Hello and Happy Saturday!
THANK YOU to everyone who joined us last night for our Horse Talk. Isn’t our attorney, Matt Arnold from Eubanks & Associates PLLC awesome?! We think so too! Thank you again Matt for making time in your busy schedule to come and answer our questions! If you missed this Horse Talk, we did upload the video to our YouTube channel this morning: https://youtu.be/QERohSyjpnY
We are also working on scheduling some additional Horse Talks in the next couple of weeks with people who will also give some insights into Theodore Roosevelt National Park’s Draft EA. We spoke with Dr. Ross MacPhee not too long ago and several people have commented on how helpful his talk was for them to formulate some comments. You can view Ross’s talk here: https://youtu.be/tNbQf3fBf6k?si=G5Gp7cw3WtYtf6L9
We will be giving a similar presentation next Friday – October 13, 2023, when our friend at Equine Collaborative International will be hosting us in a zoom meeting. This event is also FREE, but you do need to email them at 411eci@gmail.com and ask to join the zoom!
Our friend Heather at Save Our Wild Horses will be hosting us on October 20, 2023, for a Zoom presentation as well. This talk is also FREE but Heather asks that you email her at kaya97524@yahoo.com to get the link to the meeting!
I will be making slight changes to these two presentations to reflect questions, comments as well as answers that Matt gave last night. You guys all raised a lot of great questions! Thank you again for your participation!
We are hoping through these different Zoom talks that we continue to reach people and get as many people to comment during this public comment period.
Next week, I will start a series of blog posts directed toward how and what to comment. Be sure to check back! We also have a few more media interviews set up. We will share them as they are released.
Theodore Roosevelt National Park is holding their virtual public meeting on October 10, 2023. They will give a presentation and then answer questions. These meetings are usually “drop dead” one-hour meetings. There is information on the Park’s planning website on how to attend this virtual meeting.
The most important thing you can do is COMMENT! You can read the Draft EA and enter your comments on the Park’s planning website:
We DID send in a formal request to Superintendent Richman yesterday asking for an extension to the current public comment period. We will update you as soon as she responds.
Chasing Horses Wild Horse Advocates will also have some NEW Calls to Action for you next week.
Remember, you can subscribe to our website from the homepage to be notified when we update our page.
THANK YOU to everyone who contributed to our Matching Donor Fund campaign! We raised OVER $1,000!!!! THANK YOU for helping us maximize this generous donation! Please understand, we need A LOT more as we continue our Fight for the Spirit of the Badlands! Any donation you can make to support our critical advocacy work is greatly appreciated!
Thank you for your support and have a GREAT weekend!
After more than 30 years with the Interior department, and having worked on several monster EIS processes, highly controversial, highly complex, I have the following comments. NPS will sign a FONSI to remove the horses, no doubt in my mind. Remember, parks are for RANGERS. What the public thinks matters little to them. NPS employees have an extremely tight culture. When parkies go on vacation, they go to other parks. They usually stay with other parkies when they do this. Park culture does not include horses. They are generally very anti-horse.
TR park used to have a horse concession at Peaceful Valley. What happened to that? They used to have park horses for staff use in the backcountry. Do they have any now, don’t know, didn’t see any at the corrals. Is removal of all horse use in the park next?
Is the lawyer ready to go with legal action when a FONSI is signed? Do we have a case?
I believe the only way to keep horses in the park will be through raw-boned, bare-knuckle political action. By that I mean the park is FORCED to keep horses by political fiat. Having a Senator on the Appropriations committee is very helpful, but he needs to get tough with NPS on park budgets, you know, no horses in TR may affect NPS budgets. The tremendous coalition you have built up can really be helpful, can really put pressure on the Governor and Senators to do something. Having lots of submitted comments is also very important. We need to make it look like EVERYBODY is against the NPS, and I think almost everybody is! Another thought; if the Republicans win the White House, we will have a Republican Secretary of the Interior. Given the very Republican nature of ND politics, it would be possible for the Secretary to simply step in and stop any removal of horses from the park, or force the park to do another EA, this time with an outcome favorable to us.
Hey, NPS was forced to allow for the building of an INTERSTATE HIGHWAY through the park (kind of blows their naturalness argument all to hell) we should be able to pressure them into keeping a few little ole horses, right? Endless pressure, endlessly applied.