DuBois column: Monuments, endangered species, a tax on water

 Monuments, endangered species, a tax on water

In last month’s column I walked you through the mid-term elections and their potential for impacting livestock grazing. I then predicted several items, using climate change as the action forcing event, that the progressive democrats and President Biden would implement, which were the following:

--increase funding for all their programs. with special emphasis on wildlife habitat and land acquisition

--designate more wilderness areas, wildlife refuges, national monuments, national parks, wild and scenic rivers and other land use designations

--place more emphasis on “lands with wilderness characteristics” and roadless areas during the planning process, and

--climate change will take a much more prominent place in all planning documents and decisions, including those on livestock grazing

I see I failed to mention water issues, especially those where control over water which would shift that control to the feds.

Let’s take a look at two of those: designate more “national monuments” and “wildlife habitat.”

President Biden has traveled to Colorado to designate the Camp Hale-Continental Divide National Monument.

According to fact sheet distributed by the White House, this designation represents his, “commitment to protect, conserve, and restore our country’s iconic outdoor spaces and historical sites for the benefit of future generations.”

It also announced that the Forest Service and the Department of Interior will bring forward a proposal to withdraw the Thompson Divide in western Colorado from all oil and gas leasing.

This was Biden’s first use of the Antiquities Act to designate a new national monument.

In addition, a group of enviros and tribes are pressing Biden to designate a 450,000 acre parcel in Nevada as the Ave Kwa Ame National Monument. In a recent speech Biden announced this area deserves a national monument.

This, apparently, will not satisfy their hunger for restrictive land use designations. One enviro has written, “It is hoped that the designation of Avi Kwa Ame as a national monument will be only the beginning of his administration’s commitment to protecting 30 percent of the US land and waters by 2030.”

With respect to “wildlife habitat” we see what he has in store for New Mexico.

The Biden administration has issued two final rules to designate the lesser prairie chicken as an endangered species.

This has been done, according to the National Association of Counties, “despite ongoing efforts by federal, state and local partners to develop conservation initiatives, such as Candidate Conservation Agreements with Assurances (CCAA) and Habitat Conservation Plans (HCP), that have conserved millions of acres across the lesser prairie-chicken’s current range. Many of these conservation plans have been spearheaded by voluntary partnerships with farmers and ranchers.”

In other words, all that work to protect 9 million acres was not sufficient for the enviros or Biden.

We also have the jaguar in New Mexico and Arizona, which Biden has proposed for renewal to comply with a court order.

Further, 14 conservation groups have filed a petition”urging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to provide better federal protection for Mexican gray wolves by listing its look-alike species, the coyote, within the wolves’ recovery area.”

Greta Anderson with the Western Watersheds project says, “If people are going to confuse Mexican wolves for coyotes, then it makes sense to stop killing coyotes in the areas where wolves are recovering.”

One final issue is on water. The Domestic Water Protection Act has been introduced by two Democrat congress members from Arizona (HR 9194).  This legislation would impose an excise tax on the sale of any “water intensive” crop. How much? “The tax is 300% of the price for which the crop is sold and is paid by the manufacturer, producer, or importer of the crop.”

Whew! That’s all I can stand to write about this month.

Until next time, be a nuisance to the devil and don’t forget to check that cinch.

Frank DuBois was the NM Secretary of Agriculture from 1988 to 2003, is the author of a blog: The Westerner (www.thewesterner.blogspot.com) and is the founder of The DuBois Rodeo Scholarship and The DuBois Western Heritage Foundation