June 2004
Volume 6

Interesting Tidbits & Wilderness Quotes:

Quote: "If you know wilderness in the way that you know love, you would be unwilling to let it go.... This is the story of our past and it will be the story of our future." — Terry Tempest Williams, Testimony

Vote Wilderness! Working Assets selected Wilderness Watch as one of 10 national conservation organizations for inclusion on its 2004 Donations Ballot. This is an excellent opportunity to save on your long distance, mobile service, and/or credit card payments while making a real difference for America’s Wilderness!

If you are already a Working Assets customer, you will be able to vote for Wilderness Watch on the Donations Ballot provided in your monthly bill or online at www.WorkingAssets.com/voting.

If you are not a customer, please consider using Working Assets for your long distance, credit card, or wireless services. Working Assets donates 1% of its revenue (35 million since 1985) to nonprofit groups - at no extra cost to its customers! If you are not already a customer, it is not too late to support Wilderness Watch’s efforts to ensure the protection and proper stewardship of lands and rivers included in the National Wilderness Preservation System and Wild and Scenic Rivers System.

To learn more about Working Assets or to become a customer, call 1-800-788-8588 or visit www.workingassets.com. Thank you!

Contents:
Wilderness News Briefs provide short issue summaries and contact information. Action Alerts are full-length, time-sensitive postings.

Wilderness News Briefs:

(1) Court blocks suit over Western wilderness (Norton v. SUWA)
(2) Lake restriction challenged, MI
(3) Proposed mining development in Uncompahgre Wilderness, CO
(4) Forest Service prepares environmental impact statement for outfitting and guiding in the John Muir and Ansel Adams Wildernesses, CA
(5) Outfitter Policy Act postponed…again

Action Alert:

(1) Your Letters Needed to Protect the Wild and Scenic Salmon River!

*Wilderness News Briefs*

(1) Court blocks suit over Western wilderness
By Debbie Hummel
Associated Press Writer

SALT LAKE CITY -- The Supreme Court on Monday blocked a lawsuit that accused the federal government of doing too little to protect undeveloped Western land from off-road vehicles. The court, on a 9-0 vote, said environmental groups cannot use courts to force the federal Bureau of Land Management to more aggressively safeguard about 2 million acres of potential wilderness in Utah…

For More Information:
Seattle Post- Intelligencer:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apwashington_story.asp?category=1154&slug=Scotus%20Western%20Wilderness
LA Times:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-me-enviro15jun15,1,29065.story?coll=la-home-headlines

(2) Lake restriction challenged
From the Ironwood Daily Globe
By Margaret Levra, Globe Staff Writer

WATERSMEET – [Motorized] surface use of Crooked Lake, which is surrounded by the Sylvania Wilderness Area in Watersmeet, is prohibited under the Michigan Wilderness Act.

That restriction is being challenged by Crooked Lake residents Kathy Stupak-Thrall and her husband Ben Thrall…
Thrall lobbied representatives in Lansing. The result: House Concurrent Resolution 44, which asks Congress to take action on the matter -- "to affirm support of state-empowered individual property rights and to amend the Michigan Wilderness Act to protect the rights of property owners in conflicts with the U.S. Forest Service."

More:
http://www.ironwooddailyglobe.com/0604sylv.htm

Background:
Designated in 1987, the Sylvania Wilderness lies near the Wisconsin – Michigan border. As part of its land management duties the Forest Service restricts motorized uses on Crooked Lake, a body of water largely included within the Wilderness boundary. This action angers a group of property owners, who filed several lawsuits challenging the agency’s authority to restrict motorized use on the lake. In the most recent lawsuit, Stupak-Thrall v. Glickman, the plaintiffs argued that congress did not have the authority to designate Crooked Lake as Wilderness, and that the lake did not in fact lie within the Wilderness boundary and was therefore exempt from Forest Service regulation. After they lost in the district court, and the plaintiffs appealed.

