NEWS ROUNDUP

NOTE: Click on the highlighted areas in orange to go to the article, study, report, etc.

Forest Service retirees chide firefighting litigation Calling it "ridiculous" and "irresponsible," the National Association of Forest Service Retirees on Tuesday lambasted a lawsuit filed against the agency by current employees who want an evaluation of the environmental and social effects of wildland firefighting. "It is so outrageous, it boggles my mind," said Richard Pfilf, executive director of the 250-member retirees' group. Retirees lodged their objection in a news release out of Alexandria, Va., saying they are "alarmed by the total lack of responsibility demonstrated" by the lawsuit. In an interview, Pfilf said the lawsuit would attempt to stop the use of chemical retardants while the EIS was prepared, a process that could take years. "Forest Service retirees wonder how anyone can be so irresponsible as to demand stopping the use of retardant to prepare an EIS when Santa Ana winds are now pushing an inferno through Southern California communities," he said. In his news release, Pfilf went further: "FSEEE mischievously contrived this lawsuit as a way to interfere with and subvert proven, effective methods of fighting forest fires. "Claiming possible detriment to fish, should retardant accidentally fall into a water body, and citing a number of deaths of firefighters over the years, the suit fails to mention or equate stream habitat saved by fire suppression and the human lives saved by the use of retardant."...Groups file lawsuit over Kootenai forest timber sale Environmentalists filed another lawsuit against the Kootenai National Forest on Tuesday, hoping to stop a 12.5 million-board-foot timber sale they believe would pollute an already degraded stream. At almost the same time, not knowing a lawsuit had been filed, the Forest Service awarded a contract for the Garver timber sale to Riley Creek Lumber Co. - which bid $1.3 million over the advertised price of $230,000. Filed by Alliance for the Wild Rockies and The Lands Council, the complaint seeks to stop the Garver sale on grounds it violates the Clean Water Act and destroys habitat for species that depend on old-growth trees...House Conferees Backpedal on Protection of Public Lands Conferees from the House and Senate voted last night to reject attempts to protect national parks and monuments, wildlife refuges, and wilderness areas from a Bush Administration rule that could turn cow paths and jeep tracks into thousands of miles of bulldozed highways. The joint House-Senate FY 2004 Interior Appropriations Conference approved a conference report that fails to include a bipartisan House provision aimed at limiting a controversial Bush administration regulation. This House provision would have limited the Bush administration from moving forward with efforts to allow BLM to recognize rights-of-way across public lands where there are now little more than footpaths. The Interior Department funding bill now goes back to both houses for final passage...Environmental group plans to sue agency The Blue Mountain Biodiversity Project plans to sue the U.S. Forest Service to stop a large-scale thinning and logging project in the Metolius Basin, according to the environmental group's executive director. Karen Coulter said Monday that her group would file a lawsuit in U.S. District Court because the federal agency denied the organization's appeal of the project. That denial was issued Oct. 17. Coulter said the lawsuit would seek to prohibit the Forest Service from allowing large and old-growth trees to be logged and to prevent the agency from allowing activities that could harm soil productivity...Congress feels heat on logging proposals The wind-whipped wildfires scorching Southern California are providing momentum for legislation moving through Congress to speed thinning of dense forests and brush on public lands throughout California and the West. The fast-moving blazes that have already consumed more than 400,000 acres, destroyed 1,100 homes and claimed at least 13 lives are being cited as exhibit A by advocates of President Bush's "Healthy Forests Initiative" as well as by those supporting a compromise proposal being pushed by California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein to thin at least 20 million acres of land at high risk of a catastrophic fire. On Friday, even before the wildfires raged out of control, House Resources Chairman Richard Pombo, R-Tracy, urged the Senate to "wake up and smell the smoke" and rally behind a House-passed bill that encompasses much of Bush's original proposal to limit administrative appeals and court challenges for logging and brush-clearing projects. But critics say they fear the hysteria over deadly wildfires in California will help gain approval for a bill that could increase logging in old-growth forest areas and curtail the rights of citizens to challenge Forest Service decisions...Environmentalists suspicious over Bush's Healthy Forest plan "They're working on public fear that a big, catastrophic fire is going to come eat my home," said Deb Robison, a Sierra Club organizer in Boulder, Colo. "The problem is, this won't really protect people's homes." Environmentalists sense a logging giveaway. They accuse the administration of eliminating the threat of forest fires by cutting down forests. And they contend that the fuel-reduction approach is going largely to the wrong places. Rather than thin the woods close to developed areas, they say, Bush is opening too much of the backcountry. Logging there will bring more roads into more wilderness, they say, and bring more fire-starting human activity into the backcountry...Column:Greens' blues over Bush off key A prime example just arrived in the mail from actor Robert Redford on behalf of the Natural Resources Defense Council. Redford's fund-raising letter accuses Bush of "waging a sweeping attack on our environmental laws," of "cynical new policies ... (that) will enrich giant corporations even as they increase pollution and destroy some of our most treasured wild lands" and of "allow(ing) 17,000 of the nation's worst polluters to spew more toxic chemicals into our air and harm the health of millions of