Climate change. Severe wildfires. Invasive species. A booming human population. The Bureau of Land Management identifies these as four key threats to Western public lands. Stick conventional and renewable energy development, endangered species protection, and recreation in the mix, and there’s less room each year for a past widespread use of public lands: livestock grazing. Since passage of the 1934 Taylor Grazing Act, the number of livestock grazing public lands each year has dropped — the BLM issued permits for 22 million animal
One case looked at a set of 18 amendments to the Taylor Grazing Act proposed by the BLM in 2006. The changes would limit public involvement in grazing management, restrict the BLM’s enforcement powers, transfer ownership of fences and other development to permittees, and streamline and reduce oversight of public lands grazing. Wildlife and conservation groups led by Western Watersheds Project challenged the amendments and two ranching groups — the Public Lands Council and the American Farm Bureau Federation — intervened in support of the proposal. The case bumped through a district court, which ruled in favor of the conservation groups, and made its way to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which at the first of this month issued a permanent injunction against the proposed amendments. One editorial stated:
The BLM knew that the changes could threaten endangered species, … yet it concluded that there would be no impact. The court said the BLM offered no reasoned analysis for its conclusion and ignored concerns raised by other agencies such as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Environmental Protection Agency.
In the second case, Western Watersheds Project along with WildEarth Guardians, who’d filed under the Freedom of Information Act to have the BLM release the names and addresses of all grazing permittees, won again. Interestingly, the Forest Service already makes their permittee information publicly available, and now an Idaho district judge has required the BLM to do the same. Ranching interests are likely to appeal both recent decisions.
Meanwhile, grazing diminishes as more people eat more meat and use more leather every day. We may be celebrating protection of our public lands in the West, but until we address some of the bigger, global concerns like climate change, invasive species, and overpopulation highlighted by the BLM, are we only exporting our public lands problems to other landscapes?
The author is an intern at High Country News.
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