Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 886: Public Land Defense Strategy Session with Ryan Callaghan

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Ep. 886: Public Land Defense Strategy Session with Ryan Callaghan · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: the White Tail Woods, presented by first Light, creating proven
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: the show, I'm joined by Ryan Callahan to get a
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: quick level set on where things stand regarding threats to
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: public lands in early twenty twenty five, and a larger
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: discussion around the best strategies that we can employ to
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: protect those lands now and into the future, whether you
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: are listening to this in twenty twenty five, twenty thirty
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: or thirty more years down the road. All right, welcome
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: back to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: by First Life, and to start today, I want you
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: to close your eyes now. If you're driving, don't do
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: that please, but assuming you are in a safe place,
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: close your eyes. Bear with me here and imagine a
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: piece of public land, a piece of public land that
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: has been special to you, a favorite place, a cherished place,
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: somewhere that has lingered long into your memory because of
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: fishing trip or a hunting trip, or an incredible wildlife
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: encounter or an experience you shared with your son or
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: your daughter, or your mom or your dad. Think about
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: this place, the first place that comes to your mind
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: like that and picture it. Imagine what it looks like,
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: Imagine what it sounds like, the wind through the trees,
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: the river flowing through the rocks, Smell it, touch it,
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: remember what it feels like to be there. And then
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: imagine if that place was gone. Imagine if you couldn't
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: take your son or your daughter, or your grandkids, or
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: your friend or your mentee there. Imagine if you couldn't
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: go back because it was given away, sold off, it
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: was cut down, or if a road was built through
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: the middle of it, whatever it might be. Imagine that
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: that opportunity was no longer available to you. How does
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: that feel? I don't like that thought exercise. I don't
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: like the way that makes me feel, and I don't
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: want that to happen. And that's why we are having
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: this podcast here today, because this podcast, at a very
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: high level, is about what we can do as Americans,
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: as hunters and anglers, to make sure that this never
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: happens to your special place or my special place, or
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: anyone else here that loves our public lands, whether these
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: threats be now or five years from now, or ten
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: years from now or twenty years from now, Because what
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: I learned when I was working on my book was
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: about the history of our public lands and the threats
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: facing them in the future. When you look back in
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: the hundreds of years long history of how we got
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: these places, one of the biggest things that stood out
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: to me while working on that wild country was this
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: fact that these fights happened over and over and over again.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: Ever since we secured these lands as a shared inheritance
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: for all Americans, there have been people trying to get
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: their hands on them, trying to squeeze every penny they
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: can out of them, trying to find ways to sell
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: them off for milk them for more money, or get
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: them in some other person's control. Whatever it is, it
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: continues and it will continue. And so we today are
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: going to discuss some things going on right now in
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty five that are causing all sorts of buzz.
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: If you've been following the media and the news, of
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: course there's a lot going on nationally, but a lot
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: of that national conversation has ramifications for public lands and
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: hunting and fishing and outdoor recreation. So we today are
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: going to discuss a little bit of what's happening right now.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: But then I also and what the biggest part of
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: this conversation entails is zooming out, zooming out of twenty
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: twenty five and talking more generally about we what we
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: as hunters and anglers can do to be the absolute
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: most effective advocates for public lands that we possibly can be.
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: This is a strategy session me my buddy Ryan Callahan,
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: a colleague, for me to the host of Kales. We
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: can review so one of the absolute leaders in the
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: conservation in public land space. Today we are going to brainstorm,
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: We are going to spitball. We are going to wipeboard
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: out different ideas and strategies and tactics and best practices
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: for being the best possible version of a public land
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: defense crew that we can possibly be. What have Cal
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: and I learned over the years as we've studied these issues,
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: What have we learned as we have participated in various
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: nonprofit conservation organizations and as volunteers, and as you know
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: folks that have created content around this and spoken to
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: many of the leaders in the space. The game plan
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: today is to try to really uncover the action items
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: that we need to be taking right now and five
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: years from now, and ten years from now, right on
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: down the line. And you know, I think it has
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: to be acknowledged that, you know, to set the context here,
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: to set this stage, there is a real swelling of
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: energy around anti public land ideas right now. The anti
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: public land movement has existed for many years. It's kind
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: of gone up and down with support and power and
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: opportunity and energy around it, and right now it's on
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: the rise. As hell. Herring said maybe six weeks six
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: weeks ago when he was on the podcast with me,
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: he said that that movement is ascendant right now. There
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: is a lot going on in the world right now,
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: a lot going on nationally that's providing an opportunity for
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: those people. So I want to start here with an
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: excerpt from an email that the CEO of Backcountry Hunters
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: and Anglers just sent. This is Patrick Barry, and he
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: wrote this, I quote, the avalanche of foreboding attacks on
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: public lands, combined with calculated misinformation campaigns design to gaslight
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: Americans into believing what's happening is in their best interest,
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: has reached a crisis point. From Utah's US Supreme Court
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: lawsuit aimed at eroding the very foundations of federal land ownership,
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: to the transactional view that public lands are no more
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: than a line at them on a balance sheet, to
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: the recent raft of political maneuvers setting the stage for
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: a public lands liquidation. The drumbeat of selling out and
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: selling off has become deafening end quote. And it's not
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: just BHA who's raising the red flag on this one.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: Similar concerns have been raised all across the outdoor media
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: and conservation landscape. You can see it in the pages
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: of Field and Stream and Outdoor Life and Meat Eater.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: You're gonna hear it from folks like Randy Nuberg and
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: Hell Herring, and Andrew McKean and Steve Vanella and so
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: many others. This is a across the board realization from many,
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: many people that there's something going on right now, and
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: it's going to require something on our end. Me and
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: Kail are going to dive into questions and concerns and
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: ideas related to everything from how can we as advocates
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: cut through the noise, how can we reach the people
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: we need to reach even though there's so much other
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: stuff going on. How can we actually get our elected
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: officials to listen to us, How can we rally big,
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: diverse coalitions in support of public lands. How can we
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: get conservation organizations to actually act and move forward on
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: the things that we really need them to. How can
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: we individually speak out about these issues more effectively. How
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: can we be more effective in educating our friends and
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: family members and work colleagues and all that kind of stuff.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: How can we kind of get outside of the partisan, polarizing,
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: name calling and craft talking that so much of our
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: politics are today. These are some of the things that
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: Cal and I try to discuss. And I will say that,
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: you know, the first thirty minutes or so of the
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: conversation with me and Cal here do kind of get
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: to the you know, context of what's happening right now.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: We do a level set some of the things that
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: Cal's concerned about, some of the things that I'm concerned about.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: Some of the current events right now in early twenty
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: twenty five that are you know, giving folks in the
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: public land world from heartburn. So if you know, if
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: you've heard enough, if you're very well aware of the
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: situation in March twenty twenty five and don't need to
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: hear more about that. You can fast forward maybe thirty
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: minutes ish. That's when we get to more of this
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: tactical strategy session. But you know, I don't think that
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: it's I don't think it is, you know, a bad
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: idea to take stock of where we are right now, though,
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: because there is a lot and maybe you've been seeing
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: social media posts or you've been seeing the headlines with
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: concerns raised about public lands, but you're not really sure
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: of the details. I've had a lot of people commenting
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: on some of my things on social media saying, well,
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: you know, what's the big deal? You know, we have
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: to lay off some people. What's the big deal with that?
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: And so I think some people are aware of maybe
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: like one tiny slice of what's happening, but haven't seen
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: the full picture. So Cal and I do try to
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: speak to more of that full picture. But let me
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: give you a very quick rundown here, so you have
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: a sense of, you know, this kind of stack of
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: issues that keeps on piling up, piling up, piling up,
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: and it has been for a number of years now.
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: This isn't something that just began with the new administration.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: There have been folks, you know, slowly accruing power, pushing
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: for these ideas, you know, for years. So one thing
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: mentioned there in Patrick Barry's email was this lawsuit from
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: the state of Utah asserting that the federal government was
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  Speaker 2: breaking the law supposedly by having and managing federal public lands,
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: and the State of Utah demanded that the federal government
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: give eighteen point five million acres of federal public land
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: to the State of Utah. That fortunately was not picked
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: up by the Supreme Court. They decided not to hear
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: that case. But it's very likely that that's gonna rear
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: its ugly head up again in some appeals court or
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: something down the line. I think that was a strong
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: signal of what's going on. More than a dozen other states.
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: I thought it was somewhere around almost twenty different states
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: signed on in support of that. So this isn't just
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: a Utah thing. This is also North Dakota thing. This
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: is also an Iowa thing. This is also a bunch
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: of other state governments agreeing and supporting that idea. Speaking
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: of states supporting the idea of getting rid of public lands,
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: the state Senate in Wyoming pushed through a big resolution
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: again demanding that the federal government give over all the
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: federal public lands they've gotten the state of Wyoming. Now,
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: that actually got passed at one point, that resolution was
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: passed at one point by why Ioming State Senate. Fortunately,
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: they don't actually have the powers to do that, to
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: force the federal government to hand over their public lands,
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: but that kind of thing is being proposed by Wyoming
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: and other states. This kind of state control thing continues
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: to get some interest in certain corners, you know. Continuing
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: down that line, a bill was recently introduced that's trying
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: to you know, remove the power of the presidency to
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: use the Antiquities Act, which has been a tremendous tool
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: for protecting public lands. Theodore Roosevelt was the first to
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: do it and secure it incredible places that we all
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: enjoy today, such as the land that's now the Grand
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Canyon National Park and many others. Let's see, when it
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: comes to you know, more recent high level federal stuff,
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: what probably most of you are aware of are the
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: cuts that have happened at the federal level. And and yes,
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: like there's there's important efficiency measures being taken which I
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: am many people'll kind of appreciate, but when it comes
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: to public lands specifically, there's been some concerns there. More
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: than two thousand folks from the Department of the Interior
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: were laid off, including more than a thousand from the
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: National Park Service. I also saw that another seven hundred
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: I believe took the kind of the pushed on them
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: early retirement offering. So that leads to about seventeen hundred
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: folks not at the National Park Service anymore. In that
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: I believe was almost ten percent of their staff. There
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: was thirty four hundred Forest Service employees that were let go.
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: That's about ten percent of the Forest Service. And you
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: know this isn't official yet, but the latest report I
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: saw is that there is another push happening where they
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: are asking for a push to lay off another seven
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: thousand folks there. And these are agencies that were already understaffed,
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: that were already underfunded. Budgets were slashed last year during
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: the previous administration and that passed Congress. So the agencies
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: that are managing our public lands are facing really really
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: difficult conditions too. This is concerning. And then you also
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: have further cost cutting measures. Many of the grants and
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: funds and budgets for these agencies and habitat programs are
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: being either frozen or slashed. And then on the flip side,
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: there's the cost cutting side, and then there's also the
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: revenue side. And this is an inherent what I would
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: say a good thing about public lands, but also a
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: thing that you always have to be careful about, is
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: the fact that revenues are raised from our public lands.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: They are a revenue source, They are meant to be
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: a sustainable profit center, a sustainable resource in which there
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: is extraction for gas and oil and minerals and timber
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: and grazing. Those are opportunities that have been available on
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: public lands and should continue to be available. The thing
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: with our shared multi use landscape is that all priorities
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: need to be considered, and sometimes the pendulum swings one
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: way too far, and sometimes the other way. And right now,
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: based on what we're hearing and based on many of
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: the proposals and executive orders that we're seeing right now,
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: it seems like the pendulum is swinging far far to
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: the extraction side. All other things being equal, there's a
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: very high priority on drill baby, drill, extract baby extract.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: Let's let's milk these things for as much money as
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: we possibly can. So many executive orders recently and secretarial
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: orders have been essentially laying the groundwork and asking for
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: the departments to start building out plans to take action on,
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: you know, fast tracking anything we can to get extraction
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: and development projects underway. Things like getting drilling going in
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Things like possibly going and
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: getting the Ambler Road development in Alaska approved even after
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: it was denied last year after hearing from hunters and anglers.
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: Things like taking any mineral withdrawals that were made during
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: the last administration, So any places that you know, the
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: government said, hey, this place is too special to mine
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: or to extract, let's not do it in this spot.
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: Now they're looking to reassess and possibly remove those such
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: as the mineral withdrawal around the Boundary Waters Wilderness area
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: that we've talked a lot about, and a whole bunch
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: of more examples like that. And you know, anytime when
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: you talk national priorities, shifting priorities, and federal government right,
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: it can be touchy, It can make us defensive. And
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: I want to be clear here that in by talking
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: about any of these things whether it's right now in
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty five, or when I talked about these things
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: in twenty twenty one or twenty twenty two or twenty
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: nineteen or twenty seventeen. You know, these aren't attacks on people,
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: These aren't attacks on parties. These are simply you know,
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: at least the way I approach it, I take an
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: issue by issue perspective. I don't care who the president is.
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: I don't care what parties in office. I just care
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: about the specific ideas being put on the table and
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: what they mean for hunting and fishing and the different
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: things that we do on public landscapes. And so you know,
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: right now we have you know, the Republicans's side does
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: have more control right now, and they're doing plenty of
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: good things, plenty of things that I would say, God
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: bless you to them for. I appreciate the support that
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: they are giving our firearm rights. I appreciate the fact
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: that they are incredibly supportive of hunting opportunities and access
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: in our way of life, and you know, so many
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: other things like that. I think most of us listening
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: to this podcast are in support of a more efficient,
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: smart government, absolutely, but at the same token, I do
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: not think that it is unpatriotic or Unamerican or unsupportive
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: to also point out some warts when we see them.
