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A10 NEWS Blue Mountain Eagle Wednesday, December 25, 2019 Judge revokes Hammonds’ grazing permit, sends it back to BLM By Mateusz Perkowski EO Media Group A federal judge has effec- tively revoked a grazing per- mit for Oregon’s Hammond Ranches, ruling that it was renewed contrary to regula- tions and thus unlawful. U.S. District Judge Michael Simon has determined that for- mer Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke didn’t properly justify his decision earlier this year to renew the grazing permit for ranchers Dwight and Steven Hammond, a father and son who’d been convicted of arson and then received a presidential pardon. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management had previously decided against renewing the grazing permit for Hammond Ranches in 2014, after a jury had found the Hammonds guilty of setting fires to public rangeland. Contrary to federal reg- ulations, Zinke didn’t con- duct the analysis necessary to find that their company, Ham- mond Ranches, had a “satisfac- tory record of performance” by reviewing the “nature and seri- ousness” of incidents in which they’d failed to comply with grazing rules, the judge said. “It was arbitrary and capri- cious, an abuse of discretion, not rationally connected to the facts before the agency, incon- sistent with the governing stat- utes and regulations, and an unexplained change in agency practice and procedure,” Simon said. EO Media Group was unable to reach the Hammonds for comment as of press time. Although the Hammonds were pardoned by President Donald Trump in 2018 and released from prison before completing their mandatory five-year prison sentences, that doesn’t provide a sufficient basis for renewing their graz- ing permit, the judge said. The pardons could have been issued for multiple rea- sons and don’t necessarily mean the president discounted the seriousness of their crimes in the context of grazing reg- ulations, Simon said. “ T h e President may have believed that the shorter Steven sentences Hammond originally imposed of three months for Dwight Hammond and one year and one day for Steven Hammond Dwight were more Hammond equitable,” the judge said. “Such a belief would not show that the underlying crimes were not serious or did not support permit nonrenewal, but merely that they did not support five years of confine- ment in a federal prison.” Due to these “serious errors,” Simon said it was more appropriate to over- turn the renewal of Hammond Ranches’ grazing permit rather than allow it to remain in place while the agency reconsiders the decision under the proper regulatory framework. That’s particularly true since BLM may eventually decide the Hammonds didn’t have a “satisfactory record of performance,” once the agency properly follows regulatory procedures, the judge said. “Thus, it is far from certain that a renewal permit will be issued after remand.” The consequences of vacat- ing the grazing permit renewal would not have severe conse- quences for BLM, aside from “the loss of a few thousand dollars in grazing revenue,” Simon said. Nor would the impact be “economically disastrous” for Hammond Ranches, which was “able to maintain its ranch- ing operation and obtain pri- vate grazing for the previous five years when it had no fed- eral grazing permit and, pre- sumably, during this past year when it was allowed only reduced grazing.” The judge issued his ruling EO Media Group file photo Cattle graze in Eastern Oregon. A federal judge has effectively revoked a grazing permit for ranchers Dwight and Steven Ham- mond, who were convicted of arson but later pardoned by President Donald Trump. The BLM must reconsider their application. on Dec. 20, a day after hearing oral arguments between attor- neys for the BLM and several environmental groups that sued the federal government over the grazing permit’s renewal. The BLM had argued against a motion by the envi- ronmental plaintiffs to revoke the Hammonds’ grazing per- mit, claiming that Zinke prop- erly considered the pardons in deciding to renew the ranchers’ grazing authorization. “The secretary did have the authority to make the decision he did,” said Luther Hajek, an attorney representing the government. For Zinke, the pardons were relevant when examining the ranchers’ “record of perfor- mance” in regards to maintain- ing rangeland health, includ- ing the seriousness of past non-compliance with the gov- ernment’s standards, according to BLM. The grazing decision was consistent with BLM’s graz- ing regulations and did not violate the Federal Land Pol- icy and Management Act, nor did the lack of a full environ- mental analysis run afoul of the National Environmental Policy Act, according to the government. The BLM appropriately used a “categorical exclusion” to exempt the grazing permit renewals from such an assess- ment, since it was within Zin- ke’s discretion to find an envi- ronmental analysis to be unnecessary based on the deci- sion’s environmental signifi- cance, the agency said. Even if the grazing permit renewal violated federal law, the decision should be sent back to the BLM for reconsid- eration while allowing grazing to continue at the reduced lev- els ordered by the judge earlier this year, according to BLM. Not revoking the graz- ing permits would reduce fire risks by keeping fuels in check, Hajek said. “If grazing is man- aged properly, it’s healthy for the landscape.” Any legal errors commit- ted in the case weren’t serious, while the reduced grazing level currently in place is sufficient to allay the plaintiffs’ environ- mental concerns about impacts to the sage grouse and redband trout, he said. “It’s not necessary to vacate the permit to maintain those environmental conditions,” Hajek said. The environmental plain- tiffs — Western Watersheds Project, Center for Biologi- cal Diversity and Wildearth Guardians — argued the graz- ing permit renewal was unlaw- ful because the Hammonds don’t meet the requirement for a “satisfactory record of performance.” “Livestock grazing on public lands is a privilege, not a right,” said David Becker, attorney for the environmental groups. “Like any privilege, it’s subject to revo- cation if it’s abused.” The presidential pardons don’t change the ranchers’ past actions that caused their request for grazing re-autho- rization to be denied in 2014, the groups argued. The BLM should also have evaluated the decision’s impacts on the sage grouse, rangeland health, inva- sive weeds and fire risks, the plaintiffs claim. Just because President Trump pardoned the Ham- monds does not indicate he thought their crimes weren’t serious, Becker said. “There is nothing on the face of either pardon about what the presi- dent’s intent was.” The decision to renew the Hammonds’ grazing rights was “egregious” because Zinke “invented a rationale out of thin air,” which justifies over- turning it, Becker said. It’s possible for the BLM to take into account that the Ham- monds have paid their debt to society, but the renewal deci- sion should follow the proper regulations and undergo envi- ronmental assessment, he said. “The secretary and the BLM completely cut the pub- lic out of the management pro- cess for this allotment,” Becker said, adding that dangerous environmental effects from revoking the decision were unlikely. “There’s no showing of highly disruptive conse- quences,” he said. A jury convicted the Ham- monds of arson in 2012, with Dwight Hammond receiving a three-month prison sentence for igniting a fire in 2001 that consumed about 140 acres of federal grassland. His son, Ste- ven Hammond, was sentenced to a year behind bars for that blaze as well as another fire that spread onto an acre of pub- lic grassland. However, the ranchers were sent back to prison in 2016 after the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that they must both complete the federal man- datory minimum sentence of five years for arson. A protest against their re-imprisonment precipitated an armed standoff at the Malheur National Wild- life Refuge. DOWNLOAD OUR FREE NEWS APP TODAY! 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