Tooele County Commission Chairman Bruce Clegg is headed to Congress.
On horseback.
He joined the Grass March Cowboy Express as the horsemen entered Utah at Wendover on Wednesday morning and he will accompany the group on its trek to Washington, D.C.
Started by ranchers from Nevada upset by the termination of their grazing rights by the Bureau of Land Management, the Grass March Cowboy Express is a group of western ranchers who are riding horses, coast to coast, to deliver a set of petitions from ranchers, citizens, and local governments to Congress.
The petitions demand that Congress take action to reign in what the petitioners refer to as “rampant over regulation of public lands.”
“This is a serious problem for ranchers and the people in western states where the federal government owns a lot of the land,” Clegg said.
One of the petitions the group is carrying is from the Tooele County Commission.
Approved unanimously by county commissioners at their Tuesday night meeting, the petition spells out grievances with federal agencies, including the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service.
“These agencies are not directly answerable to voters and often ignore the requests of local governments,” Clegg said.
The grievances mentioned in the petition include a disagreement over the application of the Endangered Species Act. The group disagrees with placing the sage grouse on the threatened or endangered species list while using the Migratory Bird Treaty to protect the raven that are preys on the sage grouse.
The petition also mentions the Tooele County Commission’s dispute with administrative actions by the forest service and the BLM that have reduced access and recreation on public lands, which harms Tooele County’s economy, according to Clegg.
Federal agencies have severely reduced grazing rights and have refused to enforce congressional requirements to remove wild horses from Utah.
The Environmental Protection Agency is trying to gain control of all waters, including dry washes, in Utah, according to the petition.
“We want Congress to curtail the regulatory authority of federal agencies that are not answerable directly to the public, and require administrative agencies to cooperate more closely with state and local governments,” Clegg said.
The Grass March Cowboy Express left from Bodega Bay, California on Sept. 26 and traveled through California and Nevada.
They plan to cover a 2,800 mile route with at least one rider on a horse all the way to Washington, D.C.
The group will travel along Interstate 80 to Cheyenne, Wyoming and then drop south to Denver, Colorado and pick up Interstate 70 and travel through Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Indiana, Kentucky, and West Virginia and arrive in Washington, D.C. on Oct. 16.
The group raised $35,000 in contributions to finance the trek before they left California and will continue to raise funds and collect petitions along the route, according to Clegg.
A rally at the Elko County fairgrounds on Tuesday night raised $3,000 and cowboy poet Waddie Mitchell will donate the proceeds from a show tonight at the Utah State fairgrounds, Clegg said.
The march travels at a 10 mph average pace, allowing them to cover between 150 to 180 miles per day. Riders and horses are changed in five-mile relay segments.
Tooele County Commissioner Jerry Hurst rode 10 miles of the trek through Tooele County on Wednesday.
Once in Washington, D.C., Clegg has arranged with Utah Senator Mike Lee and Utah Second Congressional District Representative Chris Stewart to have the group present their petitions to the House and Senate.
“One of my top priorities in Congress is to reduce the size and influence of the federal government,” said Stewart. “I believe that states should have the power to make the decisions that will affect its residents, especially when it comes to regulating public lands. I support all of Utah’s efforts to gain more local control of its land and, in fact, the first bill I introduced in Congress — The Utah Land Sovereignty Act — asked for just that.”