David Bamberger Interview, Part 2 of 2

The only thing on this ranch that's contrived is the historical marker when you first come in. I put that up as kind of like a cemetery.

I'd like for you to be sure to look at it. And this stone, I had it carved with some words that -- we don't want it to be our epitaph -- but the stone basically says, "In Memory of Man".

Now re -- remember this looks like a little cemetery. "In Memory of Man". 2 million B.C. to 2000 and question mark A.D., he who once dominated the earth destroyed it with his waste, his poisons and his own numbers.

And that's the path that we on this planet earth, that man is taking. We're now around 5 billion people on this planet.

There's a sustainable factor here. This ranch is a -- is a -- is a planet of its own cause its got a fence around it and it can sustain just so much life, whether that's humans or cows or goats or deer, or whatever.

A lake is a planet. A lake, a body of water, an earthen tank, a stock tank, it can sustain a certain amount of aquatic life and no more. We are putting so much pressure on the planet earth with our waste, our poisons and our own numbers that -- some of my friends get a little bit peeved with me because I happen to be an advocate of land use planning.

I believe that we can no longer be carving up America, scarring up the countryside with bulldozers, bulldozing streets, putting up more houses, putting in more septic tanks, drilling more holes in the ground trying to get water and leaving behind vast wastelands of strip centers and shopping malls that are almost abandoned.

Take a look in the cities. We need to change our whole way we look at land. But I don't believe it and my friends say, well Bamberger, you sound like a socialist. You come into this country as a poor guy, you made some money and you done some things and now you sound like a socialist. You made it under capitalism, you're going to throw it away.

I said nope, thats not it. I believe that if we had a land use, developed land used plans for all of America, the whole country, and those areas that we, as a society, decided would not be disturbed

because nature has got to have some hidden places, we can't go pumping everybody into a federal park or a state park. We can't go shoving everybody in to see an endangered species here or there cause we start shoving too many people in, the species is going to leave.

So those areas that we as a society decide should be preserved and set aside for mother nature and for us, our health, our mental health.

If that turns out that it says to Rancher X, your land can never be developed for housing but over here, ten miles away, this ranch can be. We have economically taking, taken away from you some value, because a promoter, developer sort would maybe give you 2 or $3000 an acre but now that our land use decisions have been made and it can never be developed then your land is now maybe only worth $800 an acre.

Therefore, I claim that society owes you $2200 an acre and that's where it's going to call for all Americans to belly up to the bar.

The City of Austin were -- had some foresight. They passed a bond issue here a year or two ago and they -- they raised $65 million in a bond issue to do nothing but to buy conservation easements around the watersheds around the City of Austin.

Got one gentleman over there, right around the Circle C development on South Austin, that bond money paid him $4 ½ million and he still owns his 400 acres. He still runs cows, the only thing is he can't ever build more than 4 houses on his 400 acres. So in perpetuity, that thing is taken care of.

That's the kind of thing that I think society has to -- the kind of programs and the kind of plans that we have to do as a society. We got to belly up to the bar. I don't believe in taking away the growth that somebodys put on their calf, i.e., the growth and the value of their land.

But I do believe that as a society, we've got to make some hard decisions. We got to quit having everybody with a big lawn and everybody with a little John Deere tractor to mow it, and that we've got to have our housing, we've got to look at it more like they do in Europe and other places. Some marvelous adaptations to space and land.

And we can do it. But we got to keep on teaching and educating and create this awareness. And that's part of the reason that we do the programs we do out here. Try to con -- show America and show other citizens how they can make a difference on their own little tract of land or in their -- the older person that wants to lobby or write letters or make phone calls. We can, we can all do it. But we need leadership and we need that from Washington, we need that from the State and we need it from City Hall.