Paul Thomas Richards Legendary American Folksinger, Backcountry Traveler,
and Wilderness Advocate
James “Walkin’ Jim” Stoltz
Returns to Earth
Legendary American folksinger, backcountry traveler, and wilderness advocate James “Walkin’ Jim” Stoltz passed late Friday night, September 3, 2010, at St. Peter’s Hospital in Helena, Montana.
Stoltz, age 57, a veteran performer for 35 years with 12 CDs, one DVD and several books to his credit, earned his nickname “Walkin’ Jim,” by hiking more than 28,000 miles through wild country in North America. Packing a guitar and penning extraordinary lyrics along the trails, Walkin’ Jim’s always-humble-yet-strikingly-powerful songs voiced enormous respect and appreciation for the Earth, its wild places, and the wild critters that he carefully studied and truly adored.
A one-of-a-kind performer known for his powerful baritone timbre, stunning photography, humorous and elucidative stories, inspirational poetry, literally awesome lyrics, and emotion-packed vocals, Walkin’ Jim Stoltz toured extensively throughout North America for more than 35 years. His last public performance in Montana, where he lived, was on March 6, 2010, in Missoula, where he played a benefit concert and celebration for the Last, Best Place Wildlands Campaign and Wilderness Watch.
In addition to being a co-founder of the Last, Best Place Wildlands Campaign, Walkin’ Jim Stoltz co-founded Musicians United to Sustain the Environment (MUSE) to raise funds for designating unprotected public roadless wildlands as official Wilderness, award grants to grassroots conservation organizations, and to “utilize music to promote environmental awareness and protection of wild lands, wild waters, and wild lives. We are particularly interested in efforts to protect endangered or threatened species, protection of our nation’s waters, and preserving and restoring wildland habitats. Environmental education for our young — the soon-to-be stewards of our natural heritage – is also very important to us,” Walkin’ Jim wrote when he founded the group with Craig Wagner in 1998. Walkin’ Jim staffed Musicians United to Sustain the Environment until his death.
Musicians United to Sustain the Environment (MUSE) features such luminaries as Dakota Sid Clifford, Craig Wagner, Joanne Rand, Magpie, Libby Roderick, Paul Winter, Dana Lyons, Susan Grace, Karen Goldberg, Alice Di Micele, Walkin’ Jim Stoltz, David Elias, Joyce Rouse, Peter and Lou Berryman, Lydia Adams Davis, John McCutcheon, Larry Long, Country Joe McDonald, Casey Neill, Jez Lowe, Kate Bennett, Katherine Archer, Keith Hammer, Leah Wolfsong, Pete Seeger, Steve Schuch, Kat Eggleston, Bill Oliver, Tom Vincent, Betty and the Baby Boomers, Dean Stevens, Cindy Kallet, Tom Paxton, Tish Hinojosa, Gordon Bok, Emma’s Revolution, Bob Zentz, Josh White, Jr., and Paul Todd.
Grassroots conservation groups that have received grants from MUSE include: Hells Canyon Preservation Council, Friends of the Clearwater, Northwoods Wilderness Recovery, Swan View Coalition, Center for Environmental Equity, Friends of the Bitterroot, Northwest Ecosystem Alliance (now called Conservation Northwest), Native Forest Network, Wild Things Unlimited, Blue Mountains Biodiversity Project, Predator Conservation Alliance (now called Keystone Conservation), American Wildlands, RESTORE The North Woods, Big Sky Wildcare, Natural Resources Council of Maine, Oregon Natural Desert Association, Conservation Leader’s Network, Western Watersheds Project, Endangered Species Coalition, The Heartwood Forest Council, and Forever Wild.
In 2006, beset by cancer, Walkin’ Jim Stoltz organized a 45-state outreach tour with other musicians and authors (many from MUSE), and worked with hundreds of community organizations to support clean water and to protect all public roadless wildlands and their dependent wildlife species. In tribute, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency honored Stoltz with its “Outstanding Achievement Award” for his advocacy for nature and Wilderness across America.
Walkin’ Jim Stoltz was featured on radio and television shows and syndicated programs throughout North America, including National Public Radio in the United States and CBC/Radio-Canada.
CDs, DVDs, Books, Gift Cards, Free Songs, Chords, and Lyrics:
Click HERE to listen to full versions of some of Walkin’ Jim’s songs about North American Wildlands.
Click HERE to download up to 14 free songs, straight from the heart of Walkin’ Jim.
Click HERE for one-minute-long clips from many more Walkin’ Jim songs.
Click HERE for lyrics and chords of Walkin’ Jim’s songs.
Children are encouraged to visit “Walkin’ Jim’s Kid’s Corner” by clicking HERE. Click HERE to read TRUE animal stories written by Walkin’ Jim’s many kid fans. Click HERE for the CD that Walkin’ Jim wrote especially for kids (includes the classics: Manfred the Mopey Moose, Slugs and Bugs, It Ain’t Easy Being An Ol’ Grizzly Bear, Pika, Pika , and Wild Things Need Wild Places).
After you are tantalized by the above, click HERE to purchase Walkin’ Jim’s CDs, DVDs, Books, and Gift Cards.
Other Information and Resources:
Wildlands advocates recently dedicated The Walkin’ Jim Hiking Trail, close to Arizona’s Hells Canyon Wilderness and the Center for Biological Diversity featured Walkin’ Jim on its Web site.
Visit Walkin’ Jim’s “Keeping it Wild” Web page in which Jim helps Americans take action to protect their endangered public roadless wildlands legacy.
Walkin’ Jim Stoltz was a co-author and dedicated proponent of the Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act (NREPA) , the “wildest bill on Capitol Hill,” which, when enacted, will designate 24 million acres of our roadless public wildlands legacy in Montana, Idaho, northwestern Wyoming, eastern Washington, and eastern Oregon as Wilderness.
The Northern Rockies Ecosystem is the LAST remaining functioning ecosystem in the lower 49 states where all native species still reside!
The Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act (NREPA), now co-sponsored by more than 100 members of the U.S. House of Representatives (for list, click HERE) and tirelessly promoted by Idaho resident and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Carole King, will protect essential habitats for many at-risk species that characterize the Wild Nature of the northern Rockies, such as the gray wolf, bull trout, cutthroat trout (Montana’s official state fish), otter, mountain goat, mountain sheep, elk, arctic grayling, northern goshawk, boreal owl, pileated woodpecker, ferruginous hawk, Montana vole, sage thrasher, wild bison, peregrine falcon, bald eagle, pine marten, fisher, lynx, wolverine, grizzly bear (Montana’s official state animal), and, perhaps Walkin’ Jim’s favorite animal, the pika, an extremely rare species, now endangered by global climate change, that lives only at high altitude rocky mountainsides.
(Many are the parents who have been driven to varying states of joy and madness by their kids’ singing Jim’s “Pika, Pika” song, from his much-loved “A Kid for the Wild” CD, over and over and over and over again.)
In the proud tradition of Montana’s famous conservationist and U.S. Senator, the late Lee Metcalf; NREPA will protect the public’s wildlands, wild animals, big game, pristine watersheds, and fisheries that make living in Montana and the Northern Rockies such a special and rare privilege.
To honor his legacy, Walkin’ Jim’s many friends and fans are already lobbying to name one of the first Wilderness Areas to be created by NREPA the “Walkin’ Jim Wilderness Area.” They contend it doesn’t really matter whether the future “Walkin’ Jim Wilderness Area” is in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Washington, or Oregon as, since Walkin’ Jim hiked through public roadless wildlands in all five states that comprise the Northern Rockies Ecosystem. Although Montana was his home base, Walkin’ Jim was equally loyal to all North American roadless areas, no matter in what state or province they were located.
Observations, Memorials, Tributes, Wakes, Celebrations, and Funeral:
Walkin’ Jim’s family and supportive friends assembled in Helena, Montana, during the first ten days of September 2010. A celebration of Jim’s life was held on Wednesday, September 8, 2010, at the Big Sky Ranch, near the town of Unionville, just southwest of Helena.
For the latest news about this observation, funeral details, memorial funds, tributes, and, possibly sometime in 2011, a celebration of Walkin’ Jim’s life, go to the Walkin’ Jim Web site or click HERE.
To converse and share stories with Walkin’ Jim Stoltz’s friends, family, and fans, go to: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Walkin-Jim-Stoltz/113598525318345?v=desc or: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Walkin-Jim-Stoltz/113598525318345?v=stream.
During his prolonged medical care, Walkin’ Jim incurred high bills. Please help Jim’s family defray these extensive medical bills! Click HERE, to make tax-deductible memorial tributes with your credit card to Walkin’ Jim’s Medical Fund. Or, please snail-mail your tax-deductible contributions, accompanied with brief notes explaining your checks are meant to help pay down Walkin’ Jim’s medical expenses, to Musicians United to Sustain the Environment at:
M.U.S.E.
P.O. Box 1512
Helena, MT 59624
Should you require further information, please call Musicians United to Sustain the Environment (MUSE) at 406-449-6252, or please click HERE to e-mail MUSE. THANK YOU!
Personal Note About A Dear, Dear Friend:
Walkin’ Jim’s life was his ministry. Jim walked the talk and he certainly walked the walk!
Jim consistently lived his life with grace and kindness. Jim reached so many people with his wonderfully creative, courageous, positive, gracious and loving energy! Watching him enthrall elementary school kids about with his stories, tall tales, and intimate knowledge about Wild country and its wild inhabitants is an experience never to be forgotten.
Walkin’ Jim will always be a vital wellspring for humans trying their best to live in symbiosis with Earth. Although we may feel pain with Walkin’ Jim’s passing, his legacy—already pure and luminous—will only grow more compelling, as subsequent generations take up Walkin’ Jim’s vocation and become vigorous spokespersons, musicians, poets, writers, lyricists, guitar players, harmonica players, and singers for our pubic roadless wildlands and Wilderness.
Walkin’ Jim Stoltz will always remain our steadfast and true friend. We hold dear so many treasured memories from our time spent with Walkin’ Jim! His sincere, bone-crushing hugs will be forever felt. Our hearts will be continually warmed, every time we experience the Wild that Jim so loved, every time we defend our priceless public wildlands legacy to which Jim devoted his life, every time we ponder Jim’s brilliant poetry and lyrics, every time we hum or sing Jim’s catchy tunes, and every time we again listen to his marvelous voice and heartfelt songs.
Health Complications:
Walkin’ Jim Stoltz had a successful kidney transplant, donated by John Giacalone, on March 16, 2004. In the fall of 2007, Walkin’ Jim learned that he had cancer in his tonsil chords and lymph nodes of his neck. Jim underwent surgery, followed by chemotherapy and radiation treatments. The winter of 2007-2008 was a tough one, as expenses piled up and medical bills consumed most of Jim’s financial resources.
In the summer of 2008, with his characteristic indomitability, Walkin’ Jim underwent his own self-prescribed “Wilderness Therapy” and walked 460 miles through the mountains of Idaho and Montana. In 2009, Jim walked an incredible 500-mile loop through the remote mountain ranges of eastern Nevada.
In 2009 and early 2010, Walkin’ Jim toured unwaveringly with his ever-popular “Forever Wild” show, combining live music, story-telling, and poetry with stunning, multi-image slideshows to create a stirring celebration of the natural world.
Photos, taken by Janet Zimmerman and others, from Walkin’ Jim’s March 6, 2010, benefit concert and celebration in Missoula, Montana, for the Last, Best Place Wildlands Campaign and Wilderness Watch are available upon request.
Walkin’ Jim’s aplomb was such that most of those attending his final Montana concert were unaware of his throat cancer, ensuing surgery, and extensive chemotherapy and radiation treatments.
After Walkin’ Jim returned from his spring 2010 concert tour, doctors in Seattle and Billings found that his cancer has spread. Jim’s bills for hospitals, doctors, tests, high-cost pharmaceuticals, and medical-related travel grew exponentially.
In years past, Walkin’ Jim chose to raise funds to help pay for his kidney transplant through the National Transplant Assistance Fund (NTAF). Thanks to the generosity of Jim’s many friends and fans, those transplant-related expenses have largely been addressed.
Resolving Current Medical Expenses and Bills:
Now, Walkin’ Jim’s family urgently needs Jim’s friends and fans to again help defray extensive medical bills; these costs incurred from Jim’s cancer treatments.
Ways You Can Help:
1. Please click HERE, to make tax-deductible donations with your credit card to Walkin’ Jim’s Medical Fund. Or, snail-mail your tax-deductible contributions to: Musicians United to Sustain the Environment; M.U.S.E.; P.O. Box 1512; Helena, MT 59624. Should you require further information, please call MUSE at 406-449-6252, or please click HERE to e-mail MUSE.
2. Please click HERE to purchase Walkin’ Jim’s CDs, DVDs, Books, and Gift Cards. In addition to enriching your life and spreading Jim’s message to friends, family, and loved ones; your buying Jim’s CDs, DVDs, books, and gift cards will help his family resolve Jim’s high medical bills.
3. Walkin’ Jim’s family may designate other nonprofit organizations to receive donations, tributes, memorials, and contributions to continue Walkin’ Jim’s legacy. Click HERE to keep informed concerning Jim’s family’s decisions and please contribute generously in Jim’s name.
4. If you want to learn more about the general mission of the National Transplant Assistance Fund (NTAF), that helped Walkin’ Jim in the past, click HERE. Through 26 years of service, NTAF has helped more than 4,000 patients raise $64 million for uninsured medical expenses. If you want to contribute to NTAF in Walkin’ Jim’s name, please click HERE. (Please note: These contributions will NOT help pay Walkin’ Jim’s current cancer treatment bills–They will go directly into NTAF’s general fund to help pay medical bills for OTHER uninsured transplant patients who need transplants.) If you want to keep posted about NTAF, subscribe to the organization’s bi-monthly e-mail newsletter, by clicking HERE.
His Spirit is Still on the Run:
As I write this, I listen to Walkin’ Jim’s seminal “Spirit is Still on the Run,” the original classic vinyl album, complete with Jim’s kind personal note inscribed when he gave me the album 26 years ago. The album’s incredible title track describes a young person’s plaintive queries—“What Happened?”
Spirit Is Still On The Run
By Walkin’ Jim Stoltz
Daddy, what ever happened to the old buffalo,
I know they don’t roam here no more,
Because at school today, they say they’ve gone away,
But no one ever says just what for.
Well now listen my son, I’ll tell you how the West was won,
How the herds fell to the big needle guns,
But, the ghosts of them herds still pound o’er the earth,
And, their Spirit is still on the run.
(Chorus̶ —Upton Elementary School children singing in unison with Walkin’ Jim):
Yes, their spirit is still on the run, it’s the American dream movin’ on,
Their memory is free, left to you and to me, and the Spirit is still on the run.
Daddy, what ever happened to the ol’ grizzly bear,
I know he once roamed the west wide,
But at school today they say he’s pushed back to stay,
In the mountains where he has to hide.
Well, now listen my son, I’ll tell you about these proud ones,
Where they stalk, all others walk small,
But man to his shame, can’t stand the untamed,
And there’s some that wouldn’t have him at all.
(Chorus̶ —Upton Elementary School children singing in unison with Walkin’ Jim):
Yes, their spirit is still on the run, it’s the American dream movin’ on,
Their memory is free, left to you and to me, and the Spirit is still on the run.
Daddy, what ever happened to the big piney forests,
And the prairies that stretched out like seas,
Because the schoolbooks they say, these were all in the way,
When the settlers come a-swarmin’ like bees,
Now, listen my son, yes, all these have gone,
It’s sad, but it’s not been in vain
Their life’s blood was bought and with the Spirit it brought,
A whole country was born into fame.
(Bridge):
And all that have died or been swept to the side,
They still give us hope every one,
They give us dreams of the free, what has been and can be,
And their Spirit is still on the run.
(Chorus̶ —Upton Elementary School children singing in unison with Walkin’ Jim):
Yes, their Spirit is still on the run, it’s the American dream movin’ on,
Their memory is free, left to you and to me, and the Spirit is still on the run.
©1984 by Walkin’ Jim Stoltz and Lone Coyote Records
Walkin’ Jim Music, BMI
For those who are not old-timers enamored with bulky turntables and the good ol’ days of vinyl with absolutely gorgeous record jackets that were actually readable, Jim’s “Spirit is Still on the Run” album has been combined with his equally-great “Forever Wild” album into one CD, so you can now buy BOTH albums for only $14 by clicking HERE. In addition to “Spirit is Still on the Run,” this combined CD also includes the Jim’s indispensible sage counsel contained within “I Walk With the Old Ones” and “Follow Your Heart.”
Follow Your Heart:
For an even greater version of “Follow Your Heart,” guaranteed to give you goose bumps, purchase Walkin’ Jim’s “Oh, What A Life” CD, a remarkable live concert recorded before an enraptured audience at Jim’s beloved Lone Mountain Ranch, where, for decades, Jim hosted popular winter sleigh rides and sing-alongs. For an-all-too-brief snippet from this incredible live performance; once again to feel, hear, and touch Jim, click HERE.
Follow Your Heart
By Walkin’ Jim Stoltz
(VERSE):
In this life that we’re all living with all its twists and turns,
It’s so easy to lose our way, forget the lessons that we learned,
But, the road that leads us on will always bring us back,
Once you’ve walked your own trail, and stepped in your own tracks.
(AUDIENCE HELPS JIM SING THE FOLLOWING CHORUS):
Follow your heart, that’s where to begin
Chase down those dreams and go a-dancin’ with the wind
Listen to the love that you find along the way
Let your light shine in, and sing your life away.
(VERSE):
Truth is a word, but it’s so often hard to find,
Searchin’ through the mirrors offered up by time
To face it on your own, and to look it in the eye
Will take all you have to give, but ain’t it worth the try.
(AUDIENCE AGAIN HELPS JIM SING CHORUS):
Follow your heart, that’s where to begin
Chase down those dreams and go a-dancin’ with the wind
Listen to the love that you find along the way
Let your light shine in, and sing your life away.
(VERSE):
Listen to the song of the Earth as she turns,
Bask in the life of the sun as she burns,
Seek out the power in your own minds eye,
Listen to your heart, it’ll teach you by and by.
