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900 W. Main St.,
PO Box 690 Grangeville, ID 83530
Phone: 208.983.1200 |
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| Trade within the Upper Lochsa, or not at all |
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| Task force provides county commission recommendation on land trade |
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By Andrew Ottoson - sports/outdoors reporter
GRANGEVILLE -- At a Monday night meeting of the Idaho County Commission's citizens task force on the Upper Lochsa Land Exchange, the task force voted to amend the recommendations task force chairman Roy Lee presented to the commission a week earlier.
Lee was not present; task force member Jay Balch, who called the meeting, said, "I guess we fired him."
The meeting was light on procedure, except for two votes. The first vote adopted three items including a map and a default position that would oppose trading land in 36 sections in the Fish Creek, Cove, Riggins and Lucile areas as part of an acre-for-acre concept. The first vote also affirmed the study underpinning the county commission's belief that an acre-for-acre trade would do less harm to the local timber industry than other options.
After discussion, the task force voted not to adopt the map, leaving the default position with two teeth: a preference for no action, and a recommendation that the commission pursue a trade that would block up Western Pacific Timber's land into a single inholding in the Upper Lochsa.
After the first vote went by a show of hands, commissioner James Rockwell, who sat with the audience and repeatedly deferred to the task force members, offered a suggestion: "There has been integrity with this task force...and I'd suggest you get everyone to sign off so there's a record of how everyone has voted."
While the task force was signing off on including University of Idaho research economist Steven Peterson's study, task force member Ed Hall said: "I'm not comfortable with number three and Earthquake Basin, Elk City...It's not right to be throwing others under the bus."
Task force member Larry Allen, who has headed the effort to develop a map prioritizing the lands included in Alternative F, responded that he believes "the majority [in the county] feel the Fish Creek, Lucile, Riggins, and Cove areas need to be thrown out."
Discussion was thrown open to the public. After some back-and-forth between commissioner Jim Chmelik and residents of Harpster and Riggins, task force member Bob Abbott said, "the whole point is for this task force to give the commissioners ammunition to go to the Forest Service with."
"Item number three is a pretty heavy hitter," county commissioner Jim Chmelik said. "I think this report does a pretty good job."
Chmelik said striking the map would weaken the county's position in its talks with the Forest Service, but that it is essential for the county to reference Peterson's study, because it "recognizes the takings" involved with converting privately owned timberland to public property.
"Quantifying this hasn't been done across the nation," Chmelik said.
Peterson's study found 60 timber industry job opportunities are maintained by keeping WPT's Upper Lochsa holdings as private timberland.
Ray Payton, who is not a task force member and in December 2011 organized a meeting of land trade opponents in Riggins at which the recall petitions against Rockwell and commission chair Skip Brandt first circulated, sharply criticized the position the task force had voted to affirm: "If you read this, it's saying 'no action,' but block up the Upper Lochsa, and if you have to take other land to do it, take this."
Discussion continued until task force member Denis Duman moved for a vote to remove the map from the task force's recommendations.
Striking