NEWS ROUNDUP

New split-estate law expected to be tested later this month Johnson County rancher Steve Adami will be the first landowner to challenge an oil and gas operator under Wyoming's split-estate law when he goes before the state Oil and Gas Conservation Commission Dec. 13 in Casper. In a Nov. 2 letter, Adami asked the commission to take potential environmental costs associated with off-channel water pits into consideration when it establishes bonds that Gillette-based Kennedy Oil must pay for natural gas developments on his ranch east of Buffalo. “The appeal to the Oil and Gas Commission is not whether to build the pits but whether the bonds are adequate,” Adami told The News-Record on Monday. Owner John Kennedy maintains his right to access minerals supersedes Adami's claims, which he said were off-base and unrelated to the split-estate law. “I'm afraid they don't understand the split-estate bill themselves,” he said Tuesday. “This has nothing to do, nothing with spit estate. “Mineral estate is just as much of an estate as a surface estate,” he said. “I have leased those minerals and have every right to develop them.” Kennedy Oil has posted $500 of bonding with the commission under the split-estate act for the off-channel pits that will be used for water from the wells, said Ruth Reile, who operates the permit for Kennedy Oil. Adami said the bonding is too low and wants the bonding level closer to $100,000 per well, a figure Kennedy said is too high....
Legislators to gather comments on booming oil industry Oil is booming in eastern Montana, and a legislative subcommittee wants to hear what residents think about how the industry is regulated. Issues open to public comment at the meeting include reclamation and bonding for oil and gas operations and how to handle split estates, the situation that arises when one party owns surface rights to land and another party owns the mineral rights below the property. The subcommittee of the Environmental Quality Council was created by the passage of House Bill 790 during the last legislature. The study resolution won approval after the failure of proposed legislation related to split estates coal bed methane. About two hours are set aside for public comment on: # Suggested procedures and timelines for operators, if any, to provide notice to surface owners of impending mineral development. # Proposed minimum provisions, if any, for surface use agreements, including but not limited to the road development, onsite water impoundments and the disposal of produced water. # Suggested measures, if any, for addressing disputed damage estimates between operators and surface owners. # Proposed bonding requirements, if any....
Ranchers upset by approved wolf plan Oregon Fish and Wildlife commissioners voted Thursday to approve a state wolf-management plan without the additional protections that livestock owners said they need. Livestock owners want the right to kill a wolf that threatens their sheep or cattle and state-funded compensation for livestock losses. However, commissioners cannot take those actions on their own; the changes must be put into law. Despite legislators not passing laws during the 2005 session to help livestock owners, the commissioners plan to fight to get the laws passed in 2007. Wildlife experts predict wolves that cross into Oregon from Idaho soon will establish packs....
House's mining-land plan hits stiff resistance The organization that represents Colorado counties is opposing a congressional proposal to let mining companies buy public land, fearing it could lead to widespread rural development. "This would open the possibility of every little mining claim being developed without regard for land-use patterns," said Colorado Counties Inc. executive director Larry Kallenberger. Kallenberger said the recommendation to the CCI board was made by mountain and Western Slope counties. Also, Aspen Skiing Co. this week became the first ski resort company to oppose the measure, citing fears it would damage pristine landscapes. And Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo., has come out against the measure, saying development could block access to public lands for hunters and anglers....
Column: No More Wilderness, Forever? Has anybody else noticed that we have had no new Wilderness designations in the northern Rockies (Idaho, Montana or Wyoming) for decades? In fact, the last wilderness designated in anywhere in the three-state region was 1984 when the Wyoming Wilderness Act passed and protected several small areas. In Montana, we have to go back to 1983 when the Lee Metcalf Wilderness Act passed. And in Idaho, the last bill passed was the River of No Return Wilderness Act of 1980—twenty-five years ago! The northern Rockies has around 20 million acres deserving consideration for Wilderness, but we’ve gone twenty-one years without a single acre of land being designated under the Wilderness Act of 1964. Even worse, state and national Wilderness groups have few active efforts to officially propose new Wilderness. Have we given up on Wilderness? If not, what’s the problem? No, we haven’t given up, and the problem is politics....
Three indicted again in Sabino mountain lion hunt Two environmental activists and a journalist once again have been charged with interfering with efforts to capture mountain lions in Sabino Canyon. Rodney A. Coronado and Matthew A. Crozier of Earth First! and writer John H. Richardson were indicted Wednesday by a federal grand jury on three charges related to the March 2004 mountain lion hunt. The indictment was made public today. The three were previously indicted for interfering with the hunt, but the charges were dismissed because a deputy forest supervisor didn't have the authority to close Coronado National Forest. According to the new indictment, even though the forest was not legally closed, Coronado, Crozier and Richardson believed it was and continued to thwart the mountain lion hunt on several occasions....
