I Mean by the Nature Of the Trespass Is, Is this Trespass Knowing and Willful, or Is it Inadvertent? And We Need to Find out the True Nature in Terms of Whether the Person Is Deliberately Violating The Law or Perhaps They Don't Understand What's Going on and What Needs to Occur. After That We're Going to Make Some Sort of Resolution Decision Or Recommendation on How We're Going to Proceed Through the Three Different Enforcement Aspects. The First One I'll Talk about Is The Administrative, and What I Want to Point out Here Is, First Of All, the Initiators of the Administrative Process Is BLM Staff. Okay? The BLM Staff Is What's Going to Start this Action Rolling. And That Gets into That Flowchart That's Provided to You In Your Handouts on the 3715s. This Particular Flowchart I'm Showing to You Is Very Generic In Nature and Could Apply to Minerals Cases, Trespass -- Grazing Trespass Cases or Land Trespass Cases. It's Important to Point out This Does Appear in People's Handouts and It's in Section L. Correct. What I Want to Point out about This Administrative Is in this Particular Arena What We're Really Talking about Is We're Talking about Our Own Internal Procedures and this Is Done Exclusively by the BLM. Ultimately If We Need to Adjudicate One of These Cases, It Commonly Goes to Ibla, and I Don't Even Profess to Be an Expert in the Ibla, and I'm Not Going to Speak to That. this Handout, Incidentally Is On Page L10 and Ibla, for Those That Don't Recall, Stands for The Interior Board of Land Appeals. Uh-huh. And What That Board Is All About, the Way I Understand it As a Law Enforcement Officer Is It's Primarily a Referee Function. I Can't Even Spell "Referee" This Morning. What They're Going to Determine Is Basically the Concept of Fairness. Did We Follow Our Own Procedures And Regulations? Did We Follow Our Own Rules and Regulations in Carrying out this Particular Administrative Action? The Kind of Phrase That Comes Out of it as a Judgment Sometimes Is That We Were Arbitrary and Capricious. We Didn't Play the Game by the Rules. That's Sort of What Happens in The Administrative Process. But Remember the Administrative Process Is Something We Ourselves Can Do and Take Care Of Business on Our Own. A Couple of Examples I'm Going To Use as the Beginning of an Administrative Process, There Is A Law Enforcement Procedure We Can Do Called Seizure of Process Or Seizure of Instrument Tale Tease of a Crime. In That Particular Case, One of Our Law Enforcement Officers Could Indeed Seize Signs, Could Indeed Seize Gates, Locks And/or Enclosures. Okay? If We're Going to Seize Something Because It's Evidence Of Criminality, We're Definitely Going to Have to Proceed with Prosecuting That Case in a Criminal Sort of Way. And Also If We're Going to Seize These Items, We Probably Ought To Do Our Best to Give a Warning First and Let the Violator Give -- Give the Violator a Chance to Remove Those Items If We Need Them Removed Before We Go to the Particular Seizure. A Case in Point a Few Years Back, the Way I Understand the Story, We Ultimately Ended up Seizing a Gate and Taking it Back to the BLM Office and I Want to Point out That We Certainly Have the Law Enforcement Authority to Carry Out That Seizure. The Person Was Given Plenty of Opportunities to Eliminate That This Unlawful Enclosure and They Failed to Comply. But Going Beyond a Law Enforcement Seizure, I Want to Talk about Impoundments and Property Impoundments Briefly And Not Having a Great Deal of Time to Talk about a Lot of Detail. About Before I Do, I Want to Tell You a Story and It's about A Case in California. It Was Called Jones et Al. Versus the Bureau of Land Management. Particularly Not Only the Bureau Of Land Management, but 35 Named BLM Employees, and this Involved A Procedure That We Often Do Called a Property Impoundment. In That Particular Case, I Believe Our Employees Probably Did Everything They Probably Should Have Done, and They Followed the Procedures. They Took Care of Business the Way They Thought They Needed to Do. In That Particular Case, We Had Some Claimants along the River, The Merced River, I Believe it Was, That Were Basically Not Reasonably Incident to All of Those Other Things. We Ultimately Looked at Some of Their Violations as Criminal Offenses. We Took That to the District Court for Prosecution and What We Ended up with Unfortunately Was a Magistrate's Decision to Dismace Miss the Case Based upon The Fact That, A, the 3809 Regulations Do Not Clearly Define Prohibited Acts and the Secretary Practiced His Discretion by Not Including Criminal Penalties in the 3809. Therefore the Offenses Were Not Criminal in Nature. I Am a Firm Believer That Flpma Says Any Person Who Knowingly Violates Any Regulation Issued Pursuant to this Act. So I Firmly Believe That There Is Such Criminality, but We Didn't Take Care of That Specifically. So One of the Lessons We Learned In this Case Was to Rewrite 3715 Regulations That, Indeed, Included These Two Items. But Going Back to the Story of The Property Impoundment, They Went in with a Notice to the Person That They Were Going to Seize the Property, Take the Property Away, and Dispose of it And/or Establish Value and Do Their Impoundment Procedures. Getting Back to What I Said on Day One, You Can Definitely Get Sued for Almost Anything, and That's Exactly What Happened in This Case. Just about Every Employee That Was Either Involved in Carrying Out the Impoundment, Helping With the Impoundment or Giving Advice to the Impoundment Was Named in the Suit. The Suit Basically Took the Tact Of Saying That These People Were All Participating in an Unlawful Taking of Private Property. In the End, We Did Not Get a Case Precedent out of this Case. Unfortunately, There Was a Cash Settlement. Some Same Maybe Fortunately Because Basically We Ended up Buying out the Trespass. In the End the Trespasses No Longer Existed, the United States Government Paid a Certain Dollar Amount, Basically Saying This Case Was Not Particularly Worth Prosecuting, and That Says Something about the Civil Process. The Civil Process Is Generally a Litigation Between Two Parties. The Objective Is Probably Never To Get to Trial. The Objective Is to Have the Two Parties Settle, and That's Exactly What Occurred Here. I Think the Worst Thing That Occurred Was the Personal Grief That Each of Those BLM Employees Had to Bear. I Want to Close by Saying I Think Those Employees Did Everything They Needed to Do to Do Right and I Think Those Employees Were Very Diligent in Trying to Maintain the Health of The Land, and They Certainly Helped to Serve Present and Future Publics in this Particular Action. It Was a River Area That Needed To Get These Particular Trespasses Cleaned Up, but Unfortunately There Was a Great Deal of Grief They Went Through In That Particular Process. I Give You this Example Because I Want to Remind You the Bureau Of Land Management Does Have Procedure That Relate to Impoundments. Can You Find Those in BLM Handbook 9232-1, the Realty Trespass Abatement Handbook. The Procedures Are Good. They Definitely Will Keep You Out of Trouble, I Believe, and Keep You in the Scope of Your Employment and Scope of Your Authority If You Choose to Use This Particular Method. Now the You a Bridged Edition or My Abridged Edition, Number One, Were Supposed to Provide Notice. If We Know Who the Property Belongs To, We Are Supposed to Give Them Notice We Intend to Remove That Particular Property. Number 2, We're Supposed to Make A Posting at the Particular Site. And We've Provided -- We Have a Form, of Course, as We Always Do, BLM Form 9230-4 That Can Help with You this. It's on Card Stock, and It's Fairly Self-explanatory and It's Sort of a Fill in the Blank Sort Of Thing and You Are Basically Going to Put the Person's Name, Street Address, City, et Cetera, You're Going to Describe Their Maintenance and Storage Of, Equipment, Junk, Whatever the Case May Be, You're Going to Describe the Public Lands Where It's Located On. Then We Have a Little Bit of Verbiage Saying It's in Violation of the Unlawful Enclosures Act or Perhaps in Violation of Flpma and Then Cite The Specific Regulations They Have Violated. We Might Want to Include 3715.6 (J) Uses Not Reasonably Incident To. We Might Want to Point out 2920.1-2 (E) Unauthorized Use And We Might Want to Say There Is Trash and Litter Here That Needs to Be Removed Because Our Objective Being If We Can, We Want to Encourage the Violator To Haul Away this Junk and Get Rid of it on Their Own Behalf Rather than Us Having That Particular Burden. And Then the Bottom of the Form Has a Great Deal of Verbiage That Relates to the Time Limits We're Giving. We're Going to Enter the Date We Want it Removed by in Here. We're Going to Basically Say the Location Where We Have Impounded The Property Here, and We're Basically Telling Them in this Last Paragraph That Failure to Remove May, Indeed, Result in a Citation and Their Appearance Before the Magistrate. A Couple Little Tips on Property Impoundments. If You Say You Have to Have Everything Gone by the 14th Day Or We're Coming to Get You, You Need to Be Aware of a Few Little Public Affairs Strategies. If You Say We're Coming out on Day 14, Maybe You Need to Come Out on Day 15 or 16 Rather than Exactly the 14th Day, You Know, Because If They've Arranged a Welcoming Party for You, this Is A Simple Little Tactic That You Can Avoid Some of Those Particular Complicated Factors. Another Thing You Have to Keep In Mind Is That in this Procedure the BLM Stands on its Own and We're Doing All of this Ourselves. If We're Going to Impound All of This Great Valuable Equipment or All These Structures and Everything Else, We're Doing So At Our Own Expense and it May Require Dump Trucks, it May Require Low-boys for Bulldozers Or Defunct Road Graders, Whatever the Case May Be. We Are Going to Bear All the Expenses up Front. Now, When We Impound it and They Come to Get Their Valuable Property, They Have to Pay Us Back for the Money We Spent Removing it from the Public Lands, but Chances Are They're Probably Not Going to Come Get The Property Because They Probably Don't Have the Money to Do That. But Clearly Understanding That This, to Some Extent Is a Scary Procedure, I Know I as a Law Enforcement Officer When We Discussed this as a Probability, It Makes Me Uncomfortable, Because I Prefer to Have a Document a Judge or Magistrate Signed off on Rather than Moving Through this Ourselves. But I Want You to Know We Have The Authority to Do it and it Certainly Could Be a Case -- There Certainly Could Be Cases Where this Is the Most Appropriate Way to Do It. Basically We Have to Do a Diligence Search for Ownership. We Have to Provide Legal Notices. We Have to Make Sure We Have Established Either Abandonment Or the Fact They're Not Going to Pick up That Particular Piece of Equipment. Can I Just Jump in Here for a Second? If the Rangers Are out There and They're Issuing Notices for Trash and Warning Notices or Issuing Notices to Cease or Notices to Remove, I Think There Should Also Be a Notice of Noncompliance That Should Also Be Issued That Cites the Same Violations That the Claimant Needs to Take Action on Also and It Should Also Have the Same Time Frames of the What I'm Getting at Is Notices of Noncompliance Do -- Can Also Be -- Have Cited in Them 8365s for An Example, That's Farthing on Page M55. Other Federal Regulations Also Can Be Cited in Our Notices of Noncompliance and They Should Also Coincide with What Law Enforcement Is Doing, Too. Many Years Ago When I Was Working with Mining Claim Occupancies I Used to Come upon Occupancies That Had Appeared From Nowhere. I Had No Idea Whose They Were, The Mining Claim Records Hadn't Been Caught up to Date, So I Used to Carry a Little Staple it On the Wall Form That I Hand to Do Dennis, and Dennis Is Putting It up on the Elmo. This Has Been Updated for the Regulations of 3715. It's Not a Trespass Notice. It's Just a Notice to Stop and Come in and Talk to Us in the Office. Now, this Is in Your Notes and The Page Number Is Marked on There. Dennis, Could You Read off What That Page Number Is? It's on the Left There. It's S7. It's on Page S 7 in Your Notes. Have a Look at It. It's -- It's Not Really an Action, but You Can Staple it to Something That Just Appeared Over the Weekend While You Weren't Watching, and It's a Good Invitation for Somebody to Come into the Office and Talk to You and Maybe Work Towards Getting Things Straightened out. You Do Want to Note That You Posted One. You Want to Use a Second Copy as An Affidavit of Posting and Keep It for a Case File That You'll Develop, Because as Dennis Will Be Describing, You Need to Build A Good Solid Case File That Will Sustain If Necessary a Knowing And Willful Case. Dennis? Dennis, Let Me Add a Second To Tom's Point Here. When We Built the Set of Orders And Noncompliance Provisions in This Regulation, We Did a Little Bit of Thinking, and I Want to Draw Your Attention to Notice of Noncompliance under 3715. Which Is What I'll Assume You Were Talking about. Yes. When You Get down Towards Subsubparagraph 2 of This, If You Do