Americans." When the administration recently announced possible removal of Endangered Species Act protection for Oregon coastal coho salmon because of the species' return to Oregon rivers in record numbers, the National Wildlife Federation accused Bush of "abrogating responsibility" while the Native Fish Society called it "a political fix." The Greens' hatred for Bush's environmental programs is no mystery. To them, Clinton-Gore -- with Bruce Babbitt at Interior -- ranks as the all-time dream-team of environmental politics. So close was the partnership between Clinton-Gore and the vast network of eco-activist organizations that no appreciable differences in their agendas are detectable. Now, viewed from the far left end of the environmental spectrum, each of Bush's programs to balance environmental protection with concern for the lives and livelihoods of people is regarded, and portrayed to the public, as a radical departure from the glory days of Clinton-Gore...Plan to save endangered toad hailed as 'astute compromise' The endangered Houston toad is making more friends among the pines and sandy soil east of Austin. They include weekend farmers and other residents of Bastrop County who have helped compile a conservation plan to save the palm-size amphibian from extinction. A two-volume, 300-page Lost Pines habitat conservation plan compiled by a 15-member citizens' work group is under review by the county attorney's office. By April, it is expected to be submitted to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The agency is responsible under the federal Endangered Species Act for ensuring the survival of the 3.5-inch-long amphibian...Guinn urges panel to finish sage grouse plan Gov. Kenny Guinn urged a state panel Tuesday to complete a conservation plan to protect sage grouse in Nevada before a possible listing by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service under the Endangered Species Act. Guinn appointed the committee made up of representatives of various interest groups and government agencies in 2000 and charged them with developing a conservation strategy to protect the birds and their sagebrush habitat...Rare sighting: Ranchers and farmers join efforts to save a bird Ken Morgan knows it isn't often that significant conservation deals begin with dozens of cups of coffee sipped around kitchen tables in farm country. But with the possibility of yet another species being added to the federal protected list, biologist Morgan asked a smattering of farmers to consider an unusual proposition: Identify, and then acknowledge that endangered mountain plovers nest on their land. In a surprising move of cooperation, the overall-clad agrarians agreed, even if it meant environmentalists could someday use the information against them to justify increased regulation of their land as plover habitat. In this litigious era when the fate of more and more species is being decided in courtrooms, the idea of farmers and ranchers willingly divulging the location of rare animals on the back 40 might seem counterintuitive...Park Service will study 'parasite' bird The National Park Service at Grand Canyon plans to study the possibility of trapping a species of bird that causes problems because it lays eggs in the nests of other birds -- namely the endangered southwestern willow flycatcher. Grand Canyon Deputy Superintendent Kate Cannon recently wrote a letter to the Center for Biological Diversity to let it know that the Park Service would conduct a environmental analysis of capturing and removing brown-headed cowbirds. The analysis also will examine other alternatives. The Center wrote the Grand Canyon superintendent in August, critical of the park for ignoring recommendations of a 1996 report that suggested the cowbird was causing problems for the endangered species...Authorities kill 3rd male wolf For the third time, a male wolf joining the Green River pack in Wyoming has had to be killed because of depredations on livestock in the area. The pack, which roams southwest of Grand Teton National Park, has had a consistent alpha female but a revolving door when it comes to male leadership. Federal Wildlife Services, working with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, has had to shoot three males that have joined the pack successively -- each entering the picture when another is removed...Man sought after assault on ranger One man has been arrested and the search for another continued this morning in connection with shooting at a U.S. Bureau of Land Management ranger in the Red Hills area west of Jamestown yesterday. John James Heller, 20, booked on suspicion of drug possession, remained in custody this morning in lieu of $10,000 bail...Column: Horse (Non) Sense Wild horses is an oxymoron. Wild equines did evolve in the Western Hemisphere, but they also started going extinct here millions of years ago. The last native, truly wild horses vanished from North America in advance of mammoths, camels, and even lumbering giant ground sloths. The two species of so-called wild horse and donkey at large on our prairies, plains, and deserts today were never originally on this continent but are the result of Spaniards' and prospectors' losing their livestock -- or cutting it loose to get rid of it. These feral horses and donkeys are about as wild as stray cats and park pigeons. Like many feral animals, they are whizzes at exploiting newfound habitats. As anyone who has ever followed a parade can testify, they are blessed with "straight-through" digestive systems that let them flourish on a high-fiber, low-nutrient diet. They can reproduce at an annual rate of 15 percent, potentially doubling their population every five years. And predators have never represented a threat: In the early 1800s, when it was seemingly possible to walk (rather briskly, to be sure) on the backs of wolves and grizzly bears from the Mississippi to the Pacific, feral horses were estimated to number 2 million...BLM boosts bonds for oil, gas wells Under the proposed rules, oil and gas companies will have to pay $20,000 in bonds for wells they drill in a particular lease areas. This is double the current rate of $10,000. Bonds for statewide leases, or for wells drilled in federal lands within