February 5, 2016
CapitalPress.com
Rancher inds himself in middle of standoff
By CRAIG REED
For the Capital Press
Craig Reed/For the Capital Press
Kurt Spencer is shown at his ranch headquarters near Roseburg,
Ore., but he also runs cattle on ranches in Harney County. He has
experience in working with both the Bureau of Land Management
and the U.S. Forest Service to obtain grazing permits.
ders refuge land, said the stop
at the irst was “scary.”
“They were very profession-
al and kind, but when you have
guns kind of pointing at you, it is
scary,” Spencer said in describ-
ing the scene. “They (oficers)
were very, very cautious. They
asked us to get out and keep our
hands free. They were FBI, but
Wildlife refuge employees
ready to return to work
By ERIC MORTENSON
Capital Press
As an occupation drags on,
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Ser-
vice employees don’t know
what they’ll ind when they
return to work at the Malheur
National Wildlife Refuge.
Gavin Shire, Fish and
Wildlife public affairs chief,
said he has no information
about conditions at the ref-
uge headquarters south of
Burns, scene of the armed
occupation by Ammon Bun-
dy and followers.
“We have received re-
ports that the illegal occupi-
ers accessed federal records
locked away on the refuge
and have evidence of them
accessing government com-
puters, but we know little
more than that at this stage,”
Shire said in an email.
News reports and social
media posts indicated the
occupiers fiddled with office
computers and took down a
section of barbed wire fence.
One occupier was arrest-
ed in Burns after he drove
a government vehicle into
town. Another used refuge
equipment to clear a new
roadway.
Shire said the refuge con-
tains items and places of
“immense cultural signifi-
cance” to the Burns Paiute
Tribe.
“The tribe has expressed
their outrage at the callous
disregard the occupiers have
shown for their cultural her-
itage,” Shire said by email.
“We share that outrage and
will seek and exercise appro-
priate recourse at the appro-
priate time.”
Another agency spokes-
man, Jason Holm, was par-
ticularly angry about artifacts
being handled and the road
construction. He called it “de-
plorable” and said the road-
work might have damaged
culturally signiicant sites.
“We share in the outrage
of the Burns Paiute Tribe,”
he said in a statement. “This
is disgusting, ghoulish be-
havior.”
Holm also described the
occupiers’ statements as
“vaporous pablum.”
Bundy, his brother, Ryan
Bundy, and six others were ar-
rested Jan. 26 when FBI, Ore-
gon State Police and other law
enforcement agencies stopped
their vehicles north of Burns.
An outspoken Bundy follow-
er, Robert “LaVoy” Finicum,
was shot and killed by police
during the stop. Video re-
leased by the FBI shows Fini-
cum reaching into his jacket at
least twice before he was shot
by an OSP trooper.
Since then, several other
occupiers were arrested as
they trickled out of the refuge.
Four occupiers remain at the
refuge and have insisted they
be allowed to leave without
being charged with crimes.
Employees will repair
and rebuild as necessary
when they return to work at
the wildlife refuge, the agen-
cy said in a news release.
USFWS has 17 employ-
ees at the refuge who hav-
en’t been able to work for
they looked like Army person-
nel. There were snipers around.
“It felt like a checkpoint in a
foreign country,” he continued.
“There was no room for error.
They asked for ID and ran our
license plate. They asked me if
I had a gun and I told them I
did and where it was in the rig.
I told them to help themselves
as far as looking, but they ac-
looking for you to make a mis-
take rather than helping you.
BLM coaches me on what to
do while the Forest Service is
getting more inicky. But I’ve
always done what they’ve
asked me to do.”
The Bureau of Land Man-
agement is the land manager of
3.97 million acres, or 60.6 per-
cent of Harney County. Private
ownership totals 1.6 million
acres, or 24.9 percent. The U.S.
Forest Service and the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service manage
a combined 711,231 acres, or
10.9 percent. The state of Or-
egon owns 197,417 acres and
other government agencies own
the remaining 36,507 acres.
Spencer said he has talked
to some of his ranching neigh-
bors and he said there is most
deinitely a split between them
on how they viewed the occu-
pation of the refuge headquar-
ters since Jan. 2. He described
the people as good farmers,
good ranchers and solid people,
but with different opinions.
