BLM: Sage grouse habitat eliminates airport sites

Representatives from the BLM told the Friedman Memorial Airport Authority board Tuesday that the federal agency’s plan to protect sage grouse eliminates many of the replacement airport sites selected in a 2008 environmental impact study conducted by the Federal Aviation Administration. During the board’s monthly meeting at the old Blaine County courthouse in Hailey, BLM biologist Ammon Wilhelm and Shoshone Field Manager Codie Martin passed around copies of a map outlining sage grouse protection areas overlaid by proposed airport relocation sites. Many of the proposed sites are on land designated as sage grouse habitat. Wilhelm said a decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to not list sage grouse as endangered is part of a plan intended to prevent an endangered listing in the future...more