Wild horses rule change proposed

Wednesday, Dec. 18, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

The proposal drafted for the 1997 Legislature specifies that the three general public representatives on the Commission for the Preservation of Wild Horses must come from counties with fewer than 40,000 people.

That would eliminate representatives from Clark, Washoe, Elko and Douglas Counties, as well as Carson City. Combined, those counties make up more than 90 percent of the state population.

The bill draft was requested by the Legislature's Public Lands Committee, chaired by state Sen. Dean Rhoads, a Tuscarora rancher.

The committee recently proposed the change as a new direction for the wild horse commission, at the urging of many ranchers whose livestock compete with the wild horses for forage.

Nevada is home to thousands of wild horses, running on both public and private lands. The federal Bureau of Land Management is responsible for managing herds on public land, while the state and local agencies manage stray horses that run on private property.

The state commission -- funded through interest from a trust fund -- helps coordinate herd management, but the federal government is responsible for most of the wild horses.

While some horses are gathered and adopted, others are rounded up and taken to slaughterhouses where they are packaged and sent to Europe for human consumption.