On October 3, 2003, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the decision of the district court, granting summary judgement to the defendants and dismissing the action. It is our hope that this decision will move Crooked Lake one step closer to its natural condition.

(3) Proposed mining development in Uncompahgre Wilderness, CO
From the Federal Register:

Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre and Gunnison National Forests; Robin Redbreast Unpatented Lode Claim Mining Plan of Operations; Hinsdale County, CO

ACTION: Notice of intent to prepare an environmental impact statement.

SUMMARY: A proposed Plan of Operations has been submitted for approval. The Forest Service will prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to assess and disclose the environmental effects of access and mine development the Robin Redbreast unpatented lode mining claim. The Robin Redbreast Lode mining claim is located in the NE 1/4, Section 34, Township 45 North, Range 6 West, New Mexico Principle Meridian, Hinsdale County, Colorado. The Robin Redbreast mine, an unpatented lode mining claim, was located in 1938 in Porphry Basin on the Uncompahgre National Forest. It is recorded in the Hinsdale County Courthouse, Lake City, Colorado. The most recent approved operating plan is dated August 1983.

The Robin Redbreast Lode mining claim is located at an elevation of 11,400 feet in the Uncompahgre Wilderness Area, established first as the Big Blue Wilderness in 1980, and changed to the Uncompahgre Wilderness in the 1993 Colorado Wilderness Act. The If the Plan Of Operations is approved as proposed, mining operations at the Robin Redbreast site, and travel to and from the mine would occur within designated Wilderness. The Forest Service will prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to assess and disclose the environmental effects of access and mine development of the Robin Redbreast Lode mining claim.
Federal Register: Search Volume 69, "page 33620" http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/search.html

(4) Forest Service prepares environmental impact statement for outfitting and guiding in the John Muir and Ansel Adams Wildernesses, CA
From the Federal Register:

Commercial Pack Stock Use Authorizations for the Ansel Adams and John Muir Wildernesses; Inyo and Sierra National Forests; Inyo, Fresno, Madera and Mono Counties, CA

ACTION: Notice of intent to prepare an environmental impact statement.

SUMMARY: The USDA Forest Service will prepare an environmental impact statement for a proposal to authorize outfitting and guiding activities by up to 22 commercial pack stock operations that serve the John Muir and Ansel Adams Wilderness areas. The proposed action establishes limits on the numbers of stock animals used in conjunction with commercial operators, establishes limits on the commercial group size at certain locations, determines trail suitability for commercial operations, and designates campsites for use by commercial stock users. The proposed action also establishes primary operating areas for commercial pack stock operations, establishes destination quotas, and determines grazing suitability.

DATES: Comments concerning the scope of the analysis should be received no later than July 26, 2004. A draft environmental impact statement is expected to be filed with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and be available for public review in January 2005. At that time the EPA will publish a Notice of Availability in the Federal Register. The comment period on the draft EIS will be 45 days from the date the EPA publishes the Notice of Availability. The final EIS is scheduled to be completed in May 2005.

Federal Register: Search Volume 69, "page 33346" http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/search.html

(5) Outfitter Policy Act postponed…again
From RRFW Riverwire:

According to sources in Washington DC, the Outfitters Policy Act of 2004 has been removed from consideration by the Senate Resources committee. The bill would have required a mandatory allocation of use between outfitters, non-profits and public recreationists for all US Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, and Alaska State lands where a cap on use is required to
preserve the resource.

This bill has, with minor differences, been presented every year since 1997, and would have seriously impacted wilderness areas, which restrict outfitter and guide activities to a "primitive and unconfined" type of recreation. The bill would also have decimated the Freedom-of-Choice access systems already in place, including the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in Minnesota, and soon-to-be implemented equitable access systems such as the Deschutes River plan.

According to Sen. Larry Craig's office (R-ID), the bill has been postponed indefinitely.

Concerned River Runners For Wilderness members were joined by a number of other groups expressing opposition to the proposed legislation. As written, the bill would have adversely impacted wilderness values, forced the creation of segregated user groups, stifled regional economies and created a de-facto property right for a small handful of outfitters to the detriment
of future outfitters, the public and most importantly, to America's precious wilderness resources.

