A Colorado prairie dog advocacy group is celebrating that some prairie dogs may have been saved because of property damage and vandalism on Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks land.
Deanna Mayer, executive director of Sedalia-based Prairie Protection Colorado, proposed in a Facebook post that people think about engaging in “direct action tactics” as a form of protesting harm to the environment, such as the $100,000 in property damage done to Boulder County Open Space and Mountain Parks equipment on Aug. 19.
Boulder County Sheriff’s Office reported that the damaged equipment on the Imal Open Space property, which is undergoing prairie dog mitigation, included damaged vehicles, slashed tires, cut wires and hoses, grass stuffed into gas tanks, shovels thrown into a pond, and seat belts cut out.
The case investigation is ongoing, said spokesperson Carrie Haverfield, and the sheriff’s office is aware of the “similar sentiments” posted on Prairie Protection Colorado’s Facebook page.
In an interview with the Camera, Mayer said she was not celebrating the crime, but instead how the property damage may have allowed some prairie dogs to live longer.
“I am not necessarily supporting the crime in itself; I’m supporting what works to save the last remaining remnants of this prairie community,” Mayer said.
Boulder City Council members on Tuesday will vote on whether to expand lethal control of prairie dogs on select irrigated agricultural land owned by the city. Mayer was one of dozens of people who spoke against the plan at a public hearing Aug. 11.
Mayer said the property damage and vandalism done to protect prairie dogs is similar to civil disobedience during the civil rights movement that fought for equal rights for Black people.
“All civil rights movements have direct action tactics but are not in line with the law, but the law is the problem,” Mayer said.
People are not allowed to intervene lethal prairie dog mitigation because it’s the law, Mayer said, but that doesn’t make it right.
“They’re totally allowed to go out and gas all those prairie dogs. Hitler was totally allowed to go out and gas all the Jews,” Mayer said. “That was their policy, that was what they did. Does that mean the law in place is right?”
Boulder resident Mark Gelband said he was offended by the comparison of lethal mitigation of prairie dogs to the Holocaust, which was the genocide of 6 million Jewish men, women and children. Gelband compared the community concern over prairie dogs to concern for unhoused people in Boulder — city officials cleared multiple encampments this week.
“As the son of a Holocaust survivor, I find this group’s comparison especially offensive. I’d encourage this group to think about the city gloating today about its inhumane treatment of our unhoused community members,” Gelband wrote in a statement.
Mayer’s stance is not shared by local prairie dog advocacy groups such as Keep Boulder Wild, said Taylor Jones, a scientist who works with the group.
“We do not support property destruction or property damage,” Jones said. “We believe vandalism is counter-productive to the cooperative solutions we’re trying to come up with, and vandalism has already been harmful to nonlethal relocation efforts.”
The Aug. 19 incident is sending waves of concern through the farming and ranching community, said Elizabeth Black of Boulder-based Healthy Ecosystems & Agricultural Lands.
Multiple people have contacted her to say they are no longer willing to publicly testify about prairie dogs because of fear of retaliation. Others are starting to patrol their land and setting up security cameras.
“We’ve been really outnumbered in public participation on prairie dogs and this is why — people are afraid for their livelihoods,” Black said.
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Prairie dog advocate praises ‘direct action’ of property damage - The Daily Camera
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