Copyright © 2000 NLThomas
All Rights Reserved

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK - The future of Yellowstone Bison is in your hands. In 1997, the unsubstantiated fear that buffalo could spread a disease--called brucellosis-- to Montana cattle, led to the killing of 1,083 buffalo as they strayed over the park's border in search of food during an unusually severe winter.

In response to this, in 1998, the National Park Service (NPS) received comments about the future management of Yellowstone's buffalo from more than 67,000 people, two thirds of which specifically endorsed The Citizens' Plan to Save Yellowstone Bison/Buffalo, a plan carefully designed to offer protection both to Yellowstone's bison/buffalo and to Montana's livestock producers. Regardless of citizen input, the NPS continues to ignore the voice of the American public - and it's time they hear us, and listen well.

The NPS and agencies within the Department of Agriculture have just issued a three-volume tome, their Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) designed for the management of Yellowstone buffalo over the next 15 years. The document is a huge disappointment. It will not protect buffalo from slaughter, and favors livestock over bison/buffalo on publicly owned lands outside the park. In essence, the new plan is a very expensive, bureaucratic, complex prescription for more buffalo slaughter, even in the winter when there is no chance of bison and cattle intermingling.

The National Park Service can and should do better, but we need your help to make sure this happens. TAKE ACTION! The FEIS is open for public comments through Monday, October 2, 2000. Personalized letters are CRITICAL for this issue. Please write to Sarah Bransom of the Bison Management Plain EIS Team, e-mail: Sarah_Bransom@nps.gov and elaborate on these two points:

1) The FEIS fails to end slaughter of Yellowstone's bison;
2) The FEIS doesn't make public lands outside the park available to bison/bufflo.

Comments MUST be postmarked or e-mailed by October 2, 2000! If you would like to review the NPS Executive Summary of the FEIS, just visit the NPS-PlanZone.

For more information contact NPCA's Northern Rockies Regional Director, Tony Jewett, by email: tjewett@npca.org or by phone: 406-495-1560. Please let us know you took action by sending a message to TakeAction@npa.org and visit the NPCA, National Parks Conservation Association, web site.