NEWS ROUNDUP

As Costs of Wildfires Grow, So Does a Question: Who Should Pay? The steeply rising cost of preventing and suppressing wildfires, which burned more of the American landscape in 2006 than in any other year since at least 1960, is creating a rift between Washington and state and local governments over how the burden ought to be shouldered. A study issued in November by the inspector general’s office of the United States Department of Agriculture, the parent agency of the Forest Service, said the nature of the wildfire threat was changing as private homes and communities pushed ever closer to the boundaries of once-remote public lands. Those communities and landowners, rather than federal taxpayers, should have to pay for more of their own fire protection, the report concluded. States and local governments are gearing up to fight back in Congress, arguing that decades of federal mismanagement of national forests and open spaces, not development, created the threat and that little communities with few resources are neither responsible for it nor equipped to make a difference. The pattern of wildfire distribution during the recently ended fire season, which charred more than 9.8 million acres, supports either side. According to federal statistics, more state, county and private lands burned than in any other year since 1997 — about half the total 2006 losses — primarily because of monstrous blazes in Oklahoma, in Texas and across the Upper Plains, regions where most property is privately owned. That finding, though also driven by broader factors like drought and heat that have little to do with residential development in fire-prone areas, supports the federal contention that the government has had to shift an increasingly large share of its resources from the task of protecting its own forests to firefighting elsewhere. In some places, though, the issue is more complex. In Stillwater County, Mont., north of Yellowstone National Park, for example, the small, long-established towns of Nye and Fishtail are bordered on two sides by national forest. In early July, the first of two huge fires erupted in the forest and roared into those communities, where 100,000 acres of mostly private land and 32 homes were burned. The blaze was the worst in the county’s history, local officials say....
Counties could lose millions in funding if law isn't renewed A law that has sent millions in revenue generated from National Forest lands to the states is expiring. The thought has county officials in Montana perspiring. It's called the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000. The funding comes from mineral resources, grazing fees and other sources. It's appropriated to states where national forests are located. This year, the final year of the act, Montana counties will get $13 million from the U.S. Forest Service. The check hit the mail Wednesday. But if the act isn't reauthorized, states could lose millions of dollars in federal funding. "It's a huge amount," Montana Association Counties Executive Director Harold Blattie said. Congress let the act expire before adjourning in 2006 and MACO is lobbying hard to get the Act reauthorized in 2007. So are the National Association of Counties and National Coalition of Forest Counties and Schools. If the act is not reauthorized, every county in Montana will pay the price — whether or not forested land lies within its border, according to MACO....
Outdoors: Researchers fight to save Idaho cod from extinction They're green, eel-like and incredibly difficult to raise in captivity, but Kootenai River burbot are now successfully spawning in plastic tanks at the University of Idaho. The tasty, freshwater codfish once sustained the Kootenai Tribe through the coldest months of winter, but fewer than 40 wild burbot are believed to be in the river today. In a desperate move to keep the fish from vanishing and until the politically sticky questions can be addressed about why the fish are in trouble in the first place the tribe is placing its hopes on setting up a hatchery. Problem is, nobody in the world has been able to figure out a way to raise the fish. They spawn in winter under ice, and young burbot eat things like bugs, plankton and other creatures found in only wild rivers. "Nobody has ever cultured this fish before," said Sue Ireland, fisheries biologist for the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho. "This is really feeling in the dark." It's getting a bit less dark, though. Four years ago, researchers at the University of Idaho began tackling the problem, courtesy of funding from the tribe, the Idaho Fish and Game Department and the Bonneville Power Administration....
Flower species wins fed habitat Two nearly extinct wildflowers found only in Washington County and just over the state line in Arizona now have a protected home. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has formally designated nearly 6,300 acres as critical habitat for the Holmgren milkvetch and the Shivwitz milkvetch. It marks only the second and third time the federal agency has created critical habitat for an endangered plant species in Utah. Under the designation, geographic areas containing features essential for the survival are managed for the protection of the species. "What has occurred in this instance is quite exceptional for Utah," Tony Frates, conservation co-chair of the Utah Native Plant Society, said Tuesday. "It's a long and complicated ruling, but the local field office did a real thorough job. And the [critical habitat] designation will be very helpful in keeping these two species from becoming extinct." Prompting the listing and new habitat designation has been Washington County's explosive growth and development. Specifically, the two plant species are in the path of a planned freeway interchange and roadway in St. George's south corridor that will link the city with its future airport and a planned community....
Locals: Keep East Entrance open The National Park Service lacks “adequate justification to support closure” of Sylvan Pass and has not sufficiently addressed safety, social or economic concerns in their draft winter use plan for Yellowstone National Park, according to a firm hired by Park County and Gov. Dave Freudenthal’s planning office. Ecosystem Research Group of Missoula, Mont., presented comments to Park County commissioners Tuesday in a draft document. The firm compiled arguments against the Park Service's preferred alternative, which maintains current Yellowstone winter use management provisions yet calls for closing Sylvan Pass and the East Entrance outside Cody. The proposed closure is based on avalanche danger, rising costs to control avalanches and decreased visitation numbers at that gate, according to park officials. Four of six proposed alternatives close Sylvan Pass to varying degrees of oversnow travel. “We are expressing grave concern about the closing of Sylvan Pass,” said Temple Stevenson, natural resource policy analyst for the governor’s office....
