Each of the four major federal land management agencies manages its lands and the resources they contain on the basis of its legislatively mandated responsibilities. In general, the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Park Service manage their lands primarily for noncommodity uses. The Fish and Wildlife Service manages its lands primarily to conserve and protect fish and wildlife and their habitat, although other uses—such as recreation (including hunting and fishing), mining and mineral leasing, livestock grazing, and timber harvesting—are allowed when they are compatible with the primary purposes for which the lands are managed. The National Park Service manages its lands to conserve, preserve, protect, and interpret the nation’s natural, cultural, and historic resources for the enjoyment and recreation of current and future generations. Conversely, the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management are legislatively mandated to manage their lands for both commodity and noncommodity uses. For example, the Forest Service’s organic legislation—the Organic Administration Act of 1897—refers to water flows and timber supply. The Multiple Use-Sustained Yield Act of 1960 added responsibilities for recreation, range, and fish and wildlife and required the agency to manage its lands so as to sustain all of these uses. The National Forest Management Act of 1976 (1) recognized wilderness as a use of the forests and (2) modified the Forest Service’s mandate for fish and wildlife to require the maintenance of diverse plant and animal communities (biological diversity). Similarly, the Federal Land Policy Management Act of 1976 requires the Bureau of Land Management to manage its lands for multiple uses and sustained yield. The act defines multiple uses to include recreation; range; timber; minerals; watershed; fish and wildlife and their habitat; and natural, scenic, scientific, and historic values. Both the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management have legislatively based incentives for producing resource commodities. For example, the Forest Service receives some of its operating funds from the receipts of timber sales under the Knutson-Vandenberg Act of 1930, which authorizes the national forests to retain a portion of their timber sale receipts to help fund reforestation and other activities as well as regional office and headquarters expenses. Under the Taylor Grazing Act of 1934, the Bureau of Land Management may issue permits for the use of rangelands only to persons engaged in the business of livestock grazing. The permits may not be issued for other uses, such as to provide habitat for fish and wildlife. As a result, the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management have managed their lands to a great extent for commodity uses, such as timber harvesting, livestock grazing, and mineral production. In addition, all four agencies must comply with the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). NEPA and its implementing regulations specify the procedures for integrating environmental considerations into the agencies’ management of lands and resources. In managing their lands and resources, the agencies must also comply with the requirements of other environmental statutes, including the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Clean Air Act, as well as numerous other laws and regulations. The Forest Service alone is subject to 212 laws affecting its activities and programs. Authority for implementing and enforcing these laws is dispersed among several federal agencies, including the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Department of Commerce’s National Marine Fisheries Service, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, as well as state and local agencies. Several changes and developments suggest a basis for reviewing the current approach to federal land management with an eye to improving its efficiency and effectiveness. These changes and developments include the increased similarity in the responsibilities and the increased complexity in the management of federal lands, together with budgetary and ecological considerations. Over time, the responsibilities of the four major federal land management agencies have grown more similar. Specifically, the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management now provide more noncommodity uses on their lands. For instance, in 1964, less than 3 percent (16 million acres) of their lands were managed for conservation—as wilderness, wild and scenic rivers, and recreation. By 1994, this figure had increased to about 24 percent (over 108 million acres). According to Forest Service officials, several factors have required the agency to assume increased responsibilities for noncommodity uses, especially for biological diversity and recreation. These factors include (1) the interaction of legislation, regulation, case law, and administrative direction, (2) growing demands for noncommodity uses on Forest Service lands, and (3) activities occurring outside the national forests, such as timber harvesting on state, industrial, and private lands. With this shift in its responsibilities, the Forest Service is less able to meet the demands for commodity uses on its lands, especially for timber harvesting. For example, 77 percent of the 24.5 million acres of Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management lands in western Washington State, Oregon, and California that were available for commercial timber