Column: National Park Service is Being Skinned from the Inside-Out When Steve Martin, the former Grand Teton National Park Superintendent who now serves as the National Park Service’s Deputy Director in Washington, D.C, appeared recently before a panel of U.S. senators, he struggled mightily to pass the red-face test. But I sympathize with the compromised position he was placed in. Coming under intense bi-partisan scrutiny lead by U.S. Sens. Craig Thomas, a Wyoming Republican, and Ken Salazar, a Colorado Democrat, he claimed that some of the controversial changes written in to the National Park Service’s operating manual may have been “inadvertent.” As in, they happened by accident. As in, they just slipped by or were typos. As in, even though the changes would radically alter the primary mission of America’s most beloved government agency, which is charged with protecting our crown jewel wildlands, they were added by some strange occurrence of alchemy. The bald-faced truth is that nothing about the overhaul of the Park Service’s operating manual was done without radical deliberateness executed by former Cody Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Paul Hoffman....
Toxic Residue of Hurricane Stirs Debate on Habitation The debate over whether the toxic discharges that swept over New Orleans and St. Bernard Parish after Hurricane Katrina have left the area unfit for human habitation reignited on Thursday, as state environmental officials and local environmental and citizens' groups accused one another of misinterpreting data. A toxicologist for the State of Louisiana said in an interview Thursday that about 95 percent of the city was fit for long-term human habitation. A few hours earlier, representatives of local environmental and citizens' groups, citing samples the government collected from the sediment in once-flooded areas and their own samples, said at a news conference that without an extensive cleanup of toxic sediments, at least 75 percent of the city was unfit for families with children. Asked whether the city was safe enough for people to return for the long term, Tom Coleman, a Superfund specialist at the Dallas regional office of the Environmental Protection Agency working in New Orleans, replied: "We haven't said that. And we're not going to say that. Safety is a very difficult concept. For our agency to make that declaration, that would be somewhat of an absolute, and these are not absolute situations." But, Mr. Coleman added, "Within the world of chemical contamination, we're not seeing levels of contaminants that are causing us a lot of concern." He said there were a couple of locations that needed further study....
'Red tape,' projects leave marsh dry Public agencies have steered millions of dollars into buying and improving McNabney Marsh, near the foot of the Benicia Bridge, as a place for birds and wildlife to live and for people to enjoy watching them. But for the second year in a row, the marsh visible to thousands of daily commuters on Interstate 680 was dry when migratory birds flew in from the north looking for a food and rest stop. A Caltrans drainage project and concerns over an endangered marsh mouse delayed plans to refill the marsh this year. Some conservationists are growing impatient with the wait for fixing the marsh so it can stay wet year around. The federal Army Corps of Engineers decided it wouldn't approve the dredging until scientists survey the marsh for endangered species like the endangered salt marsh harvest mouse. The tiny rodent, which scampers between picklewood plants in brackish marshes, was spotted in McNabney Marsh years ago....
Suit targets resort restoration An environmental organization has filed a lawsuit against the city and against American Development Group, challenging the environmental study done for the Arrowhead Springs restoration project. The Tucson, Ariz.-based Center for Biological Diversity says in its lawsuit, filed Thursday in San Bernardino Superior Court, that the city and the developer haven't adequately investigated the presence of endangered species on the site or the effects of the project on the habitat for those species. The lawsuit also questions the safety of the project, for people as well as for animals. The area is surrounded by forest, the lawsuit says, and very little buffer is planned between fire-prone timber and the occupied structures....Don't you see how it works? First file suit or lobby to stop logging or thinning projects, then file suit against development on private property becasue it is next to a dangerous forest....
Park grizzlies do OK despite drop in trout Munching on cutthroat trout used to be a lot easier for grizzly bears that hung around the fringes of Yellowstone Lake. Back in the days before predatory lake trout mysteriously showed up, bears in Yellowstone National Park had gamely plucked spawning Yellowstone cutthroat trout in the spring and early summer. But now that the protein-packed Yellowstone cutthroat trout is in serious decline - park officials said in a recent publication that it "appears to be in peril" - fewer bears are feeding off the lake's tributaries. When they do feed, it's more likely the males that get the meal. Those are some of the results of two studies trying to determine the effects of the dropping Yellowstone cutthroat population on grizzlies that live in the park. So far, though, it doesn't look like the dwindling supply of cutthroats is having a discernible effect on the park's grizzly population, according to Mark Haroldson, a U.S. Geological Survey grizzly researcher....
Judge: Lawsuit challenging salmon policy can go forward A federal judge Wednesday refused to dismiss a challenge to a new Bush administration policy of considering hatchery-raised salmon and steelhead when determining whether wild stocks need protection. The policy, which took effect in June, has been controversial, with environmental groups and even government-appointed scientists arguing that only wild populations of fish should be weighed in decisions about whether to list them under the Endangered Species Act. Salmon raised in hatcheries lack the long-term survival capabilities of wild fish that have evolved over millions of years, they say. “The Hatchery Listing Policy is arbitrary, capricious, contrary to best available science,” Earthjustice lawyers Kristen Boyles and Patti Goldman wrote in a lawsuit against the National Marine Fisheries Service this summer. “It reverses the position taken by the agency in its prior policies without adequate explanation; and it is not a product of rational decisionmaking.” The Justice Department asked U.S. District Judge John C. Coughenour to toss the lawsuit in late September, saying the environmental groups, led by Virginia-based Trout Unlimited, did not have legal grounds to challenge the policy. Coughenour rejected that request Wednesday and said the lawsuit can proceed....