(AUDIENCE, ONE MORE TIME, HELPS JIM SING CHORUS):
Follow your heart, that’s where to begin
Chase down those dreams and go a-dancin’ with the wind
Listen to the love that you find along the way
Let your light shine in, and sing your life away.
©1997 by Walkin’ Jim Stoltz
Walkin’ Jim Music, BMI
Forever Wild:
In conclusion, there’s little to say that Walkin’ Jim Stoltz hasn’t already beautifully articulated. Perhaps we should conclude with Walkin’ Jim’s best known anthem, “Forever Wild.”
In 1986, we closed each of our touring “Wild West Exposition” pro-wildlands, pro-Wilderness road shows with this sacred composition. Audiences everywhere always joined the cast of the Wild West Exposition in singing the pleas of Walkin’ Jim’s chorus. At song’s end, as Jim’s final guitar chord resonated and then gradually receded into the absolute stillness of entire crowds held breathless, there were no dry eyes.
Forever Wild
By Walkin’ Jim Stoltz
There’s a magic in the air, that I feel when I am there,
It plays straight to my heart, and lays it all a’bare,
It’s in the cry of the eagle and the deer so meek and mild,
It’s in the rise of a mountain, let it stay Forever Wild.
Forever wild, Forever Wild
Let it stay, Forever Wild.
It’s in all that is not tame, and some that can’t be named,
It’s in the fog down in the valley, and the scent of summer rain,
It’s in the scream of a lion when she’s soundin’ like a child,
It’s in the song of a river, let it stay Forever Wild.
Forever wild, Forever Wild
Let it stay, Forever Wild.
Now the Earth it holds the key to all that shall be free,
It’s in the peace of the desert and the wisdom of the trees,
It’s in the grace of a swan’s wing and the grizzly when she’s riled
It’s in all the love I bear it, let it stay Forever Wild.
Forever wild, Forever Wild
Let it stay, Forever Wild.
There are those of my own kind, they’re runnin’ fast, but goin’ blind
And the only thing they worship, is their God, the dollar sign
We must fight* them with our Spirit, with our might, and with our guile
We must show them that the answer: It must be Forever Wild.
Forever wild, Forever Wild
Let it stay, Forever Wild.
Forever wild, Forever Wild
Let it stay, Forever Wild.
By Walkin’ Jim Stoltz on Wild Wind Records
©1986 by Walkin’ Jim Stoltz
Walkin’ Jim Music BMI
* Editor’s Note: In his most recent concerts, Walkin’ Jim substituted the word “teach” for “fight.”
Just How Big Is the Heart of Humankind?
Now it is time for us to pause, take deep breaths, say prayers for our dear friend, lovingly and respectfully listen to Walkin’ Jim’s “Oh, What a Life,” downloadable HERE for free, weep, and gratefully allow this magnificent gentle soul to return to Mother Earth.
Oh, What A Life We Could Live
By Walkin’ Jim Stoltz
There’s an old owl flyin’ free, and he’s callin’ out to me.
What can I tell him as the big trees fall?
And he slips on through the cracks. Oh, I can’t turn my back,
For his kind is our kind, and the writing’s on the wall.
If we could see this world through the eyes of those
Who keep sharing when there’s nothing left to give
If we could walk this land with respect for all
Oh, what a life we could live.
There’s a salmon swimmin’ deep, her destiny to keep,
How can I tell her, she’s the last of her kind?
Oh, a thousand times around, from the sea to the spawning ground,
What a cost! What a loss! To all memory, and all Time!
If we could see this world through the eyes of those
Who keep sharing when there’s nothing left to give
If we could walk this land with respect for all
Oh, what a life we could live.
Oh, what a life we could live.
Oh, what a life we could live.
If we could walk this land with respect for all
Oh, what a life we could live.
(Bridge):
She wolf howling in the night,
She knows there’s a lesson comin’ soon.
Just how big is the heart of humankind?
Won’t you stand back and give her room?
(Audience now joins Walkin’ Jim on chorus)
If we could see this world through the eyes of those
Who keep sharing when there’s nothing left to give
If we could walk this land with respect for all
Oh, what a life we could live.
Oh, what a life we could live.
Oh, what a life we could live.
If we could walk this land with respect for all
Oh, what a life we could live.
(Audience again joins Walkin’ Jim on chorus):
If we could see this world through the eyes of those
Who keep sharing when there’s nothing left to give
If we could walk this land with respect for all
Oh, what a life we could live.
Oh, what a life we could live.
Oh, what a life we could live.
If we could walk this land with respect for all
Oh, what a life we could live.
(Just Walkin’ Jim):
Oh, what a life we could live.
Oh, what a life we could live.
©1997 by Walkin’ Jim Stoltz
Walkin’ Jim Music, BMI
Legendary Folksinger Walkin' Jim Stoltz Happily Returns to Mother Earth
Jim, thank you for being…..
With the deepest possible love and appreciation,
Your Forever Friend,
Paul Richards
30 Brown’s Gulch Road
Boulder, MT 59632
406-225-4235
Dispatches from the Wildlands:
http://blogs.alternet.org/paulrichards/
(All Walkin’ Jim Stoltz’s Copyrights Accompany His Above Lyrics)
Excepting All of Walkin’ Jim’s Copyrights Above, This Memorial
©201o, Paul Richards, Dispatches from the Wildlands™
“In wildness is the preservation of the world.”
Henry David Thoreau
Editor’s Note: This eulogy utilizes colored underlined “hyperlinks” known as “Uniform Resource Locators” or “URLs.” A URL is also known as a “domain name” or an “Internet address.” To fully activate and utilize these URLs, just go to the hyperlink and push down on your “Ctrl” or “Control” button on our keyboard and left click your mouse.
Walkin' Jim at Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign Celebration in Missoula, MT, on March 6, 2010. Brett Haverstick, Larry Campbell, Walkin' Jim Stoltz, and Paul Richards. (Photo by Janet Zimmerman).
Paul Thomas Richards FORMER WILDERNESS SOCIETY CHIEF OPPOSES TESTER WILD LANDS LOGGING BILL
Statement of Dr. Stewart M. Brandborg,
Former Executive Director of The Wilderness Society,
to the Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests,
U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
Concerning S. 1470, “The Tester Logging and Recreation Bill”
FOREWORD:
The following statement was written by Dr. Stewart M. Brandborg, former executive director of The Wilderness Society. As described below, Dr. Brandborg worked more than 20 years with The Wilderness Society in Washington, D.C., including 12 years as the Society’s executive director, from 1964 to 1976.
During Dr. Brandborg’s tenure as the head of The Wilderness Society, the U.S. Congress passed the Wilderness Act of 1964, landmark legislation that created our National Wilderness Preservation System and designated 9.1 million acres of National Forest wild lands as Wilderness. Since passage of the Wilderness Act in 1964, Congress has protected 110 million acres of publicly-owned wild lands as Wilderness.
Dr. Stewart M. Brandborg, Executive Director, Retired, The Wilderness Society
INTRODUCTION:
I am Stewart M. Brandborg. I am a fourth-generation Montanan. For more than 70 years, I have been involved with and worked on public lands issues. I have lived the early and late years of my life in the Bitterroot Valley of western Montana.
I grew up in a Forest Service family. Guy M. Brandborg, my father, worked a variety of positions in the Forest Service in Montana and Idaho and served as Supervisor of the Bitterroot National Forest from 1935 to 1955. I earned my Bachelor of Science Degree in Wildlife Technology in 1949 and my Master of Science Degree in Forestry and Wildlife Management in 1951 from the University of Montana, where I met my wife, Anna Vee. The University of Montana and its School of Forestry awarded me an Honorary Doctor of Science in 2010.
I worked more than 12 years as a wildlife biologist with the U.S. Forest Service and with state wildlife agencies in Montana and Idaho. My early career research work in the Bob Marshall and Selway-Bitterroot Areas gave me early, lifelong appreciation of Montana’s and Idaho’s Wilderness.
I worked for three decades for national environmental organizations and agencies in Washington, D.C. I served for four years as Assistant Conservation Director with the National Wildlife Federation in Washington, D.C. I was then associated over 20 years with The Wilderness Society, including 12 years as its executive director, from 1964 to 1976.
During these years, I was privileged to advocate for the protection of our public lands legacy, presenting the case for wild land preservation across the Nation – from Alaska to Florida – before public agencies and the Congress.
During my tenure, the U.S. Congress passed landmark public lands legislation, including the Wilderness Act of 1964, and laid the groundwork for the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which, when ultimately enacted in 1980, protected as wilderness over 56 million acres of public wild lands within our National Park, National Wildlife Refuge, and National Forest Systems.
Since passage of the Wilderness Act in 1964, Congress has protected 110 million acres of publicly-owned wild lands as Wilderness.
I submit this information concerning S. 1470 to help the Public Lands and Forests Subcommittee and the entire U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources carry out their responsibilities for wise and farsighted stewardship of our Nation’s priceless public lands legacy, including necessary protection of the public’s wild lands and the irreplaceable species that depend upon these wild lands for their very survival.
S. 1470 Threatens Our National Forests And Other Publicly-Owned Lands
It is with a deep personal concern that I share my insights and reservations about Senator Jon Tester’s Logging and Recreation Bill, S. 1470. This measure, if enacted by Congress, poses a serious threat to our National Forests and other publicly-owned lands. It was conceived in private, it revokes protections currently in place for public lands and it places National Forest management in the hands of local extractive user groups.
I have a special appreciation of Montana’s nine million acres of roadless wild lands, richly endowed with wildlife that is not to be found in such diversity and abundance anywhere else in the world. This grew out of my 12 years of research as a professional wildlife biologist in the Bob Marshall, Selway-Bitterroot, and Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness Areas, and my experience in National Forest backcountry on timber and range surveys and lookout fireman jobs.
We have the best of it, to be enjoyed by all who value unspoiled, natural ecosystems and the bounty that these public wild lands provide us: Hunters, anglers, students of nature, and the many others who seek solitude, peace of mind, refreshment of spirit, and the privilege of experiencing the best of life in the backcountry.
This wild backcountry must be preserved for those generations who follow us.
S. 1470 Is A Product Of Closed Door Deliberations
The Tester bill is described by its supporters as a product of a collaborative effort that brought all parties – all stakeholders – together in its drafting. In fact, it was conceived and put together by a few corporate logging entities and a half dozen staff members of a few conservation groups.
Major players were excluded from the closed door deliberations – local county governments, watershed and irrigation interests, local and state land, wildlife, and wilderness interests, and a broad segment of other user groups – who have a primary concern for the long-term protection of our National Forests. In forming the Tester bill, a handful of people negotiated behind-the-scenes, in complete absence of much-needed broadly-based public involvement.
S. 1470 Is A Repudiation Of Meaningful Public Involvement
Senator Tester deserves credit for his stated desire to bring people together to work cooperatively in resolving our public land issues. Ultimately, this must occur in our communities, if present polarization and divisive politics are to be overcome in favor of sound, research-based management policies.
But closed-door negotiations between self-appointed agents from a few carefully screened special interest groups are hardly the proper methods for managing our public lands.
From my more than 70 years’ involvement in public lands management, I know firsthand that respectful discussion must encompass extensive research-backed public information and spirited open debate. I know that real cooperation among all members of our communities promotes respect between all parties. This involves processes for bringing people together to build trust and working relationships in which they can honestly express their opinions, hammer out differences, and find common ground.
Meaningful communication concerning our public lands legacy must start with extensive scientific information and continue on to open public review, discussion, and understanding of that information. This will ensure the fullest possible constructive and educational dialogue.
Many of us in Montana would welcome the opportunity to participate in such well-informed and cooperative community building. An important first step in this direction will be a collective decision by all involved to implement genuine grassroots projects for this purpose, avoiding the serious breaches of the public interest that we have seen in the drafting of S. 1470.
Senator Tester’s stated desire to bring people together to work to resolve our public land issues is a good idea but one that Senator Tester clearly did not accomplish. He limited the people he invited to the timber industry that will benefit from his mandated subsidized logging and to a few foundation-funded big environmental groups. Closed-door negotiations between these carefully winnowed and self-appointed circles are hardly the proper methods for managing our public lands.
S. 1470 Revokes Current Protections For Public Wild Lands
The Tester bill places public roadless wild lands in Montana in jeopardy. Specifically authorized are requirements for taxpayer-subsidized roading and logging on 100,000 acres of the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest and 30,000 acres in the Kootenai National Forest’s critical grizzly bear habitat. Ranges of threatened, endangered, and sensitive species – wolverine, lynx, fisher, grizzly bear, wolf, and bull trout – would be written off for logging and development.
The Tester bill calls for only minimal designations of seriously fragmented “wilderness areas,” and removes the necessary protections for roadless wild lands now provided under the Clinton and Obama Presidential Roadless Initiatives and under the 1977 law, Senate Act 393, carefully shepherded through Congress by Montana’s late Senator Lee Metcalf. If the Tester bill passes, a precedent will be set to allow the greater part of these roadless wild lands to be opened for development without mandated wilderness reviews.
S. 1470 Overrides 100 Years Of Federal Forest Management Policies
Through its maze of prescriptions—acreages mandated for logging, fragmented “wilderness areas,” motorized recreational and vehicle use, etc. —Senator Tester’s bill ignores or abrogates long-established management programs of the U.S. Forest Service and other public land agencies.
The complicated and multitudinous micro-management provisions spelled out in Senator Tester’s bill defy the framework of Federal Laws that Congress has wisely passed to define management policies for our Nation’s public lands over the past 100 years: The Organic Act that established our National Forest System, the Multiple Use and Sustained Yield Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Wilderness Act, the National Forest Management Act, and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act.
In short, Senator Tester’s bill overrides the statutory policies and management requisites that the U.S. Congress enacted for the protection for the 193 million acres of our publicly owned National Forests and Grasslands. It unwisely dictates acreages and deadlines for logging of 100,000 acres of National Forest land. It subverts requirements for habitat preservation of endangered, threatened, and sensitive species.
S. 1470 Threatens Proper Congressional Management Of Other Federal Land
Similarly threatened by the sort of preemption of Federal laws promoted by the Senator Tester’s bill are all of our other Federal land jurisdictions: The National Park System, the National Wildlife Refuge System, and the public domain lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management.
Responding to the voice of the people, Congress has been successful in protecting our public lands legacy from the raids of special interest groups. Congressional supporters of public lands thwarted the D’Ewart grazing bills of the 1940s and 1950s. The House of Representatives defeated the lumber industry’s National Timber Supply Act of 1970. These bills sought to profit small segments of private users – grazers and lumbermen – at the expense of each of us who share in the ownership and stewardship of these public lands, and our right to use them in ways that best serve the public. In each instance, the U.S. Congress responded when the American people spoke out in opposition to these raids on their public lands legacy.
S. 1470 Places National Forest Management In The Hands Of Local Extractive User Groups
Senator Tester’s bill opens the door to the calamitous precedent from which any one of the 535 members of Congress could dictate how National Forests and other Federally-administered lands would be used. In place of the resource protection of our Federal Laws, management would be dictated by local advisory committees. Local pressures for any special interest – mining, logging, damming, oil and coal development, et al – would come into play solely for the benefit of personal or corporate profits. Senator Tester’s bill’s prescriptive requirements would abrogate the law and administrative procedures that have served so well to protect our public estate through the generations.
If Congress were to endorse Senator Tester’s bill and others like it, more than one hundred years of Federal resource protection laws, set in place through the bipartisan actions of 50 Congresses, could be overridden by prescriptions of any interest group that gained the ear of any Congressman or Senator.
We Need Long-Term Jobs, Revitalized Rural Communities, And Sustainable Local Economies
Objective review of Senator Tester’s bill brings these questions to mind:
1. Is the mandated designation of over 100,000 acres of public National Forest lands for taxpayer-subsidized commercial logging of sub-marginal timber in the long-term interest of our communities?
2. Is industrial-scale subsidized commercial logging the best possible employment for forest-dependent workers, when compared to the economic and environmental benefits of long-neglected forest and watershed restoration programs?
3. Are there better ways to create sustainable local economies? Can Congress better help provide restoration and reclamation jobs, recreation, pure water, clean air, and excellent wildlife habitats for many generations?
4. Instead of subsidizing the roading and logging of fragile and marginal forestlands lacking commercial timber, could not we better place our priorities upon stream bank restoration, culvert maintenance, road obliteration and reclamation, habitat restoration, tree planting, and selective thinning within designated community protection zones?
5. Is it the best role for Congress to exacerbate conflicts between short-term resource extraction and long-term public lands stewardship? Can Congress facilitate the transition from short-term “timber-dependent” communities to long-term “forest-dependent” communities?
S. 1470 Fails To Bring About Long-Term Jobs
With its emphasis on the very short-term, Senator Tester’s bill fails to bring about long-term jobs that will revitalize and sustain our rural communities in the West.
The long-term jobs our rural communities need will only be provided by directly addressing and correcting the Forest Service’s enormous backlog of reclamation, restoration, and habitat improvement programs.
For years, the Forest Service promised these reclamation, restoration, and habitat improvement programs, as conditions for obtaining approval of past timber sales. It is now time for the agency to deliver. Instead of pitting neighbor against neighbor, trying to get the last possible cut out, regardless of cost, Congress needs to honor its stewardship responsibilities.
Let’s look at old logging roads, for example. They have great deleterious effects on forest ecosystems, including dramatically altering natural drainage patterns and causing landslides, changing wildlife behavior, fragmenting wildlife habitat, and promoting weed infestations. Large amounts of sediment originating from roads ultimately reach our National Forest’s streams and rivers, degrading water quality and impairing fish reproduction.
Road decommissioning involves removing culverts and unstable road shoulders, re-contouring to restore natural slopes, and re-vegetation with native species. This restoration mitigates environmental damage, improves aquatic habitats and provides increased security for big game like deer, elk, moose, and bears.
All of this needed work requires heavy machinery and creates highly skilled well-paid jobs for rural economies. As resource extractive industries continue to lose jobs, removal of unnecessary roads and practicing forest restoration have great potential for employment throughout our forest-dependent communities.
Instead of expensive short-term subsidies to four timber corporations to log sub-marginal timber, Congress needs to provide for long-term restoration of National Forests and their watersheds. Reclamation and habitat improvement programs will provide perpetual dividends for eons to come.