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: And here's the analogy. I've got the thing that kind
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: of came to mind to me when I when I
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: have talked about some of this stuff on social media,
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: a bunch of people would write in and say, well,
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: you know, we got to have these cuts or we
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: have to do this thing because you know, we need
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: to work down the deficit, or we need to make
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: the government more efficient, and because of that, you know,
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: basically apologize and ignore any of these other things because
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: the greater cause or this other cause is important. And
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: my thought to that, my response says, Okay, let's imagine
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: going to the hospital and you got a broken arm,
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: and you recognize that you have a problem. Here's this problem.
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: I got a big old broken arm. I need you
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: to fix it. I need someone to fix it. You
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: go in there to the hospital, and if they all
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: of a sudden, before they fix my broken arm just
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: started cutting off my right leg. I wouldn't just sit
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: there and not ask any questions and just let them
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: take it. No, I would say, hey, man, why do
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: you guys take my right leg too. Are you sure
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: you need to take my right leg? I really love
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: my right leg. Can we think about this? Can we
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: do this carefully? Can we explore other opportunities? Are you
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: looking into every possible recourse you have? Let's be careful.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't just blindly let them go with it. And
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: I think we maybe should consider a similar approach when
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: it comes to our public lands, because yes, there are
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: other problems that need to be fixed. And this is
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: the case no matter who's in office, there's always going
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: to be some other problem. And it's going to be
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: our job, as hunters and anglers and people that care
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: about our public lands to say, hey, don't forget about
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: our right leg. Don't forget about our public lands. You know,
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: whether it be you know, the current administration wanting to
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: put a new road through the wilderness up in Alaska
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: to open up mind, or whether it be the past
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: administration wanting to put up millions of acres worth of
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: solar panels across wide open landscapes and destroy wildlife habitat
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: in that kind of way, I think our job is
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: to call a spade a spade to whoever's in office,
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: because you know, the wildlife and the wild places of
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: America don't have a voice, but we do. So we
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: need to speak up for them, no matter if we
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: are Republicans or Democrats or independents, no matter if the
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: President or Congress is Republican or Democrat. Regardless, we can,
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: we should, and we need to speak up and take
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: action for these things. So that is my long winded
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: rant to kick off this podcast. This one's gonna be long,
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: so apologies for that, but that's what I got. That's
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: my intro. Like I said, me and cal riff on
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: this a little bit more like I said, for maybe
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: like thirty ish minutes. So if you want to get
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: right to the strategy, fast forward from here. But I
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: do hope this is going to be helpful for you
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: now and well into the future. And while this episode
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: today is about defense, there are offensive strategies that we
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: can consider as well, and that are available even now
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: in the short term. So next week we do have
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: an episode and a couple folks coming on that are
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: going to talk about opportunities that we have over these
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: next few years, ways that we absolutely could have some
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: conservation wins and maybe some public land wins if we
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: do our job and get our elected officials back on
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: the right track. Good things aren't possible. So we're gonna
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: talk defense, We're gonna talk offense. We're gonna talk about
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: whatever we have to do, regardless of political party, regardless
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: of where we live, what we do, whatever we love
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: these places, we love these opportunities.
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: We're gonna fight.
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: All right now with me on the line. We've got
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: the one and only mister Ryan Callahan. Uh. First off, Scuss,
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: I thank you for hopping right out of bed this
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: morning and joining me early on a on a Monday morning.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: I do appreciate that.
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: To eight thirty in the morning. Mark left bed a
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: long time ago.
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: But a lot of you don't have kids. I don't
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: know what world you're living in, cal it might be.
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: No, I got a doctor making up her mind whether
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: to puke or not, so it's kind of like having kids,
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: So that's no figure. But no, Yeah, thank thank you
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: for having me on. I know we've been talking about
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: joining Forrests here for a long time and we're honestly
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: doing a pretty piss poor job of it, so I'm
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: sure this is a good, good step one here.
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: So yeah, I gotta start somewhere in in while. While
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: we've done a piss poor job so far, I have
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: pie in the sky aspirations for what we're gonna do
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: here today. We're gonna do something that that may not
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: be possible, but I hope it is. So hear me
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: out on this. I'm hoping that we can have a
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: discussion today that is not just about current events. It
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: will be about current events, but it's hopefully something that
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: somebody could return to two years from now, or four
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: years from now, or ten years from now and still
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: find helpful and relevant to whatever version of this world
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: is happening for them. Then that's kind of my goal
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: for what we're gonna do here, because what I the
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: idea for this kale was that, you know, I've been,
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: as you have, thinking a lot about what's going on
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: right now related to public lands, related to kind of
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: this rising tide of energy for some ideas around you know,
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: changing what we're doing with public lands, whether it be
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: transferring them or defunding them, or divesting of them, or
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: any other number of ways that this incredible public land
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: inheritance that we have might be damaged. There's a lot
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: of different stuff in the floating in the ether right
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: now in that front. So I've been thinking a whole
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: lot about what can I do, what should I do,
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: what shouldn't I do, What can we use a community do.
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: There's all these different ideas, and there's all these different
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: questions I have, And I got to thinking that maybe
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: it would be best to do that kind of brainstorming
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: and spitballing and figuring out the answers to those questions,
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: not just an isolation, but actually with somebody else who's
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: also doing the same kind of stuff. So rather than
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: you and me sitting in our own little rooms thinking
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: about this stuff and try and figure out what the
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: hell to do, maybe we should talk about together and
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: see if we can come up with some ideas or
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: some lessons learned, or look back on the past at
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: what's worked and what's not. Maybe that can help inform
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: us about what we should do moving forward. And gosh,
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: I bet there's a whole lot of people that'd be
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: interested in that conversation between the two of you, so
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: that this just doesn't benefit us, but also maybe is
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: a toolbox or a game plan or a blueprint that
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: could be used by all sorts of people now and
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: in the future. So that's that's the pie in the
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: sky hope. Is that asking too much? Or is that possible? Oh?
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: I think very possible. You know, like the realistic building blocks,
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: like the foundation for anything like this is really not
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: going to change.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: So yeah, well, it's funny you say that because you know,
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: in writing my book on this topic handful of years ago,
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: maybe the very biggest takeaway I had from that is
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: that these same fights and battles and debates have been
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: happening for decades. You know that the specifics are a
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: little bit different. But you know, supposedly Mark Twain said this.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: I don't know if it's actually him, but he says
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: that history doesn't always repeat itself, but it usually rhymes.
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: And there's a lot of truth to that, and I
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: think that I think that will prove true with our
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: current situation and what's to come. You know, who knows
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: how many years down the road. So that's a long
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: winded wind up kel to this. I think it would
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: be useful with all this about timeless being said, I
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: do think it would be useful to have kind of
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: a level set of where things stand right now with
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: public lands. There's been tons in the news, you guys
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: have talked about on your podcast. There's been some discussion
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: around it on the Mediator podcast. We've all had social
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: media posts that have brought up something related to these things.
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: All the major media outlets are discussing, you know, everything
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: from layoffs to funding, to executive orders to you know,
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: every other which way and another. Me and hell Herring
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: had a conversation about this prior to the new administration
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: coming on board back in January sixteenth. We have not
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: had a conversation on this podcast, this specific podcast, about
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: you know, what's gone on in six weeks since then.
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: So to kind of get our foundation, I guess you
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: could you run me through maybe the things right now
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: that have you the most concerned or that you're really
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: paying attention to or related to public lands over the
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: last six weeks. So, what are the things that have
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: been getting you, you know, stand up late at night
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: doing a lot of research, doing a lot of thinking,
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: wanting to be involved in these kinds of conversations. What
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: are those top things right now?
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: Boy? I've been learning a lot about the national debt,
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: you know, for better or worse.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: I do.
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: Kind of aggregate consistent arguments, and you hear the national
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: debt brought up a lot. So I've been reaching out
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: to folks whose job, you know, economists that work on
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: the national debt or teach classes courses on the national
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: debt and picking their brains and asking the same questions
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: of everybody, and then you know, expanding a little bit,
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: so spending time there because that just seems to be like, well,
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: it's for the national debt or or this is all
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: happening because we have to reduce the national debt. And
• 28:16
  Speaker 3: then I also am interested in you know, because like
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: I I'm kind of like a true believer, right, Like
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: that'd be the category that I fall in, where I
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: see immense value in public land, public water, public wildlife.
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: That's where I've spent my life. That's where I've gotten
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: a lot of personal growth and enjoyment, and and I'm
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: just anchored to it, right So I do also pay
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: attention to some of the arguments that kind of come
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: from that same angle, but from the opposition point of view,
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: So like public lands, water and wildlife are a socialist
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: ideal or a communist ideal. So I've spent some time
• 29:14
  Speaker 3: going through some of those which are interesting, and I
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: think you know, right now it's safe to say that
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: there's a very very good chance that public lands as
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: we know them, which should be the big asterisk there,
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: like as we know them is, are are going to change.
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: We know and have always known that there are you know,
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: redundancies in just like anybody who works for any sort
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: of big corporation, there's a lot of redundancies. That's where
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: like the B word bureaucracy comes in, and there's some
• 30:02
  Speaker 3: waste for sure. But we also know that with the
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: recent round of layoffs and impending layoffs like the there's
• 30:15
  Speaker 3: no consultation happening with leaders in the space. So nobody
• 30:22
  Speaker 3: went to like, you know, like the the best foresters
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: in the Forest Service and said, hey, this is our goal.
• 30:32
  Speaker 3: What do we need to do. Nobody went to the
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: best district rangers and said, hey, this is our goal.
• 30:38
  Speaker 3: This is what we do, right, you run the best
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: forest by these metrics in all of our national forests.
• 30:47
  Speaker 3: Here's our goal. What do we need to do? That
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: that did not happen. And when you look at like
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: these legacy federal employment rates, we peekked more or less
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: uh in the you know, late seventies, early eighties for
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: federal employees but really we've maintained a more or less
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: steady employment rate and it's just where those employees are
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: that has changed. And you know, relative to our population
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: growth and user growth visitation to these places right where,
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: we're at an all time low relative to those rates.
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: So you hear this other argument when we talk about employment,
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: of like, oh, well, they're just uh, they're doing what
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: corporations do and they're they're laying everybody off and then
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: they'll they'll backfill in. Well, a, you've ever been in
• 32:00
  Speaker 3: that position. It sucks. It's not a good thing. People
• 32:05
  Speaker 3: are going on unemployment. It drastically affects not only their lives,
• 32:13
  Speaker 3: but the lives of people around them and our gross
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: domatic domestic product, which is tied to the unemployment rate
• 32:22
  Speaker 3: in this country. And I think if there's we want
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: to get to like the good things that you can do,
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: and here's like the positive message, and I think people
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: bond around public land, public water, public wildlife for sure,
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: So I'm very optimistic there. But I do want people
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: to come away with this other thing, like what is
• 32:42
  Speaker 3: going on right now is not reducing nor in my
• 32:50
  Speaker 3: estimation and all of my research, will we see a
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: reduction in national debt. In the debt this tree carries.
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: Even if you were to do the Mark Twain thing
• 33:04
  Speaker 3: and like jump back and look at the last time
• 33:08
  Speaker 3: an attempt was made to do this, our national debt
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: still rose. Right, So like Reaganomics in the eighties would
• 33:17
  Speaker 3: be like the thing that people are pointing to. We
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: didn't reduce debt. Then we changed how we spent. And
• 33:28
  Speaker 3: anybody listening to this show, anybody you run into on
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: the street, will tell you without a doubt, saving money
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: does not affect your debt. If you have a mortgage,
• 33:39
  Speaker 3: a credit card, car loan, student loan, whatever, you can
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: save all the money you have and put it in
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: that jar. But unless you put it towards the principle,
• 33:51
  Speaker 3: you are not reducing your debt. Like we know that.
• 33:56
  Speaker 3: That is a fact. So it is very irksome to
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: me when people are like, well, we got to reduce
• 34:04
  Speaker 3: the national debt, that would be great. That is not
• 34:07
  Speaker 3: what's happening here. I don't think it's the plan at all.
• 34:12
  Speaker 3: And the only time that we're gonna see reduction in
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: the national debt is if, like President Trump came on
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: and said yesterday, past tense, we matured all these treasury
• 34:28
  Speaker 3: bills and notes, paid them off, and we will not
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: issue them again. If that were to happen, that would
• 34:38
  Speaker 3: be a reduction in national debt, and that I don't
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: think that's going to happen, right. I'd be super super
• 34:48
  Speaker 3: shocked if we don't see coming up here very soon
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: and a raising the lid on the national debt again.
• 35:01
  Speaker 3: So we are saving money, but it's money that's already
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: already spent. We're putting it in I don't even know
• 35:12
  Speaker 3: what bucket. There's an optimistic view that once we reshuffle
• 35:17
  Speaker 3: the deck and we have a surplus, which would again
• 35:24
  Speaker 3: be in quotations to reassign to other things, then we
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: can fight to have that reassigned towards things that we
• 35:33
  Speaker 3: care about, right, Like, everybody's gonna be fighting for that cash.
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: There's a chance that we could fight hard enough and
• 35:38
  Speaker 3: get that cash towards you know, new efficient ass kicking
• 35:46
  Speaker 3: management of the Forest Service to the BLM bureau, breck
• 35:49
  Speaker 3: all that stuff. But I just like to think that
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: we're reducing national debt is just not I am a
• 36:01
  Speaker 3: D minus macro economic one class University of Montana, dude, right,
• 36:08
  Speaker 3: And this is a fact, like I've corresponded with a
• 36:12
  Speaker 3: bunch of folks who do this as a as a living.
