Harja has been serving as acting coordinator of the Public Lands Policy Coordinating Office since June, when Lynn Stevens stepped down.
"John brings many years of experience in public policy regarding public lands and natural resources to this important position," Huntsman said in a statement. "I'm grateful for his continued dedication to public service and public lands."
The public lands office seeks to coordinate the various and often contradictory interests in managing Utah's public lands. That has drawn the office into conflicts such as the management of county road claims across federal lands.
Brent Gardner, executive director of the Utah Association of Counties, said the counties know Harja well. "He's got a lot of experience in this area."
"It's a tough job and it's a complicated job," Gardner said. "When you start dealing with the federal regulations and all the different agencies there are and the different statutes that have to be adhered to it gets pretty complicated."
Scott Groene, executive director of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, said his group hopes to have "improved relations with the office."
"We look forward to working with John as he faces the challenge of making sure this office provides a balanced approach to the public lands in our state," Groene said.
In 2002, Harja was Utah's lead negotiator on a major aborted land exchange in the San Rafael Swell. The land swap was scuttled when whistle-blowers at the Bureau of Land Management said the deal could potentially cost federal taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars in lost mineral royalties in the lands being given to the state.
A subsequent investigation by the Interior Department's inspector general verified the exchange was uneven, and the Interior secretary pulled the plug on the deal, although Harja defended it at the time.
Harja has served on the board of trustees of the School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration and on the board of trustees of the Navajo Trust Fund, and the Navajo and Uinta Basin Revitalization Funds.
He is a graduate of the University of Utah law school.
