Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Department of Lands helped during wildfire


    The Idaho Department of Lands wants to provide some facts in response to your Dec. 13, 2013, editorial titled, “Shabby Extortion.”
    The IDL (a state of Idaho agency) charged federal fire managers for use of state endowment trust lands to expand the main fire camp during the Beaver Creek Fire. In your editorial, you said the “greedy, grasping and callous action of the Department of Lands” made the natural disaster a “profit center for the state.” Unlike the nearby private landowner you referenced who had the choice not to charge for similar use of his land during the fire, current law and policy doesn’t give IDL the option not to charge for formal uses of state endowment trust lands. The Idaho Constitution requires the millions of acres of state endowment trust lands in Idaho—including the Blaine County parcel that was used to expand the fire camp—be managed to generate income to support public schools and other state institutions.
    In fact, the Blaine County School District received $377,458 from endowment earnings during the 2012-2013 school year. Additionally, the neighboring private landowner in this situation was not like most private landowners in choosing to not charge a use fee. Federal fire managers commonly negotiate land-use agreements paying private landowners $300-600 per day for the use of their lands. Working with Commissioner Larry Schoen, IDL negotiated a rate of $100 per day for the parcel associated with the Beaver Creek Fire.
    A further consideration in the negotiations was that there was an individual already leasing the parcel for farming. The lessee had to be compensated for his un-harvested crop in order to accommodate the fire camp. In the end, the final cost to fire managers for use of the land was $2,910, with 70 percent of that going to the individual as compensation for having to eliminate his crop. By comparison, the total cost to fight the Beaver Creek Fire was approximately $26 million.
    Lastly, I’d like to point out that IDL provided significant support to your community during the Beaver Creek Fire. IDL advised fire managers regarding suppression activities on state and privately owned forested lands in the area, and advised and assisted your local government—including county and city fire departments and rural fire districts—in negotiating a cost-share agreement that significantly reduced their expenses to support suppression and protection activities. Through a Cooperator Agreement IDL set up, fire managers mobilized and quickly dispatched 40 structure fire engines from across southern Idaho to assist the Blaine County fire departments and districts in efficiently protecting the hundreds of structures threatened by flames.
Pat Brown
Eastern Area manager for IDL Idaho Falls

 




About Comments

Comments with content that seeks to incite or inflame may be removed.

Comments that are in ALL CAPS may be removed.

Comments that are off-topic or that include profanity or personal attacks, libelous or other inappropriate material may be removed from the site. Entries that are unsigned or contain signatures by someone other than the actual author may be removed. We will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or any other policies governing this site. Use of this system denotes full acceptance of these conditions. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.

The comments below are from the readers of mtexpress.com and in no way represent the views of Express Publishing, Inc.

You may flag individual comments. You may also report an inappropriate or offensive comment by clicking here.

Flagging Comments: Flagging a comment tells a site administrator that a comment is inappropriate. You can find the flag option by pointing the mouse over the comment and clicking the 'Flag' link.

Flagging a comment is only counted once per person, and you won't need to do it multiple times.

Proper Flagging Guidelines: Every site has a different commenting policy - be sure to review the policy for this site before flagging comments. In general these types of comments should be flagged:

  • Spam
  • Ones violating this site's commenting policy
  • Clearly unrelated
  • Personal attacks on others
Comments should not be flagged for:
  • Disagreeing with the content
  • Being in a dispute with the commenter

Popular Comment Threads



 Local Weather 
Search archives:


Copyright © 2024 Express Publishing Inc.   Terms of Use   Privacy Policy
All Rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of Express Publishing Inc. is prohibited. 

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.