After almost 40 years, some Utah waterways may get federal recognition, protection From wide, chocolate-colored rivers flowing through redrock deserts to pristine bubbling creeks in high-elevation meadows, Utah's moving waters provide thrills, spills and an ability to quench all kinds of thirsts. When it comes to wild and scenic settings, Utah rivers are second to none. Federal recognition and accompanying protection of those rivers is another story. More than 11,400 miles of rivers in the United States have been designated as part of the Wild and Scenic Rivers (WSR) system since an act of Congress in 1968, but not 1 inch of Utah water is on the list. That could change in the coming years. As as part of updating their management plans, the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management have identified more than 200 segments of Utah waterways for possible designation in the WSR system. Water is important in Utah - the second driest state in the nation - and that may partially explain why no waterways in the state have made the list during the 39 years since the act became law. Everyone from anglers and recreationalists to farmers and ranchers and local, state and federal governments have a vested interest in water....
Should Forest Service ease restrictions on recreational use at Mount St. Helens? Mark Smith owns a lodge and campsite about 20 miles from Mount St. Helens, but he says it's not always the volcano that draws his guests. Some, in fact, never go up to see the mountain or the several visitor centers. Instead, Eco Park Resort visitors come to enjoy nature in a breathtaking setting. As Smith calls it, they want "to commune with nature." For decades people throughout the Northwest did the same, but that changed when Mount St. Helens erupted on May 18, 1980. Since then, safety and scientific restrictions in the Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument have limited the access that Smith and thousands of Southwest Washington residents once enjoyed. While researchers and conservationists call the monument a priceless scientific gift to the nation, Smith and others say they're tired of a gift they can look at but can't touch. Roughly one-third of the 110,000-acre monument is restricted for research, meaning visitors can't venture off established trails or camp overnight. And while hunting is permitted on about half the land, motorized vehicles in some areas are forbidden....
S.D. Stockgrowers Meet Under Secretary Mark Rey Stockgrowers and guests alike were able to present the frustrations they have in trying to encourage management of the prairie dog’s explosive population on government owned land which then extends over to private lands. The statement was made that although the state management plan calls for 199,000 acres of prairie dog populated land, in South Dakota we now have 625,000 acres and that the 2010 goal for the nation is 1.6 million acres. South Dakota is nearing the halfway mark for the entire nation. Secretary Rey discussed a plan to utilize a combination of the United States Forest Service (USFS) and the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) explaining that it could help reduce the number of prairie dogs while at the same time repairing the damaged soil. Regarding national forests and timber management, Secretary Rey explained that timber sales and fire management are still serious problems, but that they are making headway. He feels that they have accomplished approximately one third of their goal for fuel reduction and that they should reach it in about 7 or 8 years....
Lake poisoning seems to have worked to kill invasive pike There may be something that is still alive in Lake Davis, but crews with the state Department of Fish and Game have not yet found it. Game wardens in an armada of 25 boats poured 16,000 gallons of the fish poison rotenone into the scenic Sierra reservoir a week ago in an attempt to exterminate a voracious invader known as the northern pike. Some 41,000 pounds of dead fish have since been scooped from the lake at the northern headwaters of the Feather River in Plumas County. The carefully hatched plan was to kill virtually every living thing in the high Sierra lake and its tributaries, assuring that the pike would be exterminated. "No one wants chemicals dumped in their lake to kill fish and we don't like doing it, but you have to look at the big picture," said Steve Martarano, a spokesman for the Department of Fish and Game. "It's something we needed to do and we gave it our best shot." Drastic measures were the only surefire way to get rid of the pike, which had wiped out the area's famous trout, destroying the local tourist economy....
Four-wheelers should be part of forest solution No sooner had everyone settled into their seats at the Foothill Middle School cafeteria when somebody in the back lobbed this barb in the direction of Sierra National Forest supervisor Ed Cole: "How come you're kicking us out of the forest?" Cole calmly denied the accusation, but it was too late. The confrontational tone of Thursday's public forum regarding the forest's controversial Off-Highway Vehicle Route Designation Plan had already been set. Local four-wheel drive enthusiasts are livid because they believe trails they've enjoyed for decades are being taken away for no good reason. Forest officials insist they're not taking anything away. They contend they're doing everything they can to include as many trails as possible to the designated system, albeit through a complex, mind-numbing bureaucratic process. Which side is right? It depends which side of the roll bar you sit on....
Court decision likely to slow project Opponents of a major real estate play next to the Wolf Creek Ski Area in southern Colorado have won a court ruling. A Colorado Court of Appeals ruled that Mineral County commissioners wrongly approved the project, called the Village at Wolf Creek, because the road that was then the sole means of access is unsuitable for year-round use. The road is covered by as much as 10 feet of snow. Because of that faulty premise for approval, Mineral County must review the project again, but this time with the proper information. Colorado Wild, one of the two environmental groups that filed the lawsuit, described the court decision as a "small step in the right decision," according to Ryan Demmy Bidwell, the group's executive director. While there is no reason to believe Mineral County won't approve the project again, the decision still is "quite important in its larger implications," Bidwell added. He explained that Mineral County's approval was then cited by the U.S. Forest Service as the grounds for permitting another road across Forest Service land to the private inholding. By treating the real-estate development as a foregone conclusion, the Forest Service argued that it therefore did not have to address the impact of the real estate development on surrounding federal lands. Colorado Wild argues that it does....
