Jack Horner

[Horse]

Cowman I will start a new thread here as the last one was getting long but I still have a few questions
Just what did Mr Horner have to say to Ralph that scared him so bad?
If you get a lease agrement from the public ;lands you will see the minister is supreme as for people suposidly buying leases well to bad I have bought cows at to high a price and I had to eat it myself I have also purchased land a to high a price but by holding on it has worked out.
If one checked out the sales of leases you will probably find they were sold in the family and if it was known the money never realy changed hands it is just wndow dresing to be able to cry poor me.
I wish I was a been counter and then mabey I could figure out how much these leases have cost US as Alta citizens, my guess is in the Billions.

[cowman]

Not sure if I remember exactly what Horner said(it was a long time ago) but he led a group that came out swinging, that was for sure! And hey, who could blame him? If I owned something that was a little goldmine I wouldn't want to give it up either? He led the charge against a government takeover...and if nothing else Jack knew how to get the medias' attention!
The fact is the courts have ruled that a Crown grazing lease is real property and can be bought and sold? I'm not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing? Obviously if you own something you usually will take better care of it than if you are just renting? And I think the people who have Crown leases are better "keepers of the land" than some government beurocrat?
The real problem here is the oil and gas revenue where the surface rights are worth several times more than the grass ever was or will be? The actual economic viability of a grazing lease without the oil money are actually pretty poor? On top of that you have to live with a lot of rules that curtail what you might think is best?
I doubt any provincial government is going to be too bold with the "Crown Grazing crowd"? There are some pretty heavy hitters in their lineup?
I wonder if the Horner family still owns Jacks lease....I wonder if Doug Horner has an interest in it?

[cowman]

Tom Thurber headed up a committee that went around the province holding public meetings with the intent of changing the Grazing Lease legislation. At one occasion the minister of the day ordered him to have a guard with him when he attended a meeting in southern AB.
This topic was hot and heavy, and Jack Horner and his family had a lot to lose because they had more oil wells paying lease revenue on the property than they had cattle.
I would doubt that Doug Horner owns any portion of a grazing lease as he was in the grain business and certainly if he did have a share in any lease on public land he would have to declare it. He and other MLA's have to declare all their financial and property holdings in a statement filed with the Provincial Ethics Commissioner.

[Horse]

7311 agri dispositions 2002
Number with oil activities receving first yr payments 3601
First yr plus annual 2596
total# 28446
Average # of wells 3.85/ leasee
First yr plus annual 5.62/ leasee
1 or 2 wells 1604
3 to 4 wells 423
5 to 9 we;lls 322
10 or more / leasee 232
total 7311
the average fees paid to lease is 1100$ per well the gov gets 360$ per well plus a $50 aplication fee
There are 744,383 A U M on 2,975,016 acres or app 150,000 cows eat on gov grass at average 2.50$ /A U M or $12.50 per summer or a subsidy of app $17,000,000 shared between 5600 lease holders then add on 40 mill more for oil revenue that gives an average of over $10,000 per lease holder

[Horse]

Annual rental should have never been factored into this lease system. Lease holders should have been compensated for fence damage, inconvenience during drilling etc., but the annual rental should have gone to the province, and it should be the same rate as lease rental on private land. This was the position that many municipalities had when the Thurber committee was making their rounds.
I think the current discussions on Integrated Land Use Policies may attempt to deal with the grazing lease issue but who knows if anyone in government will want to tackle it again.

[cowman]

In the big picture it might just be better to let sleeping dogs lie? I mean what is $50 million or so in Alberta? Chicken feed!
The Alberta government isn't exactly lily white on this issue? They only opened up this can of worms because the oil companies wanted a sweet heart deal? Of course it backfired in a big way for both the government and the cheapskate oil companies who thought they could get a cheaper deal from the government! No one involved was really concerned about the Alberta taxpayer?

[cowman]

It is all about fairness as Horse has pointed out so many times. Are cattle producers renting grass or oil leases ?

[JD4ME]

yup and I'm sure rcalf won't consider none of this an actionable issue or subsidy, doesn't matter because like sumpage fees and the softwood issue all they need to find is a sympathetic ear and the border will be shut again while we go round in circles for years.

Grazing leases are leases just like renting farmland to grow crops or run cows if the owner fails to maximise the revenue or at least achieve fair market value for these leases they in the least poor businessmen, and in the worst as in this case putting politics above the responsibilities they have to the taxpayers in this province.
I wonder if as a non leaseholder I should be entitled to receive a per head subsidy on my deeded land from the crown to conteract this grazing lease subsidy being recieved by my competitors and fellow cattlemen that have leases??

[Horse]

I have often wondered about a class action suit , as we as beef producers are at a gov sponsored disadvantage. I took that up with the auditor general and was told he couldnt do any thing unless I was directly affected well my opinion was I am but hard to fight city hall .
Now I am doing not much I may try to take another run at it . I only went to 1 of Thurbers meetings but the concenus was to do something to level the playing field and he had some good recomandations but some where some big bucks must have said something I think it would be fun to get a clarification from Ralph on what hapened.

[Horse]

Thurber had been dumped from cabinet and the Grazing Lease Review was his pat on the head, he was former Chair of the Cattle Commission so he was given the dirty task of trying to pry away some of the revenue from producers. He knew what had to be done but his recommendations were watered down