Comprehensive Evaluation Report

ural region would be substantially more challenging. Thus, Grasslands management contributes to
protecting valuable natural resources along with private properties and communities.
Determining the Need to Change the Current
Management Plan
The main responsibility of administering the Grasslands includes managing and monitoring the health and
status of the natural resources (e.g. vegetation and wildlife) while balancing the many human uses of the
Grasslands (e.g. camping, hunting, livestock grazing). This CER examines the social, economic, and
ecological conditions and trends in and around the Grasslands, as detailed in the Socio-Economic
Sustainability Report and the Ecological Sustainability Report for the Kiowa, Rita Blanca, Black Kettle,
and McClellan Creek National Grasslands. The sustainability reports evaluated ecological models, social
and economic statistics, monitoring data, public comments and the results of the Forest Service
Southwestern Region’s Attitudes, Values, and Beliefs Report to describe the current conditions and trends
on the Grasslands. This report summarizes those findings and uses them to identify where these trends
generate a need to change direction in the current Plan.
Even though the Need for Change identified in this report is the primary driver of the development of a
revised Plan, they do not represent a comprehensive list of needed changes. There are some areas of the
current Plan that are still adequate and timely; that direction will be carried forward into the revised Plan.
Most objectives and guidelines from the existing Plan may be modified or removed, for one of the
following reasons:
o They describe a purely administrative function, such as budgeting rather than the management of
land and resources;
o They duplicate of direction that can already be found in Forest Service handbooks and manuals;
or
o They are based on outdated policies, science or information and would therefore be updated or
removed as appropriate.
Schedules of activities in the Plan have been outdated for more than a decade and will be removed as
well. There are also issues that have emerged since the Plan was developed or that were not as great of a
threat to social, economic and ecological sustainability at that time. The Plan is silent or may have very
little direction on such issues. These issues will be considered in the development of the revised Plan.
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