Federal agency OKs sheep trail closures A federal agency Thursday approved the closure of some Coachella Valley hiking trails and the construction of new ones to protect endangered bighorn sheep. The trails are in or near the Dead Indian Canyon and Carrizo Canyon areas, where there are only three or four female bighorn sheep, said Jim Foote, an outdoor recreation planner in the federal Bureau of Land Management office in Palm Springs. The trail sections affected are on federally owned property west of Highway 74 and south of Palm Desert. Joan Taylor, conservation chairwoman of the Sierra Club's Tahquitz group, said the decision struck a good balance between protecting sheep and giving recreational hikers access to trails. But Chuck Nisbet, president of the Coachella Valley Hiking Club and the Desert Trails Coalition, said there's no evidence closing the trail segments will help sheep....
Miracle in the wilderness Every day is a good day for Amy Racina. It wasn't always that way, but crashing 60 feet into a granite ravine changed her perspective. Racina of Healdsburg, a seasoned backpacker, was on a solo trip two years ago in the Tehipite Valley, a seldom-visited area of Kings Canyon National Park, which is in the southern end of the Sierra Nevada directly east of Fresno. She was 12 days into a 162-mile trip when she lost the trail she was on. As she carefully crisscrossed down the valley looking for the trail, the ground suddenly gave way and she found herself careering through the air. "So this is how it ends," she thought in the seconds before she slammed into a granite ravine. The fall nearly killed Racina, but the miracle -- the first of many -- was that it didn't. Racina has published a book recounting her rescue and arduous recovery. "Angels in the Wilderness" ($24.95, Elite Books in Santa Rosa), is titled for the three hikers who saved her life after they came upon her even though she had been off-trail when she fell in a remote area visited only by a handful of people each season....
New parks policy would give private donors more recognition The Interior Department is poised to begin naming benches, bricks and rooms in national parks after private donors, a practice that critics say sends mixed signals about industry influence on public lands policy. Park Service officials say the new guidelines, which could be approved by early next year, would simply make it easier for the agency to recognize corporations and individuals who are already giving. Names already appear on plaques around parks, but the new policy would make donors more prominent. Corporate logos would be forbidden in most cases, officials say. ‘‘We hope to create a positive tone for philanthropy,’’ said John Piltzecker, chief of the parks’ partnership office. The guidelines, which will be reviewed again by the agency after the public comment period closes next week, would also allow some high-level employees to solicit donations....
Decatur cowboy chasing all-around title Trevor Brazile of Decatur will attempt to earn his fourth consecutive world all-around title at the 47th National Finals Rodeo, the sport's most prominent show, which begins its 10-day run tonight in Las Vegas. In the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association world all-around standings, Brazile leads Ryan Jarrett, $175,945 to $148,947. Cash Myers is third with $136,347. Brazile has qualified in tie-down roping and team roping. Jarrett is competing in tie-down roping and steer wrestling. Myers made the cut in steer wrestling....
Thousands cash in behind scenes of 10-day event ESPN's television cameras won't focus on Ted Groene during the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo's 10-day run at the Thomas & Mack Center. The 44-year-old cowboy's competitive days have passed. Now he labors outside the bright arena lights in a cold, pungent place where no champion's gold belt buckle shines. But without workers such as Groene -- who is NFR's livestock superintendent -- Las Vegas couldn't benefit from this month's projected $43 million cash cow. And Groene is proud to help make the rodeo a success, even if few outsiders appreciate the efforts of his 11-person crew. "We're not here for the money," said Groene, a burly Californian who lost one eye to a bull years ago. "The money is nothing compared to what the competitors receive. "But this job is all about the chance to be around rodeo." Groene's behind-the-scenes saga isn't unique....
Idaho cowboy takes hard road to Vegas Zeb Lanham is in Las Vegas today, where he'll work no more than eight seconds a day for the next 10 days. If all goes as planned, he hopes to win at least $50,000. A get-rich-quick scheme in Sin City? Nope — the National Finals Rodeo. Lanham is a 21-year-old bullrider who lives on a 160-acre ranch northeast of Sweet, a tiny Gem County town between Emmett and Horseshoe Bend. He is the only Treasure Valley cowboy to qualify for the biggest rodeo of the year. He's 14th in the world standings — only the top 15 in each of seven events are invited to the NFR. It's a moment Lanham has been waiting for since he was 5, when he first jumped on a calf at a small rodeo in Garden Valley....