Kansas City Star calls for Buffalo Commons National Park

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New national park could save high plains in Kansas

By The Kansas City Star Editorial Board

In 1987, two Rutgers’ University researchers ignited a prairie fire by suggesting much of the high plains, including a large swath of Kansas farmland, should be returned to its natural state — what they called a Buffalo Commons.

The idea, which envisioned parts of 10 prairie states being transformed into a massive short-grass prairie national park, was derided as impractical, impossible and un-American. It was called city-logic.

Farmers questioned why the Easterners hadn’t suggested returning New York City to its wild roots. “The idea offended me,” said former Kansas Governor Mike Hayden, once a harsh Buffalo Commons critic.

But in the decades since, the population decline that spurred the plan not only continued, but accelerated. The already-stressed Ogallala Aquifer, the sole source of water for much of the region, has dried up faster than anticipated. Irrigated farmland has become dry, low-production farmland. Local economies of the high plains have dwindled.

Today, Buffalo Commons — far from threatening an iconic American lifestyle — may instead be a savior to the region. “How do we bring a vital economy to life in northwest Kansas?” Hayden asked recently from his office as Kansas Secretary of Wildlife and Parks. “The model we’re now following has failed. Buffalo Commons makes more sense every year.”

In Kansas, the primary focus would be in 16 northwestern counties. Since 1980, 12 of the counties have lost more than a quarter of their population, while the state population has increased by almost a fifth.

Rutgers professor Frank J. Popper, one of the Buffalo Commons architects, says it was never a plan, but a general idea of how to turn some horrible news about population losses into a positive for the region.

“The new data is quite frankly very scary,” Popper said. Beyond those who’ve left, those who remain are far less likely to be under age 18 and more likely to be over 65 (often twice the Kansas average).

Reversing those trends would take a major effort. After decades of failing to attract business in northwestern Kansas, it’s clear the model has to go in a different direction. Nobody wants to believe it, but agriculture is only 3 percent of the gross state product of Kansas, and that proportion is falling.

Especially in northwest Kansas, a big, new idea is needed.

The biggest asset of the region is its heritage, the prairie. The romance of an open space to the horizon — home to grazing bison, antelope, elk and deer — is the American story in a nutshell. Land as vast and open as an ocean.

So The Star is suggesting a new, million-acre park: Buffalo Commons National Park.

And, while this will be costly and upset some landowners, we’re suggesting that private, state and federal officials start planning and purchasing the least-populated pieces of the state: Greeley and Wallace counties.

Land acquisition would cost something less than $1 billion. There’s even a potential funding source. Last week, Democratic U.S. senators Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico and Max Baucus of Montana introduced a bill to fully and permanently fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

Since 1965, the fund has used offshore oil and gas royalties for land protection. In recent years, much of that money has been re-directed, but the new bill would ensure the intended $900 million a year is available. Only $155 million was made available a year ago.

The two Kansas counties best-suited to become home to the new park are flush against the Colorado border, just south of Interstate 70. The terrain is typically stark. The aquifer is almost tapped out, though without use it could recharge, and some experts believe the stream beds that have run dry for decades would again boast water.

Today, the total population for the two counties is below 2,700. The average population is at or below two people per square mile. One of every five residents is past retirement age, and the average age for a farmer is 56.

This isn’t a call to grab the land tomorrow, but to begin making progress toward what could become one of the country’s 15 largest national parks, a place to honor the American Prairie. Over time, a park could grow up around the three small towns of the area, without eliminating them. Bolstered by tourism, nearby small towns would grow slightly in size. Schools already under intense pressure to further consolidate would get enrollment boosts.

There are numerous arguments in favor of this plan:

*Kansas is vastly under-represented in national parkland, and can accurately be considered parkland poor today.

*The prairie is the greatest long-term carbon sequestration landscape available, as the grasses take carbon from the atmosphere and bury it deep in the ground, where it stays to nurture plant growth.

*A new national park would attract tourists. Europeans, in love with the romance of the American West, would be drawn to it, as would other international visitors and Americans. Parks of similar size and remoteness in Texas and North Dakota attract at least 300,000 visitors a year. With the central location of Kansas, it has the potential to attract more.

*Tourism could grow into a lifeline for surrounding counties, all of which are struggling to find ways to keep native sons and daughters at home, but have largely failed to build enough industry or create enough jobs.

*Grasslands are the world’s most endangered eco-system, and re-establishing a large patch is important to America’s natural and cultural heritage.

Buffalo Commons is an idea whose time has come.

As Walt Whitman explained more than 100 years ago: “While I know the standard claim is that Yosemite, Niagara Falls, the Upper Yellowstone and the like afford the greatest natural shows, I am not so sure but the prairies and plains, while less stunning at first sight, last longer, fill the esthetic sense fuller, precede all the rest, and make North America’s characteristic landscape.”

http://voices.kansascity.com/node/6547

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