Commissioners meet with new Yaak Valley Forest Council director

County commissioners last week welcomed a reopening of dialogue with the Yaak Valley Forest Council, but said protecting area residents and property from wildfire remained a priority.

“When we look at … the volatility of the county, when you’re growing anywhere for 400 to 800 million board feet a year and only treating 400 or 500 or 600 acres a year, we’re in a world of hurt,” said Jerry Bennett, chair of the board and Troy District representative.

His remarks came as commissioners met with Amy Pearson, the Yaak Valley Forest Council’s newly named executive director. Pearson, who joined commissioners during the board’s Feb. 9 meeting, said she hoped to restart dialogue about the Yaak.

“I know I’m walking into a history in this situation,” she said. “I’m really open to conversations about the Yaak and the landscape there.”

Pearson met with members of the Kootenai National Forest Stakeholders Coalition earlier in the week. She described it as a “tough conversation.”

“Those things are really important as we move forward,” Bennett said. “We need to be able to have those conversations and, even though they’re difficult at times and we have different perspective on things, conversation is always good.”

Bennett made an oblique reference to the council’s opposition to the Black Ram Project, a Kootenai National Forest undertaking encompassing about 95,412 acres in the Yaak, during the chat. While commissioners have made clear their support for the project, the courts will settle questions and objections raised by the council and others, he said.

“We’re not going to solve anything there until a judge makes a ruling one way or the other,” he said while reiterating the county’s wildfire risk.

The state identified Lincoln County as having among the most acres at risk to disease or wildfire in a recently revised Montana Forest Action Plan. Locally, officials have partnered with state and federal agencies in addressing what is known as the wildland-urban interface or the forested areas around developments and key infrastructure.

The council has argued that much of the Black Ram Project falls outside of the interface and treatment there will harm the health of the forest and the region’s grizzly bear population.

County Commissioner Brent Teske looked back to last summer’s fire season and the two major blazes — known as the South Yaak Fire and Burnt Peak Fire — that burned outside of Troy.

“Those really bring that stuff into the limelight and [leave people concerned],” he said.

Taking a preemptive approach to wildfire management is at the forefront of commissioners’ minds, Bennett said.

“To care for that is a high priority for us as commissioners,” he told Pearson.