Grand Staircase grazing plan

Dave

Broadcaster, formerly "ashergrey"
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May 5, 2012
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BLM asking for input. From their press release:

BLM Seeks Comment on Grazing EIS Preliminary Draft Alternatives
Kanab, Utah— The Bureau of Land Management is seeking public comments on the preliminary draft alternatives for the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument’s Livestock Grazing Monument Management Plan Amendment and Associated Environmental Impact Statement (MMP-A/EIS). Comments will be considered as the BLM develops the draft MMP-A/EIS that will replace existing grazing management decisions.
The public is invited to meet with GSENM staff, learn more about the preliminary draft alternatives, and provide written comments during three public open houses December 2 – 4, 2014. All meetings will run from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. The December 2 meeting is at the Utah State Capitol Building, 350 North State Street, Salt Lake City; the December 3 meeting takes place in Kanab at the Kane County Search and Rescue Facility located beside the airport on South Highway 89A; and the December 4 meeting is being held at the Interagency Visitor Center at 755 West Main Street in Escalante, Utah.
You may submit comments on the preliminary draft alternatives in writing to the BLM at any public scoping meeting, or by any of the following methods:
· Mail: Bureau of Land Management
Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
669 S. HWY 89-A
Kanab, Utah 84741
· Email: BLM_UT_GS_EIS@blm.gov
· Fax: (435) 644-1250
Please reference “GSENM Livestock Grazing Plan Amendment” when submitting comments.
The affected planning area includes all public lands within GSENM and public lands for which GSENM has livestock grazing management responsibility. This includes BLM lands within GSENM and additional lands within portions of the BLM’s Kanab Field Office and the Arizona Strip Field Office as well as lands managed by the National Park Service (NPS) in Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. Small areas of additional state, municipal, and private lands also border or are contained within the planning area, but are not included in the decision area.
The preliminary draft alternatives were developed using public feedback received during the scoping process last winter, in close coordination with the state of Utah, Kane and Garfield counties, other federal agencies, and the best available science. The range of action alternatives will allow the BLM to find a decision that will enable sustained use of the land through improved land health and science-based grazing management.
To be most helpful, please submit comments by close of business on January 20, 2015. Before including your address, phone number, email address, or other personal identifying information in your comment, you should be aware that your entire comment – including your personal identifying information – may be made publicly available at any time. While you can ask us in your comment to withhold your personal identifying information from public review, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to do so. The minutes and list of attendees for each meeting will be available to the public and open for 30 days after the meeting to any participant who wished to clarify the views he or she expressed.
For further information, please contact Matt Betenson, Planning and Support Services Division Chief at (435) 644-1205. Persons who use a telecommunications device for the deaf (TDD) may call the Federal Information Relay Service (FIRS) at 1-800-877-8339 to contact the above individual during normal business hours. The FIRS is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to leave a message or question with the above individual. You will receive a reply during normal business hours.
The BLM manages more than 245 million acres of public land, the most of any Federal agency. This land, known as the National System of Public Lands, is primarily located in 12 Western states, including Alaska. The BLM also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the nation. The BLM’s mission is to manage and conserve the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations under our mandate of multiple-use and sustained yield. In Fiscal Year 2013, the BLM generated $4.7 billion in receipts from public lands.
– BLM –
 
Thanks for the heads up Asher... YOU BET I'll be giving them input on overgrazing on our public lands. Had to wade through extensive cow damage and feces on the Boulder Mail Trail AND in Butler Wash in the last two weeks. Pains me... Speak up! all of those of you who have expressed an opinion on this subject here.
 
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Thanks for the heads up Asher... YOU BET I'll be giving them input on overgrazing on our public lands. Had to wade through extensive cow damage and feces on the Boulder Mail Trail AND in Butler Wash in the last two weeks. Pains me... Speak up! all of those of you who have expressed an opinion on this subject here.

Cow shit is bad enough, but the rotting corpses in Willow Gulch, and LDH were just too much.
 
Cow shit around Wall Spring and in Poison Spring Cyn. Cow shit around the spring, massiveness cow paths in the upper portion of Lower Gulch. :(


Gesendet von meinem iPadAir mit Tapatalk
 
Cow shit around Wall Spring and in Poison Spring Cyn. Cow shit around the spring, massiveness cow paths in the upper portion of Lower Gulch. :(
You go Michael! I think negative feedback all the way from Germany would help get their attention. They include an email based submission process. Thanks!
 
