Judge shuts down some Jarbidge grazing allotments

Six local cattle producers must now organize rapid roundups to move their herds off public land. On Monday, following a five-year reprieve, U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill reasserted his 2005 ruling prohibiting grazing on some of the land in the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s Jarbidge Field Office. Monday’s ruling suspends grazing on 17 of 28 contested allotments, including three near China Mountain. In 2005, Winmill agreed with the Western Watersheds Project that the BLM violated federal law in reissuing the 28 permits. He elected to prohibit grazing because “irreparable harm warranted an injunction.” Rather than kicking ranchers off the land, Winmill allowed the parties to negotiate. Agreements were reached on 11 allotments to allow grazing. After three months, the parties reached a temporary settlement, which Winmill approved, allowing continued grazing on the remaining 17 allotments until a new Jarbidge management plan could be published in 2009. The BLM has since operated using an interim plan that was extended to 2010 since the management plan was not completed on time. Vander Voet said the permanent management plan won’t be done until 2012; he’s just begun to review 1,200 pages of comments on the draft. Once the plan is finalized, permit approvals can take up to three years, pushing the date to 2015, far later than allowed in the settlement. The BLM requested that the settlement be extended, but Winmill refused. “Because there is no agreement on the (grazing plans) beyond 2010, the (plans) cease to exist, and the Court’s remedy — the injunction — takes over,” Winmill wrote...more