The Government Wants to Turn Public Land into ‘Affordable Housing’

“Our agencies can take inventory of underused federal properties, transfer or lease them to states or localities to address housing needs, and support the infrastructure required to make development viable,” they said. The details on how the newly-formed task force will characterize “underused” lands, however, are nonexistent. The op-ed goes on to say that much of the Department of Interior’s 500 million acres of federal land are suitable for residential use.

Guidelines on how and where exactly these land transfers will play out are yet to be revealed. Nearly half of all federal lands managed by the Interior are in Alaska, and the vast majority of the remainder is in rural areas of the West, where housing shortages aren’t nearly as acute as in urban areas.

However, the land transfers could be particularly useful to a handful of urban enclaves in states like California, Nevada, and Utah. Salt Lake City, for example, has already been laying the groundwork for exactly these kinds of developments. 2.8 million people currently live on the Wasatch Front, and with a growing population, projections anticipate a shortage of 153,000 houses and apartments by 2030.

In an interview with a local Utah news outlet last November, Redge Johnson, director of the Utah Public Lands Policy Coordinating Office, said, “As we keep growing, I think there should be or could be an option to take a look at some of these [federal] parcels within municipal boundaries.” He went on to clarify, “We’re not talking about public lands in the west desert or around the Moab area or around our parks or national monuments. That’s not the type of public lands we’re talking about.” Rather, Johnson and his office have their eyes on a handful of federal parcels strategically located on the edges of towns.

Already, the same tactic has been employed by Nevada. Last spring, the BLM initiated the process of selling 20 acres near Las Vegas at well below market value for affordable housing development. The DOI solicited public input before the sale, which ultimately went through in October for $2,000 total, or $100 an acre. The estimated market value was $2 million. The local Clark County will maintain ownership of the land, even once a planned 210 single-family homes are built. In the same area, the county purchased another five acres from the BLM in 2023 to build 195 apartments that will be rented out below market value to senior citizens once complete.

When it comes to land sales and developments like these examples, it’s worth noting that both Democrat and Republican politicians have approved of the method as a means of helping with housing shortages in the West. Both the Clark County sales were made under the Biden administration, and a handful of others were in the planning process. Additionally, the Forest Service in Colorado (though managed under the Department of Agriculture rather than the Interior) has already been making agreements to sell or lease land to build houses in mountain towns. Last April, the Forest Service and city of Dillon, Colorado, reached an agreement—made possible by the 2018 Farm Bill—allowing for the development of 177 rental units on Forest Service land, ten of which are to be reserved for forest staff.

Similarly, the town of Steamboat—also in Colorado—is in the process of purchasing an eight-acre Forest Service property on which to build around 100 housing units, with a quarter reserved for Forest Service employees, many of whom are being priced out of the once-sleepy mountain town. (One-day lift tickets to the ski area in town routinely retail for $310 nowadays, with housing prices reflecting that obscene price tag.) Another similar project in the town of Ketchum, Idaho, consisting of 80 units, is also in the early stages of negotiations, though this project is on land owned by the U.S. Forest Service.

But agreements like these can take years to formalize. That’s about to change, say Burgum and Turner. “Streamlining the regulatory process is a cornerstone of this partnership,” they write. “Historically, building on federal land is a nightmare of red tape—lengthy environmental reviews, complex transfer protocols and disjointed agency priorities. This partnership will cut through the bureaucracy. Interior will reduce the red tape behind land transfers or leases.”

It’s also worth noting that even though previous land transfers have taken place on the borders of rural areas, Burgum and Turner say explicitly in their op-ed that they plan to focus on “overlooked rural and tribal communities.” Expediting the process of selling rural public land to build affordable housing is concerning to many public land advocates as well as private property owners whose property values are based on those open spaces.

Backcountry Hunters & Anglers government relations director Kaden McArthur, for example, thinks it could be a step too far. “It seems like this is a perpetual one-way ratchet,” he told Outdoor Life. “There are certainly parcels where a well-planned land exchange or some sort of limited transfer make sense, but that’s got to be the exception, not the rule.”

Ryan Callaghan, MeatEater’s Director of Conservation, also called for more accountability in how local and state governments use these parcels of public land.

“Manifest Destiny Americans want to expand, and this administration wants to provide an easy, unregulated way to do so. City councils, county commissioners, and local state governments who have refused to provide the proper tools and incentives for responsible growth should be taking ownership and accountability rather than asking for a government handout that robs the American people of our public resources. Does the accountability start after this round of land sales or the next?” he asked.

It’s also uncertain that the new housing will actually benefit lower-income Americans rather than a slew of new vacation homes.

“Where are the assurances from DOI and HUD that the acres this task force selects to sacrifice are going to be the fewest and for the benefit of the most?” Callaghan asked. “After the sales are complete and the ‘housing’ is up, is it then time for local governments to ensure that the new developments actually provide housing for local residents? Will these projects include long-term protections that would prevent investment groups from inflating rental prices or selling to part-time or seasonal owners? If we, the American people, are asked to sacrifice our resources, this is one American who wants to know what I’m giving up for what I’m getting.”

More details on the initiative will likely emerge soon, but it appears to be trending on the side of “rule” rather than “exception.” Still, “this isn’t a free-for-all to build on federal lands,” the secretaries insist. They do note, though, that “this partnership will change how we use public resources.” Public land users would be wise to pay very close attention to what that change looks like as the taskforce begins to work.