Nev. rancher awarded $4.2M for 'taken' water right

Tag : Hand Tools
Nev. rancher awarded $4.2M for 'taken' water right
By SCOTT SONNER – 11 hours ago
RENO, Nev. (AP) — A judge awarded more than $4.2 million to alate Nevada rancher's estate after finding that the U.S. ForestService engaged in an unconstitutional "taking" of water rights outof hostility to the rancher, a property rights activist.
The decision by U.S. Court of Federal Claims Judge Loren A. Smithinvolved the Fifth Amendment clause against private property beingtaken for public use without just compensation.
The rancher, Wayne Hage, bought the sprawling Pine Creek Ranch incentral Nevada in 1978.
In the early 1980s, the Forest Service began to notify him he wasin violation of his federal grazing permit. In 1983, the ForestService sent him 40 letters and agency officials made 70 visits tohis ranch.
Smith, based in Washington D.C., said the cancellation of Hage'sgrazing permit because of overgrazing and trespassing did notviolate the Fifth Amendment because a grazing permit is a license,not property.
However, Smith said, the taking occurred when the Forest Servicemade it impossible for Hage to maintain irrigation ditches, whichdeprived the ranch of water and made it unviable.
The government demanded that he maintain the ditches using nothingmore than hand tools. As willows, pinion, juniper and othervegetation grew unchecked in the irrigation ditches, Hage hadargued that his ranch lost water.
"The court finds the government's actions had a severe economicimpact on plaintiffs and the governments' actions rose to the levelof a taking," Smith wrote.
Hage first filed a claim seeking $28 million in 1991. In aninterview in 2004, two years before his death, he told TheAssociated Press his case could dramatically impact states' rightsand federal lands in the West.
"It's the first time in nearly a century that someone haseffectively challenged the government over who owns the rangerights and water rights out here on these federal lands," he toldThe Associated Press.
The judge noted that hand tools would not be effective over suchvast expanse of land. The ditches brought water to the 7,000-acreranch as well as the 700,000 acres of national forest land whereHage grazed his cattle.
Hage "offered ample evidence that the Forest Service had engaged inharassment toward (him), enough to suggest that the implementationof the hand tools requirement was based solely on hostility toplaintiffs," Smith said.
Hage was one of the leaders of the so-called "Sagebrush Rebellion"during the 1980s, a movement among Western landowners who believedthe federal government had no jurisdiction over their propertybecause the ranches predate the federal agencies that sought toregulate them.
The judge also ordered the government to pay back interest toHage's family. A lawyer estimated the interest dating to 1991 wouldbe an additional $4.4 million.
"It sends a pretty important message to the government that if youscrew with a small ranching family and put them out of business,you have to pay big bucks," said Lyman "Ladd" Bedford, a SanFrancisco-based lawyer who argued the case since its beginning.
Ed Monnig, supervisor of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, saidTuesday there had been no decision made yet on whether to appeal.
"We're aware of Friday's court decision and our agency is nowconsidering the implications of this ruling and carefully weighingoptions," Monnig said.
The Pine Creek Ranch is owned now by Hage's children. Calls to themwere not returned.