Not Start and Complete Corrective Action Within the Time Frame Allowed, BLM May Order an Immediate Suspension Under Paragraph A. Remember, That's the Immediate Temporary Suspension Order. Of this Section If Necessary or We May Order an Appealable Cessation Order. Rick Is on Page 28. I Am on Page 28 of the Regulations in Your Copy. Now, Let Me Give You at Least From the Policy Standpoint, as Dennis and I Were Building this System about Six Years Ago, If You Fail to Follow That Notice Of Noncompliance, We Follow up With an Order, and If You Fail To Follow the Order to Quit the Public Lands, You Have Committed A Prohibited Act, and under the Provisions of 3715, Dennis Is Empowered to Take an Action of Arresting the Individual in Question and We Have Established A Pattern That Should Go Quite a Way to Supporting the Notion That this Is a Willful Violation. and an Approach of Last Resort. Yes. That's Right. Before We Move On, Dennis, We Have Some Word on What Happened To Our Audio. Apparently the Line Between the Training Center and the Uplink Station, Somebody Backed into a Switch or Something. We're Not Exactly Sure, but Everything Was Fine on this End And Everything Was Fine at the Satellite. As a Result We'll Be Taking an Extra 15 Minutes. So We Won't Go to Lunch Right on Time. We'll Be about 15 Minutes Late. Okay, Dennis. Okay. The next Thing I Want to Talk About Is Briefly Describe the Civil Process. Civil Process, What I'm Talking About in Civil Is Basically in -- Sometimes Civil and Administrative Get Confused in The BLM. Remember, Administrative Is All Within the BLM. Ultimately it Goes Outside the BLM in the Ibla So the Person Has Their Right of Notice and to Be Heard. What Makes Something Civil Is When We're Actually Going to Take Somebody to Court. We're Not Going to Do it in a Criminal Matter but Take it as a Civil Matter, Looking upon it as A Litigation We Need to Take Place. I Want to Point out That the Initiating Office Is the Solicitor's Office. I'm Not Sure If this Is a Blessing or Sometimes it Could, Indeed, Be a Hindrance. But Going Back to What I Said About the Federal Land Policy And Management Act, it Says at The Request of the Secretary We May Institute Civil Action, and The Solicitor's Office Is the Office That Makes Those Particular Requests. Now, That Means That You're Going to Have to Have a Pretty Good Case to Convince the Solicitor's Office this Is, Indeed, Worth Pursuing, and as You All Know, Their Time Frames Are Outside the Realm of Our Immediate Control and Sometimes It's Going to Be Our Own Diligence That's Going to Hopefully Make Things Happen. If You've Read the Baird Case As You Were Asked to Last Night And Went Through the Case Chronology, You Get a Good Idea Of What a Worst Case Scenario Is For the Solicitor's Time Frame Versus Ours. in Civil We're Looking at -- As I Pointed Out, Litigation -- Whatever We're Looking at Litigation Rather than a Referee Function, and We're Basically Looking -- What We're Looking to Get out of the Court Is What's Called Damages. We're Looking for Damages or We Might Be Looking for Injunctive Relief. Okay? I'll Talk a Little Bit about Those Terms. What's Most Handy for Us in the Mining or Mining Claim Compliance Issue Really Is the Injunctive Relief Because We Want to Prevent the Action from Going On. We Want to Prevent the Action From Causing Further Harm. One of the Faxes Yesterday or The Day Before, I Can't Remember, Talked about the Threshold of Irreparable Harm. What That Threshold Is All about Is That's What We must Achieve If We Are Going to Obtain What's Called a Temporary Restraining Order. We must Show That Irreparable Harm Will Occur If We Wait the Time Necessary to Provide the Person the Opportunity to Appear. So a Tro Can Be Issued Without Notice Without Notice to the Particular Operator If, Indeed, We Have Proven Irreparable Harm. Now, When We Go into the Actual Action to Look for Permanent -- A Permanent Injunction or Something That -- T.r.o., Temporary Retrain Straining Order, If We Are Looking at Getting Something Permanent, a Permanent Injunction or a Judgment of Enjoinment, We Are Looking to Prove Beyond a Preponderance of Evidence. What That Basically Means Is If We Have Evidence 51% That They Did It, and Their Evidence Is Only 49% That They Didn't, Then Essentially We've Achieved Preponderance of Evidence. Now, I Think in Most of the Cases We've Done, They're Looking for a Much Higher Standard in Preponderance of Evidence, and They're Looking to Perhaps Prove the Item Even Greater. Basically When We Receive the Judgment, the Enforcement Order Becomes Enforceable by the United States Marshal's Service, And We in BLM Law Enforcement Request Assist the Marshal in Serving Those. What the Civil Process Can Do For Us Is it Can Take Something That Could Potentially Be Hostile or Potentially Be a Difficult Situation, it Can Remove it from the Public Land Scene, and it Can Take it to the Legal Arena Where Perhaps We Can Have a Little More Civil Discussion on the Matter. The Example I Want to Use Here, And Some of You May Have Even Read about it in the Newspaper, I Don't Know, Is United States Versus Ken Mende Nba Ch. In That Particular Case We Had An Individual Who So Severely Did Not Recognize Federal Authority over the Public Lands He Didn't Even Bother with the Mining Claim Aspect. He Basically Said That He Was Inspired from a Religious Standpoint to Take and Hold a Piece of Public Land, to Cut and Remove Trees to Use Those Trees To Build His Home and He Basically Said this Is What I'm Going to Do. He Also Was Busy as Giving Rhetoric He Intended to Defend His Right to Do this to the Bitter End. The Rhetoric Hinted Was He Was Maybe Looking for this Maybe Ruby Ridge or Waco Type Incident. I Want You to Know Clear and Well the Bureau of Land Management Is Not Interested in Having These Kind of Confrontations. In Our Conversations with the Justice Department on Hostility And Other Problems on Federal Lands, They're Not Interested in It, Either, and What They Proposed to Us Is That We Look Upon Things in Terms of the Graduated Approach, Give Somebody the Opportunity to Comply, Move Towards the Civil, Move Towards the Confrontation And in the Legal Arena. Fortunately the Justice Department Backed up What They Had to Say in Oregon and Were Very Open to Receiving Our Documents in Terms of Obtaining Injunctive Reliever and in Joinment Against the Defendant. Ultimately What We Ended up with Was That the Defendant, His Agents, Officers and Employees And All Those Acting in Concert With Him Are Permanently Enjoined and Prohibited from Occupying, Cutting And/or Removing Timber from the Public Lands Described in Township 23, Et Cetera, et Cetera. So He Was Permanently Enjoined From Having That Particular Activity. That's How the Civil Process Can Work. If it Turns into Being a Well-oiled it Can Be a Very Effective Tool in Terms of Using It out There the Public Lands. Ultimately the Defendant Moved Onto Forest Service Land in the State of Washington and He Underwent Some Similar Problems. I Also Want to Point out There Was Good Coordination with the Law Enforcement Staff in Oregon And Good Coordination with State And Local Law Enforcement Because When the Defendant Appeared for His Initial Appearance to Make His Case as To Why We Shouldn't Enjoin His Activity, Rather than Defending Himself He Stated the Judge Had No Authority over Him and Questioned Whether or Not the Judge's Membership in the Oregon Bar Was an Appropriate Thing for Him to Have. While He Had this Discussion in The Courtroom, Waiting Outside Were Some State Officers, Because the Defendant Also Had Some Outstanding Warrants for Failures to Appear in State and Local Courts. So When He Stepped out of the Federal Courtroom Arena, He Was Immediately Arrested for These Failures to Appear, and While He Was Spending Time in the Local Jail, the BLM Was Able to Go out To the Site and Do a Great Deal Of Cleanup in the Process. So a Good Coordinated Method in The Civil Enforcement, Coordination Between All the Agencies Involved, Really Paid Off in That Particular Arena. So the Civil Process Could, Indeed, Give Us Something. As I Move into Criminal, I Want To Point out Something That's Very Important and Somebody Brought Forward this in One of The Faxes. Remember I Said over Here on the Civil Side We Need Preponderance Of Evidence. When We Get to the Criminal Side, What We're Talking about Is Probable Cause. You Need to Know That Probable Cause Is Greater than Preponderance of Evidence. The less Unlearned Here Is If We Pursue Something Civilly and We End up Going to Court and the Court Finds We Did Not Have Preponderance of Evidence, Then That Sort of Prevents Us from Going over to Achieve Probable Cause in the Criminal Side. So That's Why We Need to Carefully Choose What Method We're Going to Choose Ahead of Time Before We Get Ourselves in This Particular Conflict. In Other Words, If We Go Through The Whole Civil Process and We Lose, Then We've Sort of Negated Our Ability to Look Towards the Criminal Avenue for Resolution. I Want to Point out in the Criminal Aspect the Initiating People Are Your BLM Law Enforcement Officers. They Are Authorized to Issue Citations, Authorized to Make Arrests, They Are Authorized to Seek Prosecution Through Criminal Complaints, Affidavits And Other Instruments. So They, Indeed, Can Proceed in Those Particular Arenas. I Do Want to Point Out, However, As We Move into This, When We're Dealing with Violation of the 3715s, These Are What Are Known As Class a Misdemeanors in the Federal Criminal System. What That Means to All of You Is That a Class a Misdemeanor Is Something That Has a Term of Imprisonment Greater than Six Months but Basically Not More Than a Year. Our Term of Imprisonment for the Flpma Is One Year Imprisonment. So These Are Class a Offenses. What That Means from a Rules of Criminal Procedure Standpoint Is Under a Petty Offense, Which Is Less than Six Months, the Person Is Not Entitled to a Jury Trial. However, They Are Entitled to Trial by District Court. So That Brings Us Some Unique -- Only One Unique Option to Them. A Class a Misdemeanor, the Person Is Entitled to Not Only a Trial in District Court, Rather Than Magistrate's Court, but They're Also Entitled to a Jury Trial Should They Choose to Do That, and a Lot of Us Have Found Out That Causes Us Particular Grief When it Has to Cross the U.s. Attorney's Office, and They Have to Make a Decision on Whether or Not this Is Worth Prosecuting. I'll Talk about That a Little Bit Later, Too. Because These Crimes Are Misdemeanors, We Also Have Discretion. What I Mean by Discretion Is That We Don't Have to Prosecute All Knowing and Willful Violations as Criminal Offenses. Now, That's Different If We Have Another Law That's Been Violated That Could Be a Felony Law. A Good Example Is $500 or More Damage under the Archaeological Resource Protection Act Is a Felony Offense. And a Felony Offense under a Misprison of Felony Concept must Be Reported to the U.s. Attorney's Office and Only the U.s. Attorney's Office Can Dismiss a Felony Offense. So We Don't Have Discretion for Felony Offenses, but for Misdemeanors We Do Have Discretion, and We Can Exercise That Discretion Through Combining Our Administrative and Our Criminal Procedures in Terms Of Giving Due Warning. Now I Want to Sort of Show You a Case Example That Matt and I Both Were Involved in a Number Of Years and I Will Try to Point Out Some of the Criminal Aspects Involved as We Go Through this. Before We Dive in There, Dennis, We've Had a Question About the Notice to Cease Construction That We Showed a Little While Ago, and the Question Is it an Official Form And Will it Become One? Well, Not Yet. It Was Something That Was Put Together to Solve a Problem Some Years Ago. Rick and I Have Been Discussing This and We Will Get Back to You. It's Probably Not a Good Idea to Use it until It's Approved. Go Ahead, Dennis. Okay. If I Could Have My First Slide Up There in That Series, Please. This Is What this Particular Trespass Started out to Be. In Fact, I Wasn't There on the First Visit, but I Understand From Those That Were There it Was One of Those Cases Where the BLM Boldly Where the BLM Had Never Gone Before, and What We Found on the Site Basically Was Virtually a Trailer Park. There Was a Lot of Different Residences Living There, There Was a Lot of Junk Equipment Stored There, Most of it Wasn't Working. There Was a Variety of Things Going on There. it Was Quite a Wild Time. In Fact, They Had Formed Their Own Mining District, Their Own Recorder's Office, and If Memory Serves Correctly, They Had a Ranger of Their Very Own and Their Very Own Jail. and We, Indeed, Had a Discussion about Who the Ranger Was. Yes. And the Jail and Their Ranger Disappeared, Never to Be Seen Again. Another Interesting Note on The -- When We Sent out the First Notices, I Also Remember That One of the Main Operators Wrote Us a Letter Back That Said Because He Is a Mining District And He Formed His Own Rules, That Those Rules Were the Only Rules That Were Applicable on This Piece of Land. So