BLM and the Forest Service manage over two-thirds of the nation’s public lands. Both agencies manage their lands for multiple uses, including providing sustained yield of renewable resources, such as timber, fish, wildlife, and forage for livestock, and supporting recreation. BLM, within Interior, manages more land—265 million acres—than any other federal agency. The land BLM manages is primarily located in 12 western states, including Alaska. With a total budget of about $1 billion, BLM also administers 700 million acres of subsurface mineral estates (rights) throughout the nation. BLM staff in headquarters, its 12 state offices, and 144 field offices nationwide process land exchanges. The Assistant Director, Minerals and Realty Management, in the BLM headquarters office; the headquarters Lands, Realty, and Cadastral Survey staff; and their counterparts in the state and field offices are responsible for the land exchange program, among other activities. BLM has a headquarters land exchange program lead who oversees the land exchange program, and the BLM state offices have an exchange program lead with oversight responsibility. In addition, the BLM Deputy Director and Interior’s Office of the Solicitor have oversight responsibilities for land exchanges. BLM operates the National Training Center in Phoenix, Arizona, which, in conjunction with the Forest Service, offers courses on land management for both agencies’ staff. Three courses cover land exchanges in particular, among other things, for the two agencies’ field realty staffs. The Forest Service, within USDA, manages 193 million acres of public land throughout the United States. Forest Service staff, located at headquarters, 9 regions, 155 national forests, and 20 grasslands, process land exchanges. At headquarters, the Forest Service’s Director of Lands and Realty Management, the Assistant Director for Land Ownership Adjustment, and the National Program Leader for Land Adjustments (the headquarters exchange program lead) are responsible for the land exchange program, among other land transaction activities. Each region has a Director of Lands and a land ownership adjustment program manager (the regional exchange program lead) who oversee the work of realty staff at the forest level. In some cases, forests have in-house realty staff who conduct land exchanges; other forests have pooled realty staff from more than one forest in order to provide special services, such as land exchanges in more than one forest. The Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (FLPMA), as amended, authorizes both BLM and the Forest Service to exchange federal land for nonfederal land, when certain conditions are met, including the following: The values of the federal and nonfederal lands to be exchanged must be equal, or if they are not equal, the values must be equalized by a cash payment so long as the payment does not exceed 25 percent of the federal land’s value. The cash payment should be reduced to as small an amount as possible and, in certain circumstances, can be waived. The cognizant agency must determine that the public interest will be well served by the exchange. The lands to be exchanged must be in the same state. Titles for the lands to be exchanged must be issued simultaneously (unless all parties to the exchange agree otherwise). Land acquired within the boundaries of the national forest system, national park system, or any other system or area established by Congress immediately becomes part of that system. While BLM relies primarily on FLPMA to conduct exchanges, the Forest Service has several other exchange authorities. In addition to BLM’s and the Forest Service’s broad discretionary authority to conduct land exchanges, Congress sometimes enacts specific legislation that requires either agency to proceed with or provides authority to engage in a particular land exchange. This specific legislation may include provisions that alter the processing of the land exchange. For example, in describing these legislated exchanges, BLM’s handbook advises that special legislation may prescribe certain aspects of the exchange process; allow for transactions not authorized under FLPMA (e.g., an interstate exchange); or simply direct that an exchange transaction be completed. The handbook states that transactions should be handled in a manner consistent with the specific legislation and, where guidance is not specified in the legislation, in conformance with nationally recognized appraisal standards and the regulations to the extent they apply. The Forest Service handbook also notes that legislated exchanges often include provisions that conflict with standard exchange authorities or regulations. A land exchange involves the conveyance of public land or an interest in public land from a federal agency to a nonfederal party in return for desired nonfederal land that serves the public interest. These exchanges may be simple or more complex, such as a multiphase exchange. Specifically, a simple exchange may be a two-party transaction involving a single, nonfederal landowner. The agency provides a parcel of federal land (or interest in land) in exchange for a parcel of nonfederal land (or interest in land) in a single exchange transaction. The parcels are either of equal value, or either party may provide an equalization