We will all benefit when forest restoration provides extensive recreation and restoration jobs, steady flows of pure water for agricultural irrigation and community water systems, better fishing and hunting, improved wildlife habitats, increased public recreational opportunities, more non-consumptive resource utilization, and continued sustainable harvests from our fiber producing lands.
S. 1470 Does Not Provide Needed “Shovel-Ready” Forest Jobs
Senator Tester is right concerning one thing: People in our forest-dependent communities need and deserve work. If there is to be subsidized timber cutting and tree thinning, let it occur in the critical community protection zones that most need it. Fuels reduction projects in these zones, based upon the best available science, will make our communities safer and enhance habitat. Forest restoration jobs, described in the previous section, will make our forest-dependent communities more stable.
We are talking about a fresh beginning for our National Forests – a bright new day that we welcome with open arms. The desperate need for these “shovel ready” community protection zone fuels reduction and forest restoration jobs is now firmly proven. We must now call upon Congress to think creatively and adequately fund the abundant employment opportunities produced by needed community protection and forest restoration.
Of course, our wild lands’ backcountry will continue providing virtually unlimited long-term benefits: Jobs for rangers, trail crews, scientific researchers, packers, guides, outfitters, non-extractive resource users and student conservation corps, and public recreation for hunting, fishing, backpacking and trail riding.
S. 1470 Continues A Failed Policy of Taxpayer-Subsidized Logging
Ninety percent of National Forest logging is subsidized through the agency’s road construction investment and the sale of timber at below-cost prices. Will untouched watersheds, wilderness, and wildlife preservation values be better served by opening these now-Presidentially-and-Congressionally-protected roadless wild lands to short-term taxpayer-subsidized resource extraction, as opposed to their being preserved for the long term as part of the National Wilderness Preservation System?
S. 1470 Constitutes A Direct Threat To Sound Public Lands Management
While we must encourage efforts to bring every public land shareholder – each of us – to the table in answering these and the myriad of other questions brought into focus by Senator Tester’s bill, we come down to the pivotal questions: Does the bill serve the public interest of all of us who share in the National Forests’ ownership? Or, does the bill serve the private interests of merely four logging corporations?
Does Senator Tester’s bill manage the public’s land for the public good? Or, does it initiate a dangerous precedent-setting mandate that any one of the 535 members of Congress can dictate what will be done with Federally-owned public land in their individual Congressional jurisdictions?
Is it in the public interest to override the legacy of more than 100 years of protective management under the laws laid down by Congress, in order to promote 535 separate and disparate Congressional fiefdoms?
S. 1470 Opens A “Pandora’s Box” Of Loopholes and Subsidies
The Tester bill must be recognized as a well-intentioned effort – at great public financial and environmental expense – to rescue an impoverished logging industry and the workers who depend on it for their livelihoods. However, with the lumber market near collapse, this large public investment would better be made hiring local contractors and woods workers for critically-needed forest restoration work.
We need not open this Pandora’s Box of special loopholes and subsidies for a handful of corporations.
We need not forsake our remaining public wild lands heritage.
We need not diminish the purity of the water that freely flows from our pristine roadless areas to our farms, ranches, and communities.
We need not erode the habitat of fish and wildlife species that mean so much to those of us fortunate enough to live here.
We need not subvert the functioning of our precious ecosystems, upon which we depend for life and sustenance, for the short-term economic gain of a few.
Let Us Honor The Basic Tenets For Protection Of Our Public Lands
Many of my dearest friends and colleagues – Howard Zahniser, Sigurd Olson, Harvey Broome, Ernest Oberholtzer, Bernard Frank, Benton MacKaye, Harold Anderson, George Marshall, David Brower, Olaus and Mardy Murie, Charles H. Callison, Benton Stong, Ken Baldwin, Don Aldrich, Doris Milner, Justice William O. Douglas, Congressmen John Saylor and Morris Udall, Senators Frank Church, Hubert Humphrey, and Lee Metcalf have passed on.
I have been so privileged to have known these fine spirits and to spend my life working side-by-side with them in dedication to America’s public lands! Let us not let political shortsightedness, greed, or desperation strip us of the priceless legacy they fought so hard to bequeath to us.
Let us work to bring long-term jobs and stability to our rural communities. Let us respect the countless hunters, anglers, and outdoors people that fully appreciate the true value of Wilderness and that have valiantly defended it with their hearts, minds, words, and actions through the ages.
We Montanans are blessed to live in this “Last, Best Place” with our plains and rolling prairies, snow-capped mountains, and beautiful valleys and streams. Wilderness and roadless wild lands are an irreplaceable part of this heritage. They deserve the fullest possible protection if they are to be preserved for those who follow us. Senator Tester’s bill places them in peril.
Thank you for the privilege of submitting this testimony.
Dr. Stewart M. Brandborg
647 Foley Lane
Hamilton, MT 59840
Phone: 406-375-1122
Dispatches from the Wildlands™
©2010, Dr. Stewart M. Brandborg and Paul Richards
_________________________________________________________
Editor’s Note: Dr. Brandborg wrote all of his draft language for this statement in pencil on yellow legal-sized notepads and mailed roughly-organized “chapters” via bursting-at-the-seams envelopes to Paul Richards, a Montana-based journalist with 42 years’ experience as writer and editor. Many months of respectful, productive, good-natured, and comprehensive telephone conversations between Dr. Brandborg and editor Richards produced the above final text.
Paul Thomas Richards FORMER WILDERNESS ASSOCIATION OFFICIALS
DISOWN TESTER WILDLANDS LOGGING BILL
“It is with heavy hearts we are compelled to oppose the organization we once proudly served as Officers and Governing Council Members.”
We, the undersigned former Officers and Governing Council Members of the Montana Wilderness Association (MWA), respectfully urge Senator Jon Tester (D-MT) to withdraw Senate Bill 1470, the “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act,” to rectify severe problems outlined by Agriculture Undersecretary Harris Sherman, who oversees the U.S. Forest Service.
Sherman testified that the Tester bill dictates timber cutting quotas that are “not reasonable,” “likely unachievable and perhaps unsustainable.”
Sherman also charged that the Tester bill’s “enormous” costs and mandated logging could create a harmful precedent for other National Forests. For example, the Tester bill mandates logging 7,000 acres a year for 10 years in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest—seven times the current annual average.
“The levels of mechanical treatment called for in the bill far exceed historic treatment levels on these forests, and would require an enormous shift in resources (away) from other forests in Montana and other states to accomplish,” Sherman told the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
We, as former leaders of the Montana Wilderness Association, cannot support the legislation as now written. We must diverge from our organization, because we believe that the Tester bill degrades both the quantity and quality of some of America’s most cherished wildlands in Montana. We encourage consideration of the issues we have outlined below that would be necessary in order for us to support it.
We endorse the 10-point position paper, Keeping It Wild! In Defense of America’s Public Wildlands, submitted by the Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign, a coalition of more than 55 grassroots conservation organizations.
The Tester bill legislates the net loss of hundreds of thousands of roadless area acres, including Senate Bill 393’s Wilderness Study Areas, designated in 1977 by Montana’s late U.S. Senator Lee Metcalf. This will create widespread environmental damage and the loss of an irreplaceable legacy for which future generations would, quite correctly, hold ours accountable.
Also, the Tester bill’s Congressional mandate for timber cut levels sets a dangerous precedent. Subsidizing these “below-cost” timber sales will cost federal taxpayers more than $100 million. And, the bill’s proposed new “wilderness” areas are small, often disjointed, primarily “rock and ice” parcels that would fail to protect fragile wildlands habitat and wildlife ecosystems and corridors.
To make matters worse, the Tester bill includes special provisions for new “wilderness” units that defy both the intent and letter of the Wilderness Act of 1964, and the spirit of Wilderness that so many Americans believe is a vital and wondrous part of this great Nation’s Heritage. Motor vehicles, including helicopters, simply have no place in designated Wilderness. Yes, we need more Wilderness—lots of it—but we want it to be real Wilderness!
The bill also codifies secretive negotiated agreements—such as the Beaverhead-Deerlodge “Partnership”—that excluded many individuals and groups who have long been involved in the public process. This, and similar agreements, have been sealed by the Montana Wilderness Association and others over the objections of excluded organizations and individuals, of whom most live and work close to the land and know the compromised areas intimately.
It is with heavy hearts we are compelled to oppose the organization we once proudly served as MWA Officers and Governing Council Members. Most of Montana’s undeveloped wildlands are long gone, and we cannot afford to lose big chunks of what remains.
We believe that, in recent years, the Montana Wilderness Association has clearly compromised its long-held mission of vigilant advocacy for protection of public wildlands. We know many former and current MWA members who agree.
In fact, most grassroots conservationists and activists in the region are convinced that, quite simply, MWA has lost its way. We are saddened to now count ourselves among them.
The Tester bill currently supported by the Montana Wilderness Association will irreparably damage Montana’s and the Northern Rockies’ dwindling public roadless wildlands legacy. It will salt the gaping wounds cut into the conservation community by MWA’s recent actions.
The Tester bill degrades the Wilderness Act of 1964 with provisions that damage both Wilderness and the values of what Pulitzer-Prize-winning Western author Wallace Stegner termed the “Wilderness Idea” in his seminal 1960 “Wilderness Letter.”*
In conclusion: The Tester bill is a bad deal for future generations of Montanans, who will need Wild country more than ever, in an increasingly crowded and uncertain future.
Again, we respectfully urge Sen. Tester to withdraw this bill.
Sincerely for Wild Montana,
Loren Kreck (Co-Founder of the Montana Wilderness Association, MWA Council, and past MWA Vice-President) (Please see Editor’s Note concerning Kreck below) – Columbia Falls, MT
Lou Bruno (MWA Council and past MWA President) – East Glacier, MT
Joan Montagne (MWA Council and past MWA President) – Bozeman, MT
Elaine Snyder (MWA Council and past MWA President) – Kalispell, MT
Dan Heinz (MWA Council and past MWA Vice-President) – Reno, NV
Paul Edwards (MWA Council and past Chairman, MWA Wilderness Committee) – Helena, MT
Paul Richards (MWA Council and Recipient of MWA’s Brass Lantern Award, “For leadership in defending unprotected public wildlands contained within the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest”) – Boulder Valley, MT
Larry Campbell (MWA Council) – Darby, MT
Susan Colvin (MWA Council) – Great Falls, MT
Randall Gloege (MWA Council) – Billings, MT
Keith Hammer (MWA Council) – Kalispell, MT
Steve Kelly (MWA Council) – Bozeman, MT
Lance Olsen (MWA Council) – Missoula, MT
Bob Oset (MWA Council) – Hamilton, MT
Ross Titus (MWA Council) – Big Fork, MT
George Wuerthner (MWA Council) – Helena/Livingston, MT
Janet Zimmerman (MWA Council) – Pony, MT
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EDITOR’S NOTE: Co-writing and signing the above statement was the final of countless acts taken by Dr. Loren Kreck to protect our nation’s priceless public wildlands legacy.
Dr. Kreck, a co-founder of the Montana Wilderness Association in the 1950s, and, for the last six decades, one of Montana’s premier conservationists, died peacefully in his Columbia Falls, MT, home earlier this year. Homage to Dr. Kreck will soon be posted upon this “Dispatches from the Wildlands” Web site.
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* Stegner submitted his seminal “Wilderness Letter” to the University of California at Berkeley’s Wildland Research Center, after what he termed considerable “prodding” from passionate outdoorsman David Brower.
“I want to speak for the Wilderness Idea as something that has helped form our character and that has certainly shaped our history as a people. Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed; if we permit the last virgin forests to be turned into comic books and plastic cigarette cases; if we drive the few remaining members of the wild species into zoos or to extinction; if we pollute the last clear air and dirty the last clean streams and push our paved roads through the last of the silence, so that never again will Americans be free in their own country from the noise, the exhausts, the stinks of human and automotive waste. And so that never again can we have the chance to see ourselves single, separate, vertical and individual in the world, part of the environment of trees and rocks and soil, brother to the other animals, part of the natural world and competent to belong in it.
“Without any remaining wilderness, we are committed wholly, without chance for even momentary reflection and rest, to a headlong drive into our technological termite-life, the Brave New World of a completely man-controlled environment. We need wilderness preserved–as much of it as is still left, and as many kinds–because it was the challenge against which our character as a people was formed. The reminder and the reassurance that it is still there is good for our spiritual health, even if we never once in ten years set foot in it. It is good for us when we are young, because of the incomparable sanity it can bring briefly, as vacation and rest, into our insane lives. It is important to us when we are old simply because it is there–important, that is, simply as an idea.”
DEDICATION:
IN LOVING MEMORY OF MONTANA’S “LIVING LEGEND”
Dr. Loren Kreck, Co-Founder of the
Montana Wilderness Association (MWA)
Dr. Loren Kreck, Co-Founder, Montana Wilderness Association
Dispatches from the Wildlands™
Paul Thomas Richards Tester’s Logging Bill Ignores
Forest Service Experts
By: Bill Worf, Deputy Regional Forester (Retired)
U.S. Forest Service
I am a Montana native who graduated with a degree in Forestry from the University of Montana in 1950, when I started a career in the U.S. Forest Service.
When the Wilderness Act passed in 1964, I was serving as supervisor of the Bridger National Forest in Wyoming.
Forest Service Chief Ed Cliff and U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Orville Freeman immediately tapped me to serve in the national office to oversee implementation of the Wilderness Act.
I moved from Wyoming to Washington, D.C., to administer the National Wilderness Preservation System established by the Act. I served in that position until 1969, when I was appointed Deputy Regional Forester for Wilderness, Recreation and Lands in Missoula.
Although I retired in 1983, I have remained involved in National Forest issues. In this capacity, I have strong feelings about the Logging Bill (S. 1470) introduced by Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT).
I share the senator’s concern about growing fire and insect problems in our National Forests.
The senator’s heart may be in the right place, but his proposed solution would result in severe long-term damage to the Forest Service as an institution.
The Forest Service is one of the most respected agencies in government. It contains the finest collection of natural resource professionals in the world. I spent my professional career as a proud member.
With his Logging Bill, Tester is saying he knows more about how forests ought to be managed than professionals who work for the Forest Service. Tester is telling us what to do and how to do it, even though what Tester wants may violate other federal laws.
If Tester gets away with dictating forest management in Montana, every senator and every representative in Congress will try to do the same. Instead of being managed by one professional agency that considers all the views of public stakeholders from throughout the country, our National Forests would be managed by local interests primarily geared toward resource extraction.
By effectively dissolving the Forest Service, Tester’s Logging Bill would create 535 fiefdoms, all with different management mandates dictated by different members of Congress. This would take away Americans’ rights concerning our public lands.
What Tester may not know is that the National Forest System was established in 1897 by Congress. Congress also established the Forest Service to administer these National Forests for the benefit of all Americans of present and future generations.
Subsequent laws provided additional guidance, including the Multiple Use Sustained Yield Act of 1960, the National Forest and Range Land Renewable Resources Planning Act of 1974, and the National Forest Management Act of 1976.
Congress passed these laws to ensure our National Forests are administered in a planned and sustainable way — in perpetuity.
Because Tester is a Hi-Line farmer, I figured he may not know much about Forest Service history.
So, I attended an open house on Oct. 26, 2009, concerning his logging bill. I shared with the senator that heavy corporate and political pressure had caused the violation of the 1960 Act mandating “sustained yield.” This unwise overcutting of our National Forests resulted in the closure of mills in Montana and elsewhere.
I followed up my Oct. 26, 2009, direct conversation with Sen. Tester by sending him a detailed letter on Nov. 12, 2009.* I included a 20-page comprehensive analysis of Forest Service reports which clearly shows the failure to maintain a “sustained yield” throughout the entire National Forest System.*
I strongly disagree with Tester that the answer to overcutting in the past is to overcut in the future!
Congressionally mandating logging quotas and legislatively dictating management would convert our National Forests into “private local forests.”
This is directly contrary to 113 years of precedence. When Congress passed the Organic Act in 1897, lawmakers were assured that National Forests would remain open to the public and not restricted to private companies or privileged groups.
The Tester bill effectively says that a handful of local extractive interests have greater knowledge than the professionals of our Forest Service.
This dangerous precedent would be viewed with glee by special interest groups of all kinds!
For that reason, I must oppose the Tester bill.
USFS Deputy Regional Forester (Retired) Bill Worf
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Editor’s Notes:
1. Retired Deputy Regional Forester Bill Worf of Missoula, Montana, worked for the U.S. Forest Service for 33 years.
2. * Despite his Oct. 26, 2009, personal promise to the retired Deputy Regional Forester, made in the presence of many witnesses, Sen. Tester never honored his commitment to respond to and address Bill Worf’s concerns. As of September 2010, Worf has not received any reply of any type from Tester or Tester’s staff regarding information verbally presented to Tester on Oct. 26, 2009, followed up by a November 12, 2009, personal letter to Tester, accompanied by 20 pages of detailed analyses, documenting Forest Service overcutting of timber and the agency’s past failures to provide for “sustained yields.” (Although blind, Worf devoted weeks of effort to researching, preparing, and typing this 20-page report for Tester).
3. “Hi-Line” is a colloquialism referring to northern Montana.
4. Bill Worf was born in 1926 on an eastern Montana homestead. A Marine during World War II, Worf is one of the few remaining survivors of the fierce battle for Iwo Jima, immortalized forever by Joe Rosenthal’s iconic photograph of the raising of the U.S. flag on top of Mount Suribachi by five Marines and one Navy Corpsman. Worf witnessed the original flag raising on the morning of Feb. 23, 1945. Rosenthal’s Pulitzer-Prize-winning photograph was a reenactment. Sculptors later used Rosenthal’s photo as the model for the cast bronze United States Marine Corps War Memorial, commonly referred to as “The Iwo Jima Memorial,” at Arlington National Cemetery.
