Ranch Groups Oppose
Bank Info To Greens

SANTA FE —(AP)— Livestock industry groups want a federal judge to block the release of information about how much money ranchers have borrowed against federal grazing permits.

The New Mexico Public Lands Council and the New Mexico Cattlegrowers Association have asked a federal magistrate to allow them to intervene in a lawsuit Forest Guardians filed this summer.

The Santa Fe-based anti-grazing group is seeking a court order to force the U.S. Forest Service to turn over information about the agency's ``escrow waiver'' program, which allows ranchers to use public land grazing permits as collateral for bank loans.

Although Forest Guardians is in court seeking specifics on the program, the group has estimated that banks have loaned perhaps $200 million to ranchers in New Mexico and Arizona under the program.

Forest Guardians and the Forest Service recently reached a proposed settlement that would call for the federal agency to release information about the total amount of money ranchers have borrowed overall without identifying how much money individual ranchers have borrowed.

``The limited information to be released under the parties' agreement does not reveal any specific proprietary or commercial information whatsoever concerning either individual grazing permittees or their lending institutions,'' the parties stated in the agreement they presented to the court.

However, the two livestock industry groups recently filed a request to intervene in the case and block the proposed settlement.

John Zavitz, assistant U.S. attorney, said Wednesday that he and other lawyers on the case tentatively have agreed to allow the livestock groups to intervene.

The groups will have about two months to file all their briefs, he said.

In their filing to intervene in the case, the livestock groups argue that the Forest Service already has violated provisions of a federal privacy law in releasing some information to Forest Guardians about how much money ranchers have borrowed.

In addition to asking the court to block the Forest Service from releasing any more information, they are asking for a court order to block Forest Guardians from disseminating any of the information it already has.

The industry groups also seek damages from the Forest Service, alleging the agency failed to abide by federal privacy law.