NEWS

Roadless areas offered for drilling Parts of the White River National Forest and an adjacent forest that are currently designated as roadless areas could be opened up to drilling after an auction of oil and gas leases set for August. Some environmentalists say that would circumvent a state process designed to make recommendations to the federal government about which roadless areas should receive stiffer protections. With the state roadless task force set to meet in Glenwood Springs on Wednesday to discuss the White River National Forest, environmentalists are criticizing the decision by the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to offer up these parcels before the group's work is done. "The goal posts are moving," said Sloan Shoemaker, director of the Carbondale-based Wilderness Workshop, one of the groups that has been vocal in seeking to protect roadless areas from development....
Editorial: Restoring sanity to the Interior IN ONE OF HIS FIRST ACTS as Interior secretary, Dirk Kempthorne took the gratifying step of tossing out a proposal that would have ruined our national parks. Gone is language that would have opened them to mining and grazing as well as increased commercial development, snowmobiling and off-road-vehicle use. Restored is the National Parks Service's commitment to conservation. The parks were never intended for the mixed industrial and recreational uses commonly allowed on property under the Bureau of Land Management. Instead, their purpose is to preserve the nation's natural treasures as close to their original state as possible and to provide for recreation as long as it does not conflict with the main goal of conservation. On Monday, by announcing that he had rejected a management plan drafted under his predecessor, Gale Norton, Kempthorne returned to that original vision for the parks. It was a welcome and somewhat surprising move from the novice secretary who was no tree-hugger as a senator and governor from Idaho....
Ex-BLM firefighter pleads guilty to arson fires An ex-firefighter for the Bureau of Land Management pleaded guilty to setting three wildfires that burned hundreds of acres of national forest land in north-central Nevada last summer, federal prosecutors said Monday. Investigators alleged Mark E. Morgan of Reno started the fires that burned hundreds of acres of national forest land last August because he was bored and needed the paycheck, according to court documents. Morgan, 34, faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine, as well as being required to pay restitution for the damages to federal property, U.S. Attorney Daniel G. Bogden said. He entered the plea Thursday in U.S. District Court in Reno before Judge Edward C. Reed Jr., Bogden said in a statement Monday. Reed set sentencing for Oct. 23. Morgan was employed as a member of a BLM fire crew based in Austin at the time of the fires. He also had worked before fighting fires for the U.S. Forest Service....
Cutting edge niche When Aaron Nash moves through a thinning site, it’s obvious where he’s been and where he’s going: Sunlight illuminates the progress of his work while darkness shrouds what lays ahead. Nash brings light to practically any forest’s darkness, and makes a profit from it too — no matter what size the timber. “This little niche that I’m in, there’s a high demand,” Nash said of the small-diameter trees he harvests and has delivered to local markets. “We can sell all that stuff.” The niche of a one-man logger is making the most of a harvest site. Nash has figured that out, and has carved himself a corner of the timber market since starting his independent logging operation, Western Oregon Forest Management, nearly six years ago. “I’ve never not had a day of work,” said Nash, 38, of Curtin. A day of work for Nash is typically the thinning and harvest of another acre of trees. Cutting through the overcrowded understory of timber to promote old-growth characteristics and decrease fire fuels, Nash targets timber 3 inches in diameter and larger and designates its stock for particular markets....
BLM recommends lifting restrictions on millions of acres The federal Bureau of Land Management is recommending that Congress lift development restrictions on millions of acres of federal land in the state. In a report to Congress this month, BLM officials suggested lifting prohibitions on mining, oil and gas leasing, and other development on some large tracts. The restrictions were put in place in 1970s when the Interior Department secretary withdrew lands under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. Native corporations were selecting 44 million acres granted by that 1971 law. Also, state officials were choosing land Alaska received under the Statehood Act of 1958. Congress froze huge swaths of Alaska until that process was completed. Three decades later, Native corporations are still making selections, as are state officials. U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, got Congress to pass a bill two years ago to speed up the process. Part of the bill gave BLM a deadline to submit a report this month on what to do with any "left over" lands....
Opponents critical of natural gas pipeline Opponents are organizing against a proposed natural gas pipeline from Coos Bay to the Klamath Basin. “I’m here to stop the pipeline,” said Dennis Loper, a logger from Trail, told a crowd that packed a Grange hall near the path of the line in northern Jackson County. He said it would cross land owned by relatives in Jackson County, and involve the use of eminent domain. “These people here are gonna try to take your land whether you like it or not,” he said. Officials of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and of the companies proposing the pipeline said at the hearing last week that eminent domain would be used only as a last resort and involve easements, not taking the land outright. “We try to negotiate with people,” said Steve Potts, project manager for the Williams natural gas company. “We figure out what the fair market value is of an easement across their property and any construction inconveniences. We find we reach a settlement with a majority of property owners.”....
Archaeologists, courts debate artifacts' value In a case with ramifications for archaeological treasures across the West, the Justice Department is asking the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider a ruling that freed two men convicted of stealing ancient petroglyphs in Nevada. "There is a good deal at stake here," said Sherry Hutt, a former Superior Court judge from Arizona who has written books on the subject and now heads a related program at the National Park Service. The appellate court in San Francisco concluded in March the two accused looters clearly were guilty of stealing the boulders with rare etchings of an archer and bighorn sheep but that the government failed to prove two critical elements in the case: The artifacts on national forest land were worth at least $1,000, and the accused looters knew or should have known what they were stealing was of archaeological value. The ruling "effectively provides a license to steal" petroglyphs and other things "that clearly have intrinsic -- and often culturally important -- value, but which defy efforts to reduce that value to monetary terms," assistant U.S. attorney Robert Don Gifford wrote in the petition for rehearing....