5. In 1989, Bill Worf co-founded Wilderness Watch – A citizens’ nonprofit organization dedicated to providing oversight to those federal agencies involved in administration of the National Wilderness Preservation System. Worf continues working as an active member of the Governing Board for Wilderness Watch. The following is from: http://www.wildernesswatch.org/ :
WILDERNESS WATCH is America’s leading conservation organization dedicated solely to protecting the lands and waters in the 110 million-acre National Wilderness Preservation System. We strive for proper stewardship of these remarkable Wilderness reserves through citizen oversight, education, and continual monitoring of federal management activities. Please join us in ensuring that America’s Wilderness remains full of mystery, adventure, and biological wealth. Learn more >>
6. Bill Worf can be contacted at: wworf@bresnan.net or at: 406-251-6210.
7. This piece was edited by Paul Richards, owner of PR Media Consultants®, a leading public interest consulting firm since 1968, and an AlterNet blogger. Richards’ “Dispatches from the Wildlands,” which focuses on resource issues and Western politics is located at: http://blogs.alternet.org/paulrichards/ . Richards can be contacted at: Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com .
8. Sen. Tester, the timber industry, and Washington DC-based Big Green, or “Gang Green,” “conservation” collaborators have used many terms for Tester’s logging bill. The Tester bill’s official number is “S. 1470.” Tester, the timber industry, and “Gang Green” collaborators have interchangeably used: “Tester Forest Jobs and Recreation Act,’’ “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act,” “Tester Forest Jobs Bill,” “Forest Jobs Bill,” “Forest Jobs and Stewardship Bill,” and the “Tester Forest Jobs and Stewardship Bill.”
9. Editors and reporters, who should know better, mistakenly call S. 1470 the “Tester Wilderness Bill.” This is a grave misnomer. Tester himself is very clear that his legislation is NOT a wilderness bill! “Because there are many components to the legislation, calling it a ‘wilderness bill’ is a mischaracterization,” writes Tester. “It is a ‘forest jobs and stewardship’ bill.”
10. Editors and reporters have also called S. 1470 the “Tester Forest Management Bill” and the “Tester Public Lands Legislation.”
11. Grassroots conservationists generally lean toward more truthful monikers, such as “Tester Logging Bill,” “Tester Logging-Without-Laws Bill,” and “Tester Wildlands Logging Bill.”
12. “Tester Logging Bill” is now the term most utilized by the general public, with the more accurate “Tester Wildlands Logging Bill” preferred by many grassroots wildlands supporters.
Dispatches from the Wildlands™
©2010, Bill Worf and Paul Richards
Paul Thomas Richards 
Big Nose Karma
Tools for Maintaining a Rural Zen Practice
By Paul Richards
Boulder Valley, Montana
Introduction:
Montana and the Northern Rockies Ecosystem are lands of many spaces. That’s good!
My home is 167 miles away from my “Sangha,” or organized spiritual community. How to maintain a rural Zen practice, in the absence of frequent in-person visits to a Sangha gathering?
It’s easy! I’ve got a dog, Karma (see picture), who takes me for walks. A mile down the road is a river I can listen to. I watch the clouds and the sunsets. I love wildlife viewing. And, gradually, I am learning how to occasionally do nothing.
There is much support available to rural people like me. It really helps to have an Internet connection, although it is not essential. Here are some of my favorite sources, with contact information for those with or without ready access to the Internet and the World-Wide Web.
Is Zen Complicated?
No.
In both East and West, intellectuals try their utmost to make Zen unnecessarily complicated, inaccessible, and even masochistic.
In stark contrast, this article highlights media that provide easy to understand, loving, and fun approaches to Zen and Buddhism .
This article also focuses on Vietnamese Zen master Thích Nhất Hanh , also called “Thây” (pronounced “Tie”) – an affectionate Vietnamese term meaning “teacher.”
By teaching directly from the heart, Thích Nhất Hanh avoids the cerebral traps common to many Buddhist experts, scholars, interpreters, teachers, and practitioners. Thây’s writings and spoken words are refreshingly simple, forthright, and honest.
Even though it is his third language after Vietnamese and French, (Thây is also fluent in Chinese, Sanskrit, Pāli, and Japanese), Thích Nhất Hạnh has mastered writing and speaking in English. His words, written and spoken, are wonderfully comprehensible for readers, viewers, and listeners of all ages, educations, cultures, and persuasions.
Tricycle:
Every day, I look forward to the “Daily Dharma,” concise and cogent quotes about Zen and Buddhism from the fine folks at Tricycle Magazine. Here is one of my favorites:
Watermelons and Zen Students
grow pretty much the same way.
Long periods of sitting
till they ripen and grow
all juicy inside, but
when you knock them on the head—
to see if they’re ready—
sounds like nothing’s going on.
Essential Zen (Harper Collins)
You can sign up for your free “Daily Dharma” at: http://visitor.constantcontact.com/manage/optin/ea?v=001uxu9h741ik0LIOgRSyiOAQ%3D%3D . Each “Daily Dharma” contains a hyperlink, if you want to learn more about the author or book quoted.
Tricycle Magazine bills itself as “the independent voice of Buddhism.” The home page of its Web site, located at: http://www.tricycle.com/ , is full of incredibly compelling and educational articles, audios, videos, and on-line discussions.
You can join the Tricycle on-line community for free at: http://community.tricycle.com/ .
A subscription to this excellent magazine is $24 a year at: https://subscribe.pcspublink.com/magazine/Trym/subscribeFormPD3.asp?track=JC49&pub=TRYM&term=4 .
For $30 a year, you can become a “Sustaining Member” and receive the print edition of Tricycle, Tricycle’s digital edition, unlimited access to the Tricycle archives (two decades of Buddhist wisdom), and free access to paid on-line programs and teachings. Just go to: https://subscribe.pcspublink.com/magazine/Trym/subscribeFormD.asp?track=JCOM30&pub=TRYM&term=4 .
Those who lack ready Internet access, can contact Tricycle: The Buddhist Review at 92 Vandam Street, New York, NY, 10013. For subscriptions, call: 800-873-9871. For other inquiries, call: 212-645-1143.
Why “Tricycle?” Buddhism itself is often referred to as the “vehicle to enlightenment,” and the tricycle’s three wheels allude to the three treasures: 1. The Buddha, 2.The Dharma, and 3. The Sangha; or: 1. The enlightened teacher, 2. The teachings, and 3. The community. The wheels also relate to the turning of the wheel of Dharma, or skillfully using the teachings of the Buddha to face the challenges that the circle of life presents.
Shambhala Sun:
Another amazing resource is the Shambhala Sun, whose home page is located at: http://www.shambhalasun.com/ . It, too, is very rich with incredible articles, audios, videos, and on-line discussions.
You can sign up for the Shambhala Sun newsletter for free at: http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=25&Ite&Itemid=341 .
Subscribing to this exceptional publication costs $19.95 for one year or $34.00 for two years at: https://subscribe.pcspublink.com/magazine/Ssun/subscribeForm.asp?track=JECOMM&pub=SSUN&term=6 .
If want to save money and/or trees, you can browse much of the most current issue on-line at: http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=34&Itemid=114 .
Ample free on-line archives are available at: http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2837&Itemid=260 .
Dozens of audio clips featuring teachers and practitioners from around the world are available at: http://www.shambhalasun.com/sunspace/?tag=audio . These clips are usually from five to ten minutes long.
For the latest in Buddhist videos, go to: http://www.shambhalasun.com/sunspace/?p=11402 . If you have a sense of humor about your practice, check out Arj Barker’s Buddhist rap video, about what it means to be the “sickest” Buddhist, kicking Buddha-Butt.
A special “Spotlight Section” on Thích Nhất Hạnh is located at: http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=29&Itemid=226 .
And, for the latest Buddhist news, go to: http://www.shambhalasun.com/news/ .
Those without ready Internet access can subscribe by calling the Shambhala Sun, toll-free, at: 877-786-1950. For general inquires, call: 902-422-8404. The Editorial and Business Offices of the Shambhala Sun are located at: 1660 Hollis Street, Suite 701, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 1V7. The U.S. subscriptions mailing address is: P.O. Box 469095 Escondido, CA 92046-9095 USA.
The Mindfulness Bell:
Another outstanding magazine is The Mindfulness Bell, located at: http://www.mindfulnessbell.org/ . The Mindfulness Bell is an inspiring resource for those practicing mindfulness in daily life. Each issue features Vietnamese teacher Thích Nhất Hanh, whose teachings about “engaged Buddhism” and Zen are particularly accessible.
The Mindfulness Bell Web site has easy access to Thích Nhất Hạnh’s Five Mindfulness Trainings at: http://www.mindfulnessbell.org/5mt.htm and his Fourteen “InterBeing” Mindfulness Trainings, located at: http://www.mindfulnessbell.org/14trainings.htm .
Subscriptions to The Mindfulness Bell can be ordered on-line at: http://www.smartcart.com/ubcgateway/cgi/search.cgi?terms=Mindfulness_Bell::&category=Mindfulness_Bell . It costs $24 for one year, $45 for two years, $63 for three years, or $18 for a one-year low income subscription.
If you lack ready Internet access, you can subscribe by contacting: The Mindfulness Bell, c/o David Percival, 745 Cagua SE, Albuquerque NM 87108-3717, or by calling: 505-266-9042.
Thích Nhất Hạnh:
Thích Nhất Hạnh – Poet, writer, “Dharma” teacher, “Sangha” builder, speaker, peace advocate, and human rights activist – is one of the best known and most respected Zen masters in the world today.
Nhất Hạnh was born Nguyễn Xuân Bảo in Thừa Thiên (Central Vietnam) in 1926. At the age of 16, he entered the monastery at Từ Hiếu Temple near Huế, where his primary teacher was Master Thanh Quý Chân Thật.
The Vietnam War confronted Buddhists with questions of whether to adhere to contemplative lives and remain meditating in the monasteries, or to offer help to farmers and villagers suffering from the targeted destruction of their agricultural and community infrastructures, invasions and massacres, strafings and bombings, aerial spraying of Agent Orange and other toxins, conscriptions, rapes, religious oppressions, forced relocations to “strategic hamlets,” diseases, and malnutrition and starvation.
By emerging from the cloistered confines of monasteries and committing themselves to social activism in defense of the Vietnamese people, Nhất Hạnh and a handful of others founded the “engaged Buddhism” movement.
Nhất Hạnh and his “Sangha,” or spiritual community, responded to and addressed the suffering they saw around them, seeing this work as part of their meditation and mindfulness practices, not apart from it.
Since then, the term “engaged Buddhism” continues to apply to Buddhists who seek to apply insights from meditation practice and Dharma teachings to situations of social, political, and economic injustice.
Because he helped all those in need regardless of ideologies, Nhất Hạnh was condemned by the United States, its South Vietnamese puppet government, indigenous Viet Cong guerillas in South Vietnam, and the Communist governments of North Vietnam, Soviet Union, and China.
After visiting the United States and Europe on peace missions, he was banned from returning to Vietnam in 1966. Nhất Hạnh changed the course of history when he helped the noted African-American civil rights leader and practitioner of non-violent civil disobedience, Dr. Martin Luther King, understand the immorality of the Vietnam War.
As a result, Dr. King’s courageous public opposition to the Vietnam War was one of the most important factors reversing domestic pro-War sentiment and turning American public opinion towards the peace movement.
In a January 25, 1967, letter to the Nobel Institute in Norway, Dr. King nominated Nhất Hạnh for the Nobel Peace Prize. “I do not personally know of anyone more worthy of this prize than this gentle monk from Vietnam,” King wrote. “His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a monument to ecumenism, to world brotherhood, to humanity.”
Thích Nhất Hạnh is pronounced “Tick N’yat Hawn.” His name is sometimes misspelled as Thich Nhat Hahn, Thich Nhat Han, and Thich Nat Han.
For more information about Thích Nhất Hạnh, go to: http://www.parallax.org/about_tnh.html or: http://buddhistlinks.org/ThichWorks.htm ; or: http://www.plumvillage.org/thay.html .
Engaged Buddhism has grown worldwide, with prominent figures including: Robert Aitken Roshi, Joanna Macy, Gary Snyder, Alan Senauke, Sulak Sivaraksa, Maha Ghosananda, Sylvia Wetzel, Anthony Stultz, Diana Winston, Fleet Maull, Joan Halifax, Tara Brach, Natalie Goldberg, Stephanie Kaza, Sister Chan Khong, Noah Levine, Albert Low, Caitriona Reed, and Leila Seth.
Parallax Press:
Thích Nhất Hạnh has written more than 100 books, with about 40 currently available in English. Parallax Press is the outfit that publishes most of his books. Parallax Press has a dynamite Web site, located at: http://www.parallax.org/ .
All of Thích Nhất Hạnh’s books are delightful and well worth reading. Although you will find certain themes repeated, “Thầy” is never boring or dogmatic.
You can view Thích Nhất Hạnh’s many books at: http://www.parallax.org/cgi-bin/shopper.cgi?search=action&category=BOOK&keywords=hanh .
For audio resources, go to: http://www.parallax.org/audio.html .
For videos, go to: http://www.parallax.org/video.html .
For contact information for Parallax Press, go to: http://www.parallax.org/contact_staff.html . For additional inquiries, you can e-mail Parallax at: info@parallax.org .
You can subscribe to Parallax Press’s free monthly newsletter at: http://www.parallax.org/about_news.html .
For a free Parallax Press catalog, go to: http://www.parallax.org/catalog.html .
Those lacking ready Internet access can order the Parallax Press catalog or books by calling, toll-free: 800-863-5290, or by writing: Parallax Press, P.O. Box 7355, Berkeley, CA 94707. For inquiries, call: 510-525-0101.
Amazon:
For more about Thích Nhất Hạnh books, kindles, audio books, calendars, CDs, and DVDs, and MP3s, go to: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias=aps&field-keywords=Thich+Nhat+Hanh&x=20&y=17/buddhistlinks-20 . Those lacking Internet access, can utilize Amazon’s toll-free customer service by calling: 866-216-1072. Amazon will call you right back.
Powell’s:
If you prefer independent book stores, Powell’s in Portland, Oregon is hard to beat! Their Thích Nhất Hạnh materials are located at: http://www.powells.com/s?header=Search+Form&kw=Thich+Nhat+Hanh . Those without Internet access can call Powell’s, toll-free, at: 800-878-7323.
Other Special Sites (North America, Alphabetical):
Blue Cliff Monastery
The home page of the Blue Cliff Monastery in Pine Bush, New York, is: http://www.bluecliffmonastery.org/ .
Buddhist Peace Fellowship
The Buddhist Peace Fellowship is located at: http://www.bpf.org/ . This Web site contains an Action Center, links to Turning Wheel Magazine, and a sign up form for free Buddhist Peace Fellowship newsletters.
To view Thích Nhất Hạnh’s “What Is Engaged Buddhism?” go to: http://www.bpf.org/socially-engaged/what-is-socially-engaged-buddhism .
Deer Park Monastery
The home page of Deer Park Monastery in Escondido, California, is: http://dpweb.org/ .
Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey talks with Thích Nhất Hạnh at: http://www.oprah.com/spirit/Oprah-Talks-to-Thich-Nhat-Hanh/2 .
Other Special Sites (International, Alphabetical):
European Institute of Applied Buddhism
The home page of the European Institute of Applied Buddhism in Waldbröl, Germany is located at: http://eiab-maincampus.org/EIAB_Germany/Home.html . You can sign up for e-mailings from the European Institute of Applied Buddhism and the Unified Buddhist Church on this Web page.
International Network of Engaged Buddhists
The International Network of Engaged Buddhists includes individuals and organizations from more than 20 countries. Out of this diversity, an understanding of engaged Buddhism has emerged which integrates the practice of Buddhism with social action for a healthy, just, and peaceful world.
This network trusts compassion, non-violence, and co-existence as revealed by the Buddha. Patrons include the Venerable Thích Nhất Hạnh of Plum Village, France, and Tenzin Gyatso, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, temporarily living in exile from Chinese-occupied Tibet in Dharamsala, a city in the state of Himachal Pradesh in northern India.
Contact the International Network of Engaged Buddhists at: http://www.inebnetwork.org/web/ .
Kids’ Web Sites in Four Languages
Children and parents are encouraged to visit: http://mindfulkids.wordpress.com/ .
Plum Village, France
The home page of Thích Nhất Hạnh’s Sangha in France is located at: http://www.plumvillage.org/ .
Vietnamese Religious Freedom
To support religious freedom in Vietnam, you can sign the petition located at: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/6/religious-freedom-in-viet-nam .
Young People’s Network
Wake Up, located at: http://www.wkup.org/ , is a world-wide networking Web site for young Buddhists and non-Buddhists practicing the living art of mindfulness. There are plenty of links to writings, audio, and video.
Even More Information!
The above is just a start.
To explore other Zen and Buddhist teachers and philosophies, go to: http://buddhistlinks.org/ .
This Web site has more than 7,000 links!
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Editor’s Notes:
1. This article utilizes colored underlined “hyperlinks” known as “Uniform Resource Locators” or “URLs.” A URL is also known as a “domain name” or an “Internet address.” To fully activate and utilize these URLs, just go to the hyperlink and push down on your “Ctrl” or “Control” button on our keyboard and left click your mouse.
2. This article is written by Paul Richards, a professional editor, researcher, writer, and the owner of PR Media Consultants®; Public Interest Media Since 1968; 30 Brown’s Gulch Road; Boulder, MT 59632; www.PRMediaConsultants.com and www.Richards2006.us . A former newsman with The Associated Press, Mr. Richards is a specialist in resource issues and politics of the western United States.
3. For reprint permission, to commission other projects relating to this subject matter, or for additional researching, writing, or editing assignments, please e-mail Mr. Richards at: Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com .
Karma in the Sunset
Dispatches from the Wildlands™ ©2010, Paul Richards
Paul Thomas Richards Keeping It Wild!
In Defense of America’s Public Wildlands
United by our common understanding that Montana’s wild country is its greatest treasure;
And, that once degraded or impaired, this wild country can never be restored or replaced;
And, cognizant of Thoreau’s belief that “In wildness is the preservation of the world;”
And, schooled by Aldo Leopold who long ago warned that wilderness can only shrink and not grow;
And, keenly aware of the definition of wilderness in the Wilderness Act of 1964 as being “untrammeled by man,” where “man himself is a visitor who does not remain;”
And, fully recognizing that the Northern Rockies ecosystem is the only functioning ecosystem in the lower 49 states where all native species still reside;
And, being of one mind in our desire and determination to protect and preserve what remains of our public wildlands to the greatest extent possible;
We hereby state our intention to work together to achieve the most inclusive and comprehensive protection under the law for all remaining publicly-owned de facto wilderness in Montana.
