Thank you. Let me just say from the outset that you humble me with this reception. I am absolutely confident that this Department is well on its way – all of us together – to making not only our nation but our world a better place. We are a department with huge assets. These are assets belonging to the American people that you oversee and husband. At the end of the day, they are going to be part of what allows us to take the moon shot to energy independence and deal with so many of the challenges that America faces today.
So at outset, I want to say that I am very proud to be your Secretary of the Interior and America’s Secretary of the Interior. Thank you.
Less than 48 hours ago, we witnessed one of the defining moments of our history: the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States of America. As President Obama said in his Inaugural Address, "This is a moment of opportunity for our nation; an opportunity to remake America; an opportunity to inspire a new ethic of public service."
That is why I am so excited, and so honored, to stand before you today, addressing the employees of the Department of the Interior as the 50th Secretary of this department. I believe that through our service together, we can help remake America and we can help change the world.
I want to thank several people for their work and for their support. I want to thank former Secretary of Interior Dirk Kempthorne for helping me personally in this transition.
I also, very importantly, want to thank all the men and women of the National Park Service and other bureaus who worked so tirelessly to make the inauguration an historic success.
Frankly, it was hard for me, as I moved around the city and met with President Obama, to fathom how a National Park could host almost two million people from all over the world. The logistical challenges posed by that number of people are incredible. The Park Police told me that even with two million people, there was not a single arrest. That tells you something about America. It was a great celebration of democracy.
I want to commend Peggy O’Dell, the Regional Director of the National Capital Area, for the great effort and getting it done.
I also want to thank the U.S. Park Police, which had the security and public safety responsibility for our national monuments and the National Mall area. We do not take for granted their professionalism and their sacrifice to keep us all safe. Sal Lauro, the chief of the U.S. Park Police, and his force did one extraordinary job on Tuesday.
I also would like to commend the fine work done by the Department of the Interior’s transition team as we prepared to take office. It is remarkable that with every new president, the entire leadership of the government of America changes. And with a department as large and as complex as the Department of the Interior, it is important that there be as seamless as a transition as possible.
I want to thank Larry Jensen, the leader of the transition team, and all the bureau transition team leaders, who assisted us in assuring that we did have a seamless transition. You have helped us make it possible for us to hit the ground running.
To serve in President Obama’s Cabinet as your Secretary of the Interior is an honor and I am humbled by it.
My roots in the West stretch back for four centuries to when my ancestors first came to New Mexico. I grew up in the San Luis Valley in southern Colorado, about 265 miles south of Denver on lands my family has farmed and ranched for five generations.
My family’s livelihood depended on the health of our land. Our parents taught us about the importance of water and about the importance of land. Because the sustainability of our family depended on how we took care of our land and our water, they taught us that we had to be responsible stewards of the water, soil, and wildlife around us, so that we could preserve the balance that allows us to ranch and farm, generation after generation.
This sense of stewardship is the foundation for my deep appreciation of all of our lands in America and our beautiful planet Earth. Our nation’s parks, refuges, forests, rivers and seashores are national treasures. Those who work in this department have a sacred trust to protect and conserve and enhance these treasures as an inheritance for generations to come.