It’s official, Burning Man has chosen to take the next step in terms of suing the U.S federal government. The bold move will be nothing short of challenging and expensive, but organizers claim it is necessary due to unnecessary costs. This ordeal travels back to December of last year when Burning Man first filed the lawsuit. Since then, their position in the predicament remains the same and it’s time for action.
“BLM has been charging our organization for unreasonable costs related to the annual Burning Man event in Northern Nevada”
In all, Burning Man believes they are being taken advantage of by the Bureau of Land Management, or ‘BLM’. The BLM has been specifically called out for charging the organizers for ‘unreasonable costs‘ each year. It’s been reported that since 2015, the festival has been charged a total of $18 million in land permit costs! Additionally, the permit costs have risen each year since 2011. In all, the exorbitant amount of fees applied to the yearly festival is too much to simply ignore.
Now that the lawsuit has taken motion, it’s reported that Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt, has been issued a summons to appear in Washington D.C. Bernhardt will be officially representing the U.S federal government during the case. Once Bernhardt has received notice of the summon, he will have 60 days to respond. While it’s unlikely, failing to respond to the summon could work in favor of Burning Man.
While this fight will not be a walk in the park, Burning Man and Black Rock City are prepared for the lengthy ordeal. Nonetheless, there’s no sign that this year’s event will be negatively affected. In the meantime, we’ll keep you updated during this entire process.
You can read more on the full suit that was filed here.
