NEWS ROUNDUP

Bush calls for sell-off of Western public land President Bush wants to sell more public land across the West to raise money for schools, conservation and deficit reduction. Bush's proposed 2007 federal budget, sent to Congress on Monday, calls for granting the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management new authority to sell off land. Those agencies together control hundreds of millions of acres in Western states. "We have 350,000 acres of small, isolated tracts that are difficult to manage and no longer serve National Forest System needs," said Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, who oversees the Forest Service. He also said the agency adds more than 100,000 acres a year. The Forest Service proposes selling 150,000 to 200,000 acres to raise $800 million over five years. The agency is trying to maintain a program that supported rural schools with timber proceeds but ran into financial trouble when logging declined. The BLM doesn't have an estimate of how many acres it might sell under the plan, but it expects to sell land worth $40 million to $50 million per year. Some of the money would go to BLM conservation programs, but at least 70 percent would go to the Treasury. Neither agency has said what lands it expects to sell, but the Forest Service is expected to post a list of potential sites on its website by Friday....
Coyote controversy The coyote’s mischief and persistence have sometimes been played for laughs, as in the American Indian trickster tales or, more recently, “Road Runner” cartoons. Local farmers aren’t laughing. Especially not now. There are more coyotes than ever before in Benton County, said sheep ranchers, who added that they’re facing more problems from the wild canines. “Twenty years ago, we didn’t hardly have any at all,” said Dennis Gray, who farms near Adair Village. “It was really rare to see a coyote. I see two to three coyotes per day out here now,” he said. In the last three weeks, he’s shot a dozen of the varmints, who were snacking on voles flushed out or drowned by recent flooding. Rancher David Horning, who has about 800 ewes near Bellfountain, said he expects to lose about 100 lambs per birthing season to coyotes, or nearly $15,000 worth. “They’ve just hammered me,” he said. He added that it was most depressing when coyotes killed several sheep but ate only one. “They do it for fun for the most part.”....
Inquiry of OSU study flap urged A Washington Democrat wants an inspector general's investigation into whether the federal government suspended funding for an Oregon State University study because it undermined the Bush administration's position on logging. U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., said in a Tuesday letter to the Interior Department's inspector general that he is concerned the funding was frozen "to punish researchers for reporting findings that are unpopular with the administration." Aides to Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said he has also inquired about the cutoff of funding. The Oregon office of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, an Interior agency, suspended the funding after a team of scientists from OSU and the U.S. Forest Service published a report last month in Science, a top research journal. They concluded that logging after the 2002 Biscuit fire in southwest Oregon set back the natural recovery of forests and littered the ground with tinder. The lead author of the research was Daniel Donato, a graduate student in OSU's College of Forestry. His professor, Beverly Law, was the senior author....
Montana methane wells target private, state holdings Pete Schoonmaker, president and CEO of Pinnacle Gas Resources Inc., believes in getting in, getting the job done and getting out. That's why things are little hectic in southeastern Montana this winter. Taking advantage of dry conditions, Pinnacle is in the midst of drilling 204 new coal-bed methane wells, building roads and digging trenches for gas and water pipelines all at once in its project area east of the Tongue River Reservoir. By spring, Pinnacle plans to begin producing natural gas found in the coal seams. The new wells are a major expansion to its initial 16-well pilot project near the reservoir. Pinnacle and two other companies, Fidelity Exploration and Production Co. and Powder River Gas LLC, are in various stages of developing their state and private leases in Montana. Activity on federal minerals is at a standstill because of legal challenges. The lawsuits have slowed another firm, Billings-based Nance Petroleum Corp., which has a federal lease, from expanding its Wyoming project into Montana....
Cleanup of salt water spill continues Crews in northwestern North Dakota are still working to clean up a salt water leak estimated at more than 900,000 gallons, a month after it was discovered, a state health official says. "We're seeing improvement. We're hoping by the end of this week, we should pretty much have it wrapped up," Dennis Fewless, the state Health Department's director of water quality, said Monday. State officials said the leak was discovered Jan. 4, from a Zenergy Inc. pipeline about six miles west of Alexander, near Charbonneau Creek. Salt water is a waste product of oil production that can kill vegetation and hurt livestock. Oil companies pipe it underground to dispose of it. Ranchers in the area were advised to move their livestock after the leak. The creek flows into the Yellowstone River....
Grand Mesa gas drilling will proceed Drilling for natural gas can go forward on the north edge of Grand Mesa, the Bureau of Land Management decided Tuesday. BLM officials will go ahead with the sale, scheduled for Thursday, because of relationships with local officials already in place, said BLM spokeswoman Theresa Sauer. The Grand Junction and Palisade governing boards opposed the leases because of fears they could harm their watersheds on the mesa. “We’re not going to allow a drill rig that’s obviously going to damage the watershed, and we’re not going to allow drilling where it might damage the watershed,” Sauer said. If adequate arrangements can’t be worked out with industry, leases will be withdrawn, she said....
