Troy man says Sanders Resource Council is distorting USFS facts
Letter to the Editor,
The Sanders Natural Resource Council (SNRC) recently brought their roadshow to Troy’s Senior Center.
They played before a packed house of “locals” and dispensed an endless array of cherry-picked mis-information from Forest Service documents while infusing the crowd with a solid dose of grizzly terror coupled with empty threats involving more road closures on federal land.
If you were to believe the SNRC’s message, which is deeply rooted in a conspiracy-minded opposition to Agenda 21 (a voluntary and non-binding U.N. blueprint for sustainable development), “We the People” were eliminated from public involvement on the Kootenai National Forest revised Forest Plan until it mysteriously fell from the sky on the same day public comments were due.
I have to ask, which is more plausible – that Forest Service employees, our neighbors, have been sneaking behind our backs for years to then jam a decades-old “secret” United Nations agenda down our throats or that a special-interest group from Sanders County is attempting to further its own political cause in an election year?
The following are facts that SNRC failed to present at the meeting:
1.) The basis for the revised Forest Plan was derived from 21 informational and public comment meetings that took place in and around KNF communities during the scoping process, which began in 2002, along with 38 community workgroup meetings from August 2003 to May 2004 (KNF DLMP DEIS, page ii).
2.) Local papers and the USFS advertised in advance of open house meetings that discussed the revised plan in a public format long before the end of the comment period earlier this year – in Libby (Jan. 24), Eureka (Jan. 26), Troy (Jan. 31), Trout Creek (Feb. 2), and Yaak (Feb. 22).
3.) Preliminary analysis of the Grizzly Bear Access Amendment expects between 16 and 48 miles of now-open roads would be eliminated and another 18 to 54 miles would be gated when the entire plan is implemented (Missoulian, Nov. 29, 2011).
These figures include roads from the Kootenai, Idaho Panhandle, and Lolo National Forests combined. A far cry from the projected 278 – 2,222 miles of road closures that the SNRC cited at their meeting.
4.) It is true that Grizzly Bear Core Areas are not included in the suitable timber base for the forest. But what the SNRC neglected to tell those in attendance was that timber management is still permitted in core areas to meet resource objectives.
For example, in Backcountry areas located within grizzly core, “timber harvest may occur to improve habitat for endangered species, restore ecosystem composition and structure, reduce the risk of wildfire (fuels reduction), or to address insect and disease concerns” (KNF DLMP, 64).
The SNRC appears to have organized the very day that public comment ended for the revised Forest Plan, thus ensuring their current victimization role.
How could a so-called local grassroots group, who is so passionate about the management of our federal lands, be so oblivious of the public process for the single-most important document that will guide management on the Kootenai National Forest for the next 15 years? I suspect they weren’t.
Unfortunately, the meeting had absolutely nothing to do with pursuing realistic solutions to issues or budgetary setbacks on our National Forests. Instead, the SNRC used smoke and mirrors to get people all riled-up over severely distorted information.
And as far as being a “local” town hall gathering – did anyone else in attendance notice the abundance of Washington and Idaho license plates in the parking lot?
— Matt Bowser
Troy