04/12/05 A victory for ranchers?

04/12/05 A victory for ranchers?

When U.S. District Court Judge Robert Jones ordered all parties in the Oregon Natural Desert Association versus U.S. Forest Service case to sit down and work out a stipulated order, it was not the final verdict the Oregon Cattlemen's Association, an intervener in the case, wanted. But it was close enough, as in their opinion, the Judge denied specific request of the O.N.D.A. including grazing allotments on national forest land. The O.N.D.A. claims livestock grazing is causing areas of both the Malheur River and Murderer's Creek allotments to change from forest to desert. That stems, from their opinion, from Forest Service mismanagement. Their proposed solution was the end of all grazing on those properties for a twenty or thirty year period to allow vegetation to return. Pat Larsen, a scientific advisor for the Oregon Cattlemen's Association, says the Judge basically denied the O.N.D.A. request, based on her agencies' intervention and a little scientific research. LARSEN: And they showed these photos and made these claims that there was this great devastation going on. And I spent all summer going out backtracking those sites, monitoring, taking good measurements that we could statistically prove, that we had some confidence in their summary. These are beautiful pastures. The riparian is in very fine condition. O.N.D.A. took a biased view of things. And they didn't consider everything they should have Larsen says the O.C.A. expects Judge Jones to dismiss the case when he issues his final ruling. In addition, they expect Judge Ancer Haggerty's verdict on a similar case surrounding Murderer's Creek allotments to produce a similar favorable outcome. Larsen and other ranchers say any potential ruling in their favor is critical to ranchers both in Oregon, as well as the entire Western U.S., based on O.N.D.A.'s perceived goal to end all public land grazing. One of the challenges made by O.N.D.A., and by similar groups in similar cases, is based on how the U.S. Forest Service interprets fish monitoring data, and measures grazing utilization as described under their forest management plans. LARSEN: They have concerns about the way the Forest Service monitors. They're concerned about these N.E.P.A. analysis getting done in a timely matter, little things like that, that the Forest Service was able to defend in the case and able to address in a satisfactory way for the judge.
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