In full affirmation of the above and, after having been unsuccessful in our earnest efforts to improve Sen. Tester’s so-called “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act,” or “S. 1470,” we must now unanimously oppose this bill.
The bases for our opposition are exhaustively catalogued in separate analyses and papers, but we submit this foundational document to concisely articulate our chief objections. They are as follows:
1. The Tester bill specifically eliminates from mandated protection large portions of the late Senator Lee Metcalf’s wildlands legacy, Congressionally designated as Wilderness Study Areas in 1977 by his farsighted bill, S. 393. By eliminating this protection, the Tester bill opens these priceless public wildlands for road building, logging, and other development.
2. The Tester bill undermines the overwhelmingly popular Clinton Roadless Rule and Obama Roadless Initiative. Over one million acres of federally-inventoried roadless wildlands protected under the Roadless Rule and the Roadless Initiative would be classified as “Timber Suitable or Open to Harvest.” (See map).
3. The Tester Bill surrenders decisions about our National Forests to a handful of local bureaucrats and extraction-oriented corporations, thereby promoting fragmentation of America’s national public lands legacy into locally controlled fiefdoms.
4. The Tester bill undermines the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by imposing unrealistic and arbitrary requirements that preclude the Forest Service from accurately assessing environmental impacts of road building, logging, habitat loss, water degradation, weed infestation, and other costs of developing public wildlands.
5. The Tester bill mandates unsustainable logging quotas regardless of environmental costs, thereby jeopardizing safeguards provided public lands by the Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act, National Forest Management Act, Wilderness Act, and Federal Land Policy and Management Act.
6. In its effort to isolate decisions to log wildlands from national attention, the Tester bill disenfranchises public lands stakeholders, by overriding legitimate science-based forest planning that involves full public information and participation. It deprives the public of our rights to be included in irreversible decisions concerning our own land.
7. The Tester bill mandates cutting at least 100,000 acres over 10 years. It dictates at least 7,000 acres be logged per year for 10 years in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest. In recent years, the Forest Service has set its sustainable cut level for the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest at 500 acres per year. In past years, when the Forest Service was dedicated to “getting the cut out,” an average of 3,213 acres per year was logged, from 1954 to 1996, in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest. On the Three Rivers Ranger District of the Kootenai National Forest, Tester’s bill mandates logging of 3,000 acres per year for 10 years in fragile Yaak grizzly bear habitat, already severely damaged by decades of overcutting. While logging at least 100,000 acres would be compulsory, the Tester bill contains no accompanying mandates for restoration, leaving all post-logging reclamation and forest restoration optional.
8. The Tester bill fails to address at least $100 million in costs to U.S. taxpayers that would be incurred by the Forest Service for subsidizing “below-cost” timber sales and power plants for the few specially-privileged timber corporations involved. The bill interferes with free enterprise, by mandating that five favored private mills be subsidized with perpetual supplies of National Forest trees, at huge economic costs to taxpayers. The bill ignores the financial realities that the United States currently face: Economic crises and a lumber “depression,” with new home construction down 70 percent and demands for lumber down 55 percent.
9. By forcing unsustainable industrial-scale logging upon our public lands, the Tester bill would irrevocably harm essential habitats of species that characterize the wild nature of the northern Rockies, such as the gray wolf, bull trout, cutthroat trout (Montana’s official state fish), otter, mountain goat, mountain sheep, elk, arctic grayling, northern goshawk, boreal owl, pileated woodpecker, ferruginous hawk, Montana vole, sage thrasher, wild bison, peregrine falcon, bald eagle, pine marten, fisher, lynx, wolverine, and grizzly bear (Montana’s official state animal).
10. The “wilderness” areas in the Tester bill are fragmented and unconnected islands of largely “rocks and ice,” with limited biological integrity and no potential for sustaining biodiversity. The minimal “wilderness” designated in the bill fails to protect different elevation habitats and their dependent species with core areas, buffer zones, and connecting biological corridors. The bill promotes numerous abuses that are clearly in violation of the 1964 Wilderness Act, including motorized access into and through “wilderness,” military aircraft landings in “wilderness,” possible “wilderness” logging, and other intrusions that violate the principles of Wilderness.
Due to these severe deficiencies, we intend to see that the Tester bill is not endorsed by Congress. Instead, we will constructively stand for a scientifically-sound, ecologically-based Wilderness Bill that preserves the greatest amount of our priceless and rapidly-vanishing public roadless wildlands in Montana.
We, the following members of the Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign, are conservation organizations and citizens dedicated to wildlands protection, Wilderness preservation, and the sound long-term management of our federal public lands legacy.
Our coalition includes small-business owners, scientists, educators and teachers, health care practitioners, hikers and backpackers, hunters and anglers, wildlife viewers, outfitters and guides, veterans, retired Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management officials, ranchers and farmers, craftspersons, and community leaders – all stakeholders committed to America’s public wildlands legacy.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Editor’s Notes:
1. This “Keeping It Wild! In Defense of America’s Public Wildlands” Declaration, detailed analyses, and extensive commentary on the Tester bill are located at: http://testerloggingbilltruths.wordpress.com/ .
2. This Declaration has been endorsed by more than 55 grassroots conservation groups that comprise the Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign. For the latest listing of groups, further information, or to sign up your group, go to: http://testerloggingbilltruths.wordpress.com/ .
3. Individuals can sign this “Keeping It Wild! In Defense of America’s Public Wildlands” Declaration by going to: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/keeping-it-wild-in-defense-of-america39s-public-wildlands .
4. Tester, the timber industry, and “conservation” collaborationists have used so many terms for this bill, the public has no idea how to refer it. Due to this plethora of names, the bill’s purposefully obfuscatory text, and its many loopholes; confusion is rampant. The Tester bill is suffering accordingly.
The Tester bill’s official number is “S. 1470.” Tester, the timber industry, and Big Green (or Gang Green) “conservation” collaborationists have interchangeably used: “Tester Forest Jobs and Recreation Act,’’ “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act,” “Tester Forest Jobs Bill,” “Forest Jobs Bill,” “Forest Jobs and Stewardship Bill,” and the “Tester Forest Jobs and Stewardship Bill.”
Editors and reporters, who should know better, mistakenly call it the “Tester Wilderness Bill.” This is a grave misnomer! Tester himself is very clear that his legislation is NOT a wilderness bill!
“Because there are many components to the legislation, calling it a ‘wilderness bill’ is a mischaracterization,” writes Tester. “It is a ‘forest jobs and stewardship’ bill.” Editors and reporters have also called S. 1470 the “Tester Forest Management Bill” and the “Tester Public Lands Legislation.”
Grassroots conservationists have leaned towards more truthful monikers, such as “Tester Logging Bill,” “Tester Logging-Without-Laws Bill,” and “Tester Wildlands Logging Bill.”
“Tester Logging Bill” is now the term most utilized by the general public, with the more accurate “Tester Wildlands Logging Bill” preferred by grassroots wildlands supporters.
5. After securing input from Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign groups, Paul Edwards, a Montana rancher who, years ago, wrote episodes of the television series “Gunsmoke,” penned the first 516-word draft of this Declaration.
6. With continued participation from Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign, Paul Thomas Richards, a professional writer and editor from southwestern Montana’s Boulder Valley, wrote two dozen subsequent drafts, including this final 1034-word “Keeping It Wild! In Defense of America’s Public Wildlands” Declaration.
Dispatches from the Wildlands™
©2010 Paul Thomas Richards
Paul Thomas Richards Restoring Indigenous Wildlife Species to All National Forests
National Forest Management Act
New National Forest System Planning Rule
Editor’s Notes:
The Forest Service was established in 1905 and is an agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The Forest Service manages 193 million acres of public lands in National Forests and National Grasslands throughout the country.
On December 17, 2009, the Obama Administration announced that it was taking the first step toward adopting new regulations to govern National Forest System planning and management. The four-page scoping notice was published the next day in the Federal Register (74 Fed. Reg. 67165-67169, Dec. 18, 2009) and is available on-line at: http://fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5110264.pdf . The new agency planning rule will guide public land managers as they develop, amend, and revise land management plans for all 155 National Forests and 20 National Grasslands in the National Forest System.
The 60-day public comment period on the scoping notice ended on February 16, 2010. The U.S. Forest Service expects to publish the “Draft Environmental Impact Statement” for the new planning rule in December 2010, the “Final Environmental Impact Statement” in October 2011, and its “Record of Decision” in November 2011. For further information, contact: Larry Hayden at: 202–205–0895 or: lhayden@fs.fed.us .
Below are testimonies concerning restoring indigenous wildlife species to all National Forests submitted to Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell, Region # 1 Forester Leslie Weldon, and Gallatin National Forest Supervisor Mary C. Erickson by Paul Richards and endorsed by former Deputy Regional Forester Bill Worf.
Brief Biographies:
Bill Worf. Former Deputy Regional Forester for the U.S. Forest Service, Bill Worf of Missoula, Montana, worked for agency for 33 years. Worf was born in 1926 on an eastern Montana homestead. As a Marine during World War II, Worf fought in the fierce battle for Iwo Jima, immortalized forever by Joe Rosenthal’s iconic photograph of the raising of the U.S. flag on top of Mount Suribachi by five Marines and one Navy Corpsman. He is one of only a handful of Iwo Jima survivors still living.
Tom Tidwell. Currently Chief of the U.S. Forest Service, Tom Tidwell grew up in Boise, Idaho. He has 32 years’ experience with the Forest Service, working as District Ranger, Forest Supervisor, Legislative Affairs Specialist, and Deputy Regional Forester for the Pacific Southwest Region. Tidwell then served as Regional Forester for the Northern Region, with responsibilities for all National Forests and National Grasslands in northern Idaho, Montana, North Dakota and portions of South Dakota. His official biography, located at: http://www.fs.fed.us/aboutus/chief/ , says Tidwell supports providing “protection for the values of unroaded landscapes.”
Paul Richards. Boulder, Montana area businessman Paul Richards is a Helena native, former member of the Montana House of Representatives, and former candidate for U.S. Senate. Biographies available at: www.PRMedaConsultants.com or: www.Richards2006.us . Contact Richards at: 30 Brown’s Gulch Road, Boulder, MT 59632, or at: Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com .
—————————————————————
From: Tom Tidwell <ttidwell@fs.fed.us>
Date: February 17, 2010 6:09:15 AM MST
To: Bill Worf <wworf@bresnan.net>
Subject: Re: NFMA Planning Rules: PLEASE enact mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” throughout entire National Forest System.
Thank you Bill.
Tom
————————————————————————————
From: Bill Worf <wworf@bresnan.net>
Sent: 02/16/2010 05:40 PM
To: TOM TIDWELL <ttidwell@fs.fed.us>
cc: fspr@contentanalysisgroup.com
Subject: NFMA Planning Rules: PLEASE enact mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” throughout entire National Forest System.
Dear Chief Tidwell;
Pasted below are comments for consideration of the NFMA Planning Rules prepared by Mr. Paul Richards. I have studied them in detail and endorse them completely.
Chief, I spent 30 plus years as an active member of the Forest Service. I believe it is crucial that, if we are to meet the intent of Congress when it passed the Organic Act establishing the National Forests, followed by the Multiple Use/Sustained Yield Act, we must base our management in the principle of maintaining the indigenous wildlife species.
Please consider the views expressed by Mr. Richards as also those expressed by Bill Worf.
William A. Worf
Still Forest Service.
—————————————————————————————————–
From: Paul Richards [mailto:Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com]
Sent: Friday, February 12, 2010 9:37 PM
To: (ttidwell@fs.fed.us); (fspr@contentanalysisgroup.com); (R1@fs.fed.us) (lweldon@fs.fed.us)
Cc: (Gallatin@fs.fed.us); (mcerickson@fs.fed.us)
Subject: NFMA Planning Rules: PLEASE enact mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” throughout entire National Forest System.
U.S. Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell
Forest Service National Planning Rules and Regulations
Region # 1 Forester Leslie Weldon
Dear Chief Tidwell, Forest Service National Planning Officials, and Region # 1 Forester,
I hope this note finds you all happy and well.
On December 17, 2009, the Obama Administration announced that it was taking the first step toward adopting new regulations to govern National Forest planning and management. The four-page scoping notice was published the next day in the Federal Register (74 Fed. Reg. 67165-67169, Dec. 18, 2009) and is available on the internet at: http://fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5110264.pdf .
The 60-day public comment period on the scoping notice ends on February 16, 2010. Please fully integrate this scoping comment.
Please refer to the detailed comments below concerning restoration of indigenous wildlife species on the National Forest System. These comments, wholly applicable to the new planning rule for the entire National Forest System, were first submitted on November 6, 2009, to Mary Erickson, Supervisor of the Gallatin National Forest. The current Gallatin National Forest Plan mandates that the Forest Service “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species.”
I am a strong supporter of mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” and I believe these mandates should be implemented throughout the entire National Forest System through this new planning rule initiated by 74 Fed. Reg. 67165-67169, Dec. 18, 2009.
Look what mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” would do for the Northern Rockies Ecosystem, for example — the ONLY functioning ecosystem in the lower 49 states where all native species still reside.
These indigenous species mandates would protect remaining habitat of at-risk and secluded species that characterize the wild northern Rockies, such as the bison, gray wolf, bull trout, otter, mountain goat, mountain sheep, elk, arctic grayling, northern goshawk, pika, boreal owl, pileated woodpecker, ferruginous hawk, Montana vole, sage thrasher, sage grouse, peregrine falcon, bald eagle, pine marten, fisher, lynx, wolverine, cutthroat trout (Montana’s official state fish), and grizzly bear (Montana’s official state animal).
Mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” would ensure the survival of crucial almost-extirpated forest carnivores, such as: Wolf, lynx, wolverine, fisher, grizzly bear, and pine marten – all key indicators of forest health and all dependent upon undisturbed mature-to-old growth forests.
Throughout our western National Forests, this indigenous wildlife species language will help the: Peregrine falcon, bald eagle, boreal owl, flammulated owl, black-backed woodpecker, ferruginuous hawk, northern bog lemming, Western big-eared bat, mountain plover, Preble’s shrew, Yellowstone cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus Clarki Bouvieri), and westslope cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus Clarki Lewisi)
The few remaining pure westslope cutthroat trout and bull trout populations are threatened by domestic stock pollution, excess silt and turbidity, stock overuse, lack of bank vegetation, and lack of spawning habitat. Many of these populations are limited to two kilometers or less distribution. Only a few populations are distributed over a stream length of ten kilometers.
Mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” will protect key “management indicator species,” such as:
Hairy woodpecker (overall forest management indicator species);
Goshawk and three-towed woodpecker (old growth management indicator species);
Western jumping mouse (meadows management indicator species);
Belted kingfishers and willow flycatchers (shrub riparian management indicator species);
Northern water shrew and warbling vireo (tree riparian management indicator species);
Montana vole (grasslands management indicator species); and the
Sage thrasher (shrublands management indicator species).
Mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” would ensure the survival of the Yellowstone bison. Yellowstone’s bison are genetically and behaviorally unique – the ONLY herd with continuously wild ancestry from the days when 50 million bison migrated freely across the Great Plains. After the government-sponsored holocaust of these bison and the Indigenous Peoples that depended upon them, only 23 wild bison survived, taking refuge in Yellowstone’s remote Pelican Valley.
Now, Yellowstone’s tattered remnant herd is all that remains of 50 million wild bison! This herd is America’s ONLY free-roaming, wild, genetically-pure, unfenced population. With mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species,” the Forest Service and the National Forest System could encourage this herd to naturally migrate to publicly-owned habitat adjacent to Yellowstone National Park so essential for this herd’s prosperity.
These are just a few examples of how nationwide mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” throughout our National Forest System would restore biological health to our public lands. This could be the most significant improvement in public lands management since Congress established the National Forest System in 1897.
In conclusion: PLEASE incorporate mandates to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” in all future planning, rules, and regulations for all units of the National Forest System. Please refer to my below November 06, 2009, e-mail to the Gallatin National Forest for more information and details.
Thank you for your consideration. Please keep me informed concerning all of these rules and regulations that will ensure the biological integrity of our priceless public lands legacy.
All my best,
Paul Richards
30 Browns Gulch Road
Boulder, MT 59632
Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com
——————–
From: Paul Richards [mailto:Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com]
Sent: Friday, November 06, 2009 5:12 AM
To: (mailroom_r1_gallatin@fs.fed.us); (mcerickson@fs.fed.us)
Cc: Paul Richards (Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com)
Subject: PLEASE retain current Gallatin National Forest Plan to “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species.”
November 6, 2009
Mary C. Erickson
Forest Supervisor
Gallatin National Forest
10 East Babcock
P.O. Box 130
Bozeman, MT 59771
Ph: 406-587-6701
Fax: 406-587-6758
E-mail: mcerickson@fs.fed.us
Dear Supervisor Mary Erickson,
I hope this note finds you happy and well.
PROPOSED GALLATIN NATIONAL FOREST FOREST PLAN “CLEAN UP” AMENDMENTS:
I have heard that the Gallatin National Forest is considering many new “Proposed Gallatin National Forest Plan ‘Clean Up’ Amendments.” I looked on your Web site for these proposed amendments, but could not find them. If these proposed amendments ARE somewhere on your Web site, I hope you will e-mail me with the URL of their location. Thank you.
I am concerned about one “Proposed Gallatin National Forest Plan ‘Clean Up’ Amendment” in particular. The current Gallatin National Forest Plan mandates that the Forest Service: “Provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species and for increasing populations of big game animals.”
Your proposed “Proposed Gallatin National Forest Plan ‘Clean Up’ Amendment” would drastically diminish this mandate, by removing the current Forest Plan’s language to “provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” in its entirety!!
This is hardly a “Clean Up Amendment”! By deleting the protection of “viable populations for all indigenous wildlife species,” this so-called “Proposed Gallatin National Forest Plan ‘Clean Up’ Amendment” would, if adopted, cripple the Forest Service’s management mission and severely weaken the Gallatin National Forest’s commitment to wildlife.
The proposed “Clean Up” Amendment would “replace” the current language (“provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species and for increasing populations of big game animals”) with the following weakened and immaterial language: “Habitat for big game will be managed to help meet management goals of the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks (MFWP).”
