Let's follow the law for nation's forests

Brad Smith of the Idaho Collaboration League and his cohorts want us to “avoid gridlock” and “avoid the conflict approach” when commenting on the forest plans of the Kootenai and Idaho Panhandle national forests. These forests could receive tens of millions of dollars over the next decade to boost timber production and “restore” the forests. Sound familiar? The Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Act of 2009 is funding the Kootenai Valley Resource Initiative and the Clearwater Basin Collaborative.

You know something else both projects have in common: the overwhelming, vast majority of the American public was not part of these collaborations. But officials from industry groups and so-called conservation groups were at the bargaining table representing you, the public.

You may ask yourself what happened to the National Environmental Policy Act. Thanks to Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell and Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, it’s taking a back seat to collaboration and the “spirit of cooperation.” NEPA is now a pro-forma exercise.

It gets better.

Due to a recent rider attached to a must-pass spending bill (sound familiar?), the administrative appeals process is now gone, too. Historically that’s been the public’s tool for negotiating the Record of Decision by the agency.

There is one saving grace, however. If you submit a public comment, you then gain standing, and can litigate a project that you deem to be illegal. So let the litigation begin, that is, unless the Forest Service chooses to follow the law.

BRETT HAVERSTICK

Moscow