What did this debacle cost?
To the Editor:
“I am the Lorax. I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues. And I’m asking you sir, at the top of my lungs...”
This is an excerpt from the famous, or infamous, book by Dr. Seuss. I, along with a lot of other people, probably would have never heard of it; but it drew national attention when, in a really dumb PR move, the California logging community tried to ban it from schools in 1988.
This is a letter I really don’t want to write, but I think something needs to be said.
“To be clear” (a popular politician phrase these days), I’m not a left wing greenie-weenie, with no plans to chain myself to a gate or tree anytime soon. At this stage of the game, I’ve probably whacked more trees than most anyone around; if you don’t count modern loggers sitting in air conditioned cabs pushing buttons.
Along the Vinal Lake Road in the Yaak, the county cleared the vegetation along the right-of-way. I’m assuming to let sun on the winter roadway and for bonus points, an improved fuel break. Worthy goals, both. As I found out, actually a U.S. Forest Service combined effort with the actual work being done by the county road crew in Troy.
But HOW they did this ill thought out project disturbed me. They used a masticator (brush shredding machine) to go “logging.” When I witnessed the ongoing work last fall, I contacted the (then) District Ranger. My biggest issue was the waste of a resource by butchering the merchantable saw timber, mostly Lodgepole Pine. I was appalled!
He checked it out and responded to my concerns in a timely manner, which I appreciated. He informed me that this was a group decision, with the FS “roads and timber folks” and our “engineering folks and county roads people,” to “not to try to salvage” the timber. It would be “cleaned up by next summer” by local firewood cutters. Too late now, but maybe he should have consulted someone who actually does this for a living and knows that messed up green Lodgepole isn’t a hot ticket for firewood in this part of the world.
When I e-mailed him I titled the heading next to the Re: “Boys and Their Toys.” I thought this quite clever, but seriously said a lot. Now the county is cleaning it up, piling inefficiency on top of inefficiency. Looks good what they’ve done, but should have been done in the first place.
A story in itself, I’ve spent two weeks trying to get an answer from Commissioner Jim Hammons as to what this (rhymes with duster-duck) actually cost, along with the new District Ranger who eventually did call me back. As I’m grinding my teeth with property tax time upon us once again, I think this is a reasonable request.
Tom Horelick, Libby