Interior announces intention to re-establish relationship with tribes Three officials of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Friday their intention to re-establish a working relationship between the agency and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai tribes regarding management and operation of the National Bison Range. Under the agreement announced by Deputy Secretary of the Interior Lynn Scarlett, FWS Director Dale Hall and Associate Deputy Interior Secretary Jim Cason the FWS would continue to manage the range as a national wildlife refuge. The tribes would undertake field and maintenance work, animal care and related duties on the range completely encompassed within the Flathead Reservation. In 2005 FWS entered into an annual funding agreement with the tribes to perform certain non-managerial functions on the range during Fiscal Year 2006. But on Dec. 11 FWS pulled the controversial agreement, saying the tribes had failed to live up to their responsibilities and had created an unacceptable workplace environment. Tribal officials said they were caught off guard by the move and denied allegations made in a letter from FWS Regional Director Mitch King that also said the agency was terminating negotiations for future AFAs....
Wyo targets wolf packs As they move toward delisting, many of the wolf packs in northwest Wyoming may be in the crosshairs. There are estimated to be 23 wolf packs outside Yellowstone National Park, with three packs in the park. Under federal guidelines, Wyoming needs to maintain a minimum of seven packs outside the park, in addition to three inside, to ensure that wolves will not become endangered again. Wyoming representatives have said they would like the federal government to eliminate the extra packs -- about 16 -- before removing wolves from federal protection and turning over management to the state. The prospect of eliminating wolf packs has been mentioned in recent discussions between state and federal officials about a possible new approach to wolf management in Wyoming. The state's wolf management plan has been rejected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service because it would subject the animals to unregulated killing in areas except Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks and surrounding wilderness. A new proposal aimed at resolving the dispute would increase the area where wolves would be treated as "trophy game," meaning they could only be killed with permission from the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. Regardless of which management plan prevails, Gov. Dave Freudenthal said reducing packs has always been on the table....
Plains suffering from glut of snow Utility crews struggled to restore electrical service to tens of thousands of homes in four states today as grocery store shelves went bare and ranchers tried to reach hungry cattle isolated after a blizzard dumped nearly 3 feet of snow on the Plains. In Colorado, National Guard troops and state workers prepared to bring groceries into snowbound areas with Humvees and drop hay bales into farm fields. Across the region, from the Oklahoma panhandle to Nebraska, planes have been searching snow-covered highways and fields for stranded travelers and using heat-sensing equipment to locate cattle in need of food. Hay could be dropped by military planes or helicopters or delivered by snowmobile, said Polly White of the Colorado Division of Emergency Management. What no one wants is a repeat of 1997, when a blizzard killed up to 30,000 farm animals and cost farmers and ranchers an estimated $28 million, White said. Ice and heavy snow also bent over electrical towers and downed hundreds of miles of power lines. At least 60,000 homes and businesses in western Kansas, more than 15,000 in Nebraska, and 6,000-plus in Colorado and Oklahoma were without electricity, and some utility officials warned it could take more than a week to restore....
Choppers to the rescue Ranchers across Southeastern Colorado either tried to reach their cattle or hoped the Colorado Army National Guard could Tuesday as the animals stood in 3- to 4-foot deep snow. Helicopter crews operated out of the airports near Lamar, Springfield and Las Animas to reach the animals. Aircrew members joined forces with ranchers, who volunteered to help on the flights, to throw out bales of hay to the stranded animals and, where possible, landed to break the ice in cattle water tanks. Leonard Pruett, a cattle specialist for the Colorado State University Extension Service, said ranchers have been calling to ask for the hay bale flights, but aircrews also have helped whatever isolated animals they see. "If we see cattle out there that don't look like they've been fed, we'll drop hay to them," Pruett said. "We're doing everything we can to make sure they survive. Ranchers will be charged for the cost of the hay, but not the cost of flying it to the animals, he said....
Editorial - Operation rescue A MASSIVE effort is underway to help save the cattle industry in Southeast Colorado in the wake of two holiday season blizzards. While major highways were finally opened late Sunday, most rural roads were still covered by deep snow and impassable. That made reaching cattle herds difficult if not impossible. State officials estimate that the majority of the 345,000 head of cattle in the region were stranded in 3 feet of snow on pasture land, where the storms also left 15-foot drifts in some places. Baca County officials reported numerous calls this week about cattle getting weak, falling down and unable to make it through the drifts. The snow poses a special danger to mother cows and newborn calves. There was no immediate estimate how many cow-calf pairs might be imperiled, though. Our hats are off to the National Guard troops and the county officials who are doing their utmost to save lives and livelihoods in Southeastern Colorado....
Remembering The Crash Of 1942 On Thursday, October 15, 1942, a B-17 bomber from Alamogordo Army Air Field was finishing a training run over Magdalena Flats with full crew of nine aboard. Magdalena rancher Tom Kelly was 17 years old and remembers seeing the plane fly over the village on a foggy night. Kelly is the only person still alive who helped the Army recovery team find the crash site and recover the bodies of the nine airmen who perished. As the village board considers installing a plaque commemorating those who died in the crash, Kelly visited the site for the first time in decades. Over breakfast recently at the Magdalena Café, Kelly told this reporter the story of the crash and subsequent recovery effort. As Kelly told the story, the Café became quieter as more diners listened to the story....