• 36:16
  Speaker 3: Like when we talk about reducing the national debt in
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: the in those terms, all it means is that we
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: are going to attempt to raise our gross domestic product
• 36:27
  Speaker 3: in relation to the national debt.
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: Mm hmmm.
• 36:32
  Speaker 3: That that's it.
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: So all these conversations around the national debt, and and
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: there's been interestingly a number of you know, a number
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: of people talking about this outside of our world too,
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: Like there's several opinion pieces in the Wall Street Journal
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: talking about this in waste, that the federal lands, our
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: public lands might be used in this capacity to on
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: that or something. But but here's the thing. When this
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: is brought up and the issues of you know, pulling
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: back funding of public lands, or divesting of public lands,
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: or laying off the workforce to cut costs, all these
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: different things, one thing I've noticed when someone like you
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: or myself or Steve or anyone from any other media
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: organization or any individual brings up these things and says, well,
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: this might not be such a good idea for a
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: reason A, B and C. There's a whole flurry of
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: voices who say what you just said, well we have
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: to pay off the debt. Well, we have to sacrifice
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: across the board to deal with these things. And I
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: don't disagree, and that there's plenty of as you said too,
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: plenty of room to improve efficiency, plenty of fat that
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: could probably be cut, plenty of ways we need to
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: make our government work better for us. Agree on all
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: of those fronts. But what I would also say, and
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: I made this analogy in the introduction to this separate
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: but you know, if I go to the hospital and
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: I've got a broken arm and I say, hey, you know,
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: we fix my broken arm for me. If they come
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: in and say, yep, we see that's a problem you've
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: got there. We're going to fix your broken arm, that's great.
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: But if at the same time they also mentioned, oh,
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: by the way, we're also going to cut off your leg.
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: I'm not just going to be like, all right, fine, yeah,
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: got to fix my broken arm, so take my leg
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: with it too? Why not? No, I'm going to ask
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: some serious questions. I'm gonna say, are you sure you
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: need to cut off my leg? Is there anything we
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: can do about that? Are there some alternative solutions? Can
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: you very thoroughly explain to me why you're cutting off
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: my leg. I'm going to fight for my leg. I'm
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: not just going to willingly ask no questions, say well, yeah, sure,
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: you're my doctor. I love you, Take my arm, take
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: my leg, whatever you need. No, of course not. So
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: I think that there is there's no reason why we
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: can't ask serious questions about this. There's no reason we
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: should feel bad about raising some concerns around it, because
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: I really like my leg. I'd like to keep it around.
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: And I'm not gonna, you know, feel like I'm not
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: supporting my doctor just because he's doing something that maybe
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: isn't going to help me all the way across the board.
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: So in that case, I think these questions that the
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: other people are bringing up and that we're bringing up
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: around the debt and the best way to deal with
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: that problem, or around government efficiency and the best way
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: to solve those problems, and making sure that in doing
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: those important things, at least when it comes to the
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: public land and wildlife issues that we know a lot
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: about and care a lot about, that we're not throwing
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: the baby out with the bathwater. And I think that's
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: where we come into some serious concerns about what's happening
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: right now, because, as you mentioned, there's a chainsaw approach
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: that's maybe being taken right now, where a scalpel is
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: probably more appropriate, and a scalpel being used very carefully
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: with something that matters a lot to a lot of people. Right.
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: I think that's like my entry point to a lot
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: of this is like, we have it's okay to engage
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: in that kind of way because this stuff really matters,
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: and a chainsaw is a power perful tool, but also
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: a very dangerous one if not use carefully.
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know it matters to everyone. So the
• 40:11
  Speaker 3: frustrating part here is is, you know, public lands have
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: been almost like a co op approach for a long time. Right.
• 40:24
  Speaker 3: Mother Nature's a beast. It throws a lot of curveballs
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: at individuals and agencies. You could have a forest management
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: plan that says we're going to, you know, clear one
• 40:38
  Speaker 3: thousand miles of trail this summer. That's what our trail
• 40:43
  Speaker 3: crews are going to do, and there could be a
• 40:45
  Speaker 3: microburst and a windstorm and they could very well clear
• 40:50
  Speaker 3: a thousand miles of trail, but it ends up being
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: the same trail that they worked on all summer long
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: because of you know, crazy wind events, and that leaves
• 41:03
  Speaker 3: thousands of miles of trail that is not going to
• 41:06
  Speaker 3: get the attention of that trail crew and the horse
• 41:10
  Speaker 3: packers and the recreational folks, right they're the ones who
• 41:16
  Speaker 3: are clearing trail, and that that is That's the way
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: it's always been, really, you know, I think there's some
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: frequency of some of those crews that I remember seeing
• 41:29
  Speaker 3: a lot more when I was younger and hoofing it around.
• 41:33
  Speaker 3: But you know, I don't have like the hard numbers
• 41:39
  Speaker 3: to support how many trail crews are on the landscape
• 41:42
  Speaker 3: right now, but I do know that, you know, there's
• 41:43
  Speaker 3: been a heavy reliance on independent contractors to take care
• 41:49
  Speaker 3: of all sorts of things on our public lands in
• 41:52
  Speaker 3: the last over a decade, you know, and a lot
• 41:56
  Speaker 3: of those independent contractors who have built whole businesses in
• 42:00
  Speaker 3: the private sector around these things are are really hurting
• 42:04
  Speaker 3: right now too because of the federal funding freezes. So
• 42:10
  Speaker 3: those things are going to have an impact on users,
• 42:15
  Speaker 3: if I'm being honest, Is it going to impact me
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: a whole lot? Not that much, because I've spent a
• 42:25
  Speaker 3: ton of my time parking on the in a wide
• 42:29
  Speaker 3: spot on the road and heading up, you know, terrain
• 42:34
  Speaker 3: that is not family friendly or all that accessible to
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: somebody who doesn't like to suffer a little bit, But
• 42:42
  Speaker 3: it is darn sure going to impact the people who
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: rely on maintain campgrounds and and just you know, come
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: to expect a certain level of service maintained roads for
• 42:57
  Speaker 3: one to get that fifth wheel into those spots. Stuff
• 43:01
  Speaker 3: like that, garbage removal, pumping toilets. So like, you know,
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: and how many you're of this age, and so many
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: of my friends are right, It's like I never thought,
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: ever thought we'd have a camper, but then you have
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: a kid, it's two kids, and it's like, couldn't do
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: it without it, right, just just makes things more enjoyable.
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: You eat a little time back, stuff like that, And
• 43:26
  Speaker 3: those are the people that are going to see some
• 43:29
  Speaker 3: real effects this spring and summer for sure. Another super
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: important thing, right, like we got wildfires ripping in the
• 43:47
  Speaker 3: Carolinas right now. Something that's not talked about is like
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: a ton of this seasonal employee base, although not specifically
• 43:58
  Speaker 3: assigned to fire, they plan on being assigned to fire
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: in emergency capacity, filling in extra spots when when fire
• 44:10
  Speaker 3: season starts to go, so they all have you know,
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: what's called a red card. They're they're fire certified in
• 44:17
  Speaker 3: order to do that. So it even though they're not
• 44:21
  Speaker 3: specifically fire personnel, they absolutely do work on on fire,
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: especially once once seasons get get big. You know, So
• 44:33
  Speaker 3: you know that that's one part of this. Then we
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: jump over to the announcement that was made over the
• 44:41
  Speaker 3: weekend for like increasing timber harvest on on public land.
• 44:47
  Speaker 3: You know, hunters certainly know that there can be some
• 44:52
  Speaker 3: real benefit to that new edge habitat that's created through
• 44:56
  Speaker 3: timber harvest. Not always a bad thing by any means.
• 45:01
  Speaker 3: It's certainly renewable resource. We need timber. It can be
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: done really well. The interesting thing here is, you know
• 45:15
  Speaker 3: this is like your normal blanket statement government bureaucracy stuff, right,
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: Like that's one of the other pet peeves of mine,
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: right It's like there's no clearer example of big government
• 45:31
  Speaker 3: than what's going on right now of just like, uh yeah,
• 45:35
  Speaker 3: fire all these people don't need to know what they do,
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: don't need to know what's going on. So we've laied
• 45:42
  Speaker 3: laid off a ton of folks whose job it is
• 45:45
  Speaker 3: to go through our timber stands and calculate how many
• 45:54
  Speaker 3: commercially viable board feet of lumber there are mark off zones.
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: Let's say, hey, these trees have to remain in order
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: to hold back stream bank sediment, allow fish to spawn,
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: keep our streams and rivers healthy, you know, places where
• 46:11
  Speaker 3: a road can be established in order to get that
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: commercially viable timber to market. Those people just got laid off.
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: But when the executive order just came out saying they
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: want to increase timber production dramatically, et cetera, et cetera,
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: but now we don't have the staffing to do that
• 46:32
  Speaker 2: in a smart way, right.
• 46:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. And you know it's really interesting that you
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: need these people on the ground in order, you know,
• 46:46
  Speaker 3: in order to actually make this stuff happen. We don't
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: have a nationalized timber program, right. It's not the federal
• 46:54
  Speaker 3: government going out there and taking trees to market independent contractors, right,
• 47:02
  Speaker 3: it's oftentimes like small, independent, like family owned timber operations.
• 47:11
  Speaker 3: And you know, like kids I grew up with and
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: at Hellgate High School that you know, as soon as
• 47:17
  Speaker 3: football season was over, they quit high school to go
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: cut timber with their dads. Right, it's those people that
• 47:25
  Speaker 3: are out there doing this, and like there's not that
• 47:34
  Speaker 3: much timber in certain areas, areas that are under this
• 47:40
  Speaker 3: big government, like, hey, this is where we want timber
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: to come from, Black Hills being a great example, Like
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: there's not a lot of good timber there right now.
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: So we're kind of back in this situation of like, yes,
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: we want to reduce fuels for wildfire mitigation, but the
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: fuels that are there, there's not really a strong market for,
• 48:09
  Speaker 3: especially if you've got to burn a bunch of gas
• 48:11
  Speaker 3: and time to get them. So we kind of go
• 48:17
  Speaker 3: into this zone of us, the taxpayer federal government, are
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: we going to pay these timber producers to go in
• 48:27
  Speaker 3: there and extract timber that you know, basically like subsidize
• 48:33
  Speaker 3: timber at the mill. And it could not be a mill, right,
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: it could just be a chipping facility or a pellet
• 48:40
  Speaker 3: facility type of thing, because that timber isn't what's going
• 48:45
  Speaker 3: to go into building somebody's house.
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: Well, and I think that this is just one example
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: of many in which, you know, there's a bunch of
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: things happening right now that I think it is fair
• 49:00
  Speaker 2: to say is representative of just a pendulum shift strongly
• 49:05
  Speaker 2: in one direction towards you know, fast tracking all extraction
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: possible from these public lands, like milking every dollar we
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: can from that. That's that's a higher priority right now
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: for folks who are at the levers of power than
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: it was. And so what you have is, as you
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: just described, situation where there might be some subsidizing of
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: of getting that stuff going on within our national force,
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: but maybe pushing it into overdrive. Same thing with gas
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: and oil, same thing with minerals. You know, there's been
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: this slew of executive orders trying to unleash you know,
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: Alaska's energy potential, declaring it energy emergency, fast tracking any
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: and all potential energy projects in the lower forty eight
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: you know, review and possible recision of any mineral withdrawals
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: basically anywhere, or any kind of protection was put into
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: place or speed bump was raised. You know, with the
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: new priorities, they're trying to remove that let's let's get
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: as much oil, let's get as much timber, let's get
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: as much every mine, et cetera, et cetera. That is
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: kind of the trend that things are heading towards. You
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: have places that we as hunters and anglers have you know,
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: fought for years and years to protect places like the
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: Boundary Waters or the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or you
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: know the Brooks Range there. With the Ambler Road being
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: proposed to be pushed through there, these places are back
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: on the cutting block. I guess you could say.
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: Auction block least the auction block.
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: Least block the eye. So you have things like that happening.
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: You then have the freezing of funds and grants towards
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: habitat work that a lot of organizations were working on,
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: like Trout and limited I knows lost dollars. I've talked
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: to people who had they were doing habitat work that
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: now you know they're not going to be able to do.
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: You then have the layoffs like you were talking about
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: there a minute ago, about ten percent of the National
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: Forest Service, you know worker for workforce was with involved
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: in those layoffs. Now, between the layoffs and then the
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: resignations due to the Fork in the Road proposal, about
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: ten percent of the National Park Service workforce is now gone.
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: So there's there's this whole array of things happening right
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: now that are going to lead to possible challenges with
• 51:27
  Speaker 2: management of public lands, funding issues with public lands, and
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: all of that possibly feeding into what has been again
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: a rising tide of people saying, well, public lands are
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: managed horribly by the federal government. We should transfer them
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: to the states or get rid of them. There was
• 51:44
  Speaker 2: the lawsuit from you in Utah, you know, claiming that
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: they should get all their federal public lands. There's the
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: proposal and you know the Montana sorry, Wyoming state legislator
• 51:58
  Speaker 2: legislature voting to demand all of their federal public lands
• 52:02
  Speaker 2: other than Yellowstone National Park to be given to the
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: state of Wyoming. So this is this is a kind
• 52:08
  Speaker 2: of rising tide of all these things that potentially threat
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: I think seriously threat our public lands. And that's that's
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: like our current version right now, kill right that that's
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: what we're experiencing here in early twenty twenty five.
