By Patrick Payne
Years ago, I moved to Texas for a short time for a job opportunity. Overall it’s a nice conservative state with wonderful people. But despite its cowboy western reputation, outdoorsmen in the Lone Star State face a major problem: no public lands. Talking to my new Texan friends at the shooting range one day, I asked them where they go to hunt. “Oh man, it’s tough,” they told me, “you basically have to know a rancher and get permission to go on their land.”
Permission? So much for the wild west.
Here in Idaho, hunters, anglers, and sportsmen of all stripes have won the proverbial lottery when it comes to places to enjoy our outdoor heritage. Idaho has millions of acres of pristine wilderness, nearly all open to the public. But this multi-generational endowment is now facing threats from both the Left and (sadly) the Right.
There is a growing faction of Republicans here in Idaho and other Rocky Mountain states who want to see public lands divested from the federal government and turned over to state control. They seem to believe that unlike the federal government, state government is inherently less inefficient and corrupt (hang on, let me catch my breath… I’m still laughing). Perhaps they’re forgetting the many instances of waste and fraud at the state level, such as Pocatello’s forensics lab boondoggle.[1]
There are some valid gripes about federal (mis)management of our land, of course. For instance, the unsightly Bird-Chopper 5000 wind farms going up on BLM land are something Idahoans don’t want, and something the Trump administration is working to reverse.[2] The same goes for better management of wildfire prevention. But make no mistake, the big reason for the interest in this land in Idaho is financial. Representative Heather Scott, co-chair of the Idaho Freedom Caucus said “federally owned lands impacts Idaho’s ability to generate necessary local property tax revenues, limits private land ownership, results in a constant potential for dangerous wildfires, and creates friction between the public, state and federal entities when it comes to management.”[3] (Emphasis added)
So let me get this straight, conservatives in our state legislature want to control our public lands not to manage them better, but to sell them off to private entities so they can bring in more property tax revenue? That seems to be the plan.
In fact, our own state constitution stipulates[4] that state-owned land be used to “secure the maximum long term financial return” of the state. What would secure a better financial return for the state, keeping the lands open to recreational use, or putting up condos?
Our neighbors to the south are facing the same pressure. U.S. Senator Mike Lee’s own website[5] has language bemoaning the fact that federal land in Utah has not yet been sold off as it has in other states. Land developers are no doubt watching this battle with dollar signs in their eyes.
Housing is another issue that’s often brought up. Don’t we need this land to be developed so that we can house our growing population? In short, no. Idaho, like every other state, is facing a fertility crisis[6] and were it not for immigration, would be experiencing a major population decline. If President Trump makes good on his promise to deport the tens of thousands of migrants in Idaho illegally, homebuyers will see some relief from the housing crunch. Easing burdensome regulations and lowering interest rates[7] are also potential solutions. At any rate, selling our birthright for a mess of pottage is unwise.
Similar to the recent arguments against a convention of states[8], if this land changes hands we simply have no idea what will happen. Will it give Idahoans more say in how the land is managed? Or will out of state firms swoop in like vultures to snatch it all up? Hard to say. The federal government may be slow and inefficient but they’re nothing if not predictable. They’ve controlled this land since Idaho became a state in 1890 and it’s still here. They’ve done nothing with it. Good.
It comes down to this, all of the mismanagement of this land by the federal government can be fixed. Windmills can be torn down, deadfall can be cleared from our forest floors. Wresting control of this land from the feds only to sell it off to the highest bidder, however, is permanent. Once this land is gone, it’s gone forever, and your grandchildren will grow up in a very different Idaho. Texas, we love you, but we don’t want to be you.
I urge my fellow Idaho conservatives to conserve our wilderness and hold the line against the financial interests who want this beautiful land liquidated. Let’s keep the West wild.
[1] https://idahofreedom.org/what-happened-with-isu-and-bannock-county-lab-money-anatomy-of-a-malfeasance/
[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/saradorn/2025/01/15/trump-calls-windmills-an-economic-and-environmental-disaster-in-latest-rant-against-turbines/
[3] https://gemstatechronicle.com/2024/10/the-public-land-question-continues/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
[4] https://sos.idaho.gov/elect/stcon/article_IX.html?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
[5] https://www.lee.senate.gov/issue-lands
[6] https://www.wsj.com/world/birthrates-global-decline-cause-ddaf8be2
[7] https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/trump-says-he-will-demand-lower-interest-rates-immediately-2025-01-23/
[8] https://gemstatechronicle.com/2025/02/why-i-dont-support-a-convention-of-states/
About Patrick Payne
"Patrick is a husband, father, blogger, and podcaster. He holds a degree in political science from the University of Utah and is currently the co-host of The Copybook Headings Podcast and Rocky Mountain Radio.
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