Editorial: BLM too industry friendly He who pays the piper calls the tune, goes the old saying. But the U.S. Bureau of Land Management not only is letting energy companies pay the piper, amazingly it's giving them a say in who the piper will be. The BLM has been under intense industry pressure to step up energy leasing across the West, but a 2005 Government Accountability Office report found that the agency doesn't have enough staff to process the crush of oil and gas applications and still properly mitigate environmental damage. It's become common for the energy industry to pay the costs of conducting environmental impact statements. The EIS process is used to determine whether energy leasing should occur, and if so, how any environmental, economic and social impacts will be mitigated. But there's a disturbing and qualitative difference in what BLM now proposes to do in northwestern Colorado. Over the next two decades, seven energy companies want to increase the number of wells to be drilled in the Meeker area from the 1,100 envisioned in BLM's existing plan to as many as 15,000, truly an eye-popping jump. The potential effect on the environment and nearby communities could be so extensive that BLM really ought to completely revise its basic management plan for the area. Instead, it's trying to squeeze by on the cheap, doing only an amendment to the current plan....
Cacti to limit OHV use at Factory Butte Concerns over the survival of a pair of imperiled cactus species will likely soon lead to emergency off-highway vehicle restrictions in the popular Factory Butte area of southern Utah. A petition filed by the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance last year to halt, or at least limit, OHV activity at Factory Butte has been largely dismissed by the Bureau of Land Management. But concerns raised by the environmental group over the fate of the endangered Wrights Fishhook cactus and the threatened Winkler cactus have resonated with federal land managers. "We've got [OHV] conflicts where the country is open and people are running over and killing the cactus, so we probably will be looking at some kind of restrictions," Wayne Wetzel, associate manager for the BLM's Richfield Field Office, said this week. "It's not finalized, so we can't say at this point what they will look like. But it will probably be bigger than what the OHV groups want and smaller than SUWA wants it to be." User conflicts at Factory Butte, pitting off-road enthusiasts against environmentalists and non-motorized recreationalists, have vexed federal land managers for years. Located in the middle of Wayne County, the region is renowned for its wide open badlands terrain and breathtaking vistas....
Boy Survives Bear Attack A 14-year-old boy was attacked by a black bear and lives to tell about it. "I've got a good story to tell my kids when I get older," said Cruz Bentley. It all happened early Sunday morning at a campground along the Gila River near the small town of Hayden, north of Tucson. Bentley believes he stared death in the face after coming face to face with a young black bear. "I woke up and he was just sitting down like that and he was all blap, hit me again, and then he picked up on his four feet so I looked up at him and I tried to get up and then he was gone." The bear's long sharp claws left a deep puncture wound and a gash that required four staples on Bentley's head. "Oh I was bleeding a lot. It hurt for 10 seconds then it stopped. I think I went into shock." A fellow camper rushed Cruz to his mom's house and she took him to the hospital. He's ok now and even makes light of the situation as he proudly wears a shirt that one of his friend's mom gave him. It reads, "Been pawed?" Cruz says, "She gave me this shirt, she said I earned it."....
Bulldozer used for destructive joyride A vandal has twice taken a bulldozer for a joyride at a logging site, tearing up roads and destroying newly planted trees. The first incident happened about two week ago, said Don Robinson, the assistant district law enforcement ranger working in the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's Grants Pass and Glendale resource areas. Robinson said there was five hours worth of fuel in the bulldozer and the driver operated it until it was empty. The driver tore up the road, causing $1,800 in damage, and ripped up a half-acre of newly planted Douglas fir and incense cedar trees. The cost of replacing the trees is an estimated $1,200. The culprit returned last week. "That time they took it up the road a little ways," Robinson said. "It seemed to be another joyride." Robinson thinks vandals not environmental activists caused the damage because trees were destroyed and the logging unit has been free of controversy....
Study Seeks Balance in Rockies The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) today--with key support from leading energy producers in the Rockies--released first-year results from a study on how natural gas development in the Rockies might be influencing wildlife, particularly pronghorn antelope. The report--titled The Wildlife and Energy Development Report--represents initial data of a yet-to-be-completed five-year study by WCS, funded by Shell Exploration & Production Company, Ultra Resources, Inc., and others. The study focuses on how natural gas development influences wildlife in a region that serves as a critical wintering ground for pronghorn antelope, the focus species of the study. While subject to change after further data are collected, preliminary findings from the first year of the five-year study point to the following: 1) Pronghorn can adapt to the presence of humans when not hunted or harassed, but tend to avoid areas that are fragmented by gas fields, roads, and other types of development. 2) Based on statistical models, pronghorn are more prone to use undisturbed parcels greater than 600 acres in size. 3) Animals captured both in and among gas fields and outside of petroleum development areas had no differences in either body mass (a measure of an animal's health), mineral deficiencies, disease, fecundity, or contaminant levels, indicating that proximity to development had no effect on the health of the pronghorn....