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: And if there was somebody interject yeah, just because you
• 52:26
  Speaker 3: covered so much, they're like, I think it's it's really
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: really important again to remind people that that oil and
• 52:34
  Speaker 3: gas mineral extraction that also goes in this bucket of
• 52:42
  Speaker 3: things that are not going to affect the national debt.
• 52:48
  Speaker 3: So like, at the end of the day, like I've said,
• 52:51
  Speaker 3: a couple of things that I want people to remember.
• 52:53
  Speaker 3: But like I want every Ameria to value their public lands,
• 53:03
  Speaker 3: I also want them to just understand that as we
• 53:08
  Speaker 3: continue on here and we may or may not be
• 53:10
  Speaker 3: faced with these questions of do you want to trade
• 53:14
  Speaker 3: this for that, we will not be trading natural resources
• 53:23
  Speaker 3: to reduce the national debt. That is not what's going on.
• 53:27
  Speaker 3: It will increase our gross domestic product, which makes it
• 53:31
  Speaker 3: look better in relation to the national debt. So yeah,
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: these insanely complicated, unbelievable areas that you mentioned, right, I mean,
• 53:47
  Speaker 3: just take the Boundary Waters right, that is a fresh
• 53:50
  Speaker 3: water reserve that is absolutely critical to life in the
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: United States. And you know, I think for very good reason,
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: there is a moratorium on mineral withdrawal under the last
• 54:04
  Speaker 3: administration that I feel like had overwhelming public support. Now
• 54:12
  Speaker 3: that's up for review. And the company that wants to
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: go in there, Twin Metals, is not American owned, is
• 54:21
  Speaker 3: a foreign entity like many major mining companies, right, So
• 54:29
  Speaker 3: what we are going to be getting out of that
• 54:33
  Speaker 3: are and focus need to like look up the Mining
• 54:35
  Speaker 3: Act eighteen seventy and and see like what we get,
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: because again that we don't have nationalized federal mining operations
• 54:49
  Speaker 3: or nationalized federal oil and gas operations. Right, the US
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: government is not taking anything to market, and that is
• 54:58
  Speaker 3: by design. People did not think it was fair to
• 55:06
  Speaker 3: other Americans trying to make a living to go out
• 55:09
  Speaker 3: and compete against the federal government. Right, So when we
• 55:15
  Speaker 3: talk about this stuff, you got to understand that, like,
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: we're not getting some giant chunk of the tax pile, right,
• 55:23
  Speaker 3: I think we're the US government has only pulled in
• 55:27
  Speaker 3: us the American people, I think is only pulled in
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: like four hundred billion dollars off of off of mining
• 55:36
  Speaker 3: leases since eighteen seventy two. So you know that's would
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: basically be enough to service the national debt right now,
• 55:48
  Speaker 3: pay pay the pay the juice if you will nothing.
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's it's it's a spit in the bucket
• 55:57
  Speaker 3: in the ocean. So the other thing to go back
• 56:02
  Speaker 3: to the fact that are our lands managed better than
• 56:10
  Speaker 3: private entities? Are our lands managed better than state entities? Well, gang,
• 56:17
  Speaker 3: we're getting exactly what we wanted. People don't want the
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: federal government to compete with private enterprise, so we've shackled
• 56:28
  Speaker 3: their ability to do so. Right, Like, that's why the regulations,
• 56:34
  Speaker 3: the least fees have never been updated. That's why the
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: boots on the ground workforce is always very limited. There's
• 56:46
  Speaker 3: always more to do, so it's insanely disingenuous to the
• 56:52
  Speaker 3: point where I will tell you and everybody listening it
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: is not about management. Is just not about manage. It
• 57:00
  Speaker 3: has more to do with a bunch of entrepreneurial types
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: so fricking pissed that they cannot figure out a way
• 57:07
  Speaker 3: to make money off of what we all publicly have
• 57:10
  Speaker 3: and are and is managed by us by the people.
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 57:16
  Speaker 3: It is land for the people, wildlife for the people,
• 57:21
  Speaker 3: very very American ideals. That's what's driving this. It's not
• 57:27
  Speaker 3: this idea about management. And if anybody like, I'm going
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: to cuss here, so hold on to your ears. Kids.
• 57:38
  Speaker 3: When you hear people be like, oh well, private lands
• 57:41
  Speaker 3: manage so much better, you should say, well, I should
• 57:43
  Speaker 3: fucking hope so like I should hope so a private
• 57:49
  Speaker 3: like I can go out in my lawn and manage
• 57:52
  Speaker 3: that thing any way I want to. I can hear
• 57:56
  Speaker 3: Mark's feedback, I can hear my girlfriend's feedback, I can
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: hear other people's feedback. At the end of the day,
• 58:02
  Speaker 3: It does not matter at all. That is my lawn.
• 58:05
  Speaker 3: I get to manage it for me.
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: Yep.
• 58:07
  Speaker 3: That is not a comparison to federally managed lands, not
• 58:11
  Speaker 3: in any way, shape or form. Federally managed lands are
• 58:14
  Speaker 3: a very different thing and people need to understand that.
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: And that's a feature, not a bug, I would argue.
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: And by that, I mean that's part of what. Yes,
• 58:28
  Speaker 2: it is part of what makes federal public lands challenging
• 58:32
  Speaker 2: to any one particular user base. They might say, well,
• 58:35
  Speaker 2: they're not doing everything they possibly could be doing that
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: I would like them to do. But what makes our
• 58:41
  Speaker 2: federal public lands really special is that they are to
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: a large degree mandated to be managed for multiple uses.
• 58:50
  Speaker 2: So there's not one single entity that gets everything they want.
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: There's not one single user base that gets a free
• 58:56
  Speaker 2: for all. This is for all of those things you mentioned. Yes,
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: there's going to be sustainable resource extraction, that's important. There's
• 59:02
  Speaker 2: going to be some grazing, there's going to be some mining,
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: there's going to be some logging. There's also going to
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: be protections for clean water. There's also going to be wildlife.
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: There's also going to be recreation. And if we want
• 59:14
  Speaker 2: to like you said, if we want to go to
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: the private land route, you better be ready that maybe
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: your user base, maybe your use just isn't going to
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: be prioritized by that particular private land entity or state,
• 59:25
  Speaker 2: and you just might be shit out of luck. But
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: with the federal situation we have right now, we have
• 59:30
  Speaker 2: a set of regulations and systems and processes in place
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: to as best as possible manage for the many. And
• 59:39
  Speaker 2: it's never perfect, but it's a heck of a lot
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: better than what we've seen happen in many other countries
• 59:44
  Speaker 2: or many other places where you know, it's it's the
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: king's deer, the king's land, or it's the state's land,
• 59:51
  Speaker 2: and then before you know it, it's not too terribly
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: profitable and they sell it off and it's gone and
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: it's nobody else's or it's you know, paved over and
• 59:58
  Speaker 2: turned into a Walmart.
• 59:59
  Speaker 3: So yeah, man, like, listen, if somebody wants to tell
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: me that our federally managed lands or a socialist or
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 3: a communist construct, I will buy you a fricking plane
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 3: ticket and encourage you to go hike around on government
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 3: owned land in a socialist or communist country. Yeah, you're
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 3: probably gonna get shot. But if that's the experiment you want.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 2: To run, Yeah, I see our public lands as as
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 2: the maybe one of the most shining examples of democracy.
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 3: Right, it's Americanism not communism. Yeah, Americanism not socialism.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 2: Right, that that argument falls, that that one falls on
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: deaf ears for me, I just I don't see that
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: one at all.
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 3: But yeah, it's like, is it hard? Yeah, it is, right.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 3: And the reason that things got complicated it is because
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 3: we have you know, timber barns, oil barrens, mining barns,
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 3: folks that before regulations were put in place and we
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 3: were just left up to our own devices. These folks,
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 3: Holy shit, I better get it while the getting's good, right,
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 3: And they came in and just you know, decimated stands
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 3: of timber for the couple viable trees that are in there,
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 3: you know, and leaving the rest on the ground. Like
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 3: they set back good timber production for decades, if not
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 3: hundreds of years in certain areas because they were like, man,
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 3: if I don't get it, somebody else will. So that's
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 3: where a lot of this stuff came from. It's not
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 3: And again, like I kind of hate saying the government
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 3: because you and I everybody listening to this, we are
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 3: the government, which goes way back to one of the
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 3: first things that you talked about, which is geez doc,
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 3: I don't think it's a good idea to cut my
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 3: leg off to save my arm before we at least
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 3: have a conversation about why that needs to happen. I
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 3: think people have just gotten freaking lazy with our democratic
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 3: system here, right, Like your job doesn't end at election day,
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 3: Like you have got to be reminding your elected officials
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 3: what's important to you. I say it all all the
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 3: time on my podcast, right like, if you don't advocate
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 3: for yourself, somebody else will and you might not like
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 3: how they do it, so you better make some time,
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 3: right And I think right now it's a really good time,
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: very simple call to action to just get a hold
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 3: of your senators, congress people and just say, hey, here's
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 3: my spring summer plans on our public lands. Very important
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 3: to my family. This is what we do. This is
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 3: how much money we spend. Please make sure that they're
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 3: still there by Memorial Day, by fourth of July weekend
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 3: sorry Independence Day, you know what I mean. People need
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 3: to know that we're thinking about this, and it's important
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 3: at me.
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 2: So that's a perfect segue to where I want to
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: take stuff next. Cal we've kind of established like what's
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 2: happening right now, what's the current version of this right now?
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: But really key point to remember for anyone listening is
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 2: that there's been some different, slightly different version of this,
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: you know, eight years ago or six years ago, or
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 2: twenty years ago or thirty years ago, and there's going
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: to be some new version of this five years from now,
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 2: ur twenty years from hour ten, right, There's always going
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: to be some other interest that would rather use our
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 2: public lands for maximum profit or whatever, use them up,
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: give them away, sell them off. There's going to be
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 2: some version of that at some other point in time.
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 2: We've also fought back against this in the past. So
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: what I want to spend the rest of our time doing,
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: Kal though, is is talking about, Okay, given that, given
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 2: that we're in one of those moments now today, how
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: do we best use the tools and our toolbox to
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 2: you know, stand up against that, to protect these places,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 2: to fight for our opportunities and for this public land
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: system that we have. You mentioned one of them, which
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: is calling your senators. But I'd love to kind of
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: dig into some of the weeds on this a little bit,
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 2: because there's you hear the standard, oh do this and that,
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 2: and that is important. But I think that there's maybe
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 2: some lessons that we've learned over the last handful of
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 2: years that maybe will allow us to do this even
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: better this time around, and maybe even better the next,
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 2: because you know, there's going to be a next and
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: there's going to be a big one right now. So
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: so that said, one of the big questions I've had
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 2: cal the last six weeks or so, as these specific
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 2: current threats have been popping up is around timing, like
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 2: when's the right time to be, you know, raising our
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: voices about this, because there's been some people saying, well,
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 2: just wait, just wait and see, let's let the dust settle,
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 2: let's see, you know, if these things that are being
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 2: proposed actually happened before we call our senators or do whatever.
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 2: So my first thought is, what are your thoughts on timing.
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: Is this something where we should be waiting to see
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 2: and then going or should we be early and often
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 2: and always. That's something I'm thinking a lot about.
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 3: Oh yeah, man, and it's it's very worth while. You know,
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 3: Conservation is a high turnover game because things just just
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 3: don't end right. And it's it's funny too, right, because
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 3: it's like our biggest conservation success stories come from the
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 3: biggest conservation failures. Right, Damn near killed all the waterfowl
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 3: in this country. Yeah, what do we talk about is
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 3: like our number one conservation success story run back waterfowl. Yep,
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 3: you know, so you know I would joke like, wouldn't
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 3: it be nice just have a really boring story, right,
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 3: there's no story arc, It's just yeah, we did a
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 3: really good job.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 2: We didn't screw it up.
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 3: We didn't screw it up, right, But like that's not
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 3: how our community or really any community operates unfortunately. You know,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 3: if there was like a socialist construct we could implement
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 3: in America, it would be stewardship. Like it'd be like
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 3: you know, Trump had kind of like toyed around with
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 3: or the idea or maybe still brings up of military
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 3: service for citizenship. I would like lump into that civil service, right, yeah,
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 3: and and get people to understand like what we have,
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 3: why it's important, like why it's important to this country,
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 3: from national defense to health, clean water, clean air, all
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 3: those things.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 3: Blocking off areas for agricultural production, you know, things, things
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 3: that we really need long term versus this short term
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 3: thinking of like, well, how do we make money on
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 3: it right now? And by and large, you know, our
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 3: our federally managed lands, they do make money. It's you know,
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 3: people have a hard time, especially when you start thinking
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 3: in terms of gross domestic product to national debt ratio.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 3: You know, federal dollars spent widely are considered with a
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 3: like a three x multiplayer on the economy. Right, so
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 3: if you pay that timber cruiser that just lost your
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 3: job forty dollars a year, there's a one hundred and
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 3: twenty thousand dollars impact on the local economy. Wow, So
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 3: which is a benefit. It accomplishes our goal of that
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 3: GDP to national debt ratio. You know, it's just like
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 3: where else are we losing money? Anyway? What I would
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 3: say in regards to timing is you want to once
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 3: a week at this point, you want to say, hey,
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 3: just just what I said. This stuff's important to me.
