Dedicated to preventing the ecological degradation caused by livestock grazing on Arizona's public lands, and exposing the government subsidies that support it.
The Arizona Livestock Loss Board (ALLB) disperses federal funds to ranchers for expenses resulting from the 1998 introduction of endangered Mexican wolves in the national forests of eastern Arizona and western New Mexico. The 2015 state legislation which established the 9-member Board was sponsored by Sen. Sylvia Allen, R-Snowflake, and it put the proverbial foxes …
Continue reading “Arizona Livestock Loss Board Rife With Conflicts Of Interest”
The Arizona Game & Fish Department is involved in the business of cattle ranching on public land, despite the fact its only legal purpose is to administer the “laws of the state relating to wildlife.” The agency’s management of the Horseshoe Ranch, which it acquired in 2011, is the prime example. It’s the only one …
Continue reading “Arizona Game & Fish Department Is In The Ranching Business”
The Arizona Legislature has made drastic changes to the state’s two natural Heritage Funds since Arizona voters passed Proposition 200 in 1990 to create and annually divert up to $10 million to each of them. The one administered by the Game & Fish Commision is now being used as a source of ranching subsidies.
Massive amounts of government assistance have been used to increase cattle grazing on public land in the Desert Southwest during the region’s long-term ongoing megadrought. Ranching infrastructure projects were rubber-stamped as emergency drought measures to help ranchers access every bit of forage and keep as many cattle on the land as long as possible.
The nonpoint source pollution reduction program administered by the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) is another one of the bewildering array of state and federal government assistance programs that provide subsidies to the state’s public land ranchers. The program’s grant money comes from the U.S. Environmental Protect Agency (EPA) because the program was created …
Continue reading “Arizona’s Nonpoint Source Pollution Reduction Grants Subsidize Arizona Ranchers”