FOREST CARNIVORES:
This abandonment of a much-needed public lands management emphasis for all indigenous wildlife species does not bode well for non-big-game species. What about forest carnivores such as wolf, lynx, wolverine, fisher, grizzly bear and pine marten?
They are all key indicators of forest health. All are dependent upon undisturbed mature-to-old growth forests. Forest carnivores are threatened by the cumulative effects of development and human intrusion, effects you must now consider, under the indigenous wildlife species provisions of your Forest Plan.
Forest carnivores are secluded species that require large blocks of undisturbed land. Forest carnivores also need different types of wildlands.
Lynx, for example, need enough mature and old growth to provide cover for their kittens and dens, yet they also need enough new growth to provide food for the snowshoe hare, the lynx’s principal prey.
So little is known about wolverines, which may have territories of hundreds of miles, that scientists have not yet established accurate and reliable wolverine populations. Viable wolverine populations are found only in Idaho and Montana in the lower 49 states. Actually, some scientists no longer consider these populations “viable” – ever the more reason to manage our remaining public wildlands, including the Gallatin National Forest, for their viability.
What about pine marten? They have an extremely narrow range of habitat, requiring late successional stands of moisture-loving conifers and lots of woody debris near the ground. In the winter, pine marten spend much time beneath the snow, hunting voles and other small mammals. How does this affect forest management? Pine marten, their prey, and the prey’s vegetative food are all extremely vulnerable to artificial compaction of snow layers by snowmobiles. If we follow the current Forest Plan and manage for “viable populations” of pine marten, we’ll eliminate this deadly motorized compaction.
With the current “provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” Forest Plan mandate; recreation management in the Gallatin National Forest MUST take into account the special needs of the secluded forest carnivores mentioned above. These secluded forest carnivores can not handle the stress and harassment of very loud high-speed machinery. Some of these animals have less than 4 percent body fat. There is absolutely NO surplus with which to deal with undue torment during the winter.
WITHDRAWING PROTECTION FROM OTHER NON-BIG-GAME SPECIES:
How about other species?
If you change your Forest Plan emphasis away from indigenous species; what will happen to the: Peregrine falcon, bald eagle, boreal owl, flammulated owl, black-backed woodpecker, ferruginuous hawk, wild bison, northern bog lemming, Western big-eared bat, mountain plover, Preble’s shrew, Yellowstone cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus Clarki Bouvieri), and westslope cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus Clarki Lewisi)?
Now, apparently there is debate concerning actual distinctions between Oncorhynchus Clarki Bouvieri and Oncorhynchus Clarki Lewisi. I don’t really understand this debate, because I am not an ichthyologist.
What I do understand is that, east of the Continental Divide, where I have lived my entire life, the westslope cutthroat trout has been reduced to 7 percent of its historic range, with genetically-pure populations down to about 1 percent of historic range, according to both the U.S. Forest Service and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (1996).
Historically, there were approximately 3,600 streams that supported westslope cutthroat trout populations in the Upper Missouri River Basin. By the late 1980s, this figure had dropped to approximately 80 streams. Individual populations recently have gone extinct in five streams in the Upper Missouri River Basin.
The few remaining pure westslope cutthroat trout populations are threatened by domestic stock pollution, excess silt and turbidity, stock overuse, lack of bank vegetation, and lack of spawning habitat. Many of these populations are limited to two kilometers or less distribution. Only a few populations are distributed over a stream length of ten kilometers.
An assessment of the extinction risk for westslope cutthroat trout in the upper Missouri Basin indicates that, of the 144 remaining populations with genetic purity greater than 90 percent, 103, or 71 percent, of the 144 populations have a very high risk of extinction or very low “probability of persistence,” 27, or 18 percent, were assigned a high risk of extinction and 14, or 10 percent, were assigned a moderate risk of extinction.
Both the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) have found no populations with a low rate of extinction.
In this light, your staff’s proposal to eliminate the Forest Plan’s indigenous species management mandates flies in the face of the scientific reality of the precarious situation of the westslope cutthroat trout.
If the indigenous species Forest Plan mandate is continued and re-emphasized, Gallatin National Forest management would ensure no further stream degradation, protection of all existing westslope cutthroat trout populations, and sizeable habitat enhancement to allow for more creek segments with increased westslope cutthroat trout populations.
MANAGEMENT INDICATOR SPECIES:
If you eliminate the current Forest Plan’s management emphasis for indigenous species, what will happen to critical “management indicator species” that gauge the overall health of forest ecosystems?
If you replace the Gallatin National Forest Forest Plan’s indigenous species mandate with “Habitat for big game will be managed to help meet management goals of the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks (MFWP);” what would that spell for the future of:
Hairy woodpecker (overall forest management indicator species);
Goshawk and three-towed woodpecker (old growth management indicator species);
Western jumping mouse (meadows management indicator species);
Belted kingfishers and willow flycatchers (shrub riparian management indicator species);
Northern water shrew and warbling vireo (tree riparian management indicator species);
Montana vole (grasslands management indicator species); and the
Sage thrasher (shrublands management indicator species)?
HABITAT FOR AMERICA’S LAST REMAINING MIGRATING HERD OF WILD BISON:
By eliminating the current Gallatin National Forest Forest Plan’s indigenous species mandate, you could engender the ultimate extinction of America’s last remaining migrating herd of wild bison. Yellowstone’s bison are genetically and behaviorally unique – the ONLY herd with continuously wild ancestry from the days when approximately 50 million bison migrated freely across the Great Plains.
After the government-sponsored holocaust of these bison and Indigenous Peoples that depended upon them, only 23 wild bison survived, taking refuge in Yellowstone’s remote Pelican Valley.
Yellowstone’s tattered remnant herd is all that remains of 50 million wild bison! This herd is America’s ONLY free-roaming, wild, unfenced population.
The Yellowstone bison have naturally migrated to the public lands now contained within the Gallatin National Forest for millennia. As such, the Gallatin National Forest MUST, at the direction of your Forest Plan, do everything it can possibly do to encourage this herd to naturally migrate to public lands adjacent to Yellowstone National Park.
To escape slaughter by the Montana Department of Livestock (MDOL), the Yellowstone bison desperately need access to our National Forest lands; access mandated by your current Forest Plan to “provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species and for increasing populations of big game animals.”
PUBLIC LANDS MUST BE MANAGED FOR PUBLIC WILDLIFE:
Supervisor Erickson, I hope you strongly agree that public lands must be managed for public wildlife. The current situation of the Montana Department of Livestock slaughtering all bison that innocently migrate across the boundary of Yellowstone National Park is clearly untenable.
America’s public lands deserve a vibrantly healthy migrating herd of wild bison. If you adhere to the current Gallatin National Forest Forest Plan’s management mandate to “provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species,” you will take appropriate administrative actions to promote the migration of Yellowstone bison onto and into the Gallatin National Forest and to provide the publicly-owned habitats and birthing grounds so essential for this herd’s prosperity.
If you allow for this common sense solution – a solution that worked perfectly for tens of thousands of years – the genetic strength and population of the Yellowstone bison herd (both now rapidly diminishing due to SEVERE mishandling by the Montana Department of Livestock) could again become tenable. This would be a success story heralded worldwide, perhaps as much as the creation of Yellowstone National Park itself.
You hold the future of wild bison and many other indigenous species of the Gallatin National Forest in your hands. PLEASE retain your current Gallatin National Forest Forest Plan’s language to “provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species” and studiously manage our public lands to fully realize this mandate. Thank you.
THE NECESSITY OF BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY, OR “BIODIVERSITY”:
I am merely a stakeholder committed to the imperative for biological diversity, or “biodiversity,” on our public lands. Since I am not a scientist, I could be mistaken concerning some of the above. I welcome any corrections and/or suggestions you may have for further exploration and development of these issues.
Please acknowledge, via e-mail or snail-mail, your receipt of these comments.
Please include these comments in any and all public comment files; comments on the current Gallatin National Forest Plan; comments on the proposed Gallatin National Forest Forest Plan; comments on the “Proposed Gallatin National Forest Plan ‘Clean Up’ Amendments;” comments on the management of all the species mentioned herein; and all land use decisions by the Gallatin National Forest’s forest supervisor and the five district rangers affecting all species mentioned above and/or other indigenous species. Thank you.
Please also place me on all of your supervisor’s mailing list and of your five district ranger offices’ mailing lists for any further development concerning the Gallatin National Forest’s mandate to “provide habitat for viable populations of all indigenous wildlife species and for increasing populations of big game animals.”
Thank you for your consideration.
Respectfully yours,
Paul Thomas Richards
30 Browns Gulch Road
Boulder, MT 59632
Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com
Dispatches from the Wildlands™ ©2010, Paul Richards
Paul Thomas Richards Proposed High-Speed Freeway Threatens
Northern Rockies’ Wildlife Linkages from
Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem to
Greater Glacier/Bob Marshall Ecosystem
By Paul Richards
Many westerners are familiar with Highway 69, the scenic rural route that runs alongside the Boulder River, between the Elkhorn Mountains and Bull Mountain from Boulder to Cardwell. The Boulder Valley is one of Montana’s most beautiful drives, filled with abundant wildlife and breathtaking scenery.
This pastoral scene is gradually turning into a nightmare. Canadian truckers, fully aware that law enforcement on Highway 69 is minimal at best, drive in convoys at speeds up to 85 mph, endangering all local traffic.
For almost 10 years, Boulder Valley residents have petitioned the Montana Department of Transportation (MDOT) for a safer Highway 69. We have asked for:
* A pedestrian walkway and bicycle path along the highway’s current route;
* Safe crosswalks at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds, Boulder Hot Springs, and other frequently utilized junctions;
* Retention of the valley’s lush aspen and cottonwood;
* Underpasses or overpasses for elk, deer, moose, bear, pronghorn and other wildlife;
* A full-time truck weighing station;
* Lower speed limits for the safety of vehicles, trucks, pedestrians, ranchers and their equipment, bicycles, wildlife and livestock, and
* Strict enforcement of these lower speed limits.
In early 2005, we submitted an official “Citizens’ Alternative” to MDOT Director Jim Lynch and MDOT Butte Division Administrator Jeff Ebert. “MDOT is legally bound to offer a wide range of alternatives,” we wrote. “Any public meetings to discuss alternatives need to have the above alternative before it for consideration.”
MDOT’s response was swift and deadly. At a June 1, 2005, hearing, MDOT presented its “nuclear option” — a new high-speed freeway to be built on the river’s east bench — a stake right through the hearts of all Boulder Valley ranches.
Legally, according to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), this was a “scoping” hearing, where MDOT was supposed to receive public comments concerning features we wanted for Highway 69.
But, there was no “hearing.” MDOT never asked what we wanted. And, MDOT never mentioned our “Citizens’ Alternative.”
Instead, MDOT told us that its already-approved “preferred alternative” for a new high-speed international highway corridor was a fait accompli.
Needless to say, MDOT’s circumvention of NEPA, its premature and illegal designation of a “preferred alternative” without any public input; the agency’s violation of state and federal public participation and environmental protection mandates; and its devastating “nuclear option” did not go over particularly well.
More than 100 Boulder Valley residents at the 2005 “hearing” unanimously shouted “NO!”
Now, flash ahead five years to MDOT’s March 23, 2010, hearing. Due to steadfast community opposition, MDOT finally announced it was abandoning its “nuclear option.”
However, in the years between the 2005 and 2010 hearings, NONE of the concerns expressed by area residents have been addressed!
Even though more than 200 residents signed petitions requesting the pedestrian walkway and bike path and even though MDOT promised us in writing in 2008 they would explore this proposal, MDOT did not mention it.
MDOT did not mention safe crosswalks, truck weighing station, lower speed limits, and enforcement of speed limits. On questioning, MDOT said it would take an act of the Legislature to lower vehicular speeds to make our neighborhood safer. That is absolute nonsense.
Instead of strictly-enforced lower speed limits, MDOT actually told us it wants to “speed up” Highway 69, so Canadian truckers can drive faster and get home sooner to spend more time with their wives and kids!
MDOT did not mention wildlife collisions, although the agency’s own in-house data are overwhelming. MDOT refused to discuss underpasses and overpasses, even though studies have deemed them biologically critical to maintain existing wildlife corridors and linkages from the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem to the Greater Glacier/Bob Marshall Ecosystem.
MDOT told us “we have to design this highway for morons” who drive too fast for road conditions!
Montana’s magnificent Boulder Valley and the priceless wildlife corridors it provides need your help!
Using the contact information provided below, please tell MDOT that:
1. You support the bicycle and pedestrian path, with well-marked crossings;
2. You support wildlife underpasses and overpasses;
3. Flashing signs alerting motorists to crossings and reduced speed limits have proven effective in Montana’s wildlife-rich Bitterroot Valley on Highway 93, Gallatin Valley on Highway 191, Clark Fork Valley on Highway 200, and Mission Valley on Highway 93 — MDOT must do this in the Boulder Valley on Highway 69;
4. Since the Boulder River is officially “impaired,” MDOT cannot contribute further to its “Total Maximum Daily Loads” or “TMDLs.”
5. Highway 69 is a rural state route, not a U.S. Highway or an Interstate Highway;
6. Highway 69 is not designed for high-speed truck traffic, nor should it be;
7. Nearby and parallel Interstate 15 is the north-south freeway specifically designed for high-speed truck traffic;
8. If MDOT continues its misguided, NAFTA-driven efforts to convert Highway 69 from a pastoral rural route into a high-speed freeway for international truck traffic, the agency must first prepare a full Environmental Impact Statement.
9. The Boulder Valley is a community of sane people that doesn’t need “morons” driving through it at unsafe speeds; and
10. Give Boulder Valley residents, ranchers, kids, pedestrians, bicyclists, and wildlife a brake!
To comment, title your comments “Boulder South EA,” submit them on-line at: http://www.mdt.mt.gov/mdt/comment_form.shtml and http://governor.mt.gov/contact/commentsform.asp ; e-mail them to jebert@mt.gov ; dwambach@mt.gov ; snicolai@dowlhkm.com ; jilynch@mt.gov ; and bbrosten@mt.gov ; and/or snail-mail them to:
Boulder South EA
DOWL HKM
P.O. Box 1009
Helena, MT 59624.
Provide your contact information and ask MDOT to keep you posted concerning all stages of this project and all subsequent projects concerning the Boulder Valley and Highway 69 .
Thank you!
____________________________________________________________________
Dispatches from the Wildlands™ ©2010, Paul Richards
Paul Richards is a Helena native, Boulder area businessman, former member of the Montana House of Representatives, and former candidate for U.S. Senate. For further information, contact him at: 30 Brown’s Gulch Road, Boulder, MT 59632, or by e-mail at: Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com .
Editor’s Note:
Different versions of this piece have appeared in the:
1. (Butte) Montana Standard, located at: http://www.mtstandard.com/news/opinion/columnists/article_50f70b0e-49a6-11df-9d2c-001cc4c03286.html
2. (Helena, MT) Queen City News, located at: http://www.queencitynews.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=11387&mode=flat&order=0&thold=0
3. Boulder (MT ) Monitor. No Internet posting–no URL.
Paul Thomas Richards RESTORING BULL TROUT TO THE
UPPER CLARK FORK RIVER DRAINAGES,
INCLUDING THE GEORGETOWN LAKE ECOSYSTEM OF SOUTHWESTERN MONTANA.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Public Comments Processing
Attn: RIN 1018-AW88
Division of Policy and Directives Mgmt.
4401 N. Fairfax Drive, Suite # 222
Arlington, VA 22203
Federal e-Rulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov .
Keyword or ID: FWSR1-ES-2009-0085.
“Open for Comment/Submission”Search button. Icon that reads “Submit a Comment.”
Dear Friends of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service,
I hope this letter finds you well.
I write today in full support of a very important indigenous species to Montana and the Northern Rockies, the magnificent bull trout.
In the past, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service failed miserably to protect bull trout, a threatened species, by proposing to protect only fragmented and unconnected bull trout habitat.
I have just reviewed the map comparing the 2005 “Final Critical Habitat” to the 2010 “Proposed Final Critical Habitat,” available at:
http://www.fws.gov/pacific/bulltrout/pdf/20102005%20comparison.pdf .
Your proposed “2010 Final Critical Habitat” is a much more definitive step towards protecting this threatened species that is supposed to be fully protected under the Endangered Species Act. It seems as though you are now finally recognizing the biological imperatives of maintaining connectivity and of reconnecting core areas. Thank you!
However, in examining your documents and your maps, it seems as though you have not yet fully recognized the importance of protecting presently-and-temporarily unoccupied habitat. Protection of temporarily unoccupied habitat as transportation corridors is absolutely crucial to fully recovering bull trout throughout Montana and the Northern Rockies.
FLINT CREEK DRAINAGE:
For example, in reviewing the map available at: http://www.fws.gov/pacific/bulltrout/crithab/mtnv/31%20Upper%20Clark%20Fork%20River.pdf , I can’t help but wonder why all of Flint Creek and its tributaries aren’t proposed as protected bull trout habitat.
This also might be a good time to reestablish a bull trout population in Georgetown Lake, extirpated so many years ago. Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks’ examination of about 5500 trout captured by anglers between 1984 and 2002 revealed no bull trout, westslope cutthroat trout, or even bull trout hybrids.
However, the potential DOES exist for reestablishing bull trout in Georgetown Lake. Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks data indicate that at one time bull trout originated in Silver Lake and migrated to Georgetown Lake via Hardtla Creek. Can the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service work to reestablish this passageway?
Could the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service work to help ensure that drastic drawdowns of Georgetown Lake, resultant low dissolved oxygen, and ensuing fish kills are avoided in the future? This would help native fish like bull trout and westslope cutthroat trout tremendously. Also, could the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service work to establish fish ladders from Flint Creek up to Georgetown Lake? Again, this would help native fish tremendously.
Of course, it will take a while to reestablish native species to the Georgetown Lake ecosystem. Non-native invasives like brook trout interbreed with bull trout, damaging those few pure populations that remain. Brook trout also voraciously out-compete native cutthroat for habitat. Because of these threats, brook trout are being removed from many streams with poisons, and prevented from invading upstream refuges for native trout with barriers. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would have to work closely with Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks to change the emphasis for the Georgetown Lake area from invasive non-native species like brook trout to native species like cutthroat and bull trout.
