October 2006, Newsletter #15
Welcome to THE RED LODGE CLEARINGHOUSE,
the full-service information source for collaborative groups
throughout the Interior west committed to resolving resource-use
conflicts.
These have been a number of prickly weeks for the Department of
Interior, its Deputy Director and ambassador of good will, Lynn
Scarlett, and unsurprisingly, the somewhat schizophrenic BLM.
Burdened with self-contradictory orders and, a newly conjured
process — listening — to inform the agency apparatus of the
concerns of the citizenry.
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Neglected vows cited at BLM
BY BLAINE HARDEN, WASHINGTON POST, 09/01/06
Earlier this year, Steve Belinda, a wildlife biologist in the Pinedale office of the BLM, quit his job because he said that he and other wildlife specialists were required to spend nearly all their time working in the office on requests for more drilling and could not go into the field to study the effect on wildlife of the thousands of gas wells.
SEE FULL STORY >>
BLM lets down its Wyoming guard
EDITORIAL, DENVER POST, 09/10/06
"The facts are no surprise whatsoever," Bruce Pendery, program director for the Wyoming Outdoor Council, told The Washington Post. "What is new is that, instead of us grumbling about the BLM not doing what it said it would do, the agency itself is acknowledging that this is the case."
SEE FULL STORY >>
Interior on the hot seat
EDITORIAL, DENVER POST, 09/25/06
The U.S. Interior Department has much to worry about, and perhaps much to answer for, on key questions about how it's doing its job.
Two weeks ago, Interior's Inspector General, Earl Devaney, told a congressional committee, "Simply stated, short of a crime, anything goes at the highest levels of the Department of the Interior."
SEE FULL STORY >>
'WASTE FRAUD AND ABUSE' AT INTERIOR >>
BLM MUST SHOW IT WILL HONOR COMMITMENTS IN WYOMING >>
Lynn Scarlett, DOI, urges cooperation on land restoration
BY PERRY BACKUS, THE MISSOULIAN, 09/26/06
Nature doesn't recognize the difference between public and private ground. It doesn't see the lines on the map where one state starts and another ends. And it certainly doesn't know the difference between Forest Service green and Bureau of Land Management yellow. So when the talk turns to restoration of natural ecosystems, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Interior Lynn Scarlett said its time to search out the partnerships that will allow for those efforts to occur across the landscape.
SEE FULL STORY >>
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The listening road show started on August 9, 2006 in Spokane,
Washington and traveled through many towns, heard many versions of
complaints and suggestions, and provided numerous listeners. Secretary Kempthorne
kicked the show off in Spokane where he heard that NEPA needed
fixing, that ESA needed to add incentives to get private landowners
more motivated to harbor species, that ESA was fine as is, that ESA
was unnecessary as is. Many of the agency functionaries opened with
bland comments of good intentions, and by and large the sessions
provided a forum for a limited amount of citizen/agency
interaction. And the sessions ended fittingly in Boise, Idaho.
VISIT THE COOPERATIVE CONSERVATION PAGE FOR SESSION TRANSCRIPTS AND MORE INFORMATION >>
Kempthorne lends an ear to Idahoans’ conservation views
BY ROCKY BARKER, IDAHO STATESMAN, 10/10/06
Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne came back to Idaho on Monday not to talk but to listen.
More than 90 people came to Boise State University’s Student Union for Kempthorne’s 26th and final “listening session” aimed at hearing ideas about how the government can best aid cooperative conservation programs. Critics of the Endangered Species Act dominated the sessions.
SEE FULL STORY >>
Feds get an earful
BY WHITNEY ROYSTER, CASPER STAR-TRIBUNE, 09/20/06
PINEDALE — People packed into the Sublette County Library Tuesday to bend the federal government's ear about its cooperation — or lack thereof — with local communities and organizations.
SEE FULL STORY >>
Hearing impaired? ‘Listening tour’ seems like a stall tactic
EDITORIAL, COLORADO SPRINGS GAZETTE, 09/15/06
In case they want our opinion, we think cooperative conservation is absolutely the way to go, and we believe that most Americans, and most Westerners, much prefer a more collaborative approach to the Washington-knows-best paradigm that for decades had been the rule. But frankly, we’re a little dismayed at why this road show is necessary, since we’re six years into the Bush administration.
SEE FULL STORY >>
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The Webster definition of "mitigate" is "to cause to become less
harsh or hostile, to make less severe or painful." But it seems
impossible to find examples of actual in-the-field "mitigation"
to use as models. Here are some comments from the Clearinghouse
editorial staff:
The idea of off-site mitigation has been kicking around for a number
of years. We have yet to find out what it means. Does it mean a
3:1 match so that industry has to "restore" (?) three acres elsewhere
for every acre of forage ruined? If so, where? Is it seeding of
an area? Or what? And who monitors? We should remember that the
animals are already using the best of what is available for winter
habitat. And in normal winters most areas that might otherwise
appear "suitable" tend to be under 2-3 feet of snow, making them
unavailable to wildlife.
Several meetings have already taken place to discuss
mitigation — one
last May and one that focused on sage grouse this past
September — that have brought together serious people to
deal with this issue. It is quite possibly impervious to talk.
What is mitigation?
WILDLIFE MITIGATION WORKSHOP MEETING SUMMARY
In May of 2006, folks who are involved with mitigating the impacts of
oil and gas drilling on wildlife met in Pinedale, Wyoming to
establish a common understanding of mitigation
and clarify the sources of mitigation policy and guidance.
READ MEETING SUMMARY >>
'We're going to feel it'
BY WHITNEY ROYSTER, CASPER STAR-TRIBUNE, 10/16/06
The news is not that oil and gas development is ramping up throughout the state. Instead, the news is that the Wyoming Game and Fish Department is increasingly taking notice.
The department itself has mapped projections for oil and gas development across the state, and overlapped those projections with wildlife habitat, showing a grim picture for wildlife's future.
SEE FULL STORY >>
"WHERE ARE THE ANIMALS GOING?" >>
Elk or energy?
BY CORY HATCH, JACKSON HOLE NEWS AND GUIDE, 10/04/06
Whether energy development in the Wyoming Range will actually affect the mule deer is still guesswork, according to Hall Sawyer, a research biologist studying the effects of oil and gas development on the Pinedale Anticline.
“I don’t know if anybody can really predict what’s going to happen there when the Wyoming Range is drilled,” Sawyer says from his office in Cheyenne. “The winter and summer ranges are important, but the summer ranges are much larger and generally better protected.”
The problem, Sawyer says, is that these winter and summer ecosystems all interconnect.
“It’s important for people to realize that no matter where they are hunting deer that many of those deer winter on the same winter range,” he says.
READ MORE >>
'Mitigation office' aims to offset harm from Wyoming drilling
BY APRIL REESE, LAND LETTER, 08/03/06
As drilling fragments habitat in Wyoming's Jonah Field, land managers are hoping to minimize the damage by mitigating the environmental effects of drilling, primarily by improving or conserving comparable habitat elsewhere in the Upper Green River Basin.
Where and how that is done will be up to the newly created Jonah Interagency Mitigation and Reclamation Office.
READ MORE >>
VISIT THE HOME PAGE OF THE JONAH INTERAGENCY OFFICE >>
"JONAH OFFICE FLOATS RECLAMATION PLAN" >>
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