New West: "A day after Sen. Conrad Burns made the first step in banning all new oil and gas leases on Montana's Rocky Mountain Front, Questar E&P, a natural gas company, decided to hand 1,691 acres of its leases in the Front's Blackleaf Canyon area over to Trout Unlimited. Trout Unlimited's Vice President for Conservation, Chris Wood, said TU had been in negotiations for some time on the Front leases, but the Burns language introduced yesterday in the Interior Appropriations Bill was a final piece of the puzzle...
"This deal is a first of its kind, Wood said, but hopefully not the last -- on the Front or West-wide...
"The Burns move is one of a few such surprises in the last two weeks on the issue of oil, gas and public lands. Last week, Republican congresswoman Heather Wilson (who is running for re-election) signed on with Democrat Tom Udall to support legislation to keep oil and gas development out of New Mexico's Valle Vidal. A few days earlier, Wyoming Republican Sen. Craig Thomas had a bombshell of his own, saying generally, national forests should be off limits to energy exploration."
Category: 2008 Presidential Election
6:01:45 PM 
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