Basically We Encountered Our First Constitutionalist That We Can Remember in Terms of That Particular Concept. Go Ahead, Dennis. the next Slide Shows Us Posting Notices in Conspicuous Places and I Guess We Did this For Comic Relief, However, this Was the Community Toilet of the Trailer Park. So We Wanted to Make Sure That Everybody That Was Living Here Did, Indeed, Get Personal Notice Or Had an Opportunity to Know That Their Act Was, Indeed, in Trespass. it Is Important to Note, Though, That the People Did Have A Free and Easy Style and If That One Was in Use They Used Alternate Facilities and We Had To Step over Them Fairly Often. What Opened this Case Wide Open and When We Got There Was It Was Pretty Much an Occupancy Case and Discussions with the Solicitor's Office Was Basically Saying We Had No Authority to Move on the Occupancy, as Long As They Said They Were Miners, Quote-unquote, They Could Do Something. However, Because We Specifically Put in the Notice of Noncompliance All the Particular Things That They Were Not Allowed to Do in the Future, the Thing That Broke this Case Wide Open Is this Bulldozing of a Road. That's Right. You'll Find the Copies of the Notices of Noncompliance That We Used in this Case in the Baird Case History in Section L of This, and They're Good Reading, But Be Aware, We Really Enjoyed -- in Some Respects Enjoyed Dealing with this. It's Easy to Get into Flowery Language. They Include Things like You Have in Excess of Three Chickens. When They Decided to Bulldoze a Road, That's Basically Where I Came In. The Relationship Matt and I Had In Southern California in Those Days, I Said, Matt, You Tell Me I Am They're Not Mining and I Will Take Care of the Rest. Here's a Slide That We Took as An Evidence Photo and Became a Main Piece of Evidence. You Can See the Pole Sticking up On the Right-hand Side There. That Pole Approximates the Public Land Boundary, and Can You See Kind of a Road That's Off to the Right of the Poll. That Road Was Their -- Existing Road That Trespassed on the Neighbor's Property. What Gave Them the Incentive to Try to Build a New Road Is the Neighbor Put up a Couple Gates. The Neighbor Was Having a Dispute. And Because the Neighbor Was Adversary to Them, the Neighbor Was a Friend to the BLM in Terms Of Reporting What Was Going on There. So the Neighbor Put up the Gates. I Took this Photo Standing Right At a Section Corner Placed and I Will Show That to You in a Minute. The Damage That You See to the Left, It's Actually in Two Places, Just Immediately Left of The Pole You Can See What Appears to Be Maybe a Road, and If You Look off to the Far Left Of the Photo You Will See Another Disturbance of the Vegetation That Was Another New Road That They Cut In. Now, We Came to Find out a Long Time Later That the Purpose of That Road Had Nothing to Do with Mining, it Actually Had to Do With the Fact They Were Running An Illegal Communications Site On Top of a BLM Mountain and They Need to Do Keep Their Road Open in Order to Maintain Their Communications Site. Dennis We Have about 20 Minutes until Lunch. Maybe We Can Try to Arrange Your Spacing Here So We Might Be Able To Handle a Question or Two. Okay. I Just Want to Point out Because Of the Public Land Boundary Was In Doubt, Before We Ever Got to This Point, We Had a Cadastral Survey Completed. it Wasn't a Difficult One. It Didn't Take Long. It Only Involved Setting about Four Caps, but it Made the Work A Lot Easier. This Was a Checkerboarded Area And it Wasn't Real Easy to Figure out Where the Lines Were. All I Need to Do Prove from Criminal Standpoint Was That the Use Was Not Authorized and it Was Knowing and Willfully Committed. Fairly Easily We Took Care of That by Ultimately Matt Testified That They Had No Relationship to Mining Other Than Being Casual Employees, and The Fact That it Was a Knowing And Willful Violation Because They Had in Possession the Notices of Noncompliance, and All I Had to Show Was That Plants and Their Parts Were Destroyed, and I Did So with Some of These Illustrations. Here's Another Photo of the Road That Was Way off to the Left. And this Is the Last Photo That Basically Shows What it Looks Like the Day That -- the Day of Their Probation Hearing after The Trial Took Place. Now, I Want to Illustrate to You How Important Certain Pieces of Evidence Can Be. In this Particular Example, and You Can See It's Labeled on the Right Government Exhibit Number 8, I Saw to it Myself That I Need to Do Describe in the Courtroom Exactly What Was Going On out There Because Quite Often It's Very Difficult to Describe The Scene in a Courtroom Environment. So I Put Together this Really Quick Sketch, and I Realize Technology Today Could Probably Do a Much Better Job than I Did With this Particular Piece of Evidence, but What Really Helped Us in the Occupancy Is That I Had Labeled the Last Two Remaining People That Lived There. I Had Labeled the Neely Residence and the Baird Residence, and at One Point in The Trial, When I Was on the Stand, the Judge Looked over to Me, and He Says, Do You Mean to Tell Me That They Live There Without Paying Rent, Without Paying Property Taxes? And He Interrupted the Testimony, and I Said, Well, Yes, Your Honor, That's Correct. That's Exactly Correct. And I Put That Aside, and I Thought, Well, I Answered His Specific Question, it Was Only a Side Question, it Might Not Go Anywhere. But Ultimately it Did Go Somewhere Because When it Was Over, We Basically Had a Situation Where the Defendants Were, Indeed, Found Guilty of The Particular Charges of Knowing and Willfully Destroying Plants or Their Parts. The Other Significant Thing Is We Also Convicted Them of Violating the -- Violating Not Only a Regulation, but We Also Succeeded in Charging Them with The Federal Land Policy and Management Act as Well. So We Got a Conviction on Both Counts. They Received a Fine of $1630 to Be Surrendered to the Clerk of The Court in Order to Provide Restitution for the Damage They Caused. They Also Were Given a Great Deal of Probation and among the -- They Also Had a Jail Sentence To Do Some Time on and among the Conditions of Probation Was, Number One, They Surrender the $1630 Within Two Weeks And, Also That They Vacate the Public Lands Within Two Weeks. So We Got Sort of a Surprise out Of That One Little Question That The Judge Asked of Me. At That Two-week Mark, at the Probation Hearing, I Remember Stepping into the Judge's Chambers, and the First Thing He Asked Me, He Said, Are We Going To Put These Boys in Jail this Morning? I Said, No, Your Honor, They Cleaned up the Site to the BLM's Satisfaction, Which They Did, And the Trespass Was, Indeed, Abated. But it Shows How We Can Go from The Administrative to the Criminal Process Fairly Quickly And Without a Great Deal of Preparation. So My Lesson That I Have for You Really Is to Begin All of Your Trespass Work with the Principle Of Begin with the End in Mind And If You Begin with the End in Mind You Will Be Well Prepared For What Might, Indeed, Come Next. the Baird Case History You Have in Your Notes Is Just a Pail, Thin Fraction of the Actual Size of the Case File. What You Have Excerpts. The Case File Was Very Thick. Yet Every Document That Was Ever Served to Anybody Appears in That Case File. It Was All There. Okay. I Want to Point out the Primary Instrument We Used to Initiate Criminal Actions Is the Federal Violation Notice, and Your Rangers All Have a Good Stack of These, and this Is the Main Instrument They Use in Quite a Number of Occasions. Yes, We Can Arrest for a Lot of Offenses, but Sometimes That's Sort of Impractical, and in Reality We Usually Arrest Somebody When We Think They Will Disappear Before We Come Back Another Day. When it Comes to Occupancy Trespass, I Want to Say If They Disappear, Hey, I Think That Maybe Is What We Were Looking For, Anyway. But What I Want to Point out to You on the Form, There Is a Little Box down Here, and I'll See If I Can Bring That up for You, and That Box Is Something That Our Officer Can Check That's Entitled Information Supplied to Me from My Fellow Officer's Observation. I Want to Point out to You That All of You Nonlaw Enforcement Employees in the BLM, We Consider You Our Fellow Officers, Our Fellow Federal Officers, and If You Provide Us Information That Has to Do with Whether or Not It's Reasonably Incident or Unnecessary and Undue Degradation, All These Things Can Go into That Measure Are of Our Personal Probable Cause Observations in Order to Initiate the Criminal Case, and That Can Really Be Helpful. Now, I Won't Go into Great Detail on this One. This Is Basically the Flowchart Of the Criminal Justice System. Oh, the Flowchart from Heck. and Kit Go a Lot of Different Places. I Only Show it to You to Remind You That Once We Enter a Case Into the Criminal System, it Takes the Same Flow That Any Other Criminal Case Would Do in Terms of the Initial Appearance, The Pleading, et Cetera. Upon Initial Appearance, the Magistrate Is Mandated to Advise Them That They Have the Right to Jury Trial, and That They Have a Right to District Court Trial. If They Waive That Right, Then The Trial Can Occur Right There Before the Magistrate and We Can Get this Thing out of the Way. However, If They Ask for District Court Trial, It's Still Going to Have to Go down to the U.s. Attorney's Office, and That May Result in What's Called An Administrative Denial, Basically it Doesn't Meet Their Prosecutorial Guidelines or Maybe It's Not Important Enough To Prosecute. That Can Give Us a Great Deal of Frustration, Unfortunately. Dennis, I'll Add My Earlier Statement. When That Happens, We Need to Know about It. We Need to Know What the Outcome Is, What the Reasons Are, If Possible, That the U.s. Attorney Has Given Us for Not Taking the Case, So That We Can See If There Are Patterns Developing, So We Can See If It's a Case Where, Yes, the U.s. Attorney Is Concerned about It, But He Doesn't Have People, He Doesn't Have Time, He's Got Drug Cases. GBLM, If You Could Give Me Fte And Dollars, I Might Be Able to Dedicate Full-time Bodies to This or Part-time Bodies to This. This Was a Solution Used by the Forest Service in One of Their Campaigns in Northern California, I Believe, and It's An Option That We Might Want to Pursue. But I Again Stress, If it Isn't Reported and Documented, it Didn't Happen, and from a Management Standpoint, We Don't Have Any Way to Act on Them. So When this Occurs, We Need to Know. Another Technique That I Often Used When I Was Doing a Lot of That Casework Is That If I Knew That the Person Was Going To Request a Jury Trial and it Was Going to Ultimately Go down To the District Court, What I Would Do Is I Would Draft a Letter from the District Manager To the U.s. Attorney Basically Outlining Our Plea for Help, Basically Saying this Is an Important Case to Us, We Really Need Your Interest on it and in Most of My Cases, in this Particular Baird Case, it Resulted in Their Special Prosecutor Being Assigned to the Case, and He Was Very Helpful to Us. So You Can Also Get Some Degree Of Success That Way. But My Word of Caution Is That The U.s. Attorney's Office, They're All Busy People, and Don't Cry Wolf Too Many Times, Otherwise They'll Get the Message That Maybe Everything You Sent Them by Letter May Not Be as Important as You Describe. But If You Have Those Important Precedent-setting Cases You Need Attention On, this Certainly Should Occur. Another Case, and I'll Point it Out Only Briefly, Matt Gave You The Document on Dreamer's Paradise. On That Particular Case I Wrote The Letter, I Asked for Assistance, and I Had an Assistant U.s. Attorney Working With Us. He Very Conveniently Turned Matt's Surface Use Determination Report into an Affidavit. I Was Serving Grand Jury Subpoenas for Telephone Records, Welfare Records and Employment Records, and We Were Moving Towards Grand Jury Indictment on This Particular Occupancy Case. Unfortunately, Then the Assistant U.s. Attorney Asked Me If I Could Provide Him a Photo of the Potential Defendants, Which I Did Provide. One of the Defendants Walks with A Cane, Had a Colostomy Bag, Didn't Look Too Good, and His Answer to Me Was, Dennis, this One Doesn't Have Particular Jury Appeal. A Couple Weeks Later I Got That Phone Call That Said That They're a Little Bit Too Busy Right Now to Handle That Particular Case. So That's an Example Where I Almost Got to the Door and Then We Had to Fall Back and Resort To Other Resolutions in Order to Solve That One. Dennis, I Think It's Important to Note, Though, When You Have an Area Where You're Trying to Break into a Judicial System That Isn't Willing to Take Your Cases, the First One You Take That You Should Really Imemphasize Should Be a Very Serious, Very Important Case, One That's Very Meaningful. As in Our Case it Was the Bairds. and That Leads Me into What I Would like to Show You Here and This Is Dennis' Own -- the Three Standard Public Land Defenses: The First One Is I Didn't Know. This One Came up in the Baird Case Because They Said, I Didn't Know That it Was Against the Law. the Fact That We Sent Them Notices of Noncompliance by the