Bureau of Land Management considering changes to grazing rules

WASHINGTON -- The Bureau of Land Management is weighing changes to its grazing rules that officials say would give local administrators flexibility to deal with public land parched by drought in Western areas including Nevada.

A formal proposal won't come until later this year, but the agency outlined a number of changes Monday that could affect the management of about 170 million acres of public land.

The changes would:

-- create a system that would allow ranchers to take their herds to other tracts if their existing permits were for public land recovering from drought;

-- extend permits from three five years for conservation, business or personal reasons, letting ranchers rest the land within a permit's lifetime;

-- reinstate a rule that allows permit holders to share ownership of improvements like fences or wells with the government, if each shares the construction cost.

The changes will make it easier for local Bureau of Land Management officials, ranchers and conservationists to work together, bureau spokesman Tom Gorey said.

Some conservationists worried the plans would hand too much decision-making power to ranchers.

"Under the Bush administration, we've learned that words like 'local flexibility' are euphemisms for local private benefit of resource extractors, whether it's logging, mining or ranching," said Jon Marvel, executive director of the Western Watersheds Project, an Idaho-based conservation group.

Marvel said the Bureau of Land Management's decision to not revisit the fee schedule, which can be a fraction of the rent paid for private land, was a "huge giveaway" to ranchers.

Gorey said the bureau would balance environmental concerns against grazing needs. One measure, for example, could allow grazing in an area that would otherwise be barred for environmental reasons, if damage was zeroed out by protections put in place elsewhere, he said.

The bureau will draft a report on the environmental impact of the proposals after holding public meetings this month at four sites: Albuquerque, New Mexico; Reno, Nevada; Billings, Montana; and Washington.

The bureau oversees a total of 262 million acres of public land, mostly in the West.

ON THE NET

Bureau of Land Management: http://www.blm.gov

Western Watersheds Project: http://www.westernwatersheds.org/