And now:Sonja Keohane <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Good news for the "welfare cowboys", they get to pay the
minimum...again.
A great suggestion in this article, imo, "Under the group's plan,
all money from the increased fee - an anticipated $75 million a year -
would be spent on a new program to buy out grazing permits from ranchers
and retire the land."
Sound good?...no more cattle on "bison land"...?
<http://www.billingsgazette.com/regionframe.htm>
Critics cry foul over bargain U.S. grazing fee holding steady again
By SCOTT SONNER
The Associated Press
RENO, Nev. - Ranchers will pay the legal minimum to graze livestock on
federal land for the fourth consecutive year, a bargain critics say is a
government-subsidized incentive to overgraze sensitive rangeland.
Plagued by depressed cattle prices, Western ranchers say thousands would be
run out of business if the government charged any more than the $1.35 rate
per month per cow and calf.
But environmentalists say the market demands five to 10 times as much -
that inflation alone should have caused the fee to be raised higher than $5.
"It's cheaper to graze cattle on public lands than it is to feed your pet
hamster," said John Horning of Forest Guardians based in New Mexico.
"It's high time the livestock industry started paying its fair share," he
said Friday.
----end of excerpt-----