payment. BLM and the Forest Service conduct multiphase exchanges differently. At BLM, land values exchanged in each phase do not necessarily need to be equal, but at the final closing the land value must be equal or must be equalized with a cash payment. BLM uses records, called land exchange ledgers, to track the value conveyed by each party in the exchange and the balance due to the federal government or the nonfederal party after each phase. In contrast, the Forest Service requires that each phase of a multiphase exchange stand alone as equal in value. Furthermore, Forest Service regulations do not provide for the use of ledgers. Both agencies’ multiphase land exchanges can range from those that involve multiple parcels under the same ownership, to those with multiple owners and involving third-party facilitators—private or nonprofit individuals or entities that assist nonfederal landowners by participating in the exchange and negotiating with the federal government to complete the exchange. In addition to exchanging land for land, the Forest Service has the authority to exchange land for timber. In land-for-timber exchanges, the agency acquires nonfederal land in exchange for the rights to federal timber (the nonfederal party is authorized to cut and remove an equal value of timber from a national forest). These exchanges may involve two parties, the Forest Service and a nonfederal party, or in the case of tripartite exchanges, three parties, when a timber sale contractor participates in the transaction. BLM and the Forest Service follow similar steps to process an exchange, including receiving or making a proposal for an exchange, conducting a feasibility analysis, signing a nonbinding Agreement to Initiate (ATI), obtaining appraisals of the land, conducting resource and environmental analyses, deciding on whether to complete the exchange, and preparing title and closing documents. The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) generally requires the agencies to conduct environmental analyses. Under NEPA, agencies generally evaluate the likely environmental effects of projects they propose using an environmental assessment, or if the projects likely would significantly affect the environment, a more detailed environmental impact statement is prepared. However, if the Forest Service determines that an exchange falls within a category of activities the agency has already determined has no significant environmental impact—called a categorical exclusion—then the agency generally need not prepare an environmental assessment or an environmental impact statement. BLM’s land exchange handbook outlines a series of 26 major steps in the land exchange process. The Forest Service’s handbook provides a more detailed series of implementation schedules for various types of exchanges (i.e., a land for land exchange or a Sisk Act exchange for cash), which include from 56 to 71 action items to reach completion. Table 1 lists the major steps and who is responsible for each of them. BLM and the Forest Service processed 250 land exchanges from October 1, 2004, through June 30, 2008. Completion times for land exchanges within this period varied widely, from about 2 months to more than 12 years. Agency officials surveyed said the number of exchanges processed since 2000 has generally declined because of the availability of qualified staff, changing priorities, and the availability of funding. Some of the exchanges had unique characteristics because they were facilitated by third parties, conducted in multiple phases, or were specifically legislated by Congress. See appendixes III and IV for detailed information on the 250 exchanges processed from October 1, 2004, through June 30, 2008, as reported by BLM state offices and Forest Service regional officials. Of the 250 exchanges processed from October 1, 2004, through June 30, 2008, BLM processed 76 and the Forest Service processed 174. Table 2 provides information on the completed, pending, and terminated exchanges the agencies processed. As table 2 shows, 13 proposed land exchanges resulted in termination for various reasons, according to agency officials, including withdrawal of either party, changes in land values, legal action, and public opposition. For example, according to a BLM official, the agency’s Mesa Mood exchange in Colorado was terminated because of an appeal to the Interior Board of Land Appeals by the adjacent landowner, primarily about the appraised value of the federal land. Because of these actions, another appraisal had to be conducted. However, the landowner involved in the exchange decided to sell the property to another party because the exchange process was taking too long. As figure 1 shows, BLM’s exchange activity occurred in 11 western states. BLM’s Colorado State Office had the most activity, proces completed, pending, or terminated exchanges. Of the 250 exchanges processed from October 1, 2004, through June 30, 2008, 147 were completed, with completion times ranging from about 2 months to more than 12 years between the date the ATI was signed and the date the titles were recorded. The time to complete BLM’s 38 land exchanges averaged about 4 years, while the Forest Service’s 109 land exchanges averaged about 2 years. A few of the completed exchanges had processing times of over a decade.