Eco-Activists Fight the 'Terrorist' Label In an attempt to shield private property and development from saboteurs, business lobbyists are pushing new laws that would further criminalize the actions of radical ecological activists. Government officials and corporations are applying the rubric of anti-terrorism to penalize those who destroy company or government property when protesting mistreatment of animals and the ecosystem. Last month, federal grand juries in Oregon and California indicted 11 people on various conspiracy charges for their alleged involvement in the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) or the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) -- underground groups responsible for dozens of acts of property destruction as a strategy for protecting vulnerable species. While some federal officials and media reports liken the defendants to domestic terrorists, others, including some legal experts and free-speech groups, say the label is an intentional misnomer without legal basis....
Calif. wildfire sparked by controlled burn A 6,500-acre fire that triggered evacuations of more than 2,000 Southern California homes apparently was ignited by remnants of a controlled forest burn that escaped, a U.S. Forest Service official said Tuesday. Despite gusty Santa Ana winds, no homes had been lost in the blaze in northeastern Orange County. Evacuation orders were lifted Tuesday afternoon, and Chief Rich Hawkins of the Cleveland National Forest apologized to those displaced from neighborhoods in the cities of Orange and Anaheim about 35 miles southeast of Los Angeles. "I am very regretful of the situation I find myself in tonight," Hawkins told reporters. "The fact that nobody's home has burned down and no one's been killed, that's a godsend." The wildfire was 10 percent contained, but the dry winds were forecast to continue through Wednesday. Hawkins said fire crews ignited a prescribed burn last Thursday in a 10-acre forest area near Sierra Peak, and at the time no Santa Ana winds were predicted for at least five days....
Prairie dog won't find shelter on endangered list Efforts to have the Gunnison's prairie dog listed as an endangered species have been rebuffed, at least for now. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Tuesday that information presented by groups advocating protection was insufficient to warrant more detailed consideration of protections for the animal. The Gunnison's prairie dog scampers about the Four Corners region, including southwestern Colorado, and is distinct from the black-tailed prairie dog found along the Front Range. The announcement by federal wildlife officials comes just more than a year after the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance, Forest Guardians and other green groups sued the Fish and Wildlife Service, arguing that the agency had dragged its feet on determining whether the Gunnison's prairie dog needed protection under the Endangered Species Act....
Feds Move to Protect Polar Bears Amid concerns that global warming is melting away the icy habitats where polar bears live, the federal government is reviewing whether they should be considered a threatened species. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Tuesday that protection may be warranted under the Endangered Species Act, and began a review process to consider if the bears should be listed. The agency will seek information about population distribution, habitat, effects of climate change on the bears and their prey, potential threats from development, contaminants and poaching during the next 60 days....
Schweitzer takes first snowmobile trip through park Gov. Brian Schweitzer took his first snowmobile ride through Yellowstone National Park Tuesday, and immediately promised to do all he can to promote snowmobiling in the park. "I'll use the bully pulpit I've got," he said. "I'll talk about the great experience I've had." Schweitzer, a Democrat, rode from here to Old Faithful and back on a trip organized by Bill Howell, a partner in one of the large snowmobile rental shops. He said the park was uncrowded, the bison, elk and swans he passed seemed unconcerned and "I didn't see any clouds of exhaust." He rode one of the new "cleaner, quieter" machines that are allowed into the park under a temporary plan, then met with a group of West Yellowstone civic and business leaders....
Justice Alito's Green Day The first time he takes the bench later this month, new Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito Jr. will face a baptism -- not by fire but by water. Three cases challenging the scope of the Clean Water Act will be argued Feb. 21, testing themes of federalism and commerce clause power that were much at issue during Alito's confirmation hearings. The cases have environmentalists worried about how Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. will ultimately come down. "These are probably the most important environmental cases in a decade and will be an enormous test of the two new justices," says Douglas Kendall of the Community Rights Counsel, which filed a brief in two of the cases. The environmental cases, more than any other coming soon, will spotlight issues that got Democrats upset during Alito's contentious hearings last month. In two of the cases, Rapanos v. United States and Carabell v. United States Army Corps of Engineers, the issue is whether, under the commerce clause, the Clean Water Act protects certain wetlands that are adjacent to tributaries of navigable waters covered by the law. In the third case, S.D. Warren Co. v. Maine Board of Environmental Protection, the justices will decide whether the mere fact that a river flows through a dam produces a "discharge" that triggers federal jurisdiction under the act. In all three cases, the Bush administration is arguing for a broad view that would preserve a "landmark" law that is "a permissible exercise of Congress' power," in the words of Solicitor General Paul Clement, who will argue the cases himself....