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 3: I want you to know, try to find something your
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 3: senator or congress person has done well currently or in
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 3: the past, and say, hey, remember when you did this,
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 3: We need more of this right now, this is what
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 3: my summer looks like. I want more good work out you,
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 3: I want I want you here type of thing. I
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 3: think that is going to be important because that may
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 3: stave off some things that could potentially be really bad,
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 3: really shocking. Showing up in person, you know, any volunteer
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 3: event for any organization, aside from you know, join an organization,
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 3: get the newsletters, try to just show up in person.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 3: One thing that I'll tell you from you know, just
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 3: a little bit of lobbying up on the hill that
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 3: I've done, is, you know, an in person meeting is
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 3: way way different than an email or a phone call.
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 3: And if you if there's a public event, a public
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 3: lands rally, the diversity that shows up in the room
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 3: for public Lands is very concerning to somebody who wants
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 3: to be elected, right they go, oh wow, here's the
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 3: physical representation of people who vote. And it's hard for
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 3: them to lump people into categories when they all show
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 3: up in person, and it's like a magical thing. It
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 3: may seem a little frivolous at times, but holy cow,
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 3: it makes people think the message it's very important. I
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 3: would I'd say it's very important. And then you know,
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 3: sign up for these newsletters and all these conservation groups
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 3: are gonna be working really hard to keep you informed.
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 3: And you know there's ideas that like with the Sovereign
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 3: Wealth Fund, how are we going to fund that need
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 3: to sell off assets? Our public lands are considered assets.
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 3: That's how they're being discussed as like a real estate transaction.
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 3: I'd love to study real estate. Doesn't make sense to sell,
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 3: Like if you're you're planning a family estate, the longer
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 3: you can hold all the stuff, eventually it goes up
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 3: in price. We're planning a country, right like, we're not
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 3: saying in thirty years we're going to retire, like this
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 3: is for the long, long, long haul. Does not make
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 3: sense to sell this stuff. But people are saying this
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 3: is how we are going to address the national debt,
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 3: this is how we are going to fund sovereign Wealth
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 3: fund that's going to provide kickbacks and man, for me,
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 3: that's just like a line way too far, especially when
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 3: we have a government that provides zero guarantees that we're
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 3: not going to end up right back in this position
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 3: and have literally no pot to piss in at that point.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 2: So you bring up something though that I've that I've
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 2: wondered about, which is, you know, there's these red lines.
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 2: There's like the shocking things you're talking about, the stuff
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 2: where the ship really hits the fin yep. And some
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 2: would say, well, you're going to burn your powder too soon,
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 2: if you are freaking out and calling or emailing your
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 2: senators for this first round of layoffs, or if you're
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 2: throwing a fit because of an executive order that hasn't
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 2: actually been implemented yet just proposed, or if you were
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 2: to you know, basically, the idea here is that you're
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 2: crying wolf too soon, and then when something really, really,
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 2: really shocking actually happens, then you don't have ammunition left,
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 2: or nobody's listening because they're sick and tired of you,
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 2: et cetera. It's eight Is there any validity to that?
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 2: You think? And then, b how do you combat that?
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 2: If that is like a possible thing we have to
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 2: think about.
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 3: Uh yeah, I mean it's a great, great point, right,
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 3: And I think it's it's very much like a strategy
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 3: of some folks within this administration is you get a
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 3: lot of hyperbole out there, inevitable that hyperbole is is
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 3: fought with more hyperbolic statements and eventually you just tune
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 3: it out because you don't know what's what's true or not.
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 3: So I think avoid that as as much as you can.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 3: It's it sucks when you're going slow and trying to
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 3: be accurate and make concerted, concise statements and other people
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 3: are not. But that is the risk you run. It's
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 3: like we're gonna whip up into a frenzy, and whip
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 3: up into a frenzy and you'll see a lot of
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 3: those folks have to make these like hard pivots and
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 3: be like, oh no, that's what we meant. Oh wait, no,
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 3: this is what we meant. And you know it certainly
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 3: isn't appealing to me. But that should not stop you
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 3: at all. You should have this line of communication. You're
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 3: guaranteed this line of communication to your elected officials where
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 3: you can always just say, hey, this stuff that's happening,
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 3: I don't really understand it. It's very concerning to me.
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 3: You need to know this is what's important to me,
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 3: and I need you to represent those interests.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 2: I like this idea of consistence, you right, Yeah, like
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 2: the idea that you mentioned of like doing this every
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 2: week and that being not you know, not overreacting, but
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 2: simply you're setting expectations like, hey, I'm paying attention. Yeah,
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 2: I didn't just vote you in for you to then
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 2: run free. I'm going to hold you accountable. And I
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 2: think that's that's a really interesting idea and one that
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 2: makes a lot of sense to me.
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, And Matt, it is just like you don't
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 3: need to be one side or the other. You can say, hey,
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 3: I like my tax dollars to be spent efficiently. Yep,
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 3: please continue down this path of making sure there isn't waste.
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 3: I would love that. On the other hand, you know,
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 3: the people that my kids go to school with, they
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 3: got to pack up and move because they just got
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 3: laid off. I don't like that. Like, I'm very concerned
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 3: about how this is going to impact where I live
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 3: and where I recreate. Like that's a sensible statement, right, Yeah,
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 3: and yeah, we just we need need more of it,
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 3: and it unfortunately takes people a long time to kind
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 3: of get fired up on on our side of things.
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 2: So we can we can send form letters when we
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 2: get the action alerts, we can send customized letters and
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 2: you know, basically what you hear is that a form letter?
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 2: You know, gets kind of thrown to a bucket customized.
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 2: The letter maybe counts as five of those, maybe counts
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 2: a little bit more, and then a phone call maybe
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 2: counts as ten x that or whatever. A phone calls
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 2: a little bit more paid attention to possibly, and then
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 2: I'm sure an in person visit is ten x that. Maybe.
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 2: So there's these different levers we can pull within the government,
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 2: and then there's also just the the social energy levers
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 2: we can pull, and that being like telling our friends
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 2: and family, hey, this is a thing you should pay
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 2: attention to, or posting about on social media or talking
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 2: about it within your local sportsman's group or your conservation
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 2: group you're a member of, or in a local chapter
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 2: or whatever. Like, we can try to make sure this
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 2: stuff's being talked about and raise the energy and rally
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 2: grassroots support. That's another thing we can be doing. And
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 2: it sounds like with with the connecting with the government
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 2: frequently consistently makes a lot of sense. Keep that going,
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 2: keep that going, keep that going. What about like the
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 2: grassroots rallying side of things, though, cay with with with
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 2: trying to not like I'm constantly thinking about this personally,
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 2: trying to avoid issue fatigue. Right, Like if if we
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 2: bring up these things, people get burned out on them,
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 2: and then they tire of it and it's exhausting, and
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 2: then they're not paying attention when the next big thing arises,
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 2: and nobody then is able to rally and talk to
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 2: people and get fired up when they need to. You know,
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 2: how do you think about that? In two ways? One
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 2: as an individual just person and then be also as
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 2: someone with a platform. How are you wrestling with that?
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah? I literally had a guy at the Montana Public
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 3: Lands rally come up and be like, man, if you're
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 3: not burned out, uh, that's a great sign, right, you're
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 3: always here, which you know, for a guilty Catholic conscience,
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 3: I'm like, oh, I'm not here enough. God. Yeah, but
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 3: it is a real thing. I think, you know, up
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 3: the issue hits home enough, people are going to show
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 3: up like they're they're they're just not going to have
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 3: a choice. But I'll I guess I should just like
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 3: explain like how a membership organization works, right, like the
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 3: power behind like backcountry hunters and anglers. When we explain
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 3: our membership, like we give that demographic information, we say,
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 3: here's the age range, here's the median income. Here's how
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 3: people vote. And that's really the reason for you know,
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 3: filling out those those surveys. When when membership organizations send
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 3: them out is it provides like really strong lobbying power
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 3: when that membership organization is in front of the regulation maker,
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 3: the lawmaker, the decision maker to say, hey, this is
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 3: who we represent, this is how many states. This is
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 3: like a good slice of the membership pirade here, and
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 3: it's it's thirty percent conservative, thirty percent liberal, thirty percent independent.
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 3: Hard to pin down. They're young, they're they're energetic, They're
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 3: people who show up. These are the people that are
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 3: out there working on public lands and recreating on public lands.
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 3: That's why you got to listen to us. Like that's
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 3: how all of these membership organizations work, right, And and
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 3: some orgs put like more steak in the in different
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 3: parts of their membership demographic, but and and and you
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 3: know that's that's what you get when you see people
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 3: show up in public too, right, Like you know, I
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 3: was laughing at our state public land rally because you
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 3: like look out at that crowd and it's just so
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 3: hard to say, like here's a one sentence of who
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 3: these people are right, and it's you can't a staffer
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 3: for a politician can't be like, oh, we have this
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 3: vote locked up. They just they can't say that, Like
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 3: it's way too diverse, and especially now, you know, it's like,
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 3: you know, I think some of the polling is proven right.
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 3: It's like Democrats need to get their ship in the pile.
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 3: They got to restructure, they got to figure out who
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 3: the heck they are. And there's way more Democratic voters
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 3: voting for Republicans because they're they're voting on issues and
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 3: these people I think, you know, I think that's that's
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 3: probably a good thing. You know, it's like get people
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 3: back in tune with demanding what they want, being vocal
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 3: about it, staying in touch and saying, yeah, I don't
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 3: like this stuff that you're doing. I love this stuff.
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 3: I want more of this and less of this. Yeah,
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 3: and that's perfectly reasonable, you know.
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah that that uh, being allegiance to issues and values
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 2: versus just a party without even questioning anything. I think
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 2: is it is a pretty useful thing that I hope
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 2: we see an uptick in. But but that said, you know,
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 2: back to back to this specific set of issues. Okay,
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 2: So there's this I think we've we've kind of covered,
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 2: like consistency is important. I think being a part of
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 2: one of these membership groups that they can you know,
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 2: use that membership data and those numbers to then give
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 2: them some leverage with these organizations. That makes sense. You
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 2: need you to do both, Yep, gotta do both, you
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 2: know what of the what kinds of I guess here's
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 2: another thing I've I've been thinking about a lot too,
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 2: is where like there's a volume, there's a volume control
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 2: on each of us as individuals that we could turn
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 2: up and down. And I think like maybe at level
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 2: like three or four is like the just like consistently
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 2: keeping our folks aware of what we care about, thanking
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 2: them for the things that they're doing well, bringing up
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 2: our concerns on the things that are not doing so well.
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 2: Being a member of these organizations, activating when they ask
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 2: us to. I feel like that's like a level three
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 2: or four on the volume kind of thing, three, four, five,
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 2: And that's what a lot of people have been doing
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 2: right now. They're part of these groups. They're giving folks
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 2: a call when stuff happens, They're keeping tabs on the
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 2: news and aware of what's happening, what kind of things
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 2: cal would be a red line moment or a full
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 2: you know, blaring red siren kind of moment for you,
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 2: where we need to turn our volume up to eight,
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 2: nine or ten. What are the kind of things that
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 2: would require us and that we need to keep an
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 2: eye out for in which we as an outdoor community
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 2: would have to jump up to a whole another level
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 2: of engagement.
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 3: I mean, for me, it'd be any sort of land disposal.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 3: Right So, right now we have a role. It's in
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 3: the thirty day comment period right now. Uh, if you
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 3: go to, oh, the federal register, you'll find there's a
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 3: lot happening on the federal register. But you know, it's
• 1:25:11
  Speaker 3: like a daily ticker of what's been happening, uh, from
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 3: the government. So a lot's happening right now. But there's
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 3: a proposal to roll back the NEPA process, which is
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 3: something that came in under Nixon, and basically it says
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 3: like everything needs to have an environmental review before, before
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 3: something happens, there's got to be an environmental review. That's
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 3: been a real sticking point with a lot of industries,
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 3: even a big sticking point when you know you want
• 1:25:55
  Speaker 3: to do something relatively simple. It can be implemented in
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 3: a way that makes it just like so burden some
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 3: and bureaucratic and crappy that it's not even worth doing,
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 3: or it can be done really efficiently. There's a large
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 3: concern that the role that rolling back the NEPA process
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 3: is going to make it really efficient to categorize and
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 3: sell off public land. We there's a a mechanism for
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 3: public land sales. If you go in the Federal register
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 3: right now, there's lots and lots of small acreage sales,
• 1:26:37
  Speaker 3: which would be like very normal sometimes we're those are
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 3: part of a land exchange, lots lots of lots of things,
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 3: and they don't need congressional approval to happen. And there's
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 3: an idea that we're going to see some like larger
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 3: acreages get jammed in and through that same process with
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 3: the rollback of of NEPA. That is going to be
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 3: a major red line for me, Like you know, I mean, yeah,
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 3: there's I mean, there's there's some some chunks out there
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 3: that are not going to be like super beneficial for
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 3: wildlife you know here, and there is it in the
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 3: public interest to dispose of it and I ideally get
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 3: something else. Yeah, I'd I'd listen to that argument. But
• 1:27:40
  Speaker 3: you know, there's a fear here that we're going to
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 3: see some stuff that is really valuable going up on
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 3: that auction block that's going That's going to be a
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 3: red line for me. That's going to be that moment
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 3: where I'm like, see this is actually happening. You've got
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 3: to tune in right now. And you know, if there
• 1:28:03
  Speaker 3: are rollbacks of the public comment period that that we're
• 1:28:08
  Speaker 3: guaranteed as as citizens, that's going to be a major
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 3: red line. You know, when we started stopped start losing
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 3: that transparency. A lot of people don't think we have
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 3: transparency right now, but like everything has a public comment
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 3: period attached to it, it can just be hard to
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 3: find unless you're practiced and looking for it. Right. Oh
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 3: and then the other part that kind of goes into
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 3: your comment about you know, like the boy who cried
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 3: wolf or being too hyperbolic, right is like we've seen
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 3: like Biden administration, there's more oil and gas lease and
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 3: going on than in the previous Trump administration. That doesn't
• 1:29:08
  Speaker 3: mean that that lands being developed that's all tied to
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 3: the free market, which is you know, also an an
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 3: interesting part of going all the way back to that
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 3: GDP and national debt conversation. So as long as those
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 3: leases don't prevent good management from happening, which is a
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 3: question mark and something that tried to get done under
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 3: the Biden administration, where an oil and gas lease if
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 3: it's not being used, if that were to if that
• 1:29:47
  Speaker 3: could still be managed for the grazing plan or the
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 3: habitat plan that so still have wildlife and recreational benefits
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 3: even though it's under under a lease that's in active. Yeah,
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 3: I mean like lots of rabbit holes here.
