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Show Page 4 UTAH FARM BUREAU November, 1969 NEWS Farm Bureau deeps in Touch With PILIRC i Johnson s Summaries Probe the Commission s Reports Since the Public Land Law Review Commission was formed, the Farm Bureau has worked closely with Commission members and Commission staff, because the farm group believes that the existing patch-wor- k of public land laws has resulted in duplication, overlapping, Inconsistencies and a myriad of administrative problems for users, as well as administrators. One major problem, for the farm sector, however, has been the question of how to keep informed of the results of the commissions 33 studies. Beginning in 1966, the commission let 24 contracts for studies in the field of public lands. The contracts ranged from 6 months for a study on Criteria to Judge the Facts" to 19 months for a study on the History of Public Land Laws." The original list contained studies in 34 areas, one of which lias been covered by other studies; others are being completed by the commissions staff. The actual reports of the studies, which were conducted by colleges, private groups and the commission staff, are detailed, voluminous documents, many of which run well over a thousand pages. Sitting down to digest these reports is a task not many people relish. For this reason, AFBF had Leonard Johnson, Assistant Director of the American Farm Bureau's Natural Resources Department, spend months reading the reports and analyzing their impact on agriculture in the West. Not only have his summaries of the reports been welcomed by farm leaders in the western states, they have been used by many others. Byron Mock, Public Land Law Review Commission says, Leonard's studies and analysis have been an excellent check for me on the adequacies of the other studies and other reviews of them. As a commissioner I need to be sure I have not been limited to biases of the contractor or special interest groups. More important these analysis provide to those who must be interested in the commissioners final work of whether they will support or even reject our recommendations." Farm Bureau has published 10 summaries prepared by Leonard so far while the commission has reviewed and adopted tentative positions on approximately 17 of the total 33 Public Land studies. The ten studies which have been summarized by Mr. Johnson are: Vice-Chairm- an Leonard Johnson, AFBF Assistant Director of Natural Resources, here questions Byron Mock, Vice Chairman of the Public Land Law Review Commission, about one of the Commission's studies on federal grazing policies. (1) Revenue Sharing and Payment in Lieu .of Taxes (2) Land Grants to states (3) Fish and Wildlife Study (4) Intensive Agriculture Study (5) Impact on Regional Economics (6) Legal Study of Intensive Agriculture (7) Water Study (8) ' Timljer Study (9) For- - How would you like to digest a thousand page study? age Study (10) Land Use Study. Under the direction of Clifford Mclntire, AFBF Director of Natural Resources, who serves as a member of the PLLRC Advis- ory Council, AFBF in cooperation with the western state Farm Bureaus completed in 1968 an 18 month intensive investigation of public land problems as seen by Farm Bureau members. This study was designed to assist the commission in its work. The results of the study reveal three broad public land problem areas: (1) The need to move additional public land into private, state and county ownership. (2) The need to modernize and streamline the administrative procedures of federal agencies. (3) The need to provide the private sector greater opportunity to manage and to increase the productivity of the federal lands. According to Mr. Johnson, the Commission studies indicate that, among other things, disposal of federal lands into private ownership has virtually stopped. They also point to the fact that citizens in the western states have an average total tax burden almost double that of the 38 non public land states. Another interesting fact revealed by the studies, is that the aums of forage on the federal lands could be increased by 75 - - a direct contradiction of a widely held theory. Within the next six months the commission will complete its study and report to the President and to This law library. In the Commission's countless man-hour- s use of federal lands. which Mr. Johnson has spent months analyzing bulging study reports, contains the results of of laborious study into the subject of beneficial Congress. In the words of Mr. Johnson, Then its decision time. What Congress decides to do will be largely up to us. If we do all we can, it will be possible to see Congress adopt legislation that will result in increased beneficial use and development of the federal lands. If we do nothing, its possible that Congress will ignore the Commissions recommendations and continue in the present inclination to restrict a greater portion of federal lands to recreation and exclusion of other users." |