A California Race Making Waves Across the West
A congressional candidate in Northern California is getting op-eds published in Colorado and Montana — because the precedent set at Point Reyes National Seashore isn't just a California problem. When federal agencies bypass environmental review for private conservation deals, every rancher, timber community, and rural county in the American West pays the price.
California Backroom Deal Adds a New Threat to Big Sky Country
Published in Montana's paper of record for Gallatin County and the Bozeman metro area, this letter draws a direct line between the January 2025 Point Reyes National Seashore settlement and the risks facing Big Sky Country's own federal lands. When the National Park Service and The Nature Conservancy executed a $30 million deal to remove 11 multi-generational ranching families from 12 Point Reyes ranches — with no public hearing and no NEPA environmental review — they didn't just set California precedent. They demonstrated a template that any federal agency could apply to any national park, forest, or public land in the country, including in Montana.
A NEPA bypass in California is a NEPA bypass everywhere. If a federal agency can restructure land use at a national seashore through a private conservation organization without environmental review, the same procedural shortcut is available for any federal land across the West — from Glacier to the Gallatin National Forest.
The Bozeman Chronicle reaches ranchers, farmers, and outdoor recreation communities throughout southwest Montana — people who depend on federal land governance being transparent, lawful, and open to public input. The letter argues that Montanans have a direct stake in holding California federal agencies accountable for the precedent they set.
Oil Leases Put Profits Before People
Published in the Durango Herald — southwest Colorado's newspaper of record and the voice of a community navigating the intersection of energy extraction, outdoor recreation, and rural livelihoods — this op-ed addresses how federal energy leasing policy consistently prioritizes corporate extraction revenue over the long-term interests of the people who actually live on and near the land. Durango sits in the San Juan Basin, one of the most actively drilled natural gas regions in the American Southwest.
Federal energy leasing decisions — like federal conservation deals — are being made at the agency level, without meaningful public participation, in ways that impose costs on rural communities while extracting value for distant corporations. The same accountability deficit drives both problems.
The Durango Herald reaches the Four Corners region where Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Arizona meet — a landscape shaped by federal energy policy, tribal sovereignty, and public land governance. The piece connects Burgess's platform theme of federal accountability to the energy justice concerns of a Western community far outside CA-2.
Montanans Should Be Watching This California Court Case
A second letter published in the Bozeman Chronicle argues that the federal court challenge to the Point Reyes settlement — filed in the Northern District of California — has direct implications for how public land decisions are made across the West. When a court ruling establishes what procedural safeguards federal agencies must follow before executing conservation deals with private organizations, that ruling sets precedent for every national park, forest, and grassland from California to Montana.
The legal question being litigated in California — whether the National Park Service can restructure federal land use through a private conservation settlement without NEPA review — will be answered by a federal judge whose ruling applies nationwide. Montana ranchers and timber communities have a direct stake in that answer.
Six Forces Converging to Drive Up Food Costs
Published in Longmont's daily paper of record — serving Boulder County and the northern Front Range of Colorado — this letter documents the simultaneous convergence of pressures on America's food economy: a 75-year cattle herd low, fertilizer spikes driven by the Iran war, H5N1 avian flu with 25% fewer surveillance personnel, the largest SNAP cut in program history, climate-driven agricultural collapse, and diesel surcharges hitting every rural community. The letter projects an additional $5,400 per family per year in food costs by 2027–28, rising to $17,000 by mid-century.
Six independent economic forces are converging on the American food supply simultaneously — and the federal government has canceled the 30-year Household Food Security Survey that would measure the human cost. The Agricultural Resilience Imperative, briefed to 104 congressional offices across both parties, documents 14 evidence-based recommendations that can materially reduce that trajectory.
Why the U.S. Food Supply Can't Wait
Published in Bay to Bay News — the regional news network serving the Delmarva Peninsula (Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia) — this op-ed is tailored to one of the most concentrated poultry-producing regions on Earth. Perdue's operations on the Delmarva Peninsula produce billions of pounds of chicken annually, making H5N1 avian flu not a distant threat but an immediate economic and public health crisis for the region's farms, processing plants, and workers. The piece opens with an FDR quote on soil and forests, then documents how six simultaneous forces are converging on the American food supply.
H5N1 is spreading through bird populations at the precise moment APHIS has lost 25% of its surveillance staff. Chesapeake Bay blue crab and oyster harvests are in documented climate-driven decline. Iran conflict diesel surges hit every refrigerated truck and processing facility on the peninsula. $187 billion in SNAP cuts are reaching Sussex County's agricultural worker families. A California candidate is making the case that these are not separate problems — they are one convergence.
The byline credits Burgess as holding a master's degree in public health and as a CA-2 candidate — the first time this credential appears in a national byline, connecting his public health authority to his food security legislative work.
Federal Land Accountability
Has No State Lines
The January 2025 Point Reyes settlement demonstrated something that every rancher, tribal nation, and rural county in the American West already knew: federal agencies can restructure land use through private organizations without environmental review, without public hearings, and without Congressional authorization — and the communities affected have little recourse. Gregory Burgess is the only CA-2 candidate making that connection explicit, and taking it to the papers that serve the communities most at risk of seeing the same template applied on their land.
One Precedent, Five Papers, One Platform
Gregory Burgess's earned media strategy is built on a single through-line: when federal agencies make major land-use decisions through private deals — bypassing NEPA, skipping public hearings, and avoiding Congressional authorization — it isn't a local story. It's a national one. Every publication below is receiving a version of the same argument tailored to what's at stake for their specific community.
In January 2025, the NPS and TNC finalized a $30 million deal removing 11 ranching families from 12 ranches at Point Reyes National Seashore. No public hearing. No NEPA review. No Congressional authorization. The deal was challenged in federal court under the Major Questions Doctrine.
The Bozeman Chronicle piece argues that the procedural template — agency + private conservation org, no public process — is portable. It can be applied anywhere federal land abuts private conservation priorities. Big Sky ranchers and Gallatin Forest users have a stake in the California outcome.
The Durango Herald piece connects energy leasing accountability to the same structural problem: federal decisions with massive community impact made without meaningful public participation. The San Juan Basin's communities know exactly what it feels like when agency decisions favor distant interests over local ones.
Burgess has filed an amicus brief in Niman v. Burgum (No. 3:25-cv-01976-MMC) and submitted a 25-category FOIA request on the NPS settlement. His platform includes the Federal Lands Stewardship & Right of Return Act — which would require public hearings before any federal land decision displacing agricultural stewards.
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