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 2: Well okay, So so just before you go further, I
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 2: want to I want to connect the dots from a
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 2: couple of these redline moments you brought up to an
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 2: action possible action. So what I'm I guess what I'm
• 1:30:21
  Speaker 2: getting at here is if we have one of these
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 2: moments where stuff gets particularly dire or or a bunch
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 2: of these things that have been proposed all of a
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 2: sudden are actually being implemented. Like if if all of
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 2: these things being proposed all got implemented in a relatively
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 2: short period, I think that there'd be very real cause
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 2: for the Holy Smokes this thing is getting put through,
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 2: and this thing's getting put through, and this place is gone,
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 2: and this place is et cetera. Right when those moments occur,
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 2: I'm curious about what the action is that we that
• 1:30:54
  Speaker 2: is an individual listening, what that what that should look like?
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 2: If if the if the three or four on the
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 2: volume is consistent contact with my representatives and my senator,
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 2: my representative and my senators, then when the shit hits
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 2: the fan and the volume needs to be turned up
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 2: to eight, nine or ten, what does that look like? Then?
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 2: You know, I'm thinking, if if I were to answer this,
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 2: I would say, okay, well I need to be not
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 2: just checking in weekly with them, but you know, actually
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 2: pounding on the door, showing up in person, like you mentioned,
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 2: trying to make an appointment at or if I've only
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 2: been sending emails, maybe now I'm making phone calls. I
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 2: think this is the moment when concerted, unified opposition, or
• 1:31:38
  Speaker 2: or getting our voices all together across diverse coalitions matters
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 2: even more so. I think at that point, I'm not
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 2: just going to operate as an individual, but I'd be
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 2: reaching out to all the groups I'm a member of
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 2: and reaching out to my local chapter leader or the
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 2: you know, national representative or whoever I can get a
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 2: hold of and saying, hey, you know RMEF or NDA
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 2: or NWTF or BHA or TRCP or whoever, Hey, this
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 2: thing is happening. Are you leveraging our membership and making
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 2: sure all of our voices are being heard on this.
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 2: So I'd be looking for as an individual doing that,
• 1:32:18
  Speaker 2: I would be pushing for my organizations to be doing that.
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 2: I would then also be trying to rally whatever network
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 2: of people I have, whether that be my local buddies
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 2: in the neighborhood or my social media following, or the
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 2: people I work with, or whatever it might be. And
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 2: I think that we then as a larger community need
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 2: to find ways to then like funnel and create these
• 1:32:44
  Speaker 2: moments of unified volume, because I think when you look
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 2: back like times when we really broke through the noise
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 2: and influence positive change, you can look back and say,
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 2: like the Chavett's moment was like kind of like a
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 2: backbreaking moment for the land transfer movement back then, in
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 2: which you had a week or so period of time
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 2: where voices on the left and the right, hunters and environmentalists, climbers,
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 2: and anglers, Joe Rogan and you know someone on MSNBC
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 2: or whoever. Everyone for a short period of time there
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 2: was talking about how this proposed bill was a really
• 1:33:21
  Speaker 2: bad idea for public lands and Americans and wildlife and
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 2: hunting and climbing and biking and all that kind of stuff.
• 1:33:28
  Speaker 2: And because everybody talked about it all at once, across
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 2: diverse coalition, we actually had something very real and tangible happen.
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 2: I think that moving forward, if some of these things
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 2: that are you know, being proposed, if they start happening
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 2: amidst all of this other change, plenty of it good,
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 2: by the way, I'm not saying it's all bad change,
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 2: but amidst all of this noise, amidst all of this
• 1:33:52
  Speaker 2: stuff going on, we are at very real risk of
• 1:33:55
  Speaker 2: just of our issues disappearing in the background because there's
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 2: stuff about who knows what, Gaza or immigration or whatever.
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 2: If we don't have coordinated, unified utilization of our community,
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 2: it'll just be a whisper in the wind and nothing
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 2: happens because of it. What do you think about all that?
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 3: No, I think that's spot on. I mean, I love
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 3: what you said about accountability for the conservation groups as well.
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 3: That's that's something that we definitely saw on the on
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 3: the last time, And there was a lot of outreach
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 3: amongst conservation groups to other conservation groups saying like, hey,
• 1:34:32
  Speaker 3: we need you to be vocal on this. And and
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 3: sometimes these groups don't don't play well together. And and
• 1:34:39
  Speaker 3: sometimes we as hunters don't play well together because we
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 3: love to like be identified in a certain way. Right,
• 1:34:46
  Speaker 3: So public landowner t shirts versus private landowner t shirts
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 3: and you know the jackassery of of tribalism. I guess
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 3: public lands are beneficial to all Americans. They absolutely are.
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 3: If those were to go to go away, and I
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 3: mean Mark from you have way more insight into this,
• 1:35:14
  Speaker 3: but like what if all public land hunters became folks
• 1:35:18
  Speaker 3: competing for private land.
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 2: Lises, Yeah, That'd be a problem for a lot of people.
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 3: So I'd turn into a golfer probably, So I'd be
• 1:35:30
  Speaker 3: out there like really messing up your day if you
• 1:35:33
  Speaker 3: france yourself a golfer, because I am not, nor am
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 3: I big decorum follower too. So if it's a fancy place,
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 3: a lot of restoration coming down.
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 2: The pipe, it's kind of a thing, and a lot
• 1:35:45
  Speaker 2: of golf courses to kill.
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, yeah, dogs are going to be out there
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 3: retrieving my ball. So we need to unify just like
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 3: we did not all that long ago, right, Like, yeah,
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 3: yesterday you're a mountain biker. Today you support public lance.
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 3: You were a kayaker, now you support public lands, hunter,
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 3: horseback rider, motorcycler, you know, single track user, whatever, like,
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 3: you got to come together and support public lance, public
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 3: lance first, your pursuit. Second, put the freakin' election away,
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 3: put the user group bullying, put down bs away. That
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 3: that's yesterday stuff. Like the reason that we pushed so
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 3: hard to have that like public land user campaign is
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 3: because we needed all of our representatives to understand who
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 3: public land users are, right and and and it's just
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 3: like that showing up in person thing, right, it is,
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 3: look at who uses these places, Look at who is
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 3: standing up to say like this stuff is super important.
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 3: They are part of your voter base. Like they're making
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 3: the wheels go round on this whole GDP economy thing too.
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 3: So, as I've told a friend of ours in common,
• 1:37:26
  Speaker 3: it's like, you know, if the good stuff goes away,
• 1:37:30
  Speaker 3: what's the point. Right, I've been a taxpayer since I
• 1:37:38
  Speaker 3: was probably like sixteen and if the good stuff goes away,
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 3: I don't know what the hell the point is. Yeah, right,
• 1:37:48
  Speaker 3: I will be like, yeah, doc, cut off my leg.
• 1:37:53
  Speaker 2: Well that's the risk though, right, I mean, that's you know,
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 2: our buddy Randy Newberg would say, that's been the plan
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 2: for fifty or whatever it is, as folks have been
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 2: trying to slowly kill these places. Death by a thousand
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 2: cuts to the point where we don't care about the
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 2: leg anymore, and we're like, hey, I take it whatever,
• 1:38:11
  Speaker 2: And so that's important. We don't don't let it get
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 2: to that point. Now, give me this kill, give me
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 2: your take. So if it makes you know, kind of
• 1:38:20
  Speaker 2: recapping a little bit there, concerted unified voice across a
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 2: bunch of different user groups, we can we can do
• 1:38:27
  Speaker 2: it as individuals. We can pressure any organization that we're
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 2: a part of to make sure that they're a part
• 1:38:33
  Speaker 2: of this. And of course then we also need to
• 1:38:37
  Speaker 2: do what we talked about at the beginning, which is
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 2: like consistent contact with our representatives. Now, we got to
• 1:38:42
  Speaker 2: ramp it up maybe at some point, but you have
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 2: a lot of experience and you've done a great job
• 1:38:48
  Speaker 2: of maintaining that consistent point of contact with your representatives,
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 2: whether it's a phone call or in person. A lot
• 1:38:54
  Speaker 2: of people have questions about that. A lot of people
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 2: are nervous about that, intimidated by that. Can you can
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 2: can you give me your take on what a good
• 1:39:02
  Speaker 2: phone call consists of or what it actually takes to
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 2: somehow get an in person you know, can an individual
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 2: you know reach out to an elective official and somehow
• 1:39:14
  Speaker 2: get an appointment someday, Or how do you sign up
• 1:39:16
  Speaker 2: to get be able to testify in front of a
• 1:39:20
  Speaker 2: committee or something like that, whether it be at your
• 1:39:22
  Speaker 2: state or otherwise. A couple of those specific actions I
• 1:39:26
  Speaker 2: think kind of exist within like a dark black box
• 1:39:30
  Speaker 2: for a lot of people, and I'd love to kind
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 2: of uncover that a little bit.
• 1:39:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, it's not something that like comes out
• 1:39:36
  Speaker 3: in the newspaper before the legislative session that I'm aware
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 3: of anyway. So I just you know, I'm I'm like
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 3: on the older side of millennial had had that wonderful
• 1:39:51
  Speaker 3: moment in time when cell phones didn't exist. So I'm
• 1:39:53
  Speaker 3: not like the most tech savvy person, so I just
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 3: punch everything into Google and figure it out from there.
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 3: But it's not intimidating. It's the people's house, right if
• 1:40:05
  Speaker 3: you if you do show up to it is a
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 3: little intimidating because there's some decorum there. But people are
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 3: going to help you out with that, especially if it's
• 1:40:21
  Speaker 3: your first time, as long you know, as long as
• 1:40:24
  Speaker 3: you're being respectful. So hoop on the Google machine, say
• 1:40:30
  Speaker 3: you know, my state's in session. Who's my representative? Each
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 3: representative has at least a little state provided chunk of website,
• 1:40:39
  Speaker 3: if not their own website. You can sign up for
• 1:40:42
  Speaker 3: their communications. You can sign up for an in person meeting.
• 1:40:47
  Speaker 3: You can try to make a reservation for a phone call.
• 1:40:49
  Speaker 3: A lot of times their office numbers are going to
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 3: be listed. Just just call that number to begin with.
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 3: More than likely if it's the office number, you're gonna
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 3: gonna talk with a staffer. And this is you know,
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 3: for a state like Montana, this would be for like
• 1:41:10
  Speaker 3: a senator or congress person, because we've been talking so
• 1:41:13
  Speaker 3: much about the federal level, like for a state rep
• 1:41:18
  Speaker 3: like you're. This blows people's mind. But and I've it's
• 1:41:24
  Speaker 3: taken the wind out of me a couple of times
• 1:41:27
  Speaker 3: where I've been honestly quite agitated pissed over some bill
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 3: that I didn't see, ey'd eye with. I look up
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 3: the person, I call the phone number and I get hello.
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 3: I'm like, yeah, who is this?
• 1:41:42
  Speaker 2: Ah?
• 1:41:42
  Speaker 3: This is and it's the representative who introduced the bill.
• 1:41:47
  Speaker 3: And he's out driving a tractor, you know, And I'm like, ah,
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 3: damn it. You're just a people just like me. Yeah,
• 1:41:57
  Speaker 3: And and then you say, yeah, hey, I wanted to
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 3: talk to you about this, and you know, it's good.
• 1:42:05
  Speaker 3: They're they're probably gonna ask if it's a staff or
• 1:42:08
  Speaker 3: they will ask like where are you from, Like like
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 3: what's your tax address? Basically is what they're saying, So
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 3: they can say like from this region or district right,
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 3: and then yeah, you just keep it short, say hey,
• 1:42:25
  Speaker 3: this is who I am, this is why this matters.
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 3: Thank you, you know, make sure the congressman or the
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 3: senator or whomever gets it. And and and that's that's
• 1:42:38
  Speaker 3: really what happens. It's not a big deal, like it's
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 3: it's their job. It's your job if you get up
• 1:42:46
  Speaker 3: while your state's in session. There's all sorts of In Montana.
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 3: It's called l e G like legislature l e G
• 1:42:58
  Speaker 3: M T DOT G O v forward slash participate and
• 1:43:03
  Speaker 3: I hit that our states and session montanasin session right now.
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 3: I hit that every single day every morning while I
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 3: drink and drinking coffee and I roll through what what's
• 1:43:16
  Speaker 3: coming up for testimony? And you know, I like, I'll
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 3: rip up to Helen. I'm only two hours away from Helena,
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 3: and I'll rip up to Helena. If something's going to
• 1:43:27
  Speaker 3: go into a committee and I have a chance to
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 3: comment on it, I want to go up there and
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 3: and and be present and hold hold my lawmakers accountable.