harvesting have been set aside or withdrawn primarily for noncommodity uses. In addition, although the remaining 5.5 million acres, or 22 percent, are available for regulated harvesting, the minimum requirements for maintaining biological diversity and water quality may limit the timing, location, and amount of harvesting that can occur. Moreover, harvests from these lands could be further reduced by plans to protect threatened and endangered salmon. The volume of timber sold from Forest Service lands in the three states declined from 4.3 billion board feet in 1989 to 0.9 billion board feet in 1994, a decrease of about 80 percent. While our work at the Bureau of Land Management has been more limited, this agency is also assuming increased responsibilities for noncommodity uses. This shift in responsibilities of the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management to more noncommodity uses has contributed to what is sometimes referred to as a “blurring of the lines” among the four major federal land management agencies. Some Forest Service officials are concerned about the workability of the agency’s current statutory framework, which they believe is making the management of the national forests increasingly complex. They believe that it is sometimes difficult to reconcile differences among laws and regulations. For example, the National Forest Management Act requires the Forest Service to maintain diverse plant and animal communities. One process that nature uses to produce such biological diversity is periodic small wildfires that create a variety of habitats. However, until recently, a federal policy required the suppression of all fires on federal lands. As a result, there has been an accumulation of fuels on the forests’ floors. The Forest Service now plans to undertake prescribed burning to restore the forests’ health and avoid unnaturally catastrophic fires. However, the minimum standards for air quality required under the Clean Air Act may at times prohibit the Forest Service from achieving this goal by limiting the timing, location, and amount of prescribed burning that can occur. In addition, the minimum standards for water quality required under the Clean Water Act and the conservation of species listed as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act also can limit the timing, location, and amount of prescribed burning that can occur, since soils from burned areas wash into streams, modifying species’ habitats. Reconciling differences among laws and regulations is further complicated by the dispersal of authority for these laws among several federal agencies and state and local agencies. Disagreements among the agencies on whether or how these requirements can best be met sometimes delay projects and activities. According to officials in the federal land management and regulatory agencies with whom we spoke, these disagreements often stem from differing evaluations of environmental impacts and risks. For example, in 1995, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Marine Fisheries Service, and EPA could not agree with the Forest Service on the extent of risk the Thunderbolt salvage timber sale—on the Boise and Payette National Forests in central Idaho—may have to salmon spawning habitat. The federal government’s increased emphasis on downsizing and budgetary constraint demands that federal agencies look beyond existing jurisdictional boundaries to find ways to reduce costs, increase efficiency, and improve service to the public. Such gains could be achieved by refocusing, combining, or eliminating certain functions, systems, programs, activities, or field locations. Joint efforts in planning and budgeting; joint use of administrative, technical, and management systems; and joint stewardship of natural and cultural resources could lead to greater efficiency. For instance, in 1985 the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management proposed to the Congress to merge all field offices located in the same communities in western Oregon, restructure boundaries to achieve the optimum size and balance among land units, and eliminate some managerial and overhead positions. The agencies projected that this proposal would have reduced the number of permanent employees by 280 and would have achieved annual savings of $10.3 million (in 1985 dollars) once it was fully implemented. The Congress did not act on this “interchange” proposal. Ecological considerations also suggest that the federal land management agencies rethink their organizational structures and relationships with one another. Scientific research has increased the agencies’ understanding of the importance and functioning of natural systems, such as watersheds, airsheds, soils, and vegetative and animal communities, specific components of which (e.g., threatened and endangered species and wetlands) are protected under various environmental statutes. The boundaries of these natural systems are often not consistent with existing jurisdictional and administrative boundaries. Hence, activities and uses affecting these systems may need to be coordinated and managed across federal land units and agencies. For example, federal efforts to restore the environment of South Florida—including the Everglades and Florida Bay—transcend existing jurisdictional and administrative boundaries and involve numerous federal agencies, including the National Park Service, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Marine Fisheries Service, EPA, and the Corps of Engineers.