But some ranchers say the alternative could be worse -- if ranchers lose their permits, they might sell their own adjacent land to developers.
Environmentalists, said Chandler Keys, vice president for government affairs for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, are telling ranchers "to get in your pickup and get the hell out of Flagstaff. That rancher is an integral part of the system, whether you like it or not."
Bob Miller, a fourth-generation farmer, is ready to quit grazing cattle in Oregon's Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument.
(Jim Craven -- Mail Tribune Via AP)
|
|
But after decades of feuding with environmentalists, some ranchers have changed sides. Some feel pressured by federal regulation; in other instances, they simply cannot earn the living they used to.
John Whitney III started ranching when he was 14, and he still owns the Circle Bar Ranch, an hour's drive northeast of Phoenix. But he no longer owns the 1,250 cows he once did: The U.S. Forest Service forced him to take them off its land in 2000 because of a drought that has devastated the landscape, and he lost his appeal two years later.
"We're pretty much done on federal land," Whitney said. "It's not a good business environment anymore."
Whitney is one of about 160 Arizona ranchers who back buyout legislation that would pay them $175 for each "animal month unit," the amount of forage needed to sustain a cow and calf for one month. Under current rules, the federal government determines each year how long ranchers can graze their herds by allocating them a set number of animal month units.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers has filed two ranching buyout bills, one that would reach nationwide and cost $100 million, and a smaller one aimed just at Arizona ranchers. A buyout would be "a sensible policy," said Rep. Raul M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.), one of the plan's authors, who spent his first five years living on a ranch where his father worked as a cowboy. "It's a voluntary act. It doesn't push anybody out."
But Brian Kennedy, a spokesman for House Resources Committee Chairman Richard W. Pombo (R-Calif.), called the proposal "dead on arrival," saying the bill would essentially "end grazing and ranching in the West as we know it." Hughes at the Bureau of Land Management said the administration also opposes the buyout, questioning where the government would find the funds to pay for it.
But environmentalists say the buyout will save money in the long run, and Whitney said he and other ranchers believe a buyout would have a "50-50 chance" of success in Arizona.
"Economics will dictate it," he predicted. "A lot of people don't like cows anymore, they don't want them out on federal land."
