For the week of July 16 - 22, 2003

Environmental community unsure of wilderness deal

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"Is wilderness designation gaining anything that wasn’t there before with wilderness study status? What are we getting for wilderness designation in Owhyee County, except for some lines on a map?"

— JON MARVEL, Western Watersheds Project

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By GREG STAHL
Express Staff Writer

The secretive nature of negotiations for two potentially high profile Idaho wilderness designations, as well as potential concessions negotiating groups may be willing to make to achieve designations, are ruffling members of the Northwest’s environmental community.

In a five-page letter addressed to the Idaho Conservation League, The Wilderness Society and The Sierra Club, 38 other wildlands stakeholders are criticizing the three groups for their work on potential designation of Owyhee-Bruneau and Boulder-White Cloud wilderness areas.

The June 2 letter, while specifically targeting the Owyhee Initiative process, restates concerns for the separate and unrelated Boulder-White Cloud process, headed by Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Idaho.

"We are extremely concerned about both the short-term and long-term implications of the Owhyee Initiative in terms of public involvement, possible circumvention of the National Environmental Policy Act, wilderness policy, grazing administration, potential public land disposals and exchanges, and other areas," the letter states.

According to The Wilderness Society, the Owyhee Initiative process began roughly one and a half years ago at the invitation of the Owyhee County Commissioners. Conservation groups began meeting with county officials, ranchers, motorized recreation users, military officials, outfitters, guides and congressional staff to search for a consensus solution to the contentious natural resources conflicts in the area.

Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, has pledged to push legislation if the diverse interests can arrive at a consensus solution to the land management puzzle there.

However, as last week’s letter indicates, consensus among the stakeholders who have seats at the Owyhee Initiative’s table and among the public at large may be different issues.

"Most alarming to us is that by the time this proposal is finalized, we and the public at large will have no real opportunity to affect it before it is swept into legislation and through congress," the letter states. "In addition, there has been no articulation by your organizations of any bottom line(s), which makes it difficult for us to trust the process."

Craig Gehrke, The Wilderness Society’s Idaho director, took exception to the allegation that the Owyhee Initiative process is a secretive one. The meetings are open to the public, he said.

"People just need to care enough to find out when the meetings are," he said.

Gehrke also said it is too early to pass judgment on a process that has not yet produced a tangible document.

"When both packages (Owhyee and Boulder White Cloud) are done, they’ll be released to the public," Gehrke said. "That’s when people will start to look at what’s agreeable and what’s not agreeable."

In the letter, the 38 signatories—a Who’s Who of Western environmentalists—question the proposed independent administration of an Owhyee wilderness and whether it would conform with the federal Wilderness Act. They express concerns that only the most scenic portions of the Owyhee-Bruneau canyons will be "cherry picked" for wilderness designation. They also question the wisdom of potential public land exchanges or disposals that would accompany the wilderness bill.

Finally, they contend the potential use of grazing permit buyouts as a means to appease ranchers in the area is questionable, although Jon Marvel, director of Hailey-based Western Watersheds Project, said his group supports the use of permit buyouts.

Further, Marvel said in an interview that he is less concerned about the lack of information emanating from the process than about the substance of the discussions in Owhyee County.

"Is wilderness designation gaining anything that wasn’t there before with wilderness study status?" Marvel asked. "What are we getting for wilderness designation in Owhyee County, except for some lines on a map?

"We don’t gain enough from wilderness designation, and we’re giving things up in order to get it."

Will Caldwell, a Ketchum artist and board president of the Idaho Sporting Congress, agreed that the apparent compromises in the Owyhee discussion, and the Boulder-White Cloud process, go too far.

"While some Idaho conservation groups have succeeded in protecting vast acres of public land by demanding court enforcement of environmental laws, the Idaho Conservation League is narrowly focused on pursuit of the holy grail of ‘wilderness’ legislation, and to that end is making compromising deals with politicians and industry that will override environmental laws, trade over public lands to counties, deliver public land management to private interests and weaken the very Wilderness Act it worships," Caldwell said.

"This is bad precedent setting and a losing form of conservation," he said

Speaking specifically about the Boulder-White Cloud wilderness proposal, which under Simpson’s direction has been largely secretive, Idaho Conservation League Central Idaho Director Linn Kincannon said that a deal will have to be significant and meaningful to gain ICL’s support. ICL will "not be seduced by a bad deal," she said.

"It’s about the future. It’s the guarantee, to come as close as we can make it today, that this is what it will be in the future," she said. "If you’re a group that believes wilderness is the best way to go, perhaps you have to strike a compromise."

 

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