Saturday, January 10, 2009

The Monkey Wrench


On Dec. 19, 2008 Tim DeChristopher bid on several oil and gas leases during a Bureau of Land Management auction in Salt Lake City. DeChristopher disrupted the auction of drilling leases by bidding up parcels of land by hundreds of thousands of dollars without any intention of paying for them.
Telluride News Article

DeChristopher, an economics student and environmental activist, had protested, written letters and spoken to his congressman about the lease of the land near several national parks. His new organization, bidder70.org, has raised over $45,000 to cover the first payment on the 22,500 acres.
bidder70.org

DeChristopher's lawyer, Patrick Shea, who was the head of the BLM under President Clinton, said it is not clear if the government will accept the payment since he has no plans to drill. Shea is working for free partly because he’s appalled at how the Bush Administration has run the BLM.


BLM map of oil and gas property in the west

thanks to trip "metrohunk" huxley