• 1:43:39
  Speaker 1: Right and.
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 3: Everybody has the ability to weigh in on a lot
• 1:43:45
  Speaker 3: of these a lot of these bills, Like you'll read
• 1:43:50
  Speaker 3: these bills and know how they impact you, know how
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 3: how they'll impact generations beyond you, know how they'll impact
• 1:44:02
  Speaker 3: your river streams, wildlife. It is not above you, It
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 3: just just is not.
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 2: What does it take to to sign up to be
• 1:44:23
  Speaker 2: able to testify in front of a committee like that?
• 1:44:26
  Speaker 2: Do you have to sign up somewhere and go through
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 2: some kind of screening procedure or can you literally find
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 2: out when that's happening and show up that morning and
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 2: sign in on a piece of paper on a clipboard
• 1:44:37
  Speaker 2: and wait your turn and there you go.
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 3: Piece of paper and a clipboard. Is still how it's
• 1:44:41
  Speaker 3: done in the great state of Montana. You can you
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 3: can also testify online, which is great, you know. I
• 1:44:48
  Speaker 3: mean it was twenty below and white out snowstorms during
• 1:44:52
  Speaker 3: the legislative session for part of the legislative session, so
• 1:44:56
  Speaker 3: that that's an awesome option. And you know, a couple
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 3: of the online ones that I was set to testify
• 1:45:03
  Speaker 3: on through the wonderful world of politics, they actually got
• 1:45:11
  Speaker 3: settled favorably. Those bills got tabled before I even had
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 3: a chance to testify. It was great. They did it
• 1:45:21
  Speaker 3: without me, Mark, What can you do? Yeah? But yeah,
• 1:45:27
  Speaker 3: so it's yeah, they want you to sign up two
• 1:45:29
  Speaker 3: hours ahead of time, right.
• 1:45:32
  Speaker 2: I have to unfortunately cut us a little bit short
• 1:45:36
  Speaker 2: due to a family situation. All right, we had to
• 1:45:42
  Speaker 2: take a brief, impromptu twenty four hour break there. Sorry, Cal,
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 2: but we left things off where you had been telling
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 2: me about kind of best practices for you know, calling
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 2: your senators or congress man or woman, and then what's
• 1:46:01
  Speaker 2: all involved with actually showing up for in person testimony
• 1:46:05
  Speaker 2: or meeting with someone. I've got kind of two final
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 2: last things. I just want to quickly touch on with you.
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 2: And one of those is about this this flip side
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 2: of the equation. We've spent a bunch of time talking
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 2: about how you reach out to your elected officials. But
• 1:46:20
  Speaker 2: then there's this other side of what we're trying to do,
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 2: which is actually getting just average everyday people us involved
• 1:46:27
  Speaker 2: and engaged and kind of rising up and talking about
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 2: and advocating on these things. So how do we get
• 1:46:34
  Speaker 2: our friends and family members and peer group and coworkers,
• 1:46:38
  Speaker 2: how do we engage them, help them be aware of
• 1:46:41
  Speaker 2: these things, activate them to get involved with all this
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 2: kind of stuff. And one thing I've seen a lot
• 1:46:46
  Speaker 2: of on social media around this issue is there's a
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 2: lot of you know, your team did this, so you
• 1:46:54
  Speaker 2: guys are a bunch of assholes, or well, this is
• 1:46:57
  Speaker 2: my team and you know they're doing some really good things.
• 1:47:00
  Speaker 2: So I don't think we should give them a hard
• 1:47:02
  Speaker 2: time about this one because I like everything else they're doing.
• 1:47:04
  Speaker 2: And you're an asshole because you're giving my team a
• 1:47:07
  Speaker 2: hard time. And there's all this kind of back and
• 1:47:08
  Speaker 2: forth and name calling and your team versus my team,
• 1:47:12
  Speaker 2: and it gets ugly really fast. I mean, you've seen
• 1:47:14
  Speaker 2: it in the comment sections of lots of things out
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 2: there around this issue, and I don't see that really
• 1:47:20
  Speaker 2: helping at all. I don't see that leading to any
• 1:47:23
  Speaker 2: minds being changed. I don't see that leading to anyone
• 1:47:26
  Speaker 2: wanting to get more involved and advocate for our public lands.
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 2: It's just not helpful. What I have found helpful is,
• 1:47:36
  Speaker 2: you know, approaching the idea of protecting our public lands
• 1:47:41
  Speaker 2: and encouraging other people to do the same through like
• 1:47:44
  Speaker 2: shared values, by pointing out, hey, you love to deer
• 1:47:49
  Speaker 2: hunt on this stuff, I love to trout fish on
• 1:47:51
  Speaker 2: this stuff, or maybe you love to ride your UTV
• 1:47:54
  Speaker 2: on this stuff and I love to camp out here
• 1:47:57
  Speaker 2: or whatever the thing is. But finding something that we
• 1:48:00
  Speaker 2: aaron common around these things and framing you know, our
• 1:48:04
  Speaker 2: ideas or the way we're trying to share this other
• 1:48:06
  Speaker 2: people around that versus you versus me, your guys versus
• 1:48:10
  Speaker 2: my guys. And I'm just kind of curious Cale if
• 1:48:13
  Speaker 2: you have any thoughts on that when it comes to
• 1:48:15
  Speaker 2: you know, how should we be talking about this publicly?
• 1:48:17
  Speaker 2: How do we bring this up to our mom or
• 1:48:19
  Speaker 2: dad or our buddies. How do we get more folks
• 1:48:22
  Speaker 2: to do the kind of stuff that you've been talking
• 1:48:24
  Speaker 2: about so that we're in a better position in our
• 1:48:27
  Speaker 2: public lands are not threatened in the future.
• 1:48:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean a lot of good points, Mark, I think, yeah,
• 1:48:38
  Speaker 3: getting through this barrier that you know, you're not a
• 1:48:43
  Speaker 3: hypocrite if you vote for somebody, but you want them
• 1:48:45
  Speaker 3: to perform better someplace else. Like just recent example, right,
• 1:48:50
  Speaker 3: Like I have a friend he's been married, he's got kids.
• 1:48:55
  Speaker 3: He forgot to take one of the kids to school,
• 1:48:57
  Speaker 3: and his wife who is very very invested in him,
• 1:49:02
  Speaker 3: very invested in raising their children together. That you know,
• 1:49:06
  Speaker 3: it is team family unit first and foremost, right, But
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 3: that didn't prevent her from saying, hey, it's your turn
• 1:49:16
  Speaker 3: to take the kid to school. It's very important you
• 1:49:21
  Speaker 3: need to improve on your time management skills.
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 2: This is an amazing metaphor, by the way.
• 1:49:27
  Speaker 3: Right, I mean, it doesn't say our marriage is trash.
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 3: I don't love you anymore. We're raising these kids all
• 1:49:34
  Speaker 3: wrong because I'm pointing out that you didn't take the
• 1:49:39
  Speaker 3: time to get it on your schedule correctly. I may
• 1:49:43
  Speaker 3: be very frustrated with you in the moment, but I'm
• 1:49:46
  Speaker 3: not saying all the rest of this is crumbling, is it?
• 1:49:50
  Speaker 3: I need you to do better on this one thing
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 3: right now. Yes, And I feel like that is something
• 1:49:57
  Speaker 3: a lot of America can should resonate with, right, And
• 1:50:06
  Speaker 3: it is not taboo, it's not hypocritical. It is very
• 1:50:11
  Speaker 3: very normal. Like those people put themselves in this position
• 1:50:18
  Speaker 3: by getting out in front of everybody and saying elect me.
• 1:50:22
  Speaker 3: It is our right, is our duty to say, hey,
• 1:50:27
  Speaker 3: you are messing this up and let me tell you
• 1:50:29
  Speaker 3: exactly why what's in jeopardy. Is your job if you
• 1:50:34
  Speaker 3: want to go that route, but you can absolutely say, hey,
• 1:50:37
  Speaker 3: I love what you're doing over here telling everybody about it,
• 1:50:44
  Speaker 3: but what gets thrown back at me is this thing
• 1:50:46
  Speaker 3: over here, and this thing over here really bugs me.
• 1:50:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 3: And in this case, you know, public lands, public water,
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 3: public wildlife incredibly important to the country, as we've already covered,
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 3: and it's something that like everybody really can get behind,
• 1:51:06
  Speaker 3: and in my personal opinion, the ones who can't, it's
• 1:51:10
  Speaker 3: because they just don't know a damn thing about them.
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:51:15
  Speaker 2: True. Do you do you feel like, do you feel
• 1:51:19
  Speaker 2: like there's anything that we have missed from from like
• 1:51:22
  Speaker 2: a strategic perspective, Because we kind of came into this
• 1:51:25
  Speaker 2: conversation with the goal of putting together a blueprint or
• 1:51:30
  Speaker 2: like a game plan for how to fight back against
• 1:51:35
  Speaker 2: this kind of stuff, either right now or in the future.
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 2: I think we've we've talked quite a bit about, you know,
• 1:51:41
  Speaker 2: having contact with your representatives. We've talked a little bit
• 1:51:43
  Speaker 2: about what you just mentioned, which is, you know, being
• 1:51:46
  Speaker 2: willing to speak to our own team about this stuff
• 1:51:49
  Speaker 2: and not feeling bad about that. We've talked a little
• 1:51:52
  Speaker 2: bit about, you know, engaging in this kind of thing
• 1:51:55
  Speaker 2: outside of the partisan bickering. Are there any like tactical
• 1:51:59
  Speaker 2: things or strategic sides of this that we've missed or
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 2: glossed over that you think are really important when it
• 1:52:05
  Speaker 2: comes to like what we actually do.
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 3: Well. Broad diverse coalitions is what get things across the
• 1:52:13
  Speaker 3: line right now, right and and probably forever. We kind
• 1:52:19
  Speaker 3: of got into this a little bit, but it's like
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 3: that diversity of membership is a giant strength. So that
• 1:52:26
  Speaker 3: is something I like to keep in mind. Like HB
• 1:52:30
  Speaker 3: three oh seven here in Montana, which is another you know,
• 1:52:36
  Speaker 3: misguided effort to fund other programs by stealing habitat funding
• 1:52:43
  Speaker 3: that we all voted for in Montana. It's really frustrating
• 1:52:47
  Speaker 3: to me because we brought recreational marijuana into the state
• 1:52:52
  Speaker 3: of Montana. A huge argument around that was where the
• 1:52:57
  Speaker 3: taxes are going to go, and it passed because the
• 1:53:01
  Speaker 3: taxes that come from the sales of recreational marijuana, we're
• 1:53:06
  Speaker 3: gonna go to fund habitat and access recreation in the
• 1:53:13
  Speaker 3: state of Montana. And the last legislative session they got
• 1:53:17
  Speaker 3: to build through that stole some of that cash because
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 3: they were like, oh my god, we didn't know people
• 1:53:21
  Speaker 3: were gonna buy that much pot. And now we got
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 3: this HB three oh seven that is doing the same
• 1:53:30
  Speaker 3: thing with basically the rest of the cash, and we
• 1:53:34
  Speaker 3: have a surplus in the state of Montana. There's no
• 1:53:36
  Speaker 3: use sorry, there's no reason to take this money. Literally,
• 1:53:42
  Speaker 3: like fund state parks and some fishing access sites and
• 1:53:47
  Speaker 3: things that like people really use. So finding all the
• 1:53:51
  Speaker 3: ways to represent who and why that stuff's important is
• 1:53:58
  Speaker 3: really effected. So you know, I called yesterday and said, Hey,
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 3: I'm representing a business in Bozeman, Montana. It's called meat Eater.
• 1:54:08
  Speaker 3: We got a bunch of employees, we got an insanely
• 1:54:13
  Speaker 3: high cost of living in this town. It's brutal. We
• 1:54:18
  Speaker 3: have very talented people, but things are so expensive here,
• 1:54:24
  Speaker 3: it's very hard to get those people here. And what
• 1:54:26
  Speaker 3: gets them here is access to recreation. Like that is
• 1:54:32
  Speaker 3: a major recruiting tool for us. And the type of
• 1:54:36
  Speaker 3: people that we want and need in this business are
• 1:54:39
  Speaker 3: the people who love the outdoors and they are willing
• 1:54:44
  Speaker 3: to sacrifice some pay by living in a very very
• 1:54:48
  Speaker 3: expensive place because they have access to the outdoors. And
• 1:54:52
  Speaker 3: that's why this funding is critical, Like it is mission
• 1:54:55
  Speaker 3: critical to our business, how we operate, and this is
• 1:55:00
  Speaker 3: how many people we employ. We got a big impact
• 1:55:04
  Speaker 3: on this town, in this economy that could go away
• 1:55:08
  Speaker 3: if we don't have access to the outdoors.
• 1:55:11
  Speaker 2: I think that's a great way to frame it too
• 1:55:13
  Speaker 2: for someone to hear.
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know, like when I used to do
• 1:55:19
  Speaker 3: some fly ins and stuff back on the first light
• 1:55:21
  Speaker 3: side of things, like that's how folks would form groups
• 1:55:26
  Speaker 3: to go lobby senator or congress person, and you know
• 1:55:30
  Speaker 3: it's like, Okay, we need a tribal interest, we need
• 1:55:33
  Speaker 3: a business interest, we need a recreational interest, and we
• 1:55:38
  Speaker 3: need to make sure that everybody has their five minutes
• 1:55:42
  Speaker 3: and three good talking points so our time's really valuable.