*Action Alerts*

(1) Your Letters Needed to Protect the Wild and Scenic Salmon River!

On June 17, the House Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health held a hearing on S. 1003, a bill that would amend the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act to allow the operation of three commercial lodges on the Salmon River in the Frank Church – River of No Return Wilderness. S. 1003 would nullify 70 years of administrative and congressional protection and mark the first time that such developments are permitted on public land on a congressionally designated Wild River.

Brief History

In the early 1930's the national forest lands surrounding the Salmon River were designated as the Idaho and Salmon River Breaks Primitive Areas. To preserve the primitive character of the area, the regulations provided that "there shall be no…occupancy under special use permits for hotels, stores, resorts, summer homes, organizational camps, hunting and fishing lodges or similar uses."
Despite these protections, a handful of commercial hunting and fishing outfitters unlawfully constructed permanent camps on the shorelines. In 1971, the Forest Service ordered the removal of all permanent buildings. Four of the seven outfitters complied; three did not.

In 1980, the Central Idaho Wilderness Act designated 2.4 million acres in central Idaho as the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness. It also designated the 79-mile stretch of the Salmon River within the Wilderness as a Wild River under the Wild & Scenic Rivers Act.

Wilderness Watch filed a lawsuit to require the Forest Service to enforce the law and remove the three remaining unlawful camps. In September 2000, federal judge Sydney R. Thomas ruled that the resorts violated the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act and must be removed. This decision did not put the outfitters out of work, but required the removal of permanent developments in compliance with the law. In 2003, Senator Larry Craig introduced S.1003, a bill that would nullify the court’s ruling by allowing for the continued operation and maintenance of the three illegal resorts.

Problems with S.1003

S.1003 would represent the first time that the Wild & Scenic Rivers Act has been amended to allow such developments on a protected Wild River.

S. 1003 reverses 7 decades of administrative and congressional protection for the wild Salmon River. The developments that S.1003 would permit have never been legally allowed on these national forest lands.

S. 1003 is special interest legislation at its worst. If S. 1003 passes, the losers will be the vast majority of Wilderness visitors seeking a wild river experience, and the great number of Americans who take pleasure in knowing that wild places are preserved—all for the benefit of three outfitters who have willfully violated the law.

S. 1003 rewards lawbreakers and essentially punishes those who played by the rules. S. 1003 rewards individuals who have flaunted the law and who routinely violate the terms of their special use permits by granting them permanent use of these public lands.

S.1003 nullifies taxpayers’ efforts to protect the Salmon River corridor. American taxpayers have spent several million dollars since 1980 to protect the Wild Salmon River corridor from development by securing conservation easements along the river. S.1003 nullifies these efforts by allowing for permanent developments on public lands within the corridor.

Your letters are needed by June 28th, 2004. Please ask that they be included in the hearing record on S. 1003.
Please address your letter to:

The Honorable Greg Walden, Chairman
Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health
1337 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515

Please mail or fax your letter to:
Ryan R. Yates, Clerk
Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health
1337 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Fax: (202) 2225-0521
_____________________________________________________________________________
Since its founding in 1989, Wilderness Watch has pursued its mission as the citizen voice for Wilderness stewardship, giving a voice to the Wilderness and Wild Rivers of our national preservation systems. We seek to preserve our unique natural heritage - the public will articulated by the Wilderness Act and Wild and Scenic Rivers Act.

To join Wilderness Watch please visit our website at www.wildernesswatch.org.

If you would like to subscribe or unsubscribe from this list, have any questions, or would like to post a news release, please contact Hilary Wood at hwood@wildernesswatch.org. If you prefer the post, please send your letters to:

Wilderness Watch
P.O. Box 9175
Missoula, MT 59807
Phone: (406) 542-2048
Fax: (406) 542-7714
http://www.wildernesswatch.org