Public Lands Ranchers Hoping
For Rules Relief Under Bush

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. —(AP)— Ranchers who rely on the two million acres of federal grazing land in South Dakota hope the Bush administration will let management decisions be made locally.

``That is our singular biggest hope, that the Bush administration will do more at the local level,'' says Jon Doggett, senior director of government relations for the American Farm Bureau.

``I look forward to the Bush administration as being good for agriculture, especially in the area of reduced regulations we have been faced with,'' said Merrill Karlen Jr., director of the South Dakota Cattlemen's Association.

Not so fast, counters Tony Dean, a Pierre outdoors broadcaster and conservationist.

He says new Department of the Interior Secretary Gale Norton and Department of Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman, who oversee the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service, respectively, will have a tough time undoing grassland management regulations established under President Clinton.

``I don't think anybody can go in and just undo everything that has been done over the last eight years,'' he said of Norton.

Ranchers are less worried about grazing fees and animal units per month allowed on allotments of land than they are about meeting water-quality standards and about grazing restrictions related to the Endangered Species Act, Doggett said.

``How do we deal with water problems?'' he asked. ``Where are the funds to fence riparian areas? Then how do we get water to cattle? That's expensive.''

Ranchers also would like to have a say in managing endangered species and get economic incentives for doing so, he said.

``There are no incentives under the ESA now for anybody to want to have or cause to have endangered species on their property or on the federal land they use,'' he said. ``The ESA is one of the biggest outside influences on rangeland management.''

Said Karlen: ``Environmental regulations are our biggest financial burden. They are costly to implement, and there is no public assistance.''

But Dean contended that Forest Service management efforts to improve water quality and restore wildlife habitat on the 116,000-acre Fort Pierre National Grasslands are not in conflict with livestock grazing. Those management requirements are set to take effect on the 597,000-acre Buffalo Gap and the 155,000-acre Grand River grasslands in the next few years.

``I would use Fort Pierre as a yardstick,'' Dean said. ``Nobody's gone bankrupt.''