Dirk Kempthorne sought to build for President Bush a legacy on national park protection with a big increase in the budget in 2008 and a partnership program to bring private dollars to increase park capital expenditures rolling up to the 100th anniversary of the parks in 1916.

All of these efforts may be for naught if the Bureau of Land Management goes through with plans to sell oil and gas leases on the boundaries of Dinosaur, Canyonlands and Arches national parks in Utah.

Environmentalists say if the leases go forward drilling rigs could become the backdrop for the view of Delicate Arch natural bridge, one of the iconic views of American national parks. Outlandish you say? I visited drill rigs in the Bridger-Teton National Forest in the 1980s that obscured from some angles across the valley of that famous view of the three Tetons.

That picture survived and along with strong public opposition even from Republicans, has keep oil drilling away from Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks. The future Arches photo will become as much of an icon as the Arch, which is on Utah’s license plate.

The National Park Service itself has protested the BLM lease, announced on election day, saying it doesn’t have enough time to evaluate it. Cordell Roy, Utah's Park Service coordinator asked the BLM to delay the sale until next quarter, which likely would have stopped it altogether. It refused.

The BLM hasn’t appeared to act in good faith with its sister agency. It provided the Park Service with a list of land parcels included in the lease originally, which did not include the most controversial areas.

Kempthorne hasn’t sat on the sidelines.

He sent his deputy Interior Secretary Lynn Scarlett to Utah to work out an agreement between them and the BLM and Interior officials said it was resolved. But BLM state director Selma Sierra in interviews published in the Associated Press , sounds like she plans to move ahead no matter what the Park Service says.

If she makes no accommodations, this final act of the Bush Administration will define Bush’s and Kempthorne’s national park legacy as much or more than the budget issues and other initiatives. Of course, if she does it will be with the tacit approval of Kempthorne’s handpicked BLM Director Jim Caswell and Caswell’s boss, assistant secretary for lands and minerals Steve Allred, also a Kempthorne appointee.

I wrote in my column today of Kempthorne’s success in resolving the Klamath River dispute between farmers, environmentalists, Indians and an electric utility. But if he can’t find middle ground in this dispute among his own agencies he may be remembered more for the Utah decision than the Oregon resolution.