While the 108th Congress progresses and Watersheds Messenger goes to press, the National Public Lands Grazing Campaign continues to gain traction in the West and Washington, D.C.

The NPLGC's proposal to adopt a voluntary grazing buyout program that would compensate public-lands ranchers in exchange for their federal livestock grazing leases is now endorsed by the Sierra Club and more than 150 other conservation groups.

"The Sierra Club considers the voluntary livestock grazing permit retirement legislation a great opportunity for Congress to help ranchers and the land," says Wayne Hoskisson, chairman of the club's national grazing committee. "This is a simple step which allows struggling ranchers a chance to get out of public lands grazing without horrendous economic consequences."

The buyout plan has also found favor on Capitol Hill, where U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays (R-Connecticut) will lead legislation for the program.

Several congressional leaders have already mulled the proposal and their voiced support for a voluntary buyout. At a conference organized last fall by the Idaho Conservation League, U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) called the idea a "win­win" proposal for conservationists and ranchers.

"If we get together and collaborate, we can get results that are higher for the environment and higher for the economy... and everybody wins," Crapo said. "[The voluntary federal grazing permit buyout program] is an example of a win-win idea."

Meanwhile, in the West, the NPLGC is allying with public lands ranchers in several states to develop site-specific buyouts. In Arizona, a coalition of grazing permittees and the Center for Biological Diversity, one of six NPLGC steering committee groups, has formed the Arizona Grazing Permit Buyout Campaign. The coalition has already been to Washington, D.C., to work with congressional leaders.

In New Mexico, Forest Guardians and a core group of 15 public-lands ranchers are collaborating on a voluntary buyout campaign. They plan to present the program to members of the New Mexico congressional delegation.

In Idaho, WWP and the Committee for the High Desert have circulated a letter about voluntary, site-specific buyouts to grazing permittees in Owyhee County.

The NPLGC has received calls from several permittees in western Colorado who are interested in permit buyout. The campaign will also pursue an opportunity to retire the last remaining grazing permit in Death Valley National Park.

Federal agencies are also getting the message. In Utah, the Bureau of Land Management recently decided in favor of the Grand Canyon Trust in its campaign to purchase grazing permits on a "willing-buyer, willing-seller basis" from ranchers near Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

The need for grazing reform in the West is as clear as a panorama of the landscape. Domestic livestock graze more than 300 million acres of state and federal public lands. In the West, one cow and calf need an average of nearly 14 acres per month to sustain themselves on these arid lands. In the East, the same cow-calf pair requires one-sixth of an acre of average private farmland for forage.

Federal public lands produce only 2 percent of the nation's total livestock feed. Contributions from public lands grazing to state and local economies are miniscule.

The NPLGC initiative would effectively retire a federal welfare program that costs American taxpayers more than $500 million annually to subsidize public lands ranching operations. The buyout program would cost about $2.9 billion but save between $5.7 billion and $9.9 billion over the long term.

Moreover, adoption of the voluntary buyout would diminish decades of environmental destruction caused by livestock grazing. A former public-lands rancher in Idaho recently allowed, "An awful lot of demands have been put on our public lands, and grazing might be the biggest. It's time we gave these lands some consideration."

Cash-strapped ranchers deserve consideration as well. While ranching is a cherished lifestyle for many federal grazing permittees, most heirs to livestock operations don't want or can't afford to continue the tradition.

As the cost of ranching increases, the capital value of federal grazing permits declines. The NPLGC proposal would pay federal permittees four times market value to relinquish their grazing permits. Under the plan, a permittee with 300 cow/calf pairs that graze public lands for five months of the year would receive $262,000.

The federal buyout program is a safety net, or "golden saddle" in the words of NPLGC director Andy Kerr, for public­lands ranchers. It's also an environmental imperative in the arid West.

The program would stanch the economic bleeding in the rural West, allowing ranchers to recapitalize investments otherwise stranded in grazing permits. It would also heal the land.

Such progressive policymaking is a rare event in the American socio-political arena: a campaign that produces no losers.

Keith Raether is public information director of WWP and public information coordinator for the NPLGC. He lives in Missoula, Mont.

For more information about the
National Public Lands Grazing Campaign,
visit www.publiclandsranching.org