Ream Apparently Had No Effect on Them. Well, That Was Our Chief Piece of Evidence, and to Quote The Judge, He Said, the BLM Has Done and Taken Every Opportunity To Help You Understand What You Need to Comply with. So We Beat That One down. The next One Was "I Thought I Could." Now, this One I Really Want to Emphasize Because What Happened Here Was That They Tried to Make The Case That One of Our BLM Mining Engineers Gave Them Permission to Do this Particular Act. We Ended up Having to Put the Mining Engineer on the Stand and Very Quickly Answering Some Questions for the Assistant U.s. Attorney. He Denied Giving Any Such Permission for the Person to Do This. My Word of Caution Is That All Of Our People That Make Contact With the Public, Including Counter People, Need to Be Aware To Not Give the Nod or Not Give An Inadvertent Yes to a Certain Question That May Have to Do With the Use and Development of Public Lands. We Have to Be Very Careful about Informal Conversations. Otherwise We Could Provide this Particular Defense to the Thing. And the Last One Is "Somebody Else Did It." In the Baird Case They Brought In a Secret Witness, Dr. Spivey, His Name Was. He Was a Prominent Chiropractor and an Expert Witness. He Had an Old Snapshot Photograph of What Appeared to Be Some Road Somewhere Covered With Mustard Weed, and He Was Claiming That the Roads That Were Cut by the Bairds Were There Before and They Were Doing Nothing More than Improving the Roads. Unfortunately He Didn't Understand the Federal Standards Of Evidence. He Could Not Say Who Took the Photo. He Could Not Say What Correction The Photo Was Taken from. And He Could Not Put a Date on The Photo. and Also We Had Introduced 8 By 10 Before and after Photographs That Really Put That Defense to Bed. and I Bring up the Three Defenses for You That I Truly Believe If You Have the Documents and Evidence to Counteract Each of Those Three Defenses, You, Indeed, Can Be Successful in the Criminal Arena In Achieving What You Want to Achieve in Mining Claim Occupancy Regulation and in Abating Trespass. Dennis, It's Getting on Close To Lunch. I Understand You Brought a Slide Of a Peculiar Situation with You. Why Don't We Bring That Slide up Now. That's Slide 193. Can You Explain it to Us? Yeah, I Want to Give You a Chance to Sort of Exercise Your Minds after Three Days of Work Here in Terms of Deciding Perhaps What to Do about this. I Want You to Listen Very Carefully. I Didn't Conveniently Provide You One of Those Nice Little Yes Or No Forms. I Am Going to Ask You to Completely Go from Scratch and Create this as You Go. But You Need to Listen Very Carefully to the Description of The Violation. In June Your Outdoor Recreation Planner Puts a Copy of a Visitor Register for a National Scenic Trail on Your Desk. A Visitor Comment Is Circled on The Form That Says, Do We Really Have to Pay That Guy in the Shack to Cross His Mining Claim? Now, You Know That the Trail in Question Leads to a Very Popular Hot Springs. In July the next Month You Find Out That Someone Complained to The Sheriff's Office That a Naked Person Who Lives in a Shack near the Trail to the Hot Springs Has Been Pointing a Gun At People and Demanding That They Pay a Fee. Okay. You Arrange to Visit the Site, And in this Photo Is Exactly What You See. There Is No Evidence of Any Digging, Excavation or Mining Activity. There's Only a Small, and this Is Truly Vegetables, Not Marijuana, There Is Just a Small Vegetable Garden Behind the Shack. . No Mushrooms, No Peyote? No, Just Those Great Tomatoes That this Person Eats. Here Is What We Would like You To Do in Three Parts. We Would like You to Identify What Follow-up Items Should Occur on this Case, in Other Words, What Things Do You Need To Do to Collect More Information? Number Two, Discuss and Identify What Violations Are Apparent Here, Understanding That the 3715 Regulations Are Current and Being Enforced Now. And Number Three, Develop a Resolution Plan, Including Your Recommended Enforcement Actions What You Would Do about this Particular Situation. Can You Do That During Lunch. We Have a Little Time Before Lunch and We've Had Faxes That Have Come in That I Think It's Appropriate for Dennis to Talk To. Here Is One in Big, Bold Print From -- Appears to Be from Nevada. So, Dennis, Would You Help Us With That One? the Question Is: Is it the BLM Ranger Who Should Give the Order to Remove Unauthorized Structures to the Occupant? This Seems to Be Outside What The Geologist Should Be Doing? In Talking with Management on This Question, Quite Often Management Is Quick to Remind Me That All BLM Employees Have a Responsibility for Carrying out Resource Protection Actions, Including this Sort of One. Now, Certainly I Think the Ranger Should Be Involved, in Fact, What We've Been Stressing All along Here Through These Three Days a Teamwork Approach. Begin with the Mind in Mind and If the End in Mind Ultimately Becomes Criminal Enforcement, You Probably Ought to Need the Ranger Involved at Some Point or Another. I Think the Realty Specialists Because of the 2920 Applications Need to Be Involved and Certainly the Surface Protection Or Geologist Person. But Can the BLM Geologist Serve These Notices? Yes, They Can. In Fact, Matt and I Have Often Done Those Things Together. Yes, in Fact, in Many Cases These Notices to Remove Unauthorized Improvements Go out Via Certified Mail. So it Really Doesn't Matter Who Drops it in the Mailbox. I Can Recall Spending an Afternoon When it Just Got Too Much to Stay in the Office and It Was Too Nice Outside, I Would Take a Stack out and Go Knock on Doors for People That Wouldn't Receive Their Mail. So a Teamwork Approach Is Appropriate. But I Always Talked to Dennis First to Make Sure That the People I Was Going to Go and Talk to Were Not Known Threats To My Safety. And it Was Never a Problem. Good Point, Matt. Okay. That One Wasn't What I Expected. Welcome Back to the Air and the Donald Duck Tie Wins in Yuma. Never Read a Fax into the Air Cold, I Guess. Dennis, Can You Identify Some Examples of Types of Risks or Threats to Health, Safety or the Environment That Would Warrant a BLM Suspension Order? Actually this Is Addressed to The Panel and Perhaps Rick or Scott Might Want to Dive in with This One. Okay. Some of the Examples of Types of Risks and Threats to Health, Safety or the Environment... Well, Walking out and Pointing a Gun at Somebody Is Probably Right up There at the Top of One Of Those Threats to Health and Safety. Chemicals, Red Phosphorous, like You Might Find Land Mines, Pipe Bombs, That Sure Looks like a Threat to Health and Safety. Leaking Tanks of Diesel Fuel, Something That Might Tend Towards a Clean Water Act Violation or an Air Quality Violation, They Sure Look like They Fit with That. I Want to Make a Valuable Point There, Too, and I Mention That a Mining Claim Itself Does Not Exempt You from All Other Federal Laws, and We Haven't Discussed it a Lot but Certainly The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and the Water Act, They Have to Comply with Those Acts and If They Have a Situation Where We Have a Waste Hazard -- If -- Remember -- I Remember How You Used to Put That, Dennis and It's Really Good. Basically Dennis Used to Say, Staking for Four by Four Posts And Filing a Mining Claim Does Not Exempt You from All Laws, Safety and Environmental. We Have on Occasion Also Run Into a Situation Where We've Had Reported from Neighbors That Dynamite Has Been Left Inside an Adit. That, Too. We Could Sit Here All Day and Compile a List of Things That Aren't Safe, but Basically If it Doesn't Look Safe, If it Looks Like a Hazard, it Probably Is. We Had Another Question Here, Right There. Would You Hand That One over to Dennis? We've Got about Five Minutes Left. I Think We Can Handle this One. this Is a Situation Question. What Legal Enforcement Measures Would You Prescribe in the Following Situation: Claimant Is in 3809 Noncompliance for Accumulation of Junk Materials, Plenty of Time Has Been Allowed, Past Deadlines Have Been Ignored. Some Cleanup Has Been Done, but It Is Far from Complete. No Imimprovement Has Occurred For the past Several Months. Materials Are Not Reasonably Incident to Mining. No Serious Safety Hazard, but More a Public Nuisance, Unsightly. Should BLM Clean up and Bill Claimant, Haul Materials to Dumb That. Claimant Has No Means to Pay. A Similar Question Came in Yesterday about Excessive Materials, Junk, Equipment, et Cetera. The Key Here for a Law Enforcement, of Course, Is That You Have Provided Me Some Documentation That Says this Is, Indeed, Not Reasonably Incident To. Okay? I Think Certainly and in Getting With What Scott Said, Not Only Would We Go with a Written Warning with this to Start the Criminal Process, We Would Probably Do a Notice of Trespass With Certified Receipt to Make Sure They Know What's Going on Here. Personally I Would like to Move On an Objective to Get Them to Clean it Up. However, it Looks Here That Even If the Court Forced Them to Clean it up Maybe They Don't Have the Means to Do So. It Can Get Very Difficult. Now, Some Resource Areas Have Taken the Tact That It's Just Worth Tight Get it out of There And It's Worth Tight Pay the Price to Impound the Property. If You Do That, and the Claimant Is Saying, Well, I Don't Have The Money to Do It, One of the Things That You Can Do Is Go After a Relinquishment to the Property. Have Them Sign over Their Interest in the Property to the United States, and Then We Can Remove it Right Then and There, And That's Been Used Successfully in a Lot of Routines. That's a Time Honored Process. That's Been Used as Early as the '50s. Scott, Did You Have Something to Add? a Thought Here. Is it Possible for the Magistrate If the Claimant Cannot Clean it Up, Can the Magistrate Order Them to Clean It Up? the Magistrate Can Certainly Order Them to Clean it up and Basically the Penalty If They Don't -- They Are Basically Put On Probation with a Condition of Probation That They Clean it Up, And If They Don't Clean it Up, They End up Having to Spend Time In Jail. That's Precisely What Happened with the Bairds, Although They Were Fairly Wealthy, They Pled Poverty. and We Deliberately Chose to Go after $1630 to Look at Repairing the Damages They Had Caused Specifically Because We Were Not Confident That They Had The Ability to Repair the Damages Themselves. They Were Really Not That Skillful of Heavy Equipment Operators. We Weren't Sure We Wanted Them out There with Heavy Equipment Any Longer than We Had To. Let Me Go Back to the Question We Had a Little Earlier. If You Look Through the Rules, Can You Identify and I'll Go Back to the Question, Came from Oregon, Can You Identify Some Examples of the Types of Threats Or Wrist Took Health, Safety and The Environment That Will Warrant a BLM Suspension Order? Suspension Order Is the Highest Form of Noncompliance That's out There, and Essentially That Person Has to Be Not Reasonably Incident and a Threat to Health And Safety. So You Have to Two Tests That You Have to Achieve. There Is a Cessation Order Which Is Allowable for Someone Who Does Not Pass Both of Those Thresholds, but the Suspension Order Is Really Aimed at the Person Who Is Not Reasonably Incident and Who Is a Threat to Health and Safety. And the Health and Safety and The Environment Can Include Failure to Have the Necessary Permits from the County. Good. Thanks, Rick. Well, We're Right about Time to Break for Lunch. We Have a Good Question That's Come in from He Will Co-, and it Has to Do with the Step by Step Process for Confiscating or Attaching a Claim with Abandoned Equipment and What Happens If They Go into Bankruptcy. I Am Not Sure We Will Be Able to Handle That Step by Step, and We Can Speak to it Generally and After Lunch Dennis Can Give You Direction to Go and Look and Get The Answers You Need. It Is Just about Lunch Time Now. So as We Break, We Would like You to Be Thinking about the Situation That Dennis Showed You. We'd like You to Fax Us Your Suggestions as Soon as You Can. We'll Also Ask That If You Have Questions During Lunch, Go Ahead And Fax Them into Us. Now, We're Going to Start at the Regular Time That's in Your Schedule, Which Is about an Hour And 15 Minutes, Rather than 90 Minutes. When We Come Back, We'll Be on Transponder 5 of this Same Satellite. Be Sure You Are Your Receiver Is Tuned to Channel 5 and We'll Be Back in about an Hour and 15 Minutes Right as Regularly Scheduled. Welcome Back! We Hope You Had a Good Lunch. I Would like to Express Our Real Appreciation to Those of You That Called in to Tell Us Our Sound Had Gone down When We Lost Our Audio Feed. We Didn't Know it on this End Until the Phones Lit Up. It Was the Best Response We've Had on Phone-ins Throughout the Whole Session Although We Have a Couple Calls Pending Now. This Afternoon We Have the Entire Crowd with Us, We Have Rick Deery on the End, Hello, Rick. Hi. Bob Gibson Is Back. Hello, Bob. Scott. Hi, Matt. and Dennis Headquarter Lane. -- Mclane. If You Don't Know Who They Are By Now, There's No Hope. This Is Our Type for Interactive Questions and Answers. We Had