Brown sentenced An Alton woman who tried to hire someone to kill her husband was sentenced Sept. 25 to seven years and three months in federal prison. According to a press release issued by the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, Kari J. Brown, 37, will not be eligible for parole under the sentence. She pleaded guilty to crossing state lines to hire a man to kill her husband, or murder-for-hire. Brown admitted contacting a man, who in reality was an undercover U.S. Forest Service agent on Feb. 25, 2006, about killing Randy Brown, her husband. She met with the undercover officer several days later and gave him a picture of her husband offering him $10,000 to do the killing....The FS is always crying they don't have enough law enforcement personnel. What does being an undercover agent in a murder for hire case have to do with protecting Federal lands?
Judge Rules Against Gore Climate Film Only in England. Here, where there are no standards for the truth, a case like this could never happen. In England truth is justiciable. The verdict is still to come. But this from judge Mr. Justice Burton "said he would be saying that Gore's Oscar-winning film does promote 'partisan political views'." "The case arises from a decision in February by the then Education Secretary Alan Johnson that DVDs of the film would be sent to all secondary schools in England, along with a multimedia CD produced by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs containing two short films about climate change and an animation about the carbon cycle." "David Miliband, who was Environment-Secretary when the school packs were announced, said at the time: 'The debate over the science of climate change is well and truly over.' "But during the three-day hearing, the court heard that the critically-acclaimed film contains a number of inaccuracies, exaggerations and statements about global warming for which there is currently insufficient scientific evidence."....
Lawsuit challenges move to ban powerboats Raising a banner of states' rights and access for the disabled, Lane County resident Steve Stewart on Tuesday announced that he is suing to overturn the federal government's ban on gas-powered boats at Waldo Lake. The U.S. Forest Service, which instituted the ban, "appears to have an elitist view of who should have the opportunity to use and enjoy Waldo Lake," Stewart said at a news conference at the Hilton Eugene. For nearly two decades, the Forest Service considered a ban on gas engines at the pristine lake that's high in the Cascades near Oakridge. The agency surveyed hundreds of people who flock to the pristine lake each summer for recreation. Local Forest Service managers decided in favor of a ban in April. The regional forester reviewed and upheld the ban in July. The Forest Service designated the lake "semiprimitive, nonmotorized" where the public can experience peace and tranquillity. The ban is to take effect in 2009....
Editorial - Court confirms that the public has a voice in road dispute Not only governments, but groups interested in the environment and even ordinary people have a right to join in lawsuits that will decide ownership of roads on public lands. Seems like a no-brainer, but it took a ruling of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to explain to San Juan County and the state of Utah that the public has a legitimate interest in how land owned by all Americans is used, and often abused. The state and county are suing the National Park Service because it closed Salt Creek Road in Canyonlands National Park to four-wheelers that were damaging park land. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance tried to join the lawsuit, but government lawyers argued that only the two parties laying claim to the road had that right. Excuse us, but to imply that ordinary citizens, the taxpayers who fund the federal and local agencies, have no legal interest is patently ludicrous. The public, and, by extension, the advocacy groups that go to court to protect the public's land, should not be excluded from seeking judicial redress.We understand why some rural Utah counties see SUWA as the enemy in their fight to control the federal land that comprises so much of central and southern Utah. For its part, the environmental advocacy group rightly worries about overuse by motorized recreationists and overgrazing by ranchers. Too often, the battle is fought at the expense of a fragile desert landscape that is a national treasure....
Herd gone, ranchers turn to governor On a single terrible day last July, Jim and Sandy Morgan sold off their entire Bridger-area ranch's stock of nearly 600 cows, calves and bulls, liquidating them, they say, at a fire-sale price to be slaughtered. They did so, the young couple told Gov. Brian Schweitzer Tuesday, because they had the bad luck to be the first Montanans in decades to find a case of the dreaded cattle disease brucellosis in their herd. They thought if they eradicated all their animals, they would spare Montana from losing its hard-earned brucellosis-free status. The couple, along with Sandy Morgan's parents, state Rep. Bruce Malcolm, R-Emigrant, and his wife, Connie, told Schweitzer they felt they paid a dear price for the state and appealed to the governor to help them stay in ranching, which has been the family business for three generations. "We have a ranch mortgage we've got absolutely no way to pay for," Jim Morgan said. "We don't want to point fingers; we just want to get help."....
Judge halts cattle plan To graze or not to graze? That's the issue a federal administrative judge confronted Monday when he halted a plan by the federal Bureau of Land Management to increase the number of cattle allowed to graze on thousands of acres near here. The BLM wants to increase cattle-grazing to a former level on land recognized as critical habitat for the desert tortoise. The land is located south of the 15 Freeway. The plaintiffs - the Center for Biological Diversity and other California conservation groups - say the decision is a small victory. But the lawsuit is still undecided, and bureau officials are confident they'll eventually prevail. At issue is whether 130 more cows and a few horses should be allowed to graze on about 152,000 acres of private, state and federal land. The terms are part of the BLM's 10-year lease contract that was renewed in September with private ranchers and other lessees. More than 100,000 acres in that land area is designated as the bureau's Desert Wildlife Management Area and lies within the California Desert Conservation Area. The current allotment is 172 cows and a few horses. Only 25 head of cattle are grazing the land, according to Anthony Chavez, rangeland management specialist at the BLM's Barstow field office....