Dispute resolution at the Department of the Interior - by program or chance

Procedures for resolution of disputes within the Department of the Interior are ephemeral and historically chaotic. Long delays, lack of direction, arbitrariness excused as discretion, and abuses of statutory and regulatory processes are explained and frequently justified as "bureaucratic baggage." Indecision is frequently traceable to interagency policy conflicts and a total absence of any procedure for dispute resolution. From my investigations, inside and outside of the Department, however, I have found no rational explanation why the resolution of disputes between a government agency and users of public lands cannot follow procedures that seem to work expeditiously between and among private parties, viz., good faith problem analysis, hearing and decision, arbitration, and direct judicial review. Impediments in the Department's dispute resolution process stem in large part from four sources. First, from the diverse and frequently inconsistent substantive interests of its wide