Ken Salazar Confirmed as 50th Secretary of the Interior

Ken Salazar was unanimously confirmed and sworn in as Secretary of the Interior.(photo from DOI)

from a news release of theDepartment of the Interior

Ken Salazar, a fifth-generation Coloradan who served as the state’s U.S. Senator, Attorney General and Director of Natural Resources, was confirmed January 20, 2009 by a unanimous vote in the U.S. Senate to become the 50th Secretary of the Interior

“I am honored to have been chosen for this position and look forward to working with President Obama on our nation’s energy and natural resource challenges,” Salazar said. “I will be a strong and forceful advocate for the wise stewardship of our nation’s land and water resources, I will help us build a clean energy economy for the twenty-first century, and I will work to restore the integrity of the nation-to-nation relationship with our Native American communities.”

“My first priority at Interior is to lead the Department with openness in decision-making, high ethical standards and respect for scientific integrity,” Salazar emphasized. “I will work for a more proactive and balanced stewardship to protect our national parks and open spaces, restore our Nation’s rivers, resolve our water supply challenges and address the challenges faced by our Native American communities.”

Salazar, who has vigorously advocated the expanded use of clean, renewable energy technologies, will oversee 500 million acres of public lands managed by Interior that include some of the nation's largest sources of wind, solar and geothermal energy. He will lead a Department with 67,000 employees and an annual budget of about $18.6 billion, including annual and permanent funding.

After settling in New Mexico four centuries ago, Salazar's family planted roots in Colorado's San Luis Valley, where they have farmed and ranched the same land for five generations. Raised on a remote ranch without electricity or telephone, Salazar learned the values of hard work, family, and faith. Thanks to his parents’ lessons, he and his seven brothers and sisters all became first generation college graduates.

A farmer for more than thirty years, Salazar was a partner with his family in El Rancho Salazar. He and his wife have owned and operated small businesses, including a Dairy Queen and radio stations in Pueblo and Denver. Salazar worked for eleven years as a water and environmental lawyer with some of the top firms in the West. During his time in the private sector and as Colorado’s Attorney General, Salazar worked on cases from the trial courts to the Colorado and United States Supreme Courts.

He received his law degree from the University of Michigan in 1981 and a political science degree from Colorado College in 1977. He also received honorary doctorates of law from Colorado College in 1993 and the University of Denver in 1999. Salazar and his wife, Hope, have two daughters, Melinda and Andrea, and one granddaughter, Mireya.

A biography of Secretary Salazar and his official image are available online at the Department of the Interior