As an OLD backpacker, I understand and respect your concerns. However, cow shit is a very narrow perspective with which to eliminate millions of dollars from the few small towns that would be effected and through hundreds of people out of work. How would you like to receive a pink slip because somebody from across the country happened to slip on a dog turd outside where you work?
When moved to Kanab, I felt the same way as you all do, but after 6 years of actually listening to both sides, I've changed my mine. This not a simple issue and you all sound educated enough to understand that.
Walk a few miles in the ranchers footsteps (and their impact on the community) and see if your perspective changes. Education is the key to find compromise. Learn about the other guys views. Only then can your views have an impact.
Thanks for listening.
 
I have a friend in Kanab too (4th generation born and raised there) and I really got a new perspective from spending time with him. I completely agree with you.

I forwarded the meeting notice to him-hope he goes.
 
When moved to Kanab, I felt the same way as you all do, but after 6 years of actually listening to both sides, I've changed my mine. This not a simple issue and you all sound educated enough to understand that.

Thanks for your post Charlie. It is indeed a complicated issue. The empathy and respect you suggest is critical. And it needs to go both ways.

Many of us have seen abuse from the ranching community, not just in resource degradation but in improper restriction of access to public lands. There is it seems, at times, a sense of entitlement to public lands among multi-generational ranching families or those who live in small communities (see for reference Cliven Bundy).

It's encouraging to me that the land agency, in this case the BLM, is willing to gather public input and use that feedback in the decision-making process. Having people sharing their positions rationally and in good faith strengthens us all.
 
Thanks for your post Charlie. It is indeed a complicated issue. The empathy and respect you suggest is critical. And it needs to go both ways.

Many of us have seen abuse from the ranching community, not just in resource degradation but in improper restriction of access to public lands. There is it seems, at times, a sense of entitlement to public lands among multi-generational ranching families or those who live in small communities (see for reference Cliven Bundy).

It's encouraging to me that the land agency, in this case the BLM, is willing to gather public input and use that feedback in the decision-making process. Having people sharing their positions rationally and in good faith strengthens us all.

I agree that the feds are listening to all sides, that is after all their job. A good thing.
Charlie,
What is the source for your statements about "millions of dollars", and "hundreds of people out of work", due to this grazing alternative? Is this just your opinion?
I read the GSENM Livestock Grazing Plan Amendment EIS. Good read.
I saw nothing in it to justify, even remotely, your statements. Please give us your references, if not in the EIS then where did you get your numbers?

A relevant quote from the SocioEconomic Workshop Report:

"Workshop participants expressed a largely positive view of GSENM and GCNRA
although this is tempered by concern that future decisions made regarding management
in the planning area could possibly have a detrimental impact on their businesses and
their families."
 
OK, Asher, the OP, posted an objective, for-your-information post and then I jumped in expressing my strongly held opinion in one direction. That was a mistake I made in bringing that type of public lands policy debate into our forum. Sorry guys and gals. We have mostly kept politics and emotionally charged issues from landing or fermenting here because we all value our public lands and like to use it in our own way but also respect that other people don't necessarily have the same alignment with us.

This place has always been considerate of other's opinions and I know that many of you share mine on this issue but I would like to propose just shelving this debate or moving it to another venue. I'd hate to lose participants and newfound friends over something like this. We can just agree to disagree and continue to enjoy each other's work and stories here.

Not that this issue is not important.. It is seriously important and I will be working on it in detail for some time to come. Let's just take Asher's advice and all educate ourselves on the issues and sides, read the proposed alternatives in the EIS and Amended Plan and then, please, weigh in. Express your opinion to the author's of this Amended Plan who are entrusted to protect the resource and all of our disparate needs. From my standpoint... 'nuff said.
 
I see what you're saying, Art, but I also think that if an issue is so heavily centered on the topic of the outdoors (like grazing), it's pretty legit to discuss here. The trick is doing it respectfully. The lack of bickering is one of my favorite things about this place. Speaking as an individual, I think it's okey dokey if it's kept respectful.
 
Hi guys.
Thanks for the review and input. I just tore my rotator cuff and am all zoooed up on painkillers. But I'll address your questions. Its nice to discuss rather than argue.
But for now, let me tell you this about myself. Not long ago, the Sierra Club put up a PHOTOSHOPPED picture of a girl looking over the rim of a cliff supposedly looking down from Bryce Canyon and looking at Alton Coal Mine.
I wrote a long letter and they finally took it down. The problem: If there is a legitimate reason why Alton should not be allowed to expand, put it on the table and lets discuss it.....but don't try to put up bullshit and expect it to be believed.
Hope you all had a great holiday
charlie
 
After trying a few times to write up my thoughts on this topic, I've decided I just can't do it without going on a tirade, so I'm just sending my thoughts to the BLM. I hope everyone else with an opinion on the topic does the same.
 
