Will humans 'tumble down that slippery path to extinction'?

Sandy Compton’s Oct. 4 letter to the editor expresses an all-too-common misunderstanding about our national forests and ecosystem-protection organizations like the Alliance for the Wild Rockies.

However much Sandy Compton and Kootenai Forest Stakeholders want to elevate their status above ordinary citizens, current federal laws and federal legal precedent, there remains a stark reality which should not be ignored.

Blaming federal judges by name, and the Alliance’s executive director by name, won’t change current reality. Calling them names like “arrogant” and “self-righteous” demonstrates a lack of grace akin to most verbal abuse. I fail to see how maligning and demeaning individuals or groups with legitimate, opposing viewpoints and differing values accomplishes anything. After all, isn’t this still “America,” home of the brave, wild and free?

I have been involved in Kootenai National Forest management issues since the mid-1980s. I have seen the clearcuts and “spaghetti roads” up close and personal as a tree planter. I actively opposed (quite successfully) the Kootenai-Lolo Accord in 1990.

Moreover, I am a strong supporter of the Northern Rockies Ecosystem Act (H.R. 996 and S. 3022), which protects all roadless areas and linkage corridors in the five-state Wild Rockies bioregion. This national-interest legislative approach contrasts nicely with the local “collaborative” approach to public lands management.

These differences could be discussed among interested citizens, and perhaps resolved if our regional politicians were not so risk averse, and reactionary to innovative, scientific approaches to public land management policy issues.

I also understand the difficulty some people have with this kind of broad, big-picture, science-based vision for our national forests.

However, I believe it represents our collective future, or we will all end up tumbling down that slippery path to extinction along with The Great Bear, lynx and bull trout.

Steve Kelly,

co-founder and member

Alliance for the Wild Rockies

Bozeman