The land, and what it promised, has always been a part of our Nation's history. It is especially vivid in a place once called the “Land of the Dead” by those who first laid eyes on it.

This place is the California Desert!

The story of the California Desert is really the story of America. How a people came together and put in words how they would work together to resolve their differences on sharing and caring for something they dearly cherish and love: The beautiful and exceptional California Desert.

This southwest desert is part of the public domain land that was left over after the rest was cleared, farmed, and developed. Throughout American history, the public domain was used by Congress and the Office of the President to help citizens and states to further settle the country.

This is the story about a California Desert Dream that was crushed by a systematic failure of government on all levels: legislative, executive and judicial.

The keys to that dream were provided to us and we let it slipped through our desert hands like grains of sand.

In 1976, Congress provided the legal framework for us to come together to forge workable compromises and balance competing interests for the betterment of our California Desert. Congress assigned the US Bureau of Land Management the duty to fulfill the contract with the American people in carrying out the California Desert mandate: making the most judicious use of the public land resources so that they can be utilized in the best combination that best meet the American people’s needs.

However, for more than three decades the California Desert had been divided – between those who want the land to be managed according to their values and those who want the land to be managed according to their values; and for the last ten years by litigation (a series of incomprehensible and unworkable court orders). It has become clear with every passing year that the California Desert, which was supposed to strike a just and fair balance between conserving and using the resources, became a tool for exercising power and influence.

The squandering of a great opportunity to do good by the American people is evident with each new court order and agency decision. It is highly unlikely that the political planets are going to line up again on anything resembling consensus on the California Desert in particular, or management of our public lands, in general. The California Desert comprehensive mandate was shattered along with any hope of finding common ground.

It did not have to be that way.

This book shares the dream and what happened to it. Read more...