Navajo Nation ranchers wary of Grazing Act fees

The Navajo Grazing Act last was discussed in 2004, but it since has gathered dust. While the act was meant to set the guidelines for regulating agricultural resources across the reservation, disputed tidbits of the act prevented the passage of the most significant portions. While the passed portions called for spotty enforcement of proper grazing practices, the act needed to, and now needs to be, passed in its entirety, the Navajo Nation Department of Agriculture said Friday. Willed by the growing tensions over few resources and a continuing drought, the act resurfaced this summer and is being revisited in an effort to reduce the hardships of those with grazing livestock on the reservation. Roberta Atcitty knows the struggle all too well. She recalls when her family used to have both horses and sheep grazing on her family's land outside of Shiprock, though now they have no livestock. "There's nothing," Atcitty said of the land, and she's uncertain that anything besides rains can resolve the issue. The Department of Agriculture, however, hopes to try. It will attempt to lessen the demand for resources long into the future by restructuring the grazing permit process. The Navajo Grazing Act, passed in full, would establish three components to help restructure the process: --Establish a full time employee to oversee grazing practices on the Navajo Nation. --Create a branding office to keep track of grazing livestock on the Navajo Nation. --Enforce a grazing permit fee for all those on the Navajo Nation who are in possession of a grazing permit.  Many ranchers were wary of the suggestions, especially the one about the fees. In most areas of the Navajo Nation, except for the Eastern Agency, there is no fee for a grazing permit, and grazing permits in all areas have been loosely regulated since issued to Navajo ranchers in the 1950s. Currently, about 10,000 grazing permits exist on the more than 27,000 square-mile swath of land that makes up the Navajo Nation. Only about 3,000 of those permits are in use, though that's not to say they are in compliance.  Probably about 2,000 of those 3,000 in-use permits are in compliance, said Leo Watchman, director of the Navajo Nation Department of Agriculture...more