To the Editor:

State legislatures in Nevada, Utah and other western states and some of their representatives in Congress, have been wailing of late of the “unfair” amount of federal land in their states and asking or even demanding that those lands be turned over to the states.
But, as is all too often the case with these folks, they have been looking at things backwards.  The question is not how much federal lands we have, rather it is how much other, non-federal lands do we have.
Looked at this way we find that Nevada is right in the middle of the states in terms of non-federal lands, 23 states have less and 26 have more.  We have 4.1 acres of such lands per capita, nearly 6 times more than Massachusetts and about 3 times more than Florida and California for example.  But instead of appreciating what we have, too many of our state and national legislators are scheming to steal federal lands from the other 49 states.
I am sure that those “have not” states like California would take serious issue at this bare-faced and unjustified land grab.  And considering Nevada’s history with School Trust Lands, where it’s “wise” management turned four million acres into three thousand acres, we should all oppose these idiotic ideas if we want to have any public lands left at all.

Tony Barron
Mesquite