“Some know we have issues
with the federal management,
but they wanted the protesters
to go home,” he said. “On the
other side, there were ranchers
going there (the refuge) and
having dinner with them and
taking them supplies.
“We have an issue, but these
were protesters from a radi-
cal standpoint,” Spencer add-
ed. “The people from Harney
County, from Oregon, from the
U.S., we’re all in it for preserva-
tion of the land. We need to ind
common ground. We’ll do it.”
Spencer said the gener-
al consensus of the Harney
County residents was that the
issue would be resolved peace-
fully with no casualties.
“Everybody was dismayed
that somebody actually got
hurt,” he said. “We were hop-
ing there would be a peaceful
ending.”
Spencer said he hopes there
will be some good that eventu-
ally comes out of the situation.
“Let’s sit down with some
people and talk about some
of these issues,” he said. “It
hasn’t been a good situation,
so let’s ind some good in it.”
BUYING 6” and UP
Alder and Maple
Saw Logs, Standing Timber
a month. The refuge also
hosts researchers, students,
firefighters and others.
www.cascadehardwood.com
ROP-6-4-1/#24
ROSEBURG, Ore. —
Rancher Kurt Spencer had a
close encounter with the Mal-
heur National Wildlife Refuge
occupation situation on Jan. 28.
Spencer, whose beef cattle
business is headquartered in
the Umpqua area near Rose-
burg, also owns and works four
ranches in Harney and Grant
counties.
While traveling north in his
red pickup between his ranch
near Frenchglen, Ore., at the
base of the Steens Mountains
and his ranch near Izee, Ore., in
the Ochoco Mountains, Spen-
cer and his wife, Veronica, trav-
eled through two checkpoints.
The checkpoints had been
set up by law enforcement of-
icers following the Jan. 26
killing of one refuge occupier
and the arrest of several others.
The rancher, whose Frenchglen
ranch is just a half-hour drive
south of the refuge headquar-
ters and whose property bor-
tually barely looked around. I
guess they were comfortable
with who we were after check-
ing our IDs and plate.”
The couple were then al-
lowed to drive on and at the
checkpoint north of the refuge,
their travel was barely inter-
rupted. They assumed the irst
checkpoint had called ahead
and given them the OK for the
northern stop.
The 59-year-old Spencer,
who grew up in Oakland, Ore.,
and has been a rancher for
close to 40 years, said he has
dealt with federal agencies in
his business operations and
has had mixed results. He has
a grazing permit with the Bu-
reau of Land Management for
his Steen Mountains ranch and
a permit with the U.S. Forest
Service for his Ochoco ranch.
“I’ve been on both sides of
the issue,” he said. “I basical-
ly have zero complaints with
BLM. They’re been very, very
good, easy to work with. The
Forest Service has been more
challenging. They have a dif-
ferent attitude. It is like they’re
7
Farmers Ending Hunger...
Begins With You!
Help End Hunger in Oregon...
one acre at a time!
Farmers Ending Hunger
Where your donation goes
begins with Oregon farmers and
ranchers who raise hundreds of
acres of produce, grain and cattle.
With a little extra effort, each
farmer donates an acre or two to
feed the hungry and suddenly our
network has thousands of tons of
fresh food!
Donated produce, grain and cattle is
processed into canned (and fresh)
vegetables, pancake mix and ground
beef and donated to the Oregon
Food Bank and their network of 20
regional food banks throughout
Oregon and Clark County, WA.
Farmers Ending Hunger
Needs Fresh Vegetables,
Potatoes, Wheat & Cattle
Visit www.farmersendinghunger.com
to meet our generous farmers and
partners, and find out what crops and
services they’re donating.
Please
Donate Today!
Contact John Burt
Executive Director,
Farmers Ending Hunger
burtjgb@aol.com
503-931-9232
farmersendinghunger.com
Like us on Facebook
• Farmers Ending Hunger donated over SIX MILLION POUNDS of food crops to
Oregon Food Bank since 2006!
• More than 240,000 people per month eat meals from emergency food boxes.
• 33 percent of those who receive emergency food boxes are children.
6-2/#13