STATEMENT BY The NCBA Regarding the Nomination of Gale Norton for Secretary of the Interior

“NCBA applauds President-elect Bush’s nomination today of Gale Norton for secretary of the interior. 

"Norton, a Colorado attorney, has a history of working together with diverse groups to develop consensus.  This will be critical as cattle producers urge action on policy that supports science-based decisions on natural resource use that includes local and state decision-making rather than top-down mandates from Washington, ensures multiple use of federal lands including grazing, and protects private property rights. 

“For the past eight years, the cattle industry has worked with an administration that has often exerted the heavy hand of government to implement an anti-grazing and anti-multiple use agenda.  As pressures from suburbanization and threats against traditional land uses have mounted, family ranches have been sold into development.  When this happens, everybody loses: open space and riparian areas are lost, wildlife loses critical habitat, the cattle industry loses producers, and generations of the heritage and history of a family ranch are lost.  

“Norton will bring a fresh vision to the Department of the Interior.  Her expertise includes the post of Colorado Attorney General (1991-99), service to the interior department as associate solicitor for conservation and wildlife (1985-87), and assistant to the deputy secretary for the Department of Agriculture (1984-85). 

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Producer-directed and consumer-focused, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association is the  trade association of America’s cattle farmers and ranchers, and the marketing organization for the largest segment of the nation’s food and fiber industry.