Sorry this is taking so long. Blame it on the meds…. But I want to be coherent.

Here are the stats from a BLM report. Before the Monument was declared, there were 106,627 AUMs (one cow and one calf) allotted. Today there are 32,012. The difference is 74615. This year brought record prices for beef..about $600 each. If you multiply the difference above, 74,615, buy the dollar price $600 you get $44,769,000. In other words, if grazing today were at pre-Monument levels, ranchers in Kane and Garfield would have sold $44M MORE. That, of course, is not all profit, and I don’t mean to indicate it is, it’s a gross number. I don’t know what Garfield County’s budget is, but Kane’s is roughly $20M. You can see the impact the $44M would have. This money then filters down to restaurants, gas stations, clothing and food shops, etc.

As for the hundreds of jobs, I may have spoken too quickly, being in “general think mode”. “GTM” is thinking of the three areas where the county is at war with environmental groups and the Feds. That is, grazing, timber harvest, and extraction. I had in mind when the lumber mill closed and took 400 or so jobs with it. I should not have mentioned that number in conjunction with grazing. BUT if our economy had an increase of $44M ANNUALLY, I think it would be easy to see where 100 or more jobs could be created.

In ref to Clyde Bundy, what can I say, there is our rotten apple.

As far as improper restriction, you have me there. I know of none. As far back as 1975 when I moved to SLC and tried new places to camp, I saw fence after fence, but only a few(depended on the area) that were posted as “private”. It took me many years before I learned that the ones not posted were mostly public land, areas open to me.

As far as damage to the land goes, remember this; There has been grazing on this land for over 100 years. I think any normal person would expect some kind of damage to be done. The concern is that the BLM won’t allow the ranchers to go in and repair it. That is the law, and I understand it. But when the BLM wanted to construct a few toilet facilities, it didn’t seem to hurt the land when they used heavy equipment or brought in foreign substances.

Like I first said, this is a very complicated issue. One important thing that you fellows should understand is how money, in the form of taxes, relates to our economy. Federal land is not like private land as it does not get taxed. Kane County is about (?) 80% Federal. The Feds give us PILT( Payment in lieu of taxes. Unfortunately, the Feds set the amount and even at that, pay only about 70 % of it. What that all means is that we get roughly $1M, when if taxed, the land would create over $50M.

Think of your County losing 80% of its property tax revenue and how that would affect you. So, you can see how activities like grazing become very important to our economy.

TODAY there will be held the third COOP meeting between Kane and Garfield Counties and the Monument. PLEASE come to it if you can. 1:30 at the Kanab City Airport (search & Rescue building) It is very informative.

Thanks all for listening. If you think I have anything wrong, please let me know. I think discussing….that is talking WITH, not talking AT, people with other opinions is constructive.

charlie
 
Nick, you pic is multiple use in action ........... :)
 
Thanks for typing that out Charlie. I'm interested in where you got some of those numbers. 50 million due to property taxes, only 70% paid by the Feds, etc.

As outdoorsmen, it is our land we are most concerned about, but being conscious of ranchers doesn't have to be a totally at odds with ours.

One thing you didn't acknowledge, is the amount of money that comes from tourism. If cows were at the level of pre-monument levels, you can imagine that a lot of the 44 million that you quoted would be lost. I've not returned to areas that would be beautiful, if the water sources weren't destroyed, vegetation demolished, corpses rotting, etc. As long as we let the land be, this is a resource to be had forever.
 
I'd like to post a reminder and present a plea to all of you to PLEASE send an email with your opinion after reading the GSENM Livestock Grazing Plan Amendment which is open for public comment. The monument is dependent on improving grazing management to protect this resource and the environment.

You can access the plan documentation here:
http://www.blm.gov/ut/st/en/fo/gran.../livestock_grazing/eis_preliminary_draft.html

I used the "Preliminary Draft Alternative Handout" document linked at the bottom.

My personal stance is that "I must strongly recommend Alternative B “Discontinue livestock grazing on GSENM and Glen Canyon NRA with 2-year notification.”

Please make your opinion known. The BLM definitely needs us, the land-owners and users, to weigh in. They are asking for input by January 20th. I say don't even put it off until the New Year. I would be happy to share my full letter (that I submitted by email at BLM_UT_GS_EIS@blm.gov as requested) to with anyone by PM. Please weigh in!
 
Dan,
I am sorry because I have made a mistake. I inverted some numbers. I used $594 for the price of a cow, but it was $495. This will make a difference, but not that much viewed in the overall picture. I'll continue to get information together for you. But for now
ART,On what do you make this recommendation?

Thanks for your answer
charlie
 
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