a Number of Questions That Came in During Lunch and We're Going to Try and Put Some To Bed That Came in During the Day this Morning. We'd like to Encourage You to Call in Because We Will Be Taking Calls Fairly Soon. If You Do Call in and If You're Waiting on Hold, We Don't Have a Lot of Time this Afternoon, So Please Get Right to Your Point, And Try to Limit Yourself to One Or Two Questions That Are Pretty Specifically Stated. Anyway, Let's Move on -- Incidentally, Something I Nearly Forgot. If We Could Pull up Slide 194. Yesterday We Talked as You Know About Signs That Were Appropriate to Put on a Mining Claim. Well, Ron Smith out of the Phoenix Field Office Went out During Lunch and Bought Some of The Signs We Were Referring to And We Have One Showing Now. This Particular Sign He Is Being Shown Is Not My Favorite, Although It's a Whale of a Lot Better than a No Trespassing Sign. The Problem I Have with it and It's Not Serious, Is That it Says Violateors Will Be Prosecuted to the Full Extent of The Law. Actually That's Not the Case, Because BLM Is Not Going to Prosecute Citizen a for Walking Across Mining Claim B. Let's Bring up Slide 195. Slide 195 Is the One I Was Referring to Yesterday When I Mentioned That There's One That Is Advertised in the California Mining Journal. This One Is Also Available at a Lot of Mining Supply Stores Through the West, So You May Not Need to Order It. There Is Not a Severe Problem With this One. It Says Federal Mining Claim. Strictly Speaking, There Isn't Such a Thing as a Federal Mining Claim, but It's Pretty Descriptive, Nonthreatening and Explains in Accurate Detail What The Mining Claim Is for. And Slide 196 Is a Good Example Of What You Can Put up on Your Claim Corners. This Is Just Basically a Corner Marker. It's Actually a Sign about Three Inches by Three Inches. So It's Not as Big as it Actually Looks and it Can Be Nailed Easily to a Four by Four Post. Slide 197 Is an Example of What You Can Post in the Area of Open Mine Shafts. Many of the Offices of the State Mine Inspector in the West Will Have Signs Much like This, and The next One, Which Is Slide 198. You Can Generally Get These for Free from Your State Mine Inspector. I Know You've Put Them to Extensive Use Even Here in Arizona at Some of the Mines We Deal with in Training. If We Can Bring up Slide 193, Dennis Can Give Us Kind of a Background on Where He Would Go And What Other People Suggested With the Situation We Left You With at Lunch. Thanks, Matt. I Think Most Everybody Got the Right Idea, and the Right Idea Is That this Is Obviously Not Reasonably Incident to and May, Indeed, Be Unnecessary and Undue Degradation, and it Really Didn't Take a Genius to Figure That out and I Think Just about Everybody Got That Right down The Line. In Terms of the Kind of Things, And Most Everybody Got Most of These, the Kind of Things We Should Be Looking for in this Particular Case Right Away as Follow-up Items, We Need to Determine Land Status, Is it Public Land, We Need to Verify If There Is a Mining Claim in The Recordation Files, We Need To Pick up the Sheriff's Office Report on the Incident That Occurred. Another Tip I Have, and this Is Something That We Do in Law Enforcement Occasionally, We May Want to Send One or Two Law Enforcement Officers out There In Plainclothes to Find out What Happens to Them. Will They Get a Gun Pointed at Them, Be Asked for a Fee. And Last but Not Least We Might Want to Interview the Visitors At the Hot Springs to See What Happened to Them When They Went By this Guy's Shack. One Point That Nobody Seemed to Get Is What's the Camping Stay Limit? That's a Follow-up There. What's the Camping Stay Limit For That Particular District. If It's 14 Days, We Might Have An Immediate 14-day Violation There. The Kind of Things That People Identified and They Got Almost All of These That Could Be Potential Violations under 3715, Use Is Not Reasonably Incident. 2920, Unauthorized Use. Hazard and a Nuisance. Possibility for Special Recreation Use Permit Violation. Barring Transit Through or over Public Lands and Then There Is a Question of Sanitation. Where Is His Trash and Human Waste Going? We Need to Find That out. In Terms of What to Do about It, In Some Cases a Site Visit by a Law Enforcement Officer Could Solve this. We Need to Go out and Visit with This Fellow and Find out Who it Is and We May Run His Name Through the Sheriff's Office and Find out He May Be a Wanted Person or for That Mat Whir We Talk to the Sheriff's Office on The Initial Report They May Be Interested in You a Re:ing Him For That Particular Violation And We May Be Able to Coordinate That with the Sheriff's Office. In Terms of Administrative Things We Can Do, We Can Look at A Notice of Noncompliance, Make Sure We Established Knowing and Willful and Might Also Want to Issue a Law Enforcement Officer Written Warning. Then of Course We Could Move to Citations If We Have To. I Want to Point out If He Keeps Pointing Guns at People and We Prove That Up, We Probably Need To Arrest this Gentleman. Dennis, Do You Think this Is A Mining Issue? I Don't Think It's a Mining Issue at All. I Think Somebody Told Him That's Basically the Way You Homestead, Is You Post a Mining Claim and I Don't Think That's What's Going On Here. Rick, Does this Qualify for a Grace Period? this Guy Is Not Reasonably Incident and He's a Threat to Health and Safety. That's Right. This Isn't Each a Mining Issue. This Is a Public Health and Safety Issue. He's out of There. We Have a Phone Call. This Is Jim in Sacramento. Hello, Jim? Caller: Is That Me, Matt? I Kind of Hear You on Static to Boot. Here on the Phone. You Hearing Me? We Hear You Just Fine. Caller: a Question, Matt, on The Preparation -- or the Need For Preparation of Mineral Reports to Be Signed by an Examiner and Then a Mineral Reviewer. It Seems Clear from What You All And Particularly Deery, Are Saying Is That the Surface -- The Reasonableness of Surface Use or Whatever Requires a Report. Now My Question Is, and Trying To Separate Some of These Issues That You've Been Going over in 3700, Seem to Slop over into 3900, and Do You Think That It's Prudent to -- Prudent to Require A Signed Mineral Report for These 3700 Issues Whereby Diligence, Reasonable Use Is Involved with Occupancy? Rick? Absolutely, Jim. Remember That We're Going to Use This Particular Report in the Main When We've Got an Issue That Says, No, It's Not Reasonably Incident, No, You're Not Going to Be Staying out There. The Surface Use Determination Is Going to Be the Vehicle for Putting All That Together, and There Are Several Reasons for Sticking with the Certified People. One of Which Is That They Have Been Trained, They Have Met a Certain Level of Standards, and The Congress Has Recognized Them In the Current Budget Act as Being Persons of Importance. Caller: Well, That's What I Would Have Assumed, but I Wanted To Make Sure Because My Boss Is Checking with Me in Terms of Laying out the Patent Program And the Requirement of Certification and Signature and Et Cetera. Yeah, And, Understand, Jim, We Know There's a Case Load There. Doesn't Necessarily Mean That It's Solely Going to Be Done by The Certified Mineral Examiners. It's Also an Opportunity to Take Some of Your Other People Who Are Not Necessarily Certified at This Point and Get Them out and Start Them Working. Now, I Grant You That this -- This Kind of Report Doesn't Have Sufficient Economic Analysis and Mineral Costing Associated with It to Ultimately Qualify for Certification, but If Somebody's Going to Want to Start to Do Field Work as a Mineral Examiner, this Is Also a Place To Start. What We Want Is at Least One Cme Sitting There in the Process. Thanks Very Much, Jim. Caller: You Bet. Let Me Make Another Point Here. Just Got Passed over to Me. NTC Is Paying for Travel and per Diem for Cme Training. Actually It's Washington Office, And Matt and the Guys at NTC Launder the Money for Us. So If Somebody Says I Can't Afford Because of Travel and per Diem, That's Not an Issue. Thanks, Rick. We Have Another Call. This Is -- Hello, Len in Ridgecrest. Caller: Hi, Is this Matt? this Is Matt. Caller: Matt, this Is Len. I Have a Little Information in Regards to an Issue You Guys Were Discussing a Second Ago About the 14-day Camping Limit. We Did Have a Case out Here in The Argus Range Wherein We Had An Individual Who Had Not Had His Proper Plan of Operation Filed, and When We Went Through All of the Process of Getting Him into Magistrate's Court, We Won and We Lost in Court. We Lost Because the Judge Said Since We Hadn't Gone to the Site For 14 Consecutive Days and Recorded and Documented His Occupancy for Those 14 Consecutive Days That Our Conclusion by Starting in March Of One Year and Visiting the Site Several Times Between March And May Was Not Enough to Carry Weight in Court to Say He Had Violated That 14-day Limit. So I Would Suggest If You're Trying to Establish That Time Frame You Make Sure Your Ranger Or Your Geologist or Whomever The Inspector Is Goes to the Site for 14 Consecutive Days and Documents with Photo Dated Evidence the Individual's Occupation of the Ground for More than 14 Days. Dennis, Do You Have a Comment On That. . Obviously What We Have Here Is We Have a Magistrate That Is Establishing His Own Standard of Evidence for Violation of That Regulation, and That's Certainly Appropriate. The Magistrate Has Discretion to Determine Whether Proof Beyond a Reasonable Doubt Has Occurred in Terms of Conviction. It Has Not Been My Experience That That's Been Required in Other Courts for a 14-day Camping Limit. So It's Just a Matter of What Standard of Evidence You're Going to Put Together in Terms Of Proving That 14 Days. If That's What That Magistrate Wants, Then That's Probably What You're Going to Have to Show. Caller: We Also Won in That Case Admonishment to the Claimant Involved to the -- from The Court That Said Specifically In the Case, If I See You Folks Back in Here Because You Have Not Properly Filed the Plans of Operation with Bureau of Land Management as Required by the Ridgecrest Resource Area, You Will Be Sent to Jail Effectively Was His Bottom Line. So We Did, in Fact, Get Resolution. So We Lost and We Won. We Didn't Get -- like I Say, We Didn't Get to Win the Citation As Far as a Fine. There Was Also Litter and Other Things Involved. But We Did Get the Information To the Claimant We Need Your Paper Work and Need it in Proper Order. in Support of the Law Enforcement Officers, They Certainly Had Probable Cause for The Violation. Unfortunately, Proof Beyond a Reasonable Doubt Is up to the Court to Determine. Thanks Much for Calling, Len. Caller: Bye. Bob, During Lunch a Number of Questions Came in for You and Also During Our Last Session. Can You Handle a Couple for Us? Sure, Matt. I Have a Question That Came in From Redding, and it Says: We Have Existing Mining Claim Related Trespass Files Set up in Orca as 2928 Cases. What Are We to Do with These? Right Now the Answer Is Just Leave Them Right Where They Are. We're Still Working out the System. The Regulations Are Brand-new. We're Still Working with the People in the Service Center on What We're Going to Do with What Is Existing in Case Recordation And What Is Going into Almrs/ioc, Where it Will Go and How it Will Go. This Is an Issue We Will Have to Address Further since It's Brand-new We Haven't Addressed Any Conversion Issues of What Is In One Place and Where Is it Going To. Would Case Be a Good Place to Put 3715 Cases until the Almrs System Is in Place to Accept 3715? That Probably -- Well, That Can't Be Answered Because I Could Say Yes it Would Be a Good Place, but If Further Information Shows That We'll Have Problems in Taking the Stuff That Is in 2928 and Putting it to Where 3715 Cases Will Reside We Don't Want to Compound Any Problems. So Right Now I Just Say Await Further Direction as We Work These Details out. Another One Here Is: -- this One Comes from Area Code 619. I Believe That's -- Southern California. Could Be Anywhere from San Diego To Needles. it Says If a Case File Is Suffixed in Orca and an Appeal Is Filed the Entire Case File Is Sent to Ibla. This Might Not Be a Good Idea. That's What We Were Getting at Before the Necessary to Put in a Separate Case File the Information Regarding the Occupancy Versus the 3809. Possibly the 3802, 3809 Case Type Could Be Color Coded on a Label for Occupancy. Once Again, It's a Brand-new Regular Legs, We're Feeling Our Way Through It. Unfortunate Will He We're Also Right in the midst of Changing The Entire Automated System and The Way We Do Business and We're Feeling Our Way Through That as Well, Just Await Further Instructions and -- Bob Before We Move On, We Just Had a Question That Came Into Dennis about the Liability That BLM Employees May Have for Lawsuits, Especially If We Lose. Before You Do That, Dennis, We Do Have Fresh Information, Comment, on Scott's Tie and from The Field We Have Scott Megadittos. it Is True. He Is Rush Limbaugh's Stunt Double. Dennis? the Question Involved When BLM Employees Are Sued by a Claimant, If the Claimant Wins, Are We Protected in Any