A collaborative proposal by loggers, environmentalists and county commissioners to restore forests and streams on 1.4 million acres of the Clearwater and Nez Perce national forests won initial approval Thursday.
An advisory committee recommended the proposal authored by members of the Clearwater Basin Collaborative - along with nine other similar proposals across the country - be approved by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack. If he signs off on it, the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Act would provide as much as $40 million in funding over 10 years for the Clearwater project to thin fire-prone forests, obliterate old logging roads, restore degraded fish and big-game habitat and treat noxious weeds. The work would occur in the Middle Fork of the Clearwater and Selway river basins.
"The real message here is collaboration works," said Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, who convened the group made up of diverse interests. "The projections are it will bring more than 300 good-paying jobs over a 10-year basis into the basin. The focus here is improving the land and the habitat."
Two years ago, Crapo encouraged members of the timber industry, conservation community, recreational user groups and local governments to begin talks aimed at finding a way to break through decades of animosity that led to lawsuits over forest management. They formed the Clearwater Basin Collaborative and authored the proposal that competed with more than 30 others across the country.
"The proposal represents a lot of work. I wouldn't say it was necessarily difficult work in terms of relationships," said Robin Miller of the Nature Conservancy at Moscow. "It had very broad support."
Some of the work, such as thinning forests near rural communities, will produce wood products that will feed local mills.
"We are expecting several thousand acres of thinning and we expect it will produce commercial timber, and there is going to be quite a bit of aquatic restoration and weed treatment," said Bill Higgins of the Idaho Forest Group at Grangeville.
Much of the work will not focus on timber products, but instead be designed to improve water quality and stream habitat. Jonathan Oppenheimer of the Idaho Conservation League at Boise said about 80 miles of old logging roads in the Clear Creek drainage near Kooskia have been targeted for removal. He also said some forests will be burned to improve elk and other big-game habitat as well as to restore forests to historic conditions. Logging would not occur in roadless or wilderness areas but weeds, such as large infestations of spotted knapweed in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness Area, would be treated.
"Everything goes through the National Environmental Policy Act and you have to comply with the Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act," he said. "This doesn't go around any environmental laws. It's basically an opportunity to reward some collaboratively developed restoration projects around the country and help demonstrate this is a good way of doing business."
The work would be contracted through the two national forests and be dependent on funding. Congress has authorized up to $40 million a year for the 10 projects, but the money has to be appropriated annually.
Miller said Vilsack is expected to approve the 10 projects recommended by the advisory committee.
"The committee represented a very diverse group of people, and ultimately I think they feel very confident they were able to put forward the best 10 proposals. I'm confident (Vilsack's) decision will reflect the work of the committee.
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On the Web: http://www.fs.fed.us/restoration/CFLR/regionalproposals.shtml
http://www.clearwaterbasincollaborative.org/
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Barker may be contacted at ebarker@lmtribune.com or at (208) 848-2273.
