Wyoming Criminalizes taking Soil Samples and “Ecological” Photos on Public Lands
Source: ALLGOV
Those concerned with environmental pollution in Wyoming can no longer take soil samples or even photos of possible contamination without risking going to jail.
The Republican-dominated state has adopted a new law, the “Data Trespass Bill,” which outlaws “citizen science,” the collecting of ecological data on private and public lands. Violations can result in a year of prison time and fines of $5,000. It also makes any samples inadmissible as evidence in court, even if they show environmental hazards.
The law was adopted in response to a fight between 15 ranchers and the environmental group, Western Watersheds Project, in Fremont County. The ranchers sued the group, claiming it collected water samples from their land without permission. Western Watersheds took the samples because it suspected the landowners were allowing manure to contaminate local water sources. Their tests of the samples revealed the presence of E. coli bacteria, which can cause serious illness and even death in humans.
Supporters of the law are framing it as protecting property rights, but that doesn’t explain the prohibition from taking samples—and photos—from public lands. “The purpose of the bill is to discourage this kind of activity,” Debra Donahue, a law professor specializing in wildlife science at the University of Wyoming, told Courthouse News Service. “The state would prefer not to have citizens going out on public lands collecting data that could then be used against landowners.
Read more: http://www.allgov.com/news/top-stories/wyoming-criminalizes-taking-soil-samples-and-ecological-photos-on-public-lands-150520?news=856529
= new reply since forum marked as read
The land out there, if it is not on private property, is BLM land.
It is your land and my land, this is FEDERAL LAND, and if on a reservation like the Shoshones, they cannot create a law to circumvent the BLM land or its management, we are the BLM.
And the BLM was created for one purpose land management for you and me to enjoy and use.
I know I use to live out there---------and those right wingers are just nuts out there----------they really are.
There are more antelope than human beings---that is a fact, and they have the highest gun deaths based on population, and the most suicides because of the wind, which blows on average about twenty miles per hour, not everyday, but on average out of 365.
Beautiful county---really is--------but, there coal industry (Powder River Basin), oil industry (Tea Pot Dome) cronies own that state right along with the ranchers
They drink the Dick Cheney water.
that works out ok.
More like in servitude, sharecroppers who will never get out of their poverty.
"The Equality State" 
[URL=
.html][IMG]
[/IMG][/URL]
Everyday something new and putrid.....sigh......
