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Herseth tour churns up questions about Casey ranch sale
By Kevin Woster, Rapid City Journal Staff Writer
July 6, 2004

HOT SPRINGS - The on-again, off-again expansion plan for Wind Cave National Park took an interesting turn Monday on the wheels of an all-terrain vehicle driven by U.S. Rep. Stephanie Herseth.

Although the park expansion seemed to spin out four weeks ago when members of the Casey family of Rapid City confirmed they had tentatively accepted a private purchase offer for their ranch — a stunning piece of pasture, forest and craggy canyons that would form the bulk of the park's 5,675-acre expansion — Herseth's visit to the ranch suggested the deal might not be done.

The Democratic congresswoman and two of her aides rumbled through a two-hour ATV tour of the ranch with Kevin and Brendan Casey, as well as Wind Cave superintendent Linda Stoll. Herseth said she came away moved by the beauty of the place and even more certain of its potential as prime national park ground. But she also cautioned against seeing the tour as more than it was.

"They do have a private offer on the table right now. We need to remember that," Herseth said as she stood on a ridge over Beaver Creek Canyon and absorbed the view. "But if that doesn't work out, I want to make sure the federal government is fully prepared to go back to the table."

The federal government has been at the negotiating table with the Casey family, off and on, for more than three years in a failed effort to buy the ranch. A purchase plan developed by the National Park Service and introduced in Congress by Democratic Sen. Tom Daschle has twice cruised through the Senate, only to get stuck in the House.

Herseth, elected in a special June election to fill the remainder of former Congressman Bill Janklow's term, said after the tour Monday that she would push for a hearing on that proposal in a House committee. That news heartened the ever-optimistic Stoll, who continues to believe the park expansion can happen in spite of the existing purchase agreement from private buyers.

"I've never lost hope. I'm still hopeful the park can get that land," Stoll said. "I think it's a natural extension of the park."

Kevin Casey said there's no doubt the 5,555-acre ranch would benefit the park and its visitors while preserving the property from other types of development. But like other members of his family partnership, Casey has grown weary of economic dead-ends in dealing with the government.

That's why the family put the property on the private real-estate market last October and why it agreed to a purchase agreement last month of substantially greater value than the $5.5 million to $6 million Congress would authorize under an existing property appraisal.

Those figures are less than half of the $13.5 million asking price by the Caseys when they put the ranch on the private market. They won't discuss the amount of the private purchase agreement or identify the group making the offer, but Brendan Casey said earlier that it was "just a bit south" of the $13.5 million.

As for the Herseth tour, Kevin Casey also tried to downplay its significance. He said the offer on the table would stand if the prospective buyers could arrange the financing.

"We have a purchase agreement in place. They're the only people we can deal with right now," Casey said. "Today, this is just a viewing."

Even so, it was an exceptional one, through a landscape as rugged as it is beautiful.

For decades, the core of the Casey ranch belonged to Carl Sanson, a rancher whose father homesteaded the place. The late Dennis "Doc" Casey, founder of Bear Country USA, fell in love with the place and, after leasing it for a number of years, convinced the family to buy it 11 years ago.

Doc Casey saw it as a perfect place to raise buffalo and captive elk. But those elk brought trouble to the ranch in 1997, when the state confirmed chronic wasting disease -n a fatal brain disorder affecting elk and deer -n in the captive herd. The Caseys had to destroy the herd and focus on buffalo, a highly profitable animal until sharp market declines began several years ago.

After Doc Casey died in 2000 and the buffalo market fell, Kevin and Brendan Casey and their siblings began looking to sell the ranch -n starting with their neighbors in the park.

Daschle became an early advocate, along with Sen. Tim Johnson. Janklow had reservations at first but eventually supported the plan after getting what he believed were legitimate answers to concerns about the potential loss of property taxes, as well as government policies on fire suppression, pest and weed control and timber and wildlife management on existing park land.

But critics, including members of the state Legislature, say the federal government already owns more land in the area than it can manage properly. And Ken and Vivian Couch, who ranch nearby, fear the park expansion will mean more prairie dogs and weeds on their property. Vivian Couch said the park's failure to control prairie dogs has "desecrated the land."

The park also does a poor job of weed control, she said.

"And we're downstream, so we'll end up with their noxious weeds on our property," she said.

Ken Couch said the park's plans to take out a power line into the Casey ranch could affect the power supply to his place. And he also believes park officials have exaggerated the environmental resources of the land to strengthen their own cause.

Still, Couch said he knows that Carl Sanson wanted the ranch to go to the park, rather than to be subdivided for rural homes.

"That's what Carl wanted. He was a good man. I've got to defer to Carl," Couch said. "I think my underlying concern isn't the sale. It's the management."

Stoll said weed control is a priority in the park, although park officials can't use herbicides because it could affect water quality in Wind Cave itself. They rely on biological control, mowing and pulling weeds by hand, she said.

She also said the park is conducting a study of its prairie dog population.

"We do have prairie dogs, but they are important to a prairie ecosystem," she said. "How many is too many, I don't know. We're studying that right now."

Republican House candidate Larry Diedrich, who will face Herseth in the November general election, said he shares Couch's concerns about prairie dog and weed management in the park. Diedrich, a farmer from Elkton, said he sympathizes with adjoining landowners who may get prairie dogs and noxious weeds from the park.

Diedrich thinks the federal government shouldn't expand the park without offering other federal property for sale to private buyers — a no-net-gain system for the government. Diedrich said he wants a serious discussion on those issues before he could support the expansion plan.

"And whether I'd vote for it or not would depend a lot on how those discussions went," Diedrich said.

Such discussions are still weeks or months away. That's how long it would take to bring the issue to a House committee hearing, Herseth said. And that is all hinged on how the private purchase contract turns out.

"That's what they (Caseys) are focusing on now," she said. "I just wanted to get out here on the ground and see the place for myself. It was everything I expected and more."

Contact Kevin Woster at 394-8413 or kevin.woster@rapidcityjournal.com