Private Mineral Rights Complicate the Management of Eastern Wilderness Areas

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO studied the problems associated with private mineral rights for wilderness areas in the eastern United States. While the government has some regulatory control over mineral resource development in wilderness areas, it cannot deny the development of private mineral rights. However, such development conflicts with the legislation that created the National Wilderness Preservation System. That legislation restricted activities in wilderness areas to recreational, scenic, scientific, educational, historical, and conservation uses by the public.

GAO found that the Forest Service, which manages wilderness areas, experienced problems resulting from the possible development of private mineral rights in four wilderness areas and one potential wilderness area in the eastern United States. In one wilderness area, the owner of mineral rights for the area submitted a plan to mine coal. The Forest Service determined that such mining could be destructive to the area, and attempted to acquire the mineral rights. However, the owner and the Forest Service could not agree on a price for the rights, and the Forest Service believes that it must allow mining. Based on this and other such experiences, GAO and the Forest Service believe that such problems could increase because the Forest Service cannot legally prevent mineral development and Congress is unlikely to appropriate funds to acquire mineral rights for more wilderness areas. GAO also found that, in 1979, the Forest Service submitted recommendations to Congress regarding expansion of the wilderness system. However, the Forest Service did not consider the problems associated with private mineral rights for proposed wilderness areas. The Forest Service is currently reevaluating its wilderness recommendations.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

Director: Michael Gryszkowiec Team: General Accounting Office: Resources, Community, and Economic Development Division Phone: (202) 275-7756