Wyoming Republican Gov. Mark Gordon declined to veto an amendment in the state’s budget bill that now ties the Interior Department’s efforts to purchase a state-owned parcel in Grand Teton National Park to the fate of a hotly contested federal resource plan.
The amendment pushed by House Republicans directs the governor to reject the sale of the so-called Kelly Parcel to the federal government if the Bureau of Land Management approves the proposal to add conservation designations covering 1.8 million acres as part of a draft Rock Springs resource management plan update in southwest Wyoming.
The governor has the power of line-item veto, meaning he could have removed the amendment from the bill before signing it into law.
But Gordon on Friday signed the $10.6 billion biennial spending bill into law with the BLM amendment in place.
