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- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Archives Revels Classifieds Real Estate Menu Guide Wedding Weather Subscribe Contact Us March 21, 2005 Cascade-Siskiyou management back in BLM's hands By Robert Plain Ashland Daily Tidings The public protest period for the Cascade Siskiyou National Monument's proposed management plan closed a week ago. But according to Howard Hunter, the Bureau of Land Management's assistant manager for the monument, it could still take several months to determine if the proposed plan will become the final plan. The BLM received more than 11,000 comments on its Proposed Management Plan and Final Environmental Impact Statement and 23 conservation groups, led by the Soda Mountain Wilderness Council, have joined together to formally protest many elements of BLM's proposed plan. Formal protests are sent directly to BLM's Washington, D.C. offices, Hunter said. Once that office organizes the official protests, which must be addressed before a Record of Decision is released, it will contact the Medford BLM office for its insight and overview. The two BLM offices and the local office's team then meet with what Hunter described as resource specialists, which include real estate, livestock, wildlife and biology experts. Together, that group will decide if the proposed management plan should be amended or added to the Record of Decision as is. The final plan will govern Oregon's newest national monument for the next 10 to 15 years. "BLM has never had to work on any kind of management plan such as this one before," Hunter said. Dave Willis, chair of the Soda Mountain Wilderness Council, agreed that managing for conservation is a new direction for BLM. "Writing a management plan for the sole purpose of protection is a pretty new experience for BLM," Willis said. "There seems to be some pretty stubborn resistance to this goal from the district management level here and Bush appointees in Washington, D.C. They just don't seem to want the monument to be anything more than a kinder-and-gentler multiple-abuse area." He added, "There need to be some changes made to this plan before it becomes part of the Record of Decision. We need to protect Oregon's newest national monument." Willis said the 23 conservation groups agree that there are three components of the proposed plan that must be addressed in order for the monument's management to coincide with the Presidential Proclamation that created it: Grazing, road maintenance and timber management. He said the proclamation that made this area a national monument charged the BLM with studying grazing and its effects on the ecosystem. "The proclamation was real clear," said Willis. "If the impacts of cattle are not compatible with protecting the plant, animal and other natural features associated with the monument then the grazing leases shall be retired." The BLM has been dragging its feet on the issue of grazing by delaying to study the issue, Willis said. "The proclamation didn't say anything about modifying grazing," he said. "What are they going to do: Modify it, then study it again. The plan has an inability to admit that maybe not every single acre of BLM land should be chomped and stomped by cattle." Willis said the consortium of protesters and commenters have also accused the BLM of not closing or blocking enough roads to adequately protect the natural features of the monument. "BLM has to explain how each road serves to protect the monument," Willis said. "Both the draft and the proposed final EIS said the roads were built as logging roads. They weren't built to protect the area." He also said the proposed plan contains "too many loopholes for logging trucks," saying that BLM may have had the best of intentions but that, because those intentions were worded so loosely, they are vulnerable to being abused by other agencies. If the proposed management plan is not altered to better coincide with the proclamation that created the monument, then Willis says he will file suit. "If BLM continues to ignore the clear intent of the monument proclamation and the thousand and thousand of citizen reminders, we'll be left with no choice," Willis said. "This special place is an ecological wonder that should be taken seriously and celebrated. Instead, too much of BLM's begrudging plan tries to get away with a monument in name only." The Cascade-Siskiyou Monument was created on June 9, 2000, when former President Bill Clinton issued a presidential proclamation stating that the 52,000 acre biologically significant area that straddles the Oregon-California border be "set apart and reserved for the purpose of protecting" this land and its associated natural and ecological features. DailyTidings.com Home Page Archives | Revels | Classifieds | Real Estate Guide | Weather | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2005 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Deep Muscle Stimulator Ceramic Piggy Banks FREE Entertainment Guide Women's & Men's Slippers Accelerate Weightloss Products Backpacks Online Pharmacy Vegas Travel Guide Search Engine Optimization Student Loans Hotel & Airline Reservations Hammocks Water Filter Helzberg Diamonds Online Casinos Community Bonus Casino Mortgage Calculator Security Systems Mailing Lists Click Here Advertisement .:Advertisements:. 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