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 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 …
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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.
Government agencies have increased cattle grazing on public land in the Desert Southwest during the region’s long-term ongoing megadrought by distributing large subsidies to ranchers. They have been rubber-stamping new ranching infrastructure projects as drought emergency measures to help ranchers access every bit of forage and keep as many cattle as possible on the land.
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”
Arizona voters passed Proposition 303 in 1998 to fund the Growing Smarter Act with the belief that it would provide $20 million a year for communities and nonprofits to buy state land to preserve it as natural open space. But very few knew that the Arizona Legislature had secretly included a clause to divert up …
Continue reading “Arizona Legislature Diverted Proposition 303 Money To Ranchers”