Way by The BLM? Your Protections in Terms of Personal Lawsuit Against You All Revolve Around Whether or Not You Were Operating Within the Scope of Your Authority and the Scope of Your Employment. Now, Generally When That Occurs You're Exempt from Liability. However, Defending You on Behalf Of the United States Government Is Totally Discretionary on the Part of the U.s. Attorney's Office. If They Choose to Defend You, Which in Almost Every Case They Do When You Are in the Scope of Your Employment and Authority, They Are Basically Going to Ask For the Case to Be Dismissed Against You and Entered upon the United States and Deal with the Suit in That Particular Manner. It's Interesting to Note in the Story That I Shared with You, Jones Versus the Bureau of Land Management, the United States Continued to Make the Argument That These People Were Within The Scope of Their Employment And the Scope of Their Authority. However, the Plaintiffs Continued to Make the Argument That All of These Employees Should Have Known That These People Had Civil Rights and They Should Not Have Violated Them, And Unfortunately We Never Did Get a Definitive Ruling on Whether or Not That Case Was Going to Close out in That Way. So it Isn't Really the BLM That Protects You. It Would Be the United States. However, You All Need to Understand That You're Going to Have to Stand on Your Own Occasionally If, Indeed, the United States Chooses Either, A, You Were Not in the Scope of Your Employment Authority Or, B, The United States Attorney Chooses Not to Defend You. Most of Our Law Enforcement Officers Are Fully Versed in This Problem and Carry Personal Liability Insurance. I'm Not Here to Sell You Insurance, but If You're Going To Do These Sorts of Activities, You Need to Understand That This, Indeed, Is a Possibility. I Thought You Had a Cousin That Sold Insurance, Dennis. No, Never Mind. Not True. Bad Joke. Dennis, in Light of the Part of 3715, I Believe That's, What, 7.1, Rick, That Tells Us That We Will Not Go into a Residential Part of a -- an Occupancy or the Part the Claimant Has Said Is Residential and If a BLM Employee Does So, Are They Acting Outside the Scope of Their Employment? Certainly So in the Case of a Law Enforcement Officer Because There Has Been Case Law That Says Law Enforcement Officers Are Expected to Know What Is Required to Enter a Private Residence. Okay? There Have Been Some Successful Cases in Defending Nonlaw Enforcement People on the Basis They Aren't Required to Know All About Search Warrants and the Exceptions to Search Warrants, Et Cetera, but When There Is Doubt, Don't Enter a Residence. It's Just That Easy. That Seems like Good Advice In All Cases. At this Point I Would like to Suggest We Do Have Some Room on The Agenda for Some Telephone Calls and Fax Questions. Again, this Is Your Time to Call In or Fax in and Get the Questions Answered That You Would like to Have Done. We Have a Whole Pile of Them Here, and They Range -- So Far Range from General Questions to Specific Questions, and We'll Deal with Them as Best We Can. Okay. Scott? since We're Getting Back to Bob, If I Could Just Make a Comment Here and Get Any Input From Anybody Else Here. It Appears Now We're -- We Could Have up to Three Different Case Files for a Particular Mining Claim under 3809 or 3802, 2900 And Now 3715. It Has Been Our Experience That When We Have Passed Case Files On to the Ausa, They Want a Complete Document or a Complete Case File as to What Is Happening on That Claim. So I Believe What We Should Be Doing at this Point, If We Have Information in One File, it Should Also Be Included in All The Other Three Case Files, Too. That's an Excellent Idea. When in Doubt, Make a Copy and Put it in All the Files. That's Very Good. Bob, Would You like to Carry on With That Question You Have in Front of You? I Have Just One Final -- It's Not Really a Question. It's More a Point Made from Las Vegas, and It's a Good Point, Too, That under the Existing Almrs System We Have Today the Case Recordation System, an Occupancy Could Be Denoted by an Extension on the Serial Number, As Was Discussed Earlier this Morning, but in the New Almrs/ioc, this Cannot Occur Because the Number Will Be System Generated. Today Each Office Is Generating Their Own Serial Numbers In. In the New System, the System Itself Generates the Numbers for Each Case. There Are a Number of Problems That Could Occur from That. We're Working on Those. They're Still Working with Exactly How the Serial Numbers Are Going to Be Generated and Who Is Going to Assign What Where. Great. Thanks, Bob. I Have a Question Here, and this Is Concerning Section 3715.5-c. That's Paren. C. Permits. Do the Permits -- the Required Permits, I Assume, Duty Permits Just Include Residential Permits Like Sewage, Building Permits And So On, or Do They Include Permits for Mining and Milling? I Can Give You a Nickel Answer Or Give You a $5 Answer. The Nickel Answer Is, Yes. But They Include All Applicable Permits. You Can Learn a Lot by Just Reading the Regs. Rick, Do You Have That Appropriate Cite in Front of You? Yes, 5c Says Your Occupancy Must Conform to All Applicable State and Federal Standards and You must Have Acquired All Required Permits Before Beginning as Required under this Subpart. This Means Getting Permits and Authorizations and Meeting Standards Required by State and Federal Law, Including but Not Limited to and There's a Long Laundry List. It Is All Permits. Necessary for Whatever Particular Phase of Activity You Are In. You Don't Have to Have All the Permits for the Entire Life of The Operation, but If You Are Going to Turn the Key on Tomorrow, You Better Have Everything in Order to Be Able To Turn That Key On. Great, Thanks, Rick. We Have Another Call. Hello, Byard in Phoenix. Hello? Caller: How You Doing? We're Doing Fine and Be Doing Better in about Half an Hour. Caller: First of All, I Want To Thank Rick for Doing My Third Marriage. That's Okay. My Real Point Is on the Case File Recordation of Placing a Suffix at the End of the Case File Number Indicating It's an Occupancy Case, the Person from California Called in a Little Bit Ago and Said If the Case Went Back, the Entire Case File Would Have to Go, Including the 3809 Portion of the File, and I Guess the Example That I Have, I Disagree with That Statement, And the Example I Have Is a Mineral Patent File Where We Have the Mineral Patent File Is Serial Number Aza 12345 and Then If the Case Goes to Contest, the Contest File Goes to Aza 12345-1. If the Contest Goes Back to Ibla, It's Only the Contest File That Goes Back There, and I Guess I Would Suggest That a Similar Thing Would Happen in The Case of a 3809 Case That Had An Occupancy Attached to It, That If the Person Appealed the Occupancy Portion -- or -- of The Case, That Only the Occupancy Portion of the Case Would Be What Would Be Sent to Ibla. Once Again, That Only the Contest File Went to Ibla, Not The Mineral Patent Case File. That's a Good Point, Byard. I Think You're Correct in That. Again, That Points to the Necessity of Keeping the Occupancy Stuff Separate from It. We're Still Trying to Work These Little Things out. . Caller: I Agree, Bob, on Keeping it Separate, but I Think That Might Be a Way That We Could Accommodate That and Still Keep it in a 3809 Case Type as You're Suggesting until the 3715 Case Type Is Established. the Problem Isn't with the Current Case Recordation and Where We Keep it There. Where the Problems Arise Is What's Going to Happen When That Goes to Almrs/ioc? We Have a Number of Different Avenues We Could Take to Solve That Problem, and What We Have -- than What We Have Today. The Problem Is We Can't Make Any Changes in What We're Going to Be Getting in the Springtime. Caller: Okay. Great. Could I Make One Other Observation, Matt, While I'm On? Well -- Caller: Short? Make it Short. Caller: it Has to Do with Dennis' Comment Earlier about Going Through the Solicitor and Some of the Difficulties That We Have in Getting Some of These Cases into the Legal System. One of the Points That I Want to Make, First Off, Is That in Arizona We Enjoy Very, Very Good Relationship with Our Solicitor. I Don't Think We Could Ask for Anything Better. The Second Point Is, in the past We've Been Hesitant to Proceed With These Types of Cases, Mostly Noncompliance in 3809, Because the Attitude Was That The U.s. Attorney Wouldn't Take These Because They're Taking All The Good Cases, the Drug Cases And That Type of Thing, and I Guess My Point Is That Repeatedly the BLM Has Been Criticized for Not Exercising Its Authority on Processing Noncompliance Issues or the Like, and I Guess the Comment I Would Make Is That BLM Should Process the Case All the Way to The Point Where BLM Essentially Loses Control and the Control of The Case Goes to the Solicitor Or the U.s. Attorney, at Least If There's Going to Be Criticism Levied, It's Not Going to Be Levied Against the BLM, Because We've Taken it as Far as We Can Take it Without Help from Some Other Authorization, and I Guess I -- Organization and I Guess I Support We Have to Do the Same Thing in the Occupancy and Use Cases as Well, That We Carry it Forward Diligently as Far as We Can, Let the Hammer Fall on Someone Else If That's to Be. and I'll Repeat What I Said Earlier, When That Happens, We Need to Know about it at Headquarters, Because If it Isn't Documented, it Didn't Happen. Thanks for the Call. I Think We'll Comment Further on The Air Here. I Certainly Agree in Terms of Having Diligence in Pursuit of The Case. Sometimes If You Deal with the U.s. Attorney's Office or the Solicitor's Office That Has a Volume of Business Problems, the Best Thing You Can Do Is Do a Lot of the Work for Them, Write Up the Draft Actions, Write up The Draft Paper Work, Put it Before Them, Let Them Do Some Revision Work and Get it Before The Courts Where it Needs to Go. However, Clearly Understanding That the Solicitor's Office Helps Us with Civil Process and Drug Enforcement Cases on the Criminal Side Would Not Necessarily Impact the Volume of Business on the Civil Ride. That's Right. However, the Civil Side Can Be Loaded up with a Lot of Other Matters as Well. and No Matter What We Do, We Return to the Issue That If We're Going to Ask for Help from A Solicitor from the U.s. Attorney, We Have to Provide Well-documented, Thoroughly Documented, Complete Work or They'll Tell Us to Take a Hike. Uh-huh. Great. Okay. Dennis, Do You Have an Unanswered Question in Front of You There. a Couple I Can Answer Fairly Quickly. I'll Go Through this One Question by Question. What Is the Step by Step Process For Confiscating or Attaching a Claim to Abandoned Equipment on A Notice Level Mining Operation? The Answer Is You'll Find the Step by Step Process for Abandoned Equipment Impoundment In BLM Handbook 9232-1, the Realty Trespass Abatement Handbook. There's a Whole Chapter Dedicated to How to Do That with The Step by Step Process. The next Question Is: How Do We Sell the Equipment Then? You Do That with Your BLM Property Management People. They Can Do Everything They Can To Advertise the Equipment for Sale, Put it up for Sale and Recoup Some of Our Losses Through the Sale of That Equipment. Or They May Also See a Certain Equipment That Can Be Used by The BLM and They Can Make a Decision to Convert the Use of That Equipment to the United States. Then: Is There a Process to Attach Claim to the Facilities Or Equipment That Is Abandoned On Notice-level Operation If the Company Goes into Bankruptcy? I'm Certain There Probably Is a Process. I'm Not That Familiar with It. However, If You're Looking after Going after Somebody and Attaching the Bankruptcy Process In Terms of the Claim That We Have Against That Company, I Think You Need to Check with Your Field Solicitor's Office And Find out How That's Done to Get an Affirmative Claims Collection. Okay. Good. Looks like the One You Have in Front of You There Is Similar to This One, So Why Don't You Just Roll Right into It. this One Basically Refers To, Does Any Property, Including Attached Cabins and Personal Tools -- the Question Is Incomplete -- but Does Abandoned Property Revert to the Government Automatically or Does It Have to Be Posted? The Answer Is it Not Only Has to Be Posted but All the Procedures Of the Handbook must Be Followed In Order to Establish the Abandonment and Then Once the Abandonment Takes Place, We must Take Affirmative Possession of The Property, Either Through its Removal or If We're Not Removing It like a Building or Structure, The Structure Needs to Have the Windows Boarded Up, the Doors Locked, Signs Posted on it as Property of the United States. Okay. Is this Section Retroactive to Existing Abandoned Properties? The Principals Claiming Abandoned Property in the Name Of the United States Government Are the Same Regardless of Whether They're Old, New or Otherwise. We Need to Take -- Follow the Appropriate Procedures, Take Affirmative Possession of the Property. What Do We to about Old Cabins 50-plus Years That an Occupant Was Using? I Assume Was Using Means They've Moved out. The First Thing I Would Do in That