9-29 IAN Ruby Pipeline

 El Paso Corporation made a pact with the devil. I’m David Sparks and I’ll explain in a minute. It continues to stick in the collective craw of Western cattlemen that the El Paso Corporation paid two environmental groups huge sums of money to not sue them over running the 680 mile Ruby gas pipeline through four Western states. Forget about the environmental impact. This is about putting ranchers out of business with a $15 million dollar gift to Western Watersheds alone. A news release stated the money will be used to “protect and restore sagebrush habitats by purchasing and retiring federal grazing permits offered by willing sellers....” Here’s Wyatt Prescott, Executive Director of the Idaho Cattleman’s Association: “It’s no secret at all how Western Watersheds operates in terms of how they acquire grazing land is through continual litigation of certain permit holders until those individuals have no choice but to sell out in order to save what little bit of livelihood they have left after they’ve got done tied up in court with Jon Marvel and Western Watersheds so that’s how that money would be employed. They say it can be used to purchase land and permits from willing sellers but as Marvel’s concerned, there’s no such thing as a willing seller because they can make anybody be a willing seller if they’re bankrupt from continual litigation.”