Advancing Species Protection With a Revised Agency Mission: The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and Assessment '87

Abstract

Organizational missions are thought to guide decision-making by natural resource agency officials, particularly when officials must prioritize among competing responsibilities. It is unknown, however, whether officials will rearrange their priorities in response to a fundamental change in their organizational mission. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation provided an opportunity to examine this question when it revised its mission from water development to environmentally sensitive water management with a commitment to species conservation in 1987. A comparison of all major Reclamation decisions before and after the change suggests that the new mission compelled Reclamation officials to give greater priority to the needs of endangered and threatened species than they had in previous decisions. Missions may be an important factor determining how environmental laws are implemented during agency decision-making.

Keywords:

• agency mission
• bureaucratic discretion
• endangered species
• Endangered Species Act
• policy divergence

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to C. A. Handelsman, C. Davis, K. R. Crooks, S. Davis, and two anonymous reviewers for their comments