Case Is Because They Were a Claimant or Because They Were Living There, They May Have an Interest That They Can Articulate. I Would Ask That Person since You're Leaving Would You Please Sign this Relinquishment of Property for Me. By Getting That Relinquishment Then I've Taken Affirmative Possession of the Property in The Name of the United States. Do They Have to Remove or Destroy the Cabin or Building? Only If We Requirement and They Comply with -- Comply with Our Requirement. If We Want it to Stand Because It May Indeed Be a Historic Structure, We Can Do That. But We Need to Take Affirmative Possession So Nobody Else Moves In. Where Does Archaeology Move into The Picture with the an Particular Was Tease Act, it Enters with the Same Threshold Of 50 Years or 100 Years Depending on the Lawyer Interpreting. We Have a Call on Hold from Phil in Salt Lake. Phil I'm Going to Ask You to Hang on for a Second. There Is Something Rick Needs to Deal with That's Been Pointed Out to Us a Number of Times. Rick, According to Instruction Memorandum 96-147 Change 1 Effective the 23rd of August of This Year Manual Section 3893 Has Been Deleted. How Can We Still Use it in Conjunction with the 3715 Regulations If it Doesn't Exist? You Can't, but You Will Be Getting Guidance That Will Come Out Shortly about the Time it Takes for Us to Get Back to Headquarters and Matt and I Groupwise a Few Things Back and Forth That Will Take, If Not Exactly All the Principles Found In -- and Verbatim Language of That Particular Manual Section And Turn it Back into Interim Guidance. So Matt Can Look Forward to Sitting down with Me via Groupwise and Coming up with a New Version of the Sud Requirements of That Old Manual, And Look for it Shortly. We're Ready. Hello, Phil, in Salt Lake. Welcome? Caller: Hi, Matt. Appreciate You Taking the Call. I Just Wanted to Make a Quick Comment with Regard to Confiscating Things. I Think You Really Need to Have Your Hazardous Material Coordinator Look the Site over Before You Get Involved with Taking Things off the Ground, Particularly Electrical Equipment Could Have Things like Pcbs Contained and That Sort of Thing. in the Electrical Transformers? Caller: Yes. for Those That Don't Know, Until About, What, Five Years Ago, Phil, the Oil Used to Stabilize Electrical Transformers Contained Pauley Chlorinated Biphenals and It's Nasty Stuff. Caller: I Would Make Sure The Hazardous Materials Coordinator Is in the Lube and Has an Opportunity to Participate. That's a Very Good Point, Phil. Thanks Very Much for Giving Us a Call. Caller: Thanks for the Time. You Bet. Dennis, I Think That's an Excellent Point. Something to Be Remembered. In Fact, That Fits in with the Situation You Encountered up in The Northern Part of the California Desert Some Years Ago. and We Ultimately Had to Seize Hazardous Materials Rather Than Waste Because They Were Still in Sealed Containers, but When in Doubt, and If There May Be Hazardous Materials There, We Definitely Need to Have a Hazardous Materials Coordinator With Us Because Sometimes We May Have to Contract with a Clean-up Person, Go Through the Cradle to Grave Procedures That Have to Do With Cleaning up Hazardous Waste. Scott, Have You Had a Haz-mat Situation You've Had to Deal With in Folsom in Your Occupancies or Has it Mostly Just Been Sewage and Junk. Lately It's Been Sewage and Junk. We Do Have Haz-mat Problems Unrelated Where We've Got a Number of Drug Lab Sites That Have Been -- You Know, That Kind Of Thing. No Fun. I Have a Good Question in from Albert. This Is Probably the Clearest Job of Faxing I Have Ever Seen. Looks like It's Written in Ink. Rick, under the 3715 Appeals That Go Directly to Ibla Instead Of for State Director Review We Have Heard Rumors of Regulation Changes That All Appeals and All Programs Will Go Directly to Ibla with No State Director Review. Question 1: as Anyone Asked Ibla or the Office of Hearings And Appeals If it Can Handle the Workload? And Question 2: What's the Current Time Frame for Case Completion at Ibla in Years? Well, Ibla Knows It's Coming. Matt Met with Them. They Had a Long Discussion. And Matt Is Pretty Firm. We're Going to Go to a Straight To Ibla Appeal Process. Ibla Has Said They're Ready for It. As to the Current Time Line and Time Lag for Cases, I Haven't a Clue of Late What That Is. I've Heard Multiples of Years, But That Varies by Case Type and By Decision. Some Cases Naturally Enough Go To the Front of the Queue Because They're -- Cue, They're A Failure to Pay a Recordation Thing and Those Are Pretty Much Canned Decisions. It's the Toughys We're Going to See That Have a Long Residence Time. Instead of Looking Through the Case Record and Say, Yes, it Was Posted after the Deadline, Bring Up File Number 265, this Is Going to Be a Case Where They're Going to Sit down and Have to Go Through the Record Line by Line, Look What's There, Weigh Our Decision, Weigh Our Justification and Basically Mull Over the Record. These Take Time. in a Case like That, Rick, I Think the Response Time We'll Get from Ibla Will Be Directly Proportional to the Quality of Our Record. Absolutely. The Better the Quality of Your Record, the Better You Can Demonstrate What's Going on out On the Ground in an Unbiased Fashion, the Quicker the Administrative Judges at Ibla Can Look at the Record and Say, Yes, the Decision Is Supported By the Record. That's What They're Looking for. They're Not Looking to Go out And Get BLM. That's Not Their Role. Their Role Is One of Fairness. Does the Record Support the Decision That's Appealed from? That's Their Job. And They're There to Keep Us out Of Trouble When Somebody Says I'm Going to Take You into U.s. District Court, Mr. Secretary, And If the Board Isn't There Doing That Quality Control, Then We Run a Terrible Risk That Instead of Having the Board of Land Appeals Doing a Full-blown Review of the Record, We Could Have a U.s. District Judge Constructing the Record in the Case, and Believe Me, You Don't Want That to Happen. That's Right, Rick. The Goal We Should Be Aiming at As We Put Our Cases Together Is To Have the Case So Complete, So Thoroughly Documented, and So Readable and Straightforward That by the Time it Gets to the Solicitor's Office, the Solicitor Looks at and it Says, I Don't Need to File a Brief, And Just Mails it On-off to Ibla. We Have Another Question In, Rick. If the Fee Title Box Is Checked On the Existing Occupancy Notification Form, it Seems to Me That We Would Be Required to Issue a Decision Saying That We Conclude That Fee Simple Title Is Not in Question, or Is in Question, and Give Them the Opportunity to Appeal. Rick, Do You Agree? No, We Aren't Required To, at Least Not in the First Year. If We Don't Agree with Them, If It's a Ms. Understanding, the Guy Says All Mining Claims Are Fee Title, That's Why You Check The Box, You Can Pick up the Phone and Explain What the Reason Is and Very Often He Will Change That. I've Had Several Phone Calls to That. There's No Need to Issue Any Kind of Decision until Such Time As We Get Around to the End of This Grace Period and Hate to Keep Saying this like a Broken Record, We'll Get Guidance out To You on That. in Fact the Questions You've Sent Us and the Questions We Expect to Hear from You via Groupwise Will Help Tremendously In Getting That Guidance out. So Keep in Touch. We Have Another Question in from Montana and It's One That I Think We Left on the Table Yesterday. I'm Not Sure If We Left it on The Table or Answered it Quickly. or Forgot It. with a about Large Operating Mines with Approved Plans of Operation and Permits? If They Have Large Facilities And Can Have Employees, Do They Need to Fill out the Form and Send it to Us? the Simple Answer Is, Are They Ready to Be Inspected on October 16th, 1996? If They Feel They're Ready to Be Inspected on in October, 1996, Yeah, Don't Send in the Form. That's the Only Penalty. The Only Penalty Is the Rule Hits You in October of this Year Instead of August of next Year. So If You're Feeling You're Ready, Great, Go Ahead, and Frankly a Lot of These Big Guys Are Probably in Good Shape. We Have Another Good Question In from Pete in Vernal. Pete Wants Us All to Know He Is Not Related to Dan. So, Pete, You're off the Look Hook. It's a Four-page Fax but in Big Type. Pete, the Bad News Is We've Misplaced Page 1. Pete Did Ask, Do the Regulations Also Cover Tunnel Sites? Yes. Pete, If You Would like to Give Us a Call, If We Don't Get Get Everything for You, I Think This Would Be an Excellent Time For You to Do So. Is Our Concurrence of a Mill Site the Same as Recognizing the Mill Site's Validity, Remembering That the Use and Good Faith in Occupancy of a Mill Site Goes Directly to its Validity. The Answer to That Is No. Simple. It's No. We're Looking at the Reasonably Incidental Nature of the Occupancy. We Are Not in Any Way Addressing The Validity of the Underlying Claims. This Rule Doesn't Even Look to That. Matt? an Additional Subset of this Question Is: Will Guidance Later Come That Has a Boilerplate Sentence Added That Says this Approval or Concurrence Is Not a Recognition By the Bureau of the Validity of Your Mining Claim or Site? No Brainer, You Bet You. We'll Add That to the List. I Can See We're Going to Be Busy. Okay. Holy Cow. I Can't Figure this One out. This Is Question -- Pete, Pete, Pete... I'll Never Forgive You For this One. Several Operators Have Submitted Existing Occupancy Forms and All They Have Is Equipment and Supplies Stored on Site Without A Presence of Structures That Could Be Inhabited like a Tool Shed, Example. Should I Return These Forms with A Note That There Had to Have Been a Residence or Structure Capable of Being Inhabited as of 8/18/96? Yes, You Could. Or You You Can Say Do You Want Me to Return it to You? They're Not Subject to the Reg. I Have Numerous of Calls from People Who Say We've Got a Couple of Fences and We May Want To Get in There at Some Point And Do Some Drilling. Do We Need to File It? The Answer Was No. No, If They Want To, it Will Have No Effect Because They Have No Occupancy as of the -- Occupancy or Structure Capable Of Supporting Occupancy as of The Date of the Regulation. It's Moot. Dennis, What Do You Do If Somebody Points a Gun at You? If Somebody Points a Gun at Me? Yes -- Well, That's a Two-pronged Question. What Do You Do If Somebody Points a Gun at You, and What Should We Do as Geologists and Field Specialists If Somebody Points a Gun at Us? First of All, If Somebody Points a Gun at You in the Course of Carrying out Your Duties Enforcing These Regulations, Do Whatever They Tell You. You Know, If They Tell You to Leave Immediately, Leave Immediately, and Then Report That to Your Law Enforcement Officers When You Get Back as Well as Reporting it to the State and Local Law Enforcement Officers Who Can Also Look at Charges for Assault Against Your Person, as Well as Title 18 of The United States Code Which Is A Federal Offense for Assault Against Your Person. So Certainly That Needs to Be Said. What Do You Do If Somebody Points a Gun at You? If Somebody Points a Gun at Me, I'm Going to Try to Retire To the Nearest Cover I Can Find And, Indeed, Probably Point a Gun at Them and Effect an Arrest. In Fact, It's Interesting That You Bring up That Point. One of the Very First Arrests I Ever Made by a BLM Ranger Involved Somebody Occupying A, Quote-unquote, Mill Site Claim. However, the Only Thing They Were Located upon Was a Retired BLM Fire Station That Happened To Have an Electrical Hook-up. They Hooked Their Trailer up to The Electrical Hook-up. When Our Ranger Escorted the Utility Company to Disconnect Them, the Woman Besided to Point A Shotgun at the Ranger and Because of That, There Was No Mining Law Involved. She Went Direct to Jail, Did Not Pass Go, Did Not Collect $200. Bad Choice, Bad Choice. Thanks, Dennis. We Have a Series of Questions in From Ann Falcon in the Caliente Resource Area. I Will Run Through Them Quickly. I Think Each of Us May Have Something to Say Bit. It Touches on a Lot of the Work We Have All Talked about. Situation 1: Currently Active Claim to Settle an Occupancy We're in the Process of Exchanging a Portion of the Claim. We've Received a 3715 Form from The Claimant. Should We Do a Surface Use Determination or Let the Land Exchange Settle the Occupancy? Maybe We Should Handle That One Right off the Bat. Suggestions? What Did I Write on the Paper On That One Earlier, Matt? Nothing. Nutting? I Don't Know. Can the Exchange Get You out of It Faster? Is it Appropriate to Do the Surface Use Determination to Decide Whether or Not this Person Ought to Be There to Begin with? It May Change Your View of Your Willingness to Go Through and ex -- than Exchange. as We Continue with These Questions, and These Questions Are All Good, I Don't Have Any Dumb Questions in this Stack, We've Had Very, Very Few Dumb Questions. I'm Thrilled and Pleased with What's Come In. We're Start to Go Move from Questions That Ask about Principles into Questions That Ask about Strategy for Individual Cases, and I Think We're Best Equipped to Answer Questions on Principles Rather Than Questions