GUEST COMMENTARY: BILL HURTS MOST MONTANANS
Tester’s Bill Merely Payback to Green Tea Drinkers
Wilderness designations are forever and thank heavens Tester’s term in office is half over!By Kerry White, Guest Writer, 7-24-09
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| Kerry White in person and enjoying our public lands on his snowmobile. | |
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The movement by environmental organizations to remove people from the land, both federally managed and private, has found a new friend in Senator Tester. The Montana Senator that went to San Francisco and the East Coast to finance his campaign is paying back all those green tea drinkers for all the money they gave him.
The Senator’s letter in the July 19 edition of the Bozeman Daily Chronicle is full of myths and deception. First and foremost is the title of the bill, which he names the “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act.” The 7000 acres per year of never to be seen timber harvests will do nothing for the ailing industry. With over 1.6 million acres of beetle killed forest in the Beaverhead Deerlodge National Forest (B-D) it would take over 200 years to address just the dead trees that exist today at only 7000 acres per year harvested as proposed in the bill.
The buzz words of restoration and stewardship logging is just another way to say, temporary jobs through road ripping projects. Never will the American public be able to benefit from this resource as the infrastructure will be gone. According to the energy analysis just completed by Steve Jennings of Dillon, over 3.4 billion dollars of biomass energy stands dead in the B-D.
Senator Tester also makes reference in the title to “Recreation” and how this will “protect” and “guarantee access” for multiple use recreation like ATVs, snowmobiles, motorcycles and bicycles. How can this be so Senator Tester when 1000s of Montana citizens have contacted you in opposition to the Beaverhead Partnership Agreement, which is what this bill really represents? The bill clearly has language that limits all snowmobiles to existing trails with no off trail riding. Many of the areas targeted for wilderness in the Senator’s bill have numerous roads and trails that will become off limits to over 97 percent of the recreating public. Less than 3 percent of the public recreates in wilderness areas according to a 2007 study done by the Forest Service in the B-D National Forest.
The Montana legislature in 2005 passed HJ9 out of the House of Representatives but the bill was stalled by then Senate President Jon Tester in a committee he chaired. Had this bill passed, a study would have been completed that analyzed the economic affect of wilderness on Montana both positive and negative. It was Mr. Tester in 2005 that refused to get the facts on the true adverse economic impacts that wilderness has on not only wildlife and watersheds but also to people and private property. Senator Barrett this year has announced that she will again introduce HJ9 in the 2011 legislature, and I suggest to Senator Tester that we wait for the facts before locking up more land of no use.
According to Robin McCullogh, a professor at the Butte School of Mines, the B-D has vast reserves of precious metals that provide the raw materials for almost everything used in peoples’ day-to-day activities. He states that to lock land in wilderness before identifying the location of the mineral reserves present is like “cutting your nose off despite your face.”
The proposed wilderness areas in this bill have many of these resources in them. The proposed wilderness areas in the bill also have private in-holdings. The B-D contains 1000s of small family mining claims. The Forest Service is required to provide “reasonable access” to these inholdings in wilderness but as with the claims that existed in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness when it was established, the Forest Service made it harder and harder for these folks to access and work their claims. Those claims are now gone along with a part of our Montana heritage.
Several areas proposed for wilderness in the bill have active established grazing permits and Senator Tester is putting at risk those agricultural operations by removing the ability for the rancher to care for his animals when using the permitted area. No motorized or mechanized use is allowed in wilderness.
For those that don’t understand the purpose of grazing leases, here is a short course of “Grazing 101.” Cattle winter on the rancher’s private land. In the summer when the rancher needs his private land to produce hay to carry the animals through the winter he needs a place to put them. He pays the Forest Service according to the AMU (animal management unit) price per animal. This benefits the land through natural fertilizer and reduces the fire hazard by reducing the grass fuel load. The grazing permit also greatly benefits the public by providing open space at no cost to the taxpayer. A sustainable and viable ranch operation provides the vast open space that we all enjoy everyday in Montana and the Senator should realize the damage this bill will most certainly do to this industry.
Senator Tester also states in his letter “as always, let me know what you think of the Forest Jobs Bill.” I have a friend that has been trying to contact Senator Tester’s office in D.C. for 2 weeks with not a single return call.