County supervisors plan to abandon conservation program In the mid-1990s, San Bernardino County set out to satisfy local developers and federal officials with a countywide plan to save endangered species from extinction. A decade later, the plan itself is pushing up daisies, and neither environmentalists nor developers are happy. This morning, the county Board of Supervisors was expected to formally abandon its bid to create a Multi Species Habitat Conservation Plan, a regional agreement with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that would have earmarked some county land as habitats for endangered species, including the San Bernardino kangaroo rat and the Delhi Sands flower-loving fly. In exchange, developers in other areas would have been able to build with fewer environmental restrictions. The county¹s new move is not unexpected. County officials frequently tangled with Fish and Wildlife over the reach of the habitat-conservation program as well as its cost, and supervisors put the program on hold in 2002....
86 Evangelical Leaders Join to Fight Global Warming Despite opposition from some of their colleagues, 86 evangelical Christian leaders have decided to back a major initiative to fight global warming, saying "millions of people could die in this century because of climate change, most of them our poorest global neighbors." Among signers of the statement, which will be released in Washington on Wednesday, are the presidents of 39 evangelical colleges, leaders of aid groups and churches, like the Salvation Army, and pastors of megachurches, including Rick Warren, author of the best seller "The Purpose-Driven Life." The statement calls for federal legislation that would require reductions in carbon dioxide emissions through "cost-effective, market-based mechanisms" — a phrase lifted from a Senate resolution last year and one that could appeal to evangelicals, who tend to be pro-business. The statement, to be announced in Washington, is only the first stage of an "Evangelical Climate Initiative" including television and radio spots in states with influential legislators, informational campaigns in churches, and educational events at Christian colleges. Some of the nation's most high-profile evangelical leaders, however, have tried to derail such action. Twenty-two of them signed a letter in January declaring, "Global warming is not a consensus issue." Among the signers were Charles W. Colson, the founder of Prison Fellowship Ministries; James C. Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family; and Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention....
World has 7 years for key climate decisions: Blair The world has seven years to take vital decisions and implement measures to curb greenhouse gas emissions or it could be too late, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Tuesday. Blair said the battle against global warming would only be won if the United States, India and China were part of a framework that included targets and that succeeded the 1992 Kyoto Protocol climate pact. "If we don't get the right agreement internationally for the period after which the Kyoto protocol will expire -- that's in 2012 -- if we don't do that then I think we are in serious trouble," he told a parliamentary committee. Asked if the world had seven years to implement measures on climate change before the problem reached "tipping point," Blair answered: "Yes."
40 states re-examining eminent domain The city wants Anna DeFaria's home, and if she doesn't sell willingly, officials are going to take it from the 80-year-old retired pre-school teacher. In place of her "tiny slip of a bungalow" - and two dozen other weathered, working-class beachfront homes - city officials want private developers to build upscale townhouses. Is this the work of a cruel government? Or the best hope for resurrecting an ocean resort town that is finally showing signs of reviving after decades of hard times? After the court ruling, four states passed laws reining in eminent domain. Roughly another 40 are considering legislation. In Congress, the House voted to deny federal funds to any project that used eminent domain to benefit a private development, and a federal study aims to examine how widely it is used. The Washington-based Institute for Justice, a libertarian advocacy group that worked for homeowners in the New London case and in Long Branch, argues that state laws should be changed so property can only be seized for public uses like a park or a school - not urban redevelopment that benefits private developers....Go here for an interactive map of the states
Snakes for catching and for eating at round-up It may not be pretty or clean or even completely safe, but it’s a time-honored tradition that looks like it’s gaining momentum with time. For the 48th year, the Sweetwater Jaycees of Sweetwater will host the World’s Largest Rattlesnake Round-Up from March 9 to March 12. The weekend will start with a parade, queen contest and dance, then move to snake hunting sessions, snake milking demonstrations and a cook-off featuring rattlesnake meat. According to information from the Sweetwater Jaycees, the roundup began in 1958 when a group of area ranchers and farmers conceived of the idea to rid themselves and their livestock of rattlesnakes. To date, there have been more than 125 tons of Western diamondback Rattlesnakes turned in. Scott Fortin, Jaycee president, said that normally 20,000 to 30,000 people come to the event. Many vendors, demonstrations, a cook-off and several dances help draw people, he said. About 120 cooks participate in the cook-off, Fortin said. Many people akin rattlesnake to greasy chicken, Fortin said. “It tastes more like frog legs to me,” Fortin said....