on Strategy. Questions on Strategy Might Be Best Given to Us over Groupwise. Situation Number 2: to Settle The Occupancy We're in the Process of a Land Exchange. The Claim Has Lapsed since the Exchange Began. We Have Not Received a 3715 Form From the Claimant. Should We Do a Surface Use Determination? Oh, Dear, We're off Again. I Knew it Was Coming. There's Somebody at Mci Who Is Clumsy Who Keeps Backing into The off Switch. Either That or They're Doing Something Where the off Switch Is Located. Okay. Well, I Understand We Had Some -- I Understand We Had Some Audio Difficulties. It Wasn't Mci. It Was Us, I Think. But We're Back, in Any Event. Well, it Was Somewhere. Again, Thank You for Calling Anding Us We Were Having Audio Difficulties. The Problem Seems to Have Been Cured. It Was Fortunately Short this Time. We're Not Sure Where it Occurred, and it May Have Happened at a -- One or Two Downlink Sites. Excuse Me. Here We Go. Taking this from the Top, to Settle the Occupancy We Are in The Process of a Land Exchange. The Claim Has Lapsed since the Exchange Began. We Have Not Received a 3715 Form From the Claimant. Should We Do a Surface Use Determination or Let the Land Exchange Settle the Occupancy? Trespass Notice Would Be One. It's No Longer a Mining Claim. That's Right. The. The Mining Claim Is Gone. Whatever Happens to the Land Exchange Happens. Just Get That Finalized There. Here's a Fun One, Situation 3: the Claimant Did Not Tell Us Of the Occupancy of a Watchman. When We Discovered the Watchman After 17 Years, the Occupant, Who Is Not the Claimant, but Has A Claim next to the Occupancy, Asked to Exchange the Property. Somewhere I'm Expecting to Find A Statement That They Crossed The International Dateline and How Does That Affect It. The Land Exchange Process Is Has Not Started Due to Backlog. It's Uncertain or Unknown When It Will Happen. The Claim Is Still Active with The Original Claimant. I'm Not Sure What We Mean by Active Here, Like, Is There Mining Going on or Just Stuff Going On? The Watchman Is Used to Protect The Claimant's Private Property But Little If Any Mining Ever Occurs. The Land Is Within Five Miles of Civilization and Has State Highways up to the Dirt Road to The Claim. Does the Land Exchange Replace The 3715 Process and Is as it Stands If We Do a Surface Use Determination, it Will Probably Request the Occupant to Leave. First Off, I Don't Think this Is A Front-burner Issue. If It's Been There for 17 Years and Suddenly Rose to the Top, It's Sort of Like, Oh? Well, Maybe. Sounds to Me Like, Yeah, Surface Use Determination Might Be Appropriate, but it Wouldn't Be One That I Personally, If I Had Other Things on My Platter, Would Schedule next Week. You Might Request Them to File the Information Required Under 3715 and Then Take it from There, See What Happens Later On. These Kind of Time Frames Also Cause a Great Deal of Difficulty, If You Were Looking At a Criminal Resolution, Because Frankly the Criminal Side of the U.s. Attorney's Office Is Not Interested in Stale Cases. In a Stale Case You Would Probably Be Looking at a Civil Resolution at Best. this Is about as Stale as They Come, and I Don't See Any Evidence of Criminality in What's Written up Here. Here Is an Interesting One from California. A Depression Era Mine Site with Relatively Well Preserved Mill Facilities and Numerous Residential Quarters Has Had a Caretaker on the Site for a Number of Years. Here We Go Again. This Is a Different Part of California. This Is Not the Same Case. It's Two Different Resource Areas, but Things Start to Sound Similar after a While. The Claims Have Not Been Mind Since 1942, Possibly Shut down By War Production Board Order L 402 or 408. The Historical Character of the Property Does Need Protection From Vandalism but a Caretaker Cannot Be Authorized Within the Scope of 43 Cfr 3809 or 3715. Does Anyone Have a Suggestion? Scott? What Would You Do? He's Been out There for X Amount of Years -- Well, a Long Time. a Longggg Time. Sounds like You Ought to Make Him a Volunteer. I Don't Say That Flippantly. That's Not a Flippant Suggestion. That Might Be a Case Where You Turn Around to Somebody and Say, Would You like to Volunteer And Do this Job? We Offer You the Opportunity to Keep Staying Where You're Staying? We Do Have a Case of That in Nevada Right Now Where We Do Have a Volunteer out Protecting A Site Looking out after Our Interests. Yeah. an Old Building That Was Built out of Glass, Very Rare, And Individuals Are Staying out There and Keeping an Eye on it For Us. Is That the Bottle House? Yes. That's a Well-known Historic Site and I Have Been out There And It's Beautiful and Well Worth Preserving. A Question from Montana. What Is a Reasonable Range of Alternatives on a 3715 Ea Environmental Assessment for Reasonable Incident Occupancy. We Said We Would Punt on That One and We Will Continue to Punt Away. We May Make it to the Redskins If We Keep Getting Good at Punting. Or Perhaps San Diego Chargers. Next Week There Will Be a Video, Interactive Video Course, like This on the NEPA Process. Matt and I and Gregg Simmons From the Arizona State Office Will Conspire Early next Week to Come up with Perhaps a Range of Alternatives That Can Get Kicked Around on That Video Course. And We Will Also See about Getting Some Guidance out as Interim Guidance. Again, this Is One of Those Things That Takes a Little Bit More Thought and an Off-the-cuff Answer Doesn't Really Work Here. Some of These Things Are Going To Be Basically Driven by the Site at Hand and the Circumstances at Hand. Remember, NEPA Is Site Specific. There Are Certain Big Broad Parameters We Can Give You, but We Haven't Thought Those Through Yet. Regrettably, No Matter How Hard We Try, How Hard We Would Like To, We Are Not Going to Be Able to Give You a Cookbook with A List of Ingredients That Will Fit Every Possibility with High Altitude and Low Altitude Recipes. It Just Isn't Going to Happen. A Lot of Thought and a Lot of Thinking Is Going to Have to Go Into this. Does Every Every Occupancy Form Filed Need a Concurrence or Nonconcurrence Decision? Yes. Yes and No. Technically Yes, Unless the Individual Decides to Quit. Let's Say You Have an Individual Who Is Not Reasonably Incident, Files the Form. We Go out. We Do this -- Surface Use Determination That's Signed by a Certified Mineral Examiner, and We Take it to Him and Say, Boy, You're Not Even Close. The Person Gets up and Quits and Says, Good-bye. We Don't Have to Go Any Further. We Close the Case. If the Person Doesn't Quit, We're onto the next Phase. Matt? You've Said Appear Claimant Has to Relinquish or Partially Relinquish the Claim Prior to Obtaining a 2920 Lease. Why Do They Have to Relinquish. A 2920 Does Not Segregate Against Filing Future Mining Claims So Others Could Take over The Lease. Scott? I Think it Goes Back to the Rights of a Mining Claimant to Have the Right to Occupy, and in Our -- Generally How We've Been Working in Our Resource Area We Will Not Issue a 2920 Permit for Occupancy on a Mining Claim Unless the Mining Claimant Relinquishes the Rights to the Occupancy Area. We're Not Lookinging at the Entire Mining Claim. I Don't Have an Answer in Terms Of Where Is it in Writing. Rick Might Have a Better Idea. It's Sort of a Procedural Thing That Looks Back to the Old Mining Claim Occupancy Act. They Had to Relinquish the Area Around Their Occupancy and Relinquish Those Other Pieces of The Claim in Order to Get That Small Piece of Ground. It's Sort of a -- You Know, Common Currency of Doing Business in BLM. We Can't Really Come up with an Answer in Minerals as to Why We Want Them to Do That Other than There Is the Mining Law and You Have the Right to Occupy under The Mining Law If You Want to Occupy under Some Other Purpose, Quit Your Mining Claim. it Also -- since a Fee Is Also Required under 2920, this Also -- There Is Also the Acreage That Is Defined for the Occupancy Site Helps to Establish the Rate and You Don't Want to Hit Them up for a 20-acre Piece. Okay. Suppose an Occupancy Form Is Filed and the Office Determines That There Really Is No Occupancy for Whatever Reason. Would a Letter to the Claimant Stating There Is No Occupancy Serve in Lieu of a Decision? Why Not? I Can't Think of a Good Reason. a Phone Call May Also Work. Yeah. as Long as It's Documented. as Long as It's Documented. Remember, If It's Not Documented, it Didn't Happen. So as Long as You Get Some Kind Of Documentation into the Case File, a Phone Call May Be the End of It. under the Definition of Occupancy, What's the Difference Between the Presence of People And the Presence of Structures? Essentially Nothing. I Mean, the Presence of People Is You've Got an Existing Occupancy That's Ongoing, and You've Just Discovered it after 17 Years. The Presence of Structures Capable of Sheltering People Is The Functional Equivalent of Occupancy. We Have Designed a Net Big Enough to Catch Somebody Putting A Structure out on the Public Lands That Could Be Lived In. it May Seem a Little Redundant but the Question Goes On to Ask: Are Occupancy and Residence Interchangeable or Synonymous? They Are Partially Synonymous In That Residency Means You're There, You're Living There, You're on the Claim 24 Hours a Day and It's Your Sole Place of Residence. Occupancy Means That There's a Building out There That's Capable of Supporting Residency. Good. I Have Just Handed Dennis a Question and Asked Him If it Has Any Elements of Criminality in It. It's a Very Long Question That Falls into the Category of I've Got this Problem, How Would I Approach it for Strategy? So We Probably Can't Answer the Whole Question, but Can You Kind Of Summarize What You Think it Is? Is That One Wyoming? this One Is Wyoming. Let Me Take a Stab at That First. The Very First Thing That I See In this Is That You Have Somebody Who Is Not Only Saying That There Is No Authority -- Well, the Individual Has Said That He Lives on a Mill Site. The Mill Site Was Part of a Placer Claim Found Invalid in '93. He's Appealed and Got a Statement. He Refused to Pay His $100 Filing Fee on Constitutional Grounds. He Has a Stay for That. He Says He's Exempt from 3809. There Are No Exemptions from 3809. He Says His Mill Site Predates 3809. We're Sorry, That Doesn't Work. He Has Preempt Authority, Whatever That Means. He Says That Parking Equipment On Federal Land Is Not Disturbance and Cannot Count Towards the Five-acre Rule. He Denounces BLM. Stand in Line. Take a Number. No Electricity. No County Permits. Denies That the State Has the Authority to Make Him Pay a Bond And Blames BLM State Conspiracy For His Failure to Produce and I Suppose Black Helicopters and Blue Helmets. Okay. What's Going on Here? This Guy Is Saying the Entire Structure of Regulatory Management of Operations on the Public Lands Is Illegitimate. The Very First Thing Do You Is Call over to the State and Say, What Are You Guys Going to Do? There's No State Permit. Sortly Deq Has a Pretty Strong Set of Enforcement Teeth and They Have Never Been Shy in Wyoming about Using Them. You Have No County Permits. I Suspect this Is Sweetwater County. Sweetwater County Ought to Be Contacted and You Begin at the Local Level, and You Begin to Demonstrate That, No, He Has No Permits, No, He Has No County Authorization, and You Begin to See If There Isn't Some Violation at the State Level That Will Help You Lever this Guy out. Great. We're Just about out of Time. We Did Find Page 1 of Pete's Fax During the Grace Period, Rick, And We Have to Do this Quick, Are People Required to Keep the Same Level of Occupancy or Can They Increase it During the Grace Period? Say That Again. During the Grace Period, Can People Increase Their Level of Occupancy or Do They -- Are They Required to Keep at the Same Level? We're Silent on That and We've Never -- We Haven't Addressed That Issue. We Will Address That Issue in Interim Guidance. My First Answer Is, If It's Reasonably Incident to Increase Your Level of Occupancy, It's Okay. Well, We Weren't Able to Get To All of Your Questions Today And over the Last Three Days. We Still Have a Few in the Stack. The Instructors Have All Promised to Answer Questions by Phone or Groupwise. We Do Encourage Groupwise Questions to Avoid Playing Phone Tag. Please Keep in Touch with Us. Over the Last Three Days We've Examined a Spectrum of Mining Claim Use and Occupancy Issues. We Know We Haven't Answered Everyone's Questions and We're Not Sure That There Are Answers To Everything Just Yet. In the Meantime, It's Important That We All Work Diligently and Document Diligently. Remember, If it Isn't Documented. It Didn't Happen. I Would like to Thank Rick Deeree, Scott Murrellwright, Dennis Mclane and Bob Gibson for Joining Us this Week. It's Been a Really Busy Three Days, a Little Uneven at Times And We Really Thank You for Your Participation. This Telecast Is One in a Series Of Satellite Courses Offered by The BLM National Training Center. We Value Your Suggestions and Comments. Please Mail Us Your Evaluation Forms So That We Can Continue to Bring You the Best in Distance Learning. Thanks for Your Participation.