The Flint Creek drainage has seen some ill-advised road building, unsustainable logging, and the creation of polluting hard-rock mining sites. It is time for the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest to initiate an intensive and aggressive program of road and mine reclamation and forest restoration with native plant species and emphases on naturally draining watersheds.
The Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest needs to be encouraged to proceed with closing, re-contouring, and completely reclaiming unnecessary roads, with emphases on natural water drainage and restoring habitat for secluded wildlife species such as elk. For roads determined to be absolutely essential, the Forest Service needs to install stream crossing structures that allow for upstream movement of all life stages of fish such as bull trout.
The Pintler Ranger District of the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest has begun identifying undersized culverts and is proposing to the public that these undersized culverts be replaced by stream crossing structures (bridges or larger culverts) that allow for migration for all life stages of fish such as cutthroat trout (sensitive species), bull trout (threatened species), and other native aquatic organisms.
Particularly regarding the Boulder Creek watershed of the Flint Creek drainage, these actions by the Pintler Ranger District of the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest would help reconnect now-isolated populations of bull trout with the bull trout populations of Flint Creek and the Clark Fork River.
I support the efforts of the Pintler Ranger District in this regard. I offer the hope that the Pintler Ranger District will continue identifying biological “bottlenecks” throughout the entire Ranger District and proposing restoration and remediation alternatives that will well serve native fish and wildlife populations, particularly those species that are rare, threatened, endangered, secluded, sensitive, or species of special concern.
I am sending a copy of this statement to the Pintler Ranger District in care of Don Despain ( ddespain@fs.fed.us ) and Steve Gerdes ( sgerdes@fs.fed.us ) in the hopes these comments will be incorporated into all proposals and documents regarding the identification of undersized culverts, ORVs and ATVs crossing through streambeds, and other factors that radically diminish aquatic habitat and potential for native fish propagation and migration.
WARMS SPRINGS CREEK DRAINAGE AND
CLARK FORK RIVER SYSTEM FROM
WARM SPRINGS CREEK TO FLINT CREEK:
The entire Warm Springs Creek drainage needs to be included in the “Proposed Final Critical Habitat.” In their “Bull Trout Population Genetic Structure and Entrainment in Warm Springs Creek, Montana” Report, submitted on June 2, 2009, Patrick DeHaan and Lindsay Godfrey of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service write:
The Clark Fork River system west of the Continental Divide in Montana historically
contained one of the largest metapopulations of bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) throughout the species range. Historically, bull trout were likely distributed throughout the upper Clark Fork River upstream of Milltown Dam (near Missoula, MT) as there are no major natural barriers excluding bull trout from major portions of the drainage.
The Warm Springs Creek watershed likely provided a significant portion of the spawning and rearing habitat for bull trout in the upper Clark Fork River due to the large area of the drainage, the geology of the drainage, and the diversity of habitats. However, a century of mining and smelting polluted streams in the upper Clark Fork River system with toxic metals and other chemicals (MBTSG 1995), and such mining-related habitat degradation effectively extirpated migratory bull trout from much of the system.
The US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) designated seven local populations within the upper Clark Fork River core area (USFWS 2002). However, more recent information suggests that bull trout in this core area have been reduced to only three viable populations, including Warm Springs, Boulder, and perhaps Harvey Creeks (USFWS 2009). Currently these populations are isolated from one another. Of these three locations, Warm Springs Creek contains the most-upstream population of bull trout in the Clark Fork River, is comprised of multiple demes (discrete spawning units in individual tributaries), and is likely the largest among the upper Clark Fork bull trout populations in terms of number of individuals and extent of occupied habitat.
Elevations within the Warm Springs Creek drainage range from 1,524 to 3,139 meters (5,000-10,300 ft) and the drainage encompasses over 40,499 ha (100,077 acres). This system is unique in that both resident and migratory (ad fluvial and fluvial) life history type bull trout occur over a range of habitats including a series of lakes (Upper and Lower Twin Lakes), reservoirs (Silver Lake) and tributaries (Foster, Twin Lake, Storm Lake, Warm Springs and Barker Creeks). Predictions about the response of bull trout to climate change (Rieman et al. 2007) suggest that local populations like Warm Springs Creek will represent important conservation units.
Since the early 1900s, bull trout habitat within the Warm Springs Creek drainage has been extensively fragmented by development and utilization of a water supply system for large-scale smelting operations based in Anaconda, MT. Warm Springs Creek, Silver Lake, Storm Lake Creek and Twin Lakes Creek contain an intricate water conveyance system, including diversion structures, aqueducts, exposed and buried pipes, and pumping stations.
These structures clearly influence habitat connectivity within the system, and have caused the isolation of bull trout populations in Twin Lakes and Storm Lake Creeks. Moreover, bull trout from Storm Lake and Twin Lakes Creeks may also be entrained into Silver Lake, which could represent a demographic loss to source populations and constrain expression of a migratory life history if entrained individuals cannot return to spawn in their natal habitats.
DeHaan and Godfrey also write: “Bull trout habitat in Warm Springs Creek has been fragmented by a series of water diversions for nearly 100 years. Isolation of bull trout populations above barriers has apparently contributed to reduced levels of genetic variation for bull trout within different tributaries of Warm Springs Creek (relative to the Clark Fork River and elsewhere in the species range), low effective population sizes and restricted gene flow among populations. Water diversions within the system have apparently led to the entrainment and loss of important migratory bull trout from Storm Lake Creek. Bull trout populations within the system would likely benefit from the re-establishment of migratory corridors as well as measures aimed at reducing the threats posed by non-native brook trout in the system” (emphasis added).
Obviously, this fragmentation of habitat needs to be addressed. As written above, migratory corridors must be reestablished. This will not occur until the entire Warm Springs Creek drainage is considered as “Proposed Final Critical Habitat.”
Once the entire Warm Springs Creek drainage is considered as “Proposed Final Critical Habitat,” it should go without saying that the entire Clark Fork River from Warm Springs Creek to Flint Creek must also be “Proposed Final Critical Habitat.” The map you have posted at: http://www.fws.gov/pacific/bulltrout/crithab/mtnv/31%20Upper%20Clark%20Fork%20River.pdf abruptly cuts off the “Proposed Final Critical Habitat” for bull trout at the confluence of Flint Creek and the Clark Fork River. This does not serve the long-term interests of the bull trout!
We have already established that:
The Clark Fork River system west of the Continental Divide in Montana historically contained one of the largest metapopulations of bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) throughout the species range. Historically, bull trout were likely distributed throughout the upper Clark Fork River upstream of Milltown Dam (near Missoula, MT) as there are no major natural barriers excluding bull trout from major portions of the drainage.
The Warm Springs Creek watershed likely provided a significant portion of the spawning and rearing habitat for bull trout in the upper Clark Fork River due to the large area of the drainage, the geology of the drainage, and the diversity of habitats.
We have also established that “Bull trout populations within the system would likely benefit from the re-establishment of migratory corridors.”
Now that the Clark Fork River is being cleaned up, we have to honor its proud history as prime bull trout habitat. So, instead of arbitrarily, capriciously, and mistakenly cutting off “Proposed Final Critical Habitat” for the bull trout at the confluence of Flint Creek and the Clark Fork River, we must continue the “Proposed Final Critical Habitat” upstream from the Flint Creek confluence all the way to the confluence of Warm Springs Creek and the Clark Fork River.
CONCLUSION:
Since bull trout depend on cold, clear, and clean water, they are excellent indicators of water quality. Protecting and restoring their habitat contributes to the water quality of rivers and lakes throughout Montana and the Northwest. We all benefit from cleaner water and bountiful fisheries.
Federal, state, and tribal land managers must manage public land for the benefit of fish and wildlife, with emphases on indigenous species and protecting biodiversity. Where indigenous species have been extirpated, our responsibilities as stewards require us to provide the necessary migration corridors to suitable-but-temporarily-unoccupied habitat.
This is particularly true regarding bull trout. Bull trout need cool water with little-to-no fine sediment in order to successfully spawn and rear. At about two years of age they migrate from their spawning streams and mature in lakes or rivers, traveling as far as 150 miles. They return to their native stream to spawn. Unlike salmon, bull trout journey between spawning streams and rivers and lakes many times.
In order to save bull trout from extinction, all public lands must be managed to maintain the steady flows of pure and clean water required by this magnificent species. Existing public roadless wildlands and all at-risk species must be protected. And, damaged forests, plains, and watersheds must be restored.
If we manage all federal lands (U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Forest Service; U.S. Department of Interior; U.S. Bureau of Land Management; National Park Service; et al), all state lands (Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks; Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation Lands, et al), all tribal lands whenever possible, and all community watersheds for bull trout, cutthroat trout, and other species that require a clean environment, we humans are assured a healthy future. If we choose instead to continue degrading our public lands and watersheds, we humans will suffer impoverishment of both health and spirit.
I respectfully ask you, our public employees of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other agencies, to do everything within your power to protect the habitat essential for the survival of species that characterize the wild nature of the northern Rockies, such as the bull trout, cutthroat trout (Montana’s official state fish), arctic grayling, gray wolf, otter, mountain goat, mountain sheep, elk, northern goshawk, boreal owl, pileated woodpecker, ferruginous hawk, Montana vole, sage thrasher, sage grouse, wild bison, peregrine falcon, bald eagle, golden eagle, pine marten, fisher, lynx, wolverine, and grizzly bear (Montana’s official state animal).
Thank you for your consideration. Please place these comments in the hearing record.
Please keep me notified of any and all proposed U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decisions regarding the bull trout and other rare, threatened, endangered, secluded, sensitive, or species of special concern to Montana and the Northern Rockies Ecosystem.
Sincerely,
Paul Richards
Founder and Board Member, Deerlodge Forest Defense Fund
Co-Founder and Board Member, Southwest Montana Wildlands Alliance
Member, Advisory Board, Alliance for the Wild Rockies
P.O. Box 780
Boulder, MT 59632
DFDF@PRMediaConsultants.com
Editor’s Notes:
1. This comment was submitted to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on February 28, 2010.
2. Bull trout were listed as a threatened species due to many, many years of hard work by the Alliance for the Wild Rockies, a coalition of conservation groups supporting wildlands and dependent species in the Northern Rockies. Further information at: http://www.wildrockiesalliance.org/issues/bulltrout/index.html and: http://www.wildrockiesalliance.org/ .
Dispatches from the Wildlands™ ©2010, Paul Richards
Paul Thomas Richards Sixteen Major Errors of S. 1470, Sen. Jon Tester’s Wildlands Logging Bill
Analysis by Paul Richards, PR Media Consultants®
Sixteen Major Errors of S. 1470, Sen. Jon Tester’s Wildlands Logging Bill:
All of the sixteen following errors, flaws, and weaknesses of S. 1470, Sen. Jon Tester’s Wildlands Logging Bill, were covered in my July 2009 in-depth analysis posted the day that Tester announced this legislation at a Townsend, Montana, sawmill at: www.NewWest.net.
On July 17, 2009, NewWest.Net offered Sen. Jon Tester an opportunity to rebut all of these points. As of this writing (January 7, 2010), he is still “considering it.”
It should be noted that, on July 17, 2009, Peter Aengst of the Wilderness Society did issue statements calling this analysis and the resultant NewWest.Net investigative piece a “rant.” Aengst refrained from addressing any specifics.
1. The public was completely shut out of the drafting of S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill. The bill was drafted in an underhanded manner by a handful of insiders, sworn to secrecy. Rather than incorporating meaningful public involvement, Tester chose the path of “fait accompli.” This has created enormous resentment from all quarters.
DETAILS: I, for example, am a member of the National Wildlife Federation, Trout Unlimited, and Montana Wilderness Association. I served on the board of the Montana Wilderness Association and have received the organization’s “Brass Lantern” Award.
Years ago, when these three conservation groups and the timber industry first formed the “Beaverhead-Deerlodge Partnership,” I approached the players. As one who had been involved at the grassroots level with the Deerlodge National Forest for over 27 years, and as an official member of the Deerlodge National Forest Technical Advisory Committee, I thought my presence might be an asset during negotiations. I had been involved with the successful appeal and resultant “Settlement Agreement” of the Deerlodge Forest Plan, which had been heralded region-wide as a model for citizen participation.
Over a two-year period, I sent numerous e-mails and made numerous phone calls, trying to get into the negotiations or at least monitor them. All my attempts were rebuffed, as were all attempts by many other members of the public. We, as members of the National Wildlife Federation, Trout Unlimited, and Montana Wilderness Association, were kept entirely in the dark as our organizations’ staffs compromised away our public wildlands.
I have also been a member of the Wilderness Society for 40 years. At NO time were Wilderness Society members ever appraised as to deals, trade-offs, and The Wilderness Society’s staff actually supporting the removal of current administrative and Congressional protections for our public wildlands.
Wildlands proponents weren’t the only ones excluded. People in favor of resource development, county officials, and state legislators were also kept in the dark. U.S. Forest Service officials, scientists, biologists, botanists, silviculturalists, and public information specialists were purposefully excluded from participation and denied access to all drafts of the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill.
In short: There was NO public information and NO public discussion. Countless interest groups and individuals were surgically removed from every major decision regarding their own public lands.
Instead being forged by well-informed public debate, reviewed by U.S. Forest Service scientists and experts, and exposed to the healing properties of disinfecting sunlight, Tester’s bill was clandestinely and sloppily cobbled together behind-the-scenes.
2. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, violates Tester’s 2006 campaign promise “to protect all of Montana’s remaining roadless areas.”
DETAILS: With only a week to go, polls showed State Sen. Jon Tester and State Auditor John Morrison at a dead heat in the June 2006 Democratic primary race for U.S. Senate. Tester operative Missoula attorney Pat Smith directly contacted former state Rep. Paul Richards (me), who was running third of five candidates in the race, concerning Richards’ possible endorsement of Tester.
Richards agreed to meet twice with Tester in Helena, Montana, on Tuesday, May 30, 2006, to see if terms could be worked out for this endorsement.
As a result of these two negotiating sessions, Tester agreed to terms detailed at: www.Richards2006.us, including the specific promise that: “If elected, Jon Tester will work to protect all of Montana’s remaining roadless areas.”
In exchange for these mutually-agreed-upon-with-witnesses (including Tester’s wife, Shar, and Tester’s son, Shon) terms, Paul Richards agreed to withdraw from the race for U.S. Senate and publicly ask his supporters to vote for Jon Tester. After the agreement was reached, Richards personally contacted his extensive network of environmental advocates throughout the state, detailed Tester’s commitment to “protect all of Montana’s remaining roadless areas,” and asked his supporters to vote for Tester in the June 2006 Democratic primary election, rather than Richards.
News of Richards’ endorsement appeared on front pages of most Montana daily newspapers and was prominent in all other media the final week before the election. Tester and Richards celebrated the win jointly at a June 6, 2006, election night party in Missoula, MT.
3. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, alienates Tester’s main supporters from the 2006 election.
DETAILS: Conservationists provided the margin of victory that allowed Tester to defeat incumbent Sen. Conrad Burns in the general election of 2006. In tacking solely towards the timber industry, moneyed corporations that never previously supported him in any fashion, Tester has abandoned his true constituency.
To date, due to interminable efforts by countless pro-logging public relations specialists, reporters and editors that know better have been forced into states of profound stupor. As a result of this lethargy, Montana’s corporate media have largely bought into the “spin” created by timber corporations, Tester, Baucus, Wilderness Society, National Wildlife Federation, Trout Unlimited, Montana Wilderness Association, and Greater Yellowstone Coalition.
Instead of raising necessary questions concerning potential loss of our public wildlands legacy and expenditures of well over $100 million in taxpayer timber subsidies, corporate media in Montana have cast legitimate public debate aside and joined the spinmasters’ choir, making Tester’s bill the “feel good” legislation of the year!
National media, on the other hand, will likely see through the smoke and mirrors, no matter how numerous and gregarious the spinmasters, how “nice” the legislation’s sponsor, or how desperately the sawmills crave even more taxpayer subsidies.
As the actual implications of the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill become known to public lands stakeholders throughout the nation, Tester’s credibility among public lands advocates and true conservationists will suffer accordingly. Ultimately, this will become reflected in his in-state standing. Instead of longtime dedicated conservationist like the esteemed Senator Lee Metcalf representing the long-term interests of our public lands legacy, Montanans are now looking at a one-term flash in the pan.
4. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, “undesignates” S 393 wildlands and loots the wildlands legacy of former Senator Lee Metcalf – Montana’s greatest conservationist.
DETAILS: Tester’s bill is a full-scale pillaging of the legacy of Montana’s greatest conservationist and my mentor, U.S. Senator Lee Metcalf. In 1977, Sen. Metcalf, only a year before he died, worked tirelessly to pass Senate Bill 393, the Montana Wilderness Study Act.
Sen. Metcalf’s magnificent legacy protected nine roadless wildland areas, while they were studied for official designation as wilderness under the Wilderness Act of 1964, a bill which Sen. Metcalf had earlier personally shepherded through Congress, with the conscientious advocacy of Wilderness Society Executive Director Stewart Brandborg and Wilderness Society Field Director Clif Merritt, both Montana natives.
Tester’s bill removes the Sapphire Wilderness Study Area and the West Pioneers Wilderness Study Area from the Congressional protection of Sen. Metcalf’s Senate Bill 393 and opens more than two-thirds of these priceless and irretrievable roadless wildlands to logging.
Only high-elevation “rocks and ice” non-timber producing tracts would be designated wilderness. Of the 94,000 acres of public roadless wildlands currently in the Sapphire Wilderness Study Area, only 53,000 acres would be protected from development. Of the 151,000 acres of public roadless wildlands currently in the West Pioneers Wilderness Study Area, only 26,000 acres would be protected from development.
Tester’s bill “undesignates” the Axolotl Lakes Wilderness Study Area, Bell/Limekiln Canyons Wilderness Study Area, East Fork Blacktail Wilderness Study Area, Henneberry Ridge Wilderness Study Area, and Hidden Pasture Wilderness Study Area. These roadless wildlands would be subjected to “logging without laws,” as Tester’s bill excludes logging them from protective provisions of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act.
5. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, pulls roadless areas out from the protection of the Clinton Roadless Rule and the Obama Roadless Initiative.