Senator tester spoke at the annual Montana Wilderness Association meeting a couple months ago and promised a wilderness bill. When the people in the southern part of the B-D heard about the Senator bringing forward a wilderness bill, a number of people, including Senator Barrett, House Representative Welborn, Dillon Mayor Martin Malesich, Madison County Commissioner Dave Schultz, Chairman of the Beaverhead Economic Development Corporation J.S. Turner, Chairman of the Beaverhead Resource Use Committee Bill Allen and Beaverhead County Commissioners Tom Rice, Garth Haugland and Mike McGinley, who is currently the President of the Montana Association of Counties, all signed a letter asking the Senator to attend an important meeting in Dillon to discuss the economic impacts this bill would have on their cities and counties. I would have thought that Senator Tester would have responded to this invitation and the many concerns they had with putting more wilderness in their area but the Senator was a no show. Is this truly being a representative of the voters that elected the Senator?
I would hope that the people of Montana take a hard look at this 84-page bill and then try to contact Senator Tester with your reasons for opposing this legislation. Wilderness designations are forever and thank heavens Tester’s term in office is half over!
Kerry White is on the Executive Board of a nonprofit called Citizens for Balanced Use, based in Gallatin Gateway, Montana, which supports “responsible shared use of public lands.”
FOOTNOTE: For a chronology of four years of NewWest.Net’s extensive coverage of this issue, click here.
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Comments
It is my understanding Mr. White / CBU had been asked several times to sit down with conservationists and find common ground on the B-D Partnership, but at each turn they were unwilling. He often tells his fellow ATV and snowmobile riders to "never compromise with environmentalists."
Perhaps Mr. White / CBU was unwilling to talk because they were so busy fighting to deny Montanans their right to access our rivers and streams.
Thank you Senator Tester for introducing the Forest Jobs Bill. Montanans are behind you on this one and have grown tired of Mr. White /CBU.
And Doggie, there's some elections coming up and your side isn't building much confidence.
The fact of the matter is, Mr. White seems to have a black/white view and that is what has gotten our state in this gridlock initially.
Thanks again for doing this Senator and I look forward to helping you out with it.
As for sharing their pastures with infected buffalo, post a list of the states that are willing to have free roaming infected buffalo and then I will give your idea some merit. Or perhaps you could put up a bond for the total cost of having the herds wiped out if they are infected.
On the other hand drive thru any ranch country back road and you will see elk, deer and moose if they live there grazing on private owned property. How much property do you provide for grazing wildlife?
Wilderness lands provide habitat security for big bucks and bulls and clean water for Montana's blue ribbon trout streams. These backcountry areas also provide important opportunities for solitude and challenge. The last thing I want to see is some ATV driving through the backcountry and ruining what would otherwise be a quality hunt.
I've had enough of the machines. Park it at the trailhead.
LOL. No. They won't be off-limits to anyone except those who are too lazy to get off their butts and walk!
Perhaps the reason raptors are getting too many sage grouse these days is because first cows, and now drilling rigs, have destroyed grouse cover? What was the relationship between grouse and their predators before cows, rigs, and roads? Interesting question.
RH
Interestingly enough the numbers have dropped since there have been so many folks with time and money to spend a lot of time hiking, maybe they are disturbing the birds more that the livestock they are accustomed to!?! Let's eliminate hiking and see if that helps ok? Hikers provide no benefit to other people for their subsidized use of the land, so it would be no loss to keep them off public land unless they are in vehicles on planned roads.
you actually think this bill is catering to the left? That shows how extreme your views really are.
Todd
I see you havent responded to my FACTS about plum creek being a huge funder for the keeping industrialized hemp illegal. Still funny to you?
Also read wellfare ranching before you blow any more wind
for a real analysis of this issue read this article
http://www.wilderness-sportsman.com/wsblog/2009/07/18/montana-tester-lays-a-stink-bomb-with-new-forest-bill-pdf-map/#comment-43303
Shame on new west for publishing this BS
look at a map of roads, wilderness and roadless areas in MT
Next view testers forest bill map
if anyone wants exlusive use and deosnt want to share its the motorheads and their endless, degraded road system.
Honestly read the war on the greens
your view of enviros is greatly skewed
Dont support this BS bill
TESTER LIED OLD GROWTH DIED
protect our roadless areas and demand the FS inventory the uninventoried portions.
have you ever tracked a Mtn. Lion in the snow and followed its trail to where it stood on a outcropping observing ungulates below. Have you ever found where it cleaned itslef and coughed up hairballs the size of golf balls. Have you ever tracked bears in the spring when their hibernation hangover is readily apparent in their woozy gait in the snow?
I would say you probally have not because your too busy riding your snowmobile and passing over these mysteries and stories of nature.
