‘Public Land, Private Profit’

Your editorial (“Rebuild Land Management,” May 29), about BLM grazing permits makes the same erroneous assumptions that your series on the BLM did. The 8,500 acres that you used as an example is not a land lease, but a grazing permit. The rancher does not have exclusive use of the land. He shares it with hunters, fishermen, rock hounds, campers, picnickers, motorcycles and four-wheelers. The rancher is the only one of the users who pays a fee.

All the rancher gets is the privilege of grazing a certain number of cattle for a set period of time, and the responsibility of maintaining the fences, water, pipelines, roads, care of the cattle, keeping the cattle scattered so they don’t concentrate in one area, and cleaning up and repairing the damage of the other users. If ranchers develop a proprietary feeling for the land over the years it is because they are the ones that have been taking care of it and protecting it.

Comparing the $1.86 fee of the BLM to the $10 lease is like comparing the cost of the food in a home-cooked meal with the cost of eating in a fancy restaurant. The BLM permit holder does all the work, pays all the bills and assumes all the risks for the cattle. With a $10 lease the lessee only has to deliver the cattle, write the check for the pasture and take delivery at the end of the lease.

STEPHEN H. PERCY

Fillmore