a particular state, would jump three times to $75,000 from the current rate of $25,000. Bonds for nationwide leases, however, would remain unchanged at $150,000...Column: SUWA on the Defense: Rich Enviro Group Things must be heating up in southern Utah. A rich, Salt Lake City-based environmental group has charged into the middle of recent events involving Kane County’s push for equal treatment of road signage in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument (GSENM). On Saturday, all Garfield and Kane County post office box holders received an arrogant letter from the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA), informing them that their elected county officials “took actions that lack common sense and may not be in your best interest.” It looks like SUWA is attempting to instill fear into the hearts of private property owners, a large segment of those who received the mailing, by suggesting that the Federal R.S. 2477 law might someday encroach upon them by building a road across their land. SUWA, an environmental organization that has fought legal application of R.S. 2477 for years, deliberately ignores the fact that R.S. 2477 relates to rights-of-way “over public lands”, not over private lands...Park Service Studying Hacienda Casino Purchase The National Park Service has sought for decades to purchase the Hacienda casino, located within what is now the Lake Mead National Recreation Area along U.S. Highway 93 west of Boulder City and long considered an aberration at the entrance to one of the most-visited parks in the nation. After decades of waiting, the Park Service may now have its chance. The owners of the Hacienda Hotel & Casino have recently approached Lake Mead officials about possibly selling the property, an action that has triggered a government-funded appraisal and hazardous materials review of the site that is expected by March, National Park Service spokeswoman Roxanne Dey said...Saving suckers with a shock Endangered suckers still lingering in the A Canal are in for a shock. An electric shock. Fishery biologists with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation last week began to "salvage" suckers trapped in the receding waters of the A Canal, which was shut off for the season on Oct. 15. The operation involves sending an electric current through a pool of water, which harmlessly stuns the fish and sends them floating to the top. The fish are then gathered up and carted by pickup to Upper Klamath Lake so they don't dry up with the canal, stay trapped in isolated pools or become lunch for a gull, said Rich Piaskowski, a fishery biologist with the Bureau...Make Way for Buffalo This forlorn farm town — Rawson, population 6 — is a fine place to contemplate the boldest idea in America today: rescuing the rural Great Plains by returning much of it to a vast "Buffalo Commons." The result would be the world's largest nature park, drawing tourists from all over the world to see parts of 10 states alive again with buffalo, elk, grizzlies and wolves. Restoring a large chunk of the plains — which cover nearly one-fifth of the lower 48 states — to their original state may also be the best way to revive local economies and keep hamlets like Rawson from becoming ghost towns. It sounds cruel to say so, but towns like Rawson are a reminder that the oversettlement of the Great Plains has turned out to be a 150-year-long mistake, one of the longest-running and most costly errors in American history. Families struggled for generations to survive droughts and blizzards, then finally gave up and moved on. You can buy a home out here for $3,000, and you can sometimes rent one for nothing at all if you promise to mow the lawn and keep up the house. The rural parts of the Great Plains are emptying, and in some cases reverting to wilderness...PETA plans shareholder campaign against restaurant company An animal-rights group that has pressured fast-food companies is turning its attention to Brinker International Inc., owner of casual-dining chains including Chili's. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals said Tuesday it has bought 110 shares of Brinker to pressure the company on the raising and slaughter of animals used to fill the restaurants' menus. PETA said owning the shares would give it the right to speak at shareholder meetings and offer resolutions calling for tougher standards for animal care...R-CALF cautiously optimistic on COOL rules The mandatory country of origin labeling (COOL) rules released Monday by USDA were met with cautious optimism by the cattle association that helped write the law in the 2002 Farm Bill. Leo McDonnell, President of R-CALF United Stockgrowers of America (R-CALF USA) said the group's preliminary analysis of the rules reveals significant improvements over the voluntary guidelines released by USDA last November, but there are still some issues that need to be addressed. "For the most part, the process is working as USDA has clarified and corrected a number of deficiencies contained in its first draft," he said. McDonnell said the improvements indicate USDA has listened to industry concerns and has taken steps to address these concerns in a meaningful way...50% Chance Of Australian/US FTA The chances of finishing an Australian-U.S. free trade agreement were described as "better than 50 percent" Sunday by Australian Trade Minister Mark Vaile. Vaile also defended AWB Ltd. -- the former Australian Wheat Board -- against charges it may have been involved in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein's government in Iraq under an Oil For Food contract for Australian wheat with unusually high prices, as was first reported on DTN. Told by an interviewer on the Australian television program Sunday Sunrise that if the FTA is not signed by Christmas, the consensus is the deal won't be done, Vaile said, "[I] still think it's probably better than 50 percent, but it's very hard to tell. It's a very comprehensive and complex negotiation. We have been given a short time frame to do it in by comparison to other negotiations. It's a matter now of matching the political will with the energy from our negotiating teams and focusing on finding answers to some of the more sensitive issues."...