You guys dont even know how to enjoy the outdoors without a motor screeching and scaring away everything real and interesting.
if that was the truth then you would see even if you left what wild country was left alone it would still be lopsided in your favor.
How much time do you spend in roadless areas in the rockies. The majority are high to mid-elevation montane forest that are unsuitable for cultivation. We enviros are trying to protect the ultimate resource for the american people WATER. NREPA protected water for citites from la to new orleans. You want to log, graze and mine all your public lands into oblivion to benefit powerful locals and leave our lands in disaray for the benefit of the public.
As for the food issue, ever hear of steak fries, Burger King, etc? Beef graze in the mountains much to the dismay of the enviros. You want exclusive use of forests to save water???? As for NO, you must have over done it.
Why are there so few sage grouse? Overgrazing and other factors have destroyed their habitat. Yes avain predators kill sage grouse but would they have caused them to decline to their present low numbers.
Do we really need more burger king burgers coming from our mtns or fresh elk, salmon and bear meat. You guys want to graze cattle in some ridiculous places. It takes 1 acre in MN to support a cow in the arid west it can take hundreds of acres for a single cow. It does not make sense economically or enviromentally to graze cattle in the northern rockies when they already have native ungulates that benefit the ecosystem and produce superior meat to beef. Yes WATER that is worth billions, we need fresh, clean drinking water more than buger king todd.
Bearbait at least has some real outdoor knowledge your just ignorant and stubborn.
your exclusive use argument has been dismantled time and time again you sound like a broken record continually clinging to your failed and disporven prejudices. Once again todd look at the maps, the rockies are what they are Mtns. They are not your cattle grazing allotment or an off road challenge course, they are not timber producing plantations or store houses of minerals to be explited at the expense of the ecosystem. They are rough, wild mtns that provide what they provide naturally.
This link honestly looks at the causes of sage grouse decline
it doesnt take a "predators are bad" view that todd has adopted.
Alliance for the Wild Rockies once again sues a timber sale on the Beaverhead Deerlodge (Rat Creek).
The press is finally connecting the dots between the NREPA bill, endless lawsuits, and groups like "The alliance For the wild rockies", Native Ecosystem Council, and the Wildwest Institute. The Rat creek timber sale according to the press release would log 6% of the lands burned from a 2007 fire and would leave standing most trees larger than 15 inches. Meanwhile, the obstructionist environmental groups and their supporters wonder why they were left from the table during the drafting of Tester's bill.
the alliance for wild rockies was left off the table with testers bill becuase they have the guts to stand up for wild country and are a pew trust recipient. The pew trust recipients include the wilderness scoiety and trout unlimited, the comapanies behind the pew trust include dow chemical and other large corp. with bad env. records. I dont know the details behind this timber sale or lawsuit however logging at all in the beaverhead does'nt make sense. We all know this is dry country much of it east of the divide. Why would you log in these areas when there are much more suitable areas for timber harvest. Could it be the locals are all timber barons who want to log wherever there are trees and dont understand ecological concepts or dont care. Certain env. lawsuits are frivilous and prevent thinnig and other progress however logging even in burns on the beaverhead is a disaster. Unless your thinning to prevent catastrophic fire as a result of fire suppression championed by the right for decades then it shouldnt be done on the beaverhead. Treehugger you actually applaud testers shady dealings with select, corrupt env. groups thats pathetic. What does this have to do with NREPA. NREPA was drafted by scientists, locals and real outdoorsmen who care about wild country. Testers bill was drafted by timber barons, greedy ranchers and corrupt env. groups. If anyone is obstructionist its the people who want to keep cutting old growth and roadless areas in the naem of "forest health" or "fire suppression"
Jon really didn't do much in the Legislature and after being eliminated by term limits, ran against Burns(R). His win was a combination of a narrow margin from Missoula and apathy for Burns. Now Jon has repeated himself to prove his LOYALITY is for the far left and a puppet for Polosi.
He will be done in 3 yrs. I don't believe Montana can support someone who won't support the State. Mark Racicot will surface. Some may not like him but he is honest and loyal to Montana. ;-)
you actually think tester is catering to the far left....wow
that just demonstates how much of a right wing extremist you are. You guys are really crazy.....scary
thats like those letters to the editor published in the missoulian claiming it's a leftist-liberal paper which is far from the truth.
Anything not extremly right wing is viewed as socialist, leftist etc.
Let's not forget about towns like Island Park and West Yellowstone, this bill will devastate the local economies but we all know enviros don't care about people's well being, only the wild and themselves.