• 1:55:48
  Speaker 3: Like something's going to stick with this person, because what
• 1:55:51
  Speaker 3: happens in those rooms, right is like there's somebody taking
• 1:55:54
  Speaker 3: notes and they're like, oh yeah, we heard from the plumbers.
• 1:55:57
  Speaker 3: Don't need any more plumbers. Heard from the teachers, don't
• 1:56:00
  Speaker 3: need any more teachers.
• 1:56:02
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 3: So in the rec space, okay, we heard from the
• 1:56:07
  Speaker 3: fly fisherman. Okay, now we heard heard from the gear fishermen,
• 1:56:11
  Speaker 3: heard from the horseback riders. We need the motorcyclists in there.
• 1:56:14
  Speaker 3: We need this diverse group of interests. And what we
• 1:56:20
  Speaker 3: need these folks in office to feel like is it's
• 1:56:28
  Speaker 3: not me versus that person, it's me versus everybody. Yeah,
• 1:56:33
  Speaker 3: this is a bad idea.
• 1:56:35
  Speaker 2: You bring up a good point with that in that,
• 1:56:38
  Speaker 2: you know, if you think about every one of us
• 1:56:41
  Speaker 2: listening right now, we are part of a lot of
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 2: different groups, right. I think there's something to be said
• 1:56:47
  Speaker 2: about you know, we can have our individual influence with
• 1:56:51
  Speaker 2: like me emailing or calling or showing up and talking
• 1:56:54
  Speaker 2: to my senator. But then to your point, I think
• 1:56:56
  Speaker 2: we as individuals can also try to engage whatever or
• 1:57:00
  Speaker 2: other groups we're part of. So if you're part of
• 1:57:02
  Speaker 2: a horse riding club or if you're a part of
• 1:57:04
  Speaker 2: an off roading club, or if you're part of some
• 1:57:07
  Speaker 2: organization that's really into trail trailer running or whatever it is.
• 1:57:13
  Speaker 2: Let's get every one of those different groups singing this
• 1:57:16
  Speaker 2: same tune, anyone who's dependent on these places, like, we
• 1:57:19
  Speaker 2: need you, we need the runners, we need the climbers.
• 1:57:23
  Speaker 2: I want to see Patagonia and First Light and Sikka
• 1:57:28
  Speaker 2: and Yamaha and Costa and every one of these different
• 1:57:32
  Speaker 2: businesses slash communities slash recreational you know, slices. We all
• 1:57:39
  Speaker 2: have got to get on this one and in future
• 1:57:42
  Speaker 2: efforts if we want to be heard and actually paid
• 1:57:45
  Speaker 2: attention to, right, and each one of us can influence
• 1:57:48
  Speaker 2: some group, whether it's five people or five hundred or fifty.
• 1:57:52
  Speaker 3: Oh, it is not an exaggeration. And I do get frustrated.
• 1:57:57
  Speaker 3: I understand where the frustration comes from. But it's like,
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 3: you know, it's the thing that we were all taught, right,
• 1:58:03
  Speaker 3: like little Engine that Could or whatever it is. Right,
• 1:58:06
  Speaker 3: it's like, if at first you don't succeed, try try again,
• 1:58:08
  Speaker 3: and it is consistency. And you know, there's all these
• 1:58:15
  Speaker 3: avenues that our elected officials open up to communicate with us.
• 1:58:22
  Speaker 3: There are also two way streets, right, So if you're clear, concise,
• 1:58:28
  Speaker 3: respectful on social media, you can hit them there, hit
• 1:58:36
  Speaker 3: them in their email box, hit them in public meeting,
• 1:58:39
  Speaker 3: try to get a private meeting, testify in a committee.
• 1:58:43
  Speaker 3: There's all these different ways, right, and that's really expected,
• 1:58:51
  Speaker 3: and enough of it will break through the noise.
• 1:58:56
  Speaker 2: I feel like there has been a long period of
• 1:59:00
  Speaker 2: time where at least we as hunters have had a
• 1:59:05
  Speaker 2: little bit of a fat and sassy vibe and that
• 1:59:10
  Speaker 2: we would say, well, we bought our licenses, we're conservationists, right,
• 1:59:14
  Speaker 2: Like I checked the box, bought my license. Now I'm good.
• 1:59:17
  Speaker 2: I think we're getting to a point now, cal it
• 1:59:20
  Speaker 2: has been for a while, but I think now we
• 1:59:23
  Speaker 2: also need to kind of say, at least I internally
• 1:59:27
  Speaker 2: or individually believe that, you know, part of being a hunter,
• 1:59:30
  Speaker 2: or part of being a backpacker, or part of being
• 1:59:32
  Speaker 2: any one of these things is also being an advocate
• 1:59:35
  Speaker 2: for them in the ways that you just described. I
• 1:59:36
  Speaker 2: think that almost has to be an obligation today, given
• 1:59:41
  Speaker 2: you the so many different pressures on these public lands
• 1:59:45
  Speaker 2: and wildlife that we care about. If we want to
• 1:59:47
  Speaker 2: keep them around for the next five years or fifty
• 1:59:50
  Speaker 2: for my kids now or my great great grandkids. We
• 1:59:54
  Speaker 2: got to be both. We need to be a hunter
• 1:59:56
  Speaker 2: and an advocates. It's not really an option anymore. I
• 1:59:59
  Speaker 2: don't think it's not.
• 2:00:01
  Speaker 3: And you know, the proof is already in the pudding,
• 2:00:06
  Speaker 3: you know, if you I think about it this way, right, Like,
• 2:00:11
  Speaker 3: no hunter likes pressure. We don't like having I was
• 2:00:15
  Speaker 3: just explaining to a guy, you know, I'm like, you know,
• 2:00:17
  Speaker 3: where I grew up, pressure was represented by one other
• 2:00:21
  Speaker 3: vehicle at the end of that you know, next to
• 2:00:25
  Speaker 3: the locked forest service gate or at the trailhead. That's
• 2:00:29
  Speaker 3: what pressure was to me. That's obviously very different now
• 2:00:33
  Speaker 3: and in a lot of other places. But if the
• 2:00:39
  Speaker 3: landscape right now would be so dramatically different, so dramatically different,
• 2:00:44
  Speaker 3: if every hunter stood up for every disputed easement. Every
• 2:00:50
  Speaker 3: time somebody buys a chunk of property that has an
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 3: easement going through it that's designed around public access and
• 2:00:56
  Speaker 3: people don't weigh in and we lose that, that just
• 2:00:59
  Speaker 3: concentrates more and more of us at the same trailheads
• 2:01:02
  Speaker 3: or the existing easements, and every freaking time, man, people
• 2:01:06
  Speaker 3: are like, I can't believe that happened, never again. And
• 2:01:10
  Speaker 3: then it's like, well, where were you at you said
• 2:01:13
  Speaker 3: never again, right, And it's like we're living in a
• 2:01:17
  Speaker 3: landscape that we have built for ourselves and we don't
• 2:01:20
  Speaker 3: want to admit it. Like we have got to be
• 2:01:23
  Speaker 3: consistent and it's got to become normal and just part
• 2:01:29
  Speaker 3: of what we do and we will reap the benefits
• 2:01:32
  Speaker 3: for it. Like going back to the presidential election, right,
• 2:01:36
  Speaker 3: like what happened in October November, the Democrats and the
• 2:01:42
  Speaker 3: Republicans were like, oh my god, this big group of
• 2:01:47
  Speaker 3: people that identify as hunters also identify largely as independent voters.
• 2:01:54
  Speaker 3: Everybody's saying the race is going to be super tight.
• 2:01:56
  Speaker 3: We need the hunters, we need the hunters. We need
• 2:01:58
  Speaker 3: the hunters like they do. They need the hunters. And
• 2:02:04
  Speaker 3: that also signals to everybody who's a hunter to say, hey,
• 2:02:09
  Speaker 3: you guys needed us to get elected. This is what
• 2:02:12
  Speaker 3: we need you to do. And it does not matter
• 2:02:16
  Speaker 3: who you voted for. And man, if I can make
• 2:02:19
  Speaker 3: a plea again, I don't know, I've made several on
• 2:02:21
  Speaker 3: this podcast. It's like election's over. Man, who gives a
• 2:02:26
  Speaker 3: crap at this point, Like it is over. Don't point
• 2:02:31
  Speaker 3: fingers at people, don't say, oh, you voted for this
• 2:02:34
  Speaker 3: like sit and simmer in it like that has never
• 2:02:38
  Speaker 3: ever been how our politics have worked in America. We
• 2:02:43
  Speaker 3: have this beautiful system where you can continually weigh in
• 2:02:46
  Speaker 3: and again, Man, if you don't do it, somebody else
• 2:02:50
  Speaker 3: will and you may not like what they have to
• 2:02:52
  Speaker 3: say on your behalf right.
• 2:02:54
  Speaker 2: So true. So, Cal, You've got one of the best
• 2:02:59
  Speaker 2: platform for keeping people up to date on these kinds
• 2:03:02
  Speaker 2: of issues and helping people understand how they can take
• 2:03:05
  Speaker 2: action and do this kind of stuff. Can you just
• 2:03:07
  Speaker 2: remind listeners here as we close things out on where
• 2:03:10
  Speaker 2: they can catch your podcast, where they can take action
• 2:03:13
  Speaker 2: on some of the things you talk about there on
• 2:03:14
  Speaker 2: the podcast, and anything else you want people to know about.
• 2:03:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah, So the Cow in the Wild feed on the
• 2:03:21
  Speaker 3: Meat Eater Network is you know, it's supposed to be
• 2:03:28
  Speaker 3: like quick quick download information every week and we can
• 2:03:34
  Speaker 3: point in a lot of directions from there. But yeah,
• 2:03:36
  Speaker 3: the Cal's Weekend Review is kind of like the news
• 2:03:40
  Speaker 3: source and there's plenty of this in there and try
• 2:03:44
  Speaker 3: to grab something from as many states as possible, but
• 2:03:48
  Speaker 3: just just kind of like a buyer beware there is
• 2:03:52
  Speaker 3: The intention is to just get you fired up about
• 2:03:55
  Speaker 3: things that are happening, so you are motivated sufficiently to
• 2:04:00
  Speaker 3: check for yourself what is going on in your state.
• 2:04:03
  Speaker 3: That's that's the end goal.
• 2:04:06
  Speaker 2: What's that ur l for the website where folks can
• 2:04:08
  Speaker 2: get links to take action on the things you talk about.
• 2:04:12
  Speaker 2: Can you remind me of that?
• 2:04:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's just at the like the forward slash calpage
• 2:04:19
  Speaker 3: at the meat eater dot com.
• 2:04:21
  Speaker 2: Okay, it's smart. I like that you guys have links
• 2:04:24
  Speaker 2: to you know, actually send the formal letters or do
• 2:04:27
  Speaker 2: different stuff on some of the issues you bring up.
• 2:04:29
  Speaker 2: You do a great job with it. I enjoy it.
• 2:04:31
  Speaker 2: I know a lot of other folks do too, So
• 2:04:33
  Speaker 2: thank you for doing that, Kale, and thanks for having
• 2:04:37
  Speaker 2: this chat. I think we should do more of these, Yeah, man.
• 2:04:41
  Speaker 3: I agree, it'd be great. You know, we can throw
• 2:04:45
  Speaker 3: an extra drop on on my feed or I think,
• 2:04:48
  Speaker 3: you know, trying to engage that YouTube audience would be
• 2:04:51
  Speaker 3: really good. So folks can write in to ask Cal
• 2:04:56
  Speaker 3: at the meat eater dot com and let me know
• 2:04:58
  Speaker 3: what your interest level is and then Mark and I
• 2:05:00
  Speaker 3: can team up and get something going on the appropriate channel.
• 2:05:05
  Speaker 3: But plenty more to come, so please be engaged right now.
• 2:05:11
  Speaker 3: Do the easy stuff Hey, thank you for doing this.
• 2:05:15
  Speaker 3: I appreciate that. Boy. I wish you would advocate for
• 2:05:20
  Speaker 3: us here because I don't think it's going well these
• 2:05:23
  Speaker 3: things are concerning. I'm paying attention because I think we're
• 2:05:28
  Speaker 3: gonna have some some big fights coming up here, and
• 2:05:32
  Speaker 3: we need you to be there and ready to rock
• 2:05:34
  Speaker 3: and roll so we can get back to talking about
• 2:05:37
  Speaker 3: the super fun hunt and fishing stuff.
• 2:05:40
  Speaker 2: Agreed, all right, and that is a wrap. Thank you
• 2:05:48
  Speaker 2: so much for being here. I hope you enjoyed my
• 2:05:50
  Speaker 2: chat with Cale. I appreciate you chewing on these ideas,
• 2:05:54
  Speaker 2: considering these perspectives, and taking action in support of our
• 2:05:58
  Speaker 2: public landscapes. Now in twenty twenty five, next year, in
• 2:06:02
  Speaker 2: twenty six and twenty seven, and twenty eight, twenty nine, thirty,
• 2:06:05
  Speaker 2: twenty forty, twenty fifty, this stuff's going to keep on
• 2:06:08
  Speaker 2: coming back up. The specifics will be different, but the
• 2:06:11
  Speaker 2: basic idea will be the same, and we're gonna have
• 2:06:15
  Speaker 2: to be here standing in their way every time. I
• 2:06:19
  Speaker 2: know I'm going to be there. I'm excited to see
• 2:06:21
  Speaker 2: you there too, So until then, thank you and stay
• 2:06:26
  Speaker 2: wired to hunt