DETAILS: Tester’s bill withdraws around one million acres of public roadless wildlands on the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest from the protection of the Clinton Roadless Rule and the Obama Roadless Initiative and opens them to roading and logging.
You won’t find this in the bill. You have to go to the maps that accompany the bill, maps to which courts will undoubtedly refer, if this misguided legislation actually passes. The maps (located at: http://tester.senate.gov/Legislation/upload/Proposed-Land-Designations.pdf ) are very specific in reclassifying the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest’s currently protected roadless wildlands to a new category, officially designated “Timber Suitable or Open to Harvest.”
6. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, Congressionally overrides legitimate forest planning processes that involve full public information and participation.
DETAILS: Tester’s bill circumvents National Forest planning laws, procedures, and regulations. Currently, the U.S. Forest Service is required to honestly evaluate “site-specific impacts” of proposed logging.
Under Tester’s bill, these requirements would be supplanted by a new system of “Landscape Scale Restoration Projects” where mandated logging takes place in the total absence of well-established forest planning procedures that require state-of-the art science, public information, and public involvement.
Tester’s bill Congressionally mandates cut levels, damn the environmental and financial costs. Instead of decisions being made at local levels by informed forest science professionals, Tester’s bill dictates a one-size-fits-all prescription that prioritizes logging above all other uses.
Under Tester’s bill, taxpayer subsidies to timber corporations are more important than anything, be it elk hunting (which would diminish as elk security is logged away by mandated timber cutting), fishing (drastically debilitated by inevitable water degradation caused by unsustainable logging), steady supplies of clean irrigation water (logging causes much faster watershed runoffs and increased sedimentation), pure community water supplies (most western Montana cities get their water from our public roadless wildlands), diminished wildlife habitat, you name it.
7. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, promotes “logging without laws.”
DETAILS: By mandating timber cuts be placed above all other concerns, Tester’s bill could statutorily exempt timber cutting from the Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act, National Environmental Policy Act (which Tester’s bill mistakenly calls the “National Environmental Protection Act”), Wilderness Act, National Forest Management Act, and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act. This is a point of contention. Tester claims environmental laws will be adhered to. To the uninitiated, that sounds just great! However, the initiated know full well that when Congress mandates timber cutting quotas, federal courts have consistently held that the Congressional mandate to cut down the public’s trees trumps federal environmental and land use laws.
We’ve been through all this before. For over 20 years, politicians have claimed environmental laws would be followed, at the same time that they have imposed mandatory cutting quotas on public lands. While Tester’s public relations have lulled gullible “conservationists” into believing we can get the cut out and follow environmental laws, the courts consistently rule that the mandated cuts are paramount and that environmental laws don’t have to be respected.
The legal track record is available to anyone that can Google. The court precedents have already been established: If you have a conflict in law, “the specific overrides the general.” That is, Congressionally-mandated cutting quotas preempt such laws as the Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act, Wilderness Act, National Environmental Policy Act, National Forest Management Act, and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act.
Thus, despite proclamations to the contrary from Tester’s “conservation” collaborationists, if the Tester bill’s forced cutting quotas are approved by Congress, environmental laws would likely fall helplessly by the wayside.
8. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, mandates a cut of 7,000 acres a year for 10 years on a forest that sustainably produces, according to Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest officials, only between 500 and 2800 acres a year.
DETAILS: As a lifelong resident of the area and as a long-time member of the U.S. Forest Service’s Technical Advisory Committee, I know full well that the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest is not productive timberland. Much of the forest is east of the Continental Divide, receives little precipitation, and has an extremely short growing season, due to its high altitude. Due to these limiting factors, it costs the public at least $1,400 per acre to log in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest.
Tester claims the mandated cut will come from the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest’s suitable timber base and that inventoried roadless areas are not threatened. But, Tester is ignoring reality. In recent years, logging professionals with the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest have established the Forest’s sustainable yearly harvest at 500 acres. The most they’ve cut, even during the years of the housing boom, is 2,800 acres a year.
Can Tester mandate a cut of 70,000 acres (7,000 acres a year for 10 years) on a forest that is not productive timberland, without entering and developing undeveloped (roadless) lands? For a clue, review the maps located at: http://tester.senate.gov/Legislation/upload/Proposed-Land-Designations.pdf and note that, under the Tester bill, the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest’s inventoried roadless wildlands are officially re-designated as “Timber Suitable or Open to Harvest.”
9. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, mandates a cut of 30,000 acres of grizzly bear habitat on the Kootenai National Forest, causing distress and disturbance that some biologists say will force the dwindling Yaak grizzly bears into insecure habitat and ultimately extinction.
DETAILS: Wildlife consultant Brian Peck reports, “I have worked for 15 years to try and save the imperiled 30-40 grizzlies in the Cabinet-Yaak Ecosystem in a landscape where the “Cores” are too small, the “Buffers” are over-logged and roaded, and the “Linkages” are non-existent.
Tester’s bill mandates the cutting of 3,000 acres per year for ten years on the Kootenai National Forest, a forest that already looks like a moonscape in many areas from decades of U.S. Forest Service abuse. How is another 30,000 acres of logging not going to be the last nail in these bear’s coffin?”
10. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, could have a severe adverse impact upon rare, threatened, and endangered species.
DETAILS: Since the Tester bill Congressionally-mandates timber cuts, curtails forest planning, and severely restricts the U.S. Forest Service from accurately assessing logging’s impacts; environmental protections provided by the Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act, National Environmental Policy Act (mistakenly called the “National Environmental Protection Act” by Tester’s bill), National Forest Management Act, Federal Land Policy and Management Act, and Wilderness Act will likely be preempted.
If this scenario plays out, the public will never know the full extent to which secluded, rare, threatened, and endangered species will be adversely impacted, particularly in the Kootenai National Forest and the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest.
By forcing unsustainable industrial-scale logging upon our public lands, Tester’s bill would irrevocably harm essential habitat of species that characterize the wild nature of the northern Rockies, such as the gray wolf, bull trout, cutthroat trout (Montana’s official state fish), otter, mountain goat, mountain sheep, elk, arctic grayling, northern goshawk, boreal owl, pileated woodpecker, ferruginous hawk, Montana vole, sage thrasher, wild bison, peregrine falcon, bald eagle, pine marten, fisher, lynx, wolverine, and grizzly bear (Montana’s official state animal).
11. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, ignores the scientific need to protect different elevation habitats and their dependent species.
DETAILS: Conservation biologists have long understood the need to protect different elevation habitats and their dependent species, with core areas, buffer zones, and connecting biological corridors, or linkages.
More recently, scientists have documented that forest habitats are changing radically, due to global climate change. The species depending on our National Forests for survival are increasingly stressed by climate change and are increasingly in need of broader migration opportunities.
The “conservation” collaborationists (Wilderness Society, National Wildlife Federation, Trout Unlimited, Montana Wilderness Association, and Greater Yellowstone Coalition) publicly boast that, by supporting Tester’s bill, they are “creating” new wilderness areas.
These areas fail to pass scientific muster. A handful of nonproductive, high-altitude, limited-habitat “rocks and ice” wilderness areas, allocated to human recreational enjoyment does nothing for the vast majority of forest species. Unconnected islands of “rocks and ice” provide no biological integrity and no potential for sustaining biodiversity.
12. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, costs over $100 million for taxpayer-subsidized timber sales and lavish new sawmill power plants.
DETAILS: It costs the public at least $1,400 per acre to log in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest. Mandating logging of 7,000 acres will cost the public $9,800,000 a year. Mandating this level of cutting for 10 years, as Tester proposes, will cost taxpayers at least $98 million dollars.
In fact, the cost of these timber industry subsidies will be considerably higher, as the above economic figures date from the housing boom, three-to-four years ago. Now, that we are in economic depression, there is no housing construction and hardly anyone is buying timber.
In today’s depressed market for timber, the “hard money” subsidies for loggers that the Tester bill mandates will likely reach into the hundreds of millions of dollars over the next 10 years.
In addition to these taxpayer subsidies, Tester wants additional untold millions in taxpayer subsidies to build costly on-site power plants for the timber corporations promoting his bill. The taxpayer-financed power plants will only serve the timber corporations, not the communities of western Montana.
It is more corporate pork, plain and simple.
Tester’s power plants also make absolutely no sense. Trucking biomass to large, centralized power plants is grossly inefficient, when compared to utilizing numerous small-scale portable decentralized facilities.
It is far more practical to truck numerous inexpensive portable generators to the biomass, than to truck the biomass increasingly long distances to expensive and instantaneously obsolete centralized power facilities at sawmills.
13. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, negligently ignores the fact that there is no current demand for timber.
DETAILS: Since there is no demand for sawmills’ lumber, Tester’s bill defies basic common sense. The legislation is blatantly undisguised in its privatization of public resources and its forcing the public assumption of lumber mills’ private debt.
A mere four corporations: Pyramid Mountain Lumber (Seeley Lake), Roseburg Lumber (Missoula), RY Timber (Townsend and Livingston), and Sun Mountain Lumber (Deerlodge) will receive well over $100 million courtesy of the kind Senator, with taxpayers picking up the tab in tax dollars spent, watersheds degraded, habitat lost, and public wildlands destroyed.
14. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, mandates timber cutting, while leaving ensuing forest restoration optional.
DETAILS: This is the elephant in the living room. If Tester’s bill passes, by Congressional mandate, public wildlands will be roaded and their trees cut down. Then, after the trees are long gone, there will be no forest restoration.
Tester’s bill contains absolutely NO restoration mandates.
National Forests are littered with giant messes of logging restoration left unfunded and undone. It’s the U.S. Forest Service’s dirtiest secret: After the public’s trees are cut down and the logs hauled out, somehow, the agency just never seems to be able to find the money to honor its once-so-earnest promises of restoration.
There isn’t a national forest in the country that has actually delivered on its past commitments to restore public lands and watersheds wounded by logging. When it comes to budget priorities, post-logging forest reclamation and restoration has always been the U.S. Forest Service’s neglected and unwanted step-child.
Maintaining a brave posture in the face of this undeniable track record, Tester claims that revenues from mandated logging will pay for forest restoration projects. But, inconvenient truth again rears its ugly head: In lodgepole pine-dominant forests, there simply won’t be any revenues! At taxpayer-subsidies of $1,400 for every acre logged, just how will Tester’s restoration funds be magically generated?
This giant Ponzi scheme will likely be the undoing of the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill.
15. “Conservation” collaborationists supporting S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, have all received massive funding from the Pew Charitable Trusts, which works to “confine wilderness legislation to rocks-and-ice regions by co-opting gullible or calculating people in the wilderness movement.”
DETAILS: The Pew Charitable Trusts are an independent nonprofit organization–the sole beneficiary of seven individual charitable funds, with assets of $5.2 billion at the end of June 2008, established by two sons and two daughters of Sun Oil Company founder, Joseph N. Pew, and his wife, Mary Anderson Pew.
Pew works to “confine wilderness legislation to rocks-and-ice regions by co-opting gullible or calculating people in the wilderness movement,” according to former Montana Wilderness Association President Elaine Snyder and former MWA Board Member Ross Titus.
“Organizations that have gained access to Pew money are expected to show short-term gains in wilderness protection regardless of the cost to other public resources and political efforts,” according to Snyder and Titus.
The Montana Wilderness Association has received tens of thousands of dollars of Pew money. The National Wildlife Federation, Trout Unlimited, and the Wilderness Society have each received many millions of dollars from the Pew Charitable Trusts. National Wildlife Federation staffers are even housed at Pew’s Washington, D.C. headquarters.
Pew tipped its hand concerning the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill with a preemptive Thursday, July 9, 2009, e-mail “Alert” entitled “Sen. Tester Leads on Wilderness” from Mike Matz, executive director of the Pew-funded “Campaign for America’s Wilderness” (formerly known as the “Pew Wilderness Center”). “We need to THANK Senator Tester for showing positive leadership to protect the best of Montana’s pristine national forests,” Matz wrote.
“His bill would add the first new wilderness in Montana in more than a quarter of a century,” Matz continued. “Sen. Tester needs to hear that Montanans want to protect their special places as wilderness, for Montana families, clean water and wildlife. Please take a moment to call Senator Tester today and make a difference for Montana’s wilderness. Dial the nearest local office now and tell them you appreciate Sen. Tester’s leadership on wilderness,” Matz concluded. Matz then listed the telephone number for each of Tester’s eight Montana field offices.
Matz was asking well-intentioned wilderness advocates, who don’t know the funding sources of the “Campaign for America’s Wilderness,” to praise Tester for a wildlands logging bill that Tester refused to allow the public to see!
On the same afternoon, the Wilderness Society, sent out its own “Wild Alert,” under the name of Kathy Kilmer. “Montana’s Sen. Jon Tester is considering legislation that would give Montana its first new wilderness designations in decades,” Kilmer wrote. “Sen. Tester needs to hear that Montanans want to protect their special places as wilderness, for Montana families, clean water and wildlife. Please call Sen. Tester and thank him for showing positive leadership to protect the best of Montana’s pristine national forests,” Kilmer concluded. The Wilderness Society used the exact same non-alphabetical listing of Tester’s eight Montana field offices as Matz.
Besides the eeriness of identical non-alphabetical listings and the same language (“Sen. Tester needs to hear that Montanans want to protect their special places as wilderness, for Montana families, clean water and wildlife.”), the incredible thing about the preemptive Pew-funded e-mail campaigns of July 9, 2009, was that no one anywhere had actually seen the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, other than the timber industry and its collaborationists! Yet, we grassroots wildlands supporters were supposed to sign a blank check, call Tester, and thank him for drafting a public lands bill in secret!
When I first reported on the Pew-orchestrated campaign, Peter Aengst of the Wilderness Society wrote the following to Jared White of the Wilderness Society: “Can you check with Kathy Kilmer and see if it is possible to remove certain unsupportive people from our Wild Alert lists? Like Paul Richards (see his direct quoting of our alert).”
How dramatically have millions of Pew dollars caused the Wilderness Society to stray from its original mission, once pursued so faithfully by such courageous stalwarts as Robert Sterling Yard, Benton MacKaye, Robert and George Marshall, Aldo Leopold, Howard Zahniser, Stewart Brandborg, and Clif Merritt?
How could today’s Pew-funded Wilderness Society take me, a member of 40-years-standing, OFF of its mailing lists for being pro-wildlands and pro-wilderness?
How could today’s Pew-funded Wilderness Society exclude the public from public land decisions; support throwing away untold millions of dollars of pork for taxpayer-subsidized timber sales and lavish new sawmill power plants; exempting public wildlands from federal laws and the protection of a new earnest President; “undesignating” the legacy of Montana’s greatest conservationist; and destroying an irretrievable portion of Montana’s priceless roadless wildlands heritage?
16. S. 1470, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, fragments the Northern Rockies Ecosystem, the ONLY functioning ecosystem in the lower 49 states where all native species still reside.
DETAILS: Northern Rockies wildlands are the only place in the lower 49 states where all native species and wildlife remain!
These are our public wildlands, belonging to all Americans.
The Tester Wildlands Logging Bill strips away the protection of these public wildlands currently provided by the Clinton Roadless Rule, the Obama Roadless Initiative, and Sen. Lee Metcalf’s incredibly farsighted Senate Bill 393.
By fragmenting the Northern Rockies Ecosystem, the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill is a direct assault on the scientific principles of biodiversity and biological integrity for which so many dedicated citizens have worked so hard for the last quarter century. If Tester’s bill passes: Secluded, rare, threatened, and endangered species will be adversely impacted, particularly in the Kootenai National Forest and the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest.
By forcing unsustainable industrial-scale logging upon our public lands, Tester’s bill would irrevocably harm essential habitat of species that characterize the wild nature of the northern Rockies, such as the gray wolf, otter, mountain goat, mountain sheep, pika, elk, northern goshawk, boreal owl, pileated woodpecker, ferruginous hawk, sage grouse, Montana vole, sage thrasher, wild bison, peregrine falcon, bald eagle, pine marten, fisher, lynx, wolverine, arctic grayling, bull trout, cutthroat trout (Montana’s official state fish), and grizzly bear (Montana’s official state animal).
The “wilderness” areas in the Tester bill are fragmented and unconnected islands of largely “rocks and ice,” with no biological integrity and no potential for sustaining biodiversity.
These minimal “wilderness” designations in Tester’s bill fail entirely to protect different elevation habitats and their dependent species with core areas, buffer zones, and connecting biological corridors.
The Tester Wildlands Logging Bill promotes numerous abuses and violations that are clearly incompatible with the 1964 Wilderness Act, including motorized access into and through “wilderness,” low-level military overflights of “wilderness,” military aircraft landings in “wilderness,” possible “wilderness” logging, and other intrusions that violate the intrinsic principles of Wilderness.
As Montana State Rep. Francis Bardanouve used to say: “This is a BAD, BAD bill”:
As my very dear friend and companion, the late Rep. Francis Bardanouve, the highly-respected Dean of the Montana Legislature, sometimes proclaimed, when I served with him in the Montana House of Representatives, “This is a BAD, BAD bill!”
Francis rarely said this. But, the few times he did say it, legislators paid attention. They knew Francis did his homework.
House members understood that Rep. Francis Bardanouve ALWAYS researched exhaustively and deliberated studiously, before arriving at his opinion. As a result, Francis’s peers in the House of Representatives listened carefully and consistently heeded Francis’s warning that “This is a BAD, BAD bill.” They always voted the bad, bad bill down.
For all the errors, flaws, and weaknesses detailed above and for many other reasons raised by countless groups, officials, and citizens: S. 1470, Sen. Jon Tester’s Wildlands Logging Bill, is a BAD, BAD bill. It needs to die a quick death.
In support of lasting protection for our Nation’s priceless and irretrievable public wildlands legacy,
Respectfully submitted,
Paul Richards
PR Media Consultants®
Public Interest Media Since 1968
30 Brown’s Gulch Road
Boulder, MT 59632
Paul@PRMediaConsultants.com
www.PRMediaConsultants.com
www.Richards2006.us
http://blogs.alternet.org/paulrichards/
(Editor’s Note: For further extensive in-depth analyses and commentary about the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill and for information about The Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign, a coalition of 55 conservation groups opposed to the Tester Wildlands Logging Bill, go to: http://testerloggingbilltruths.wordpress.com/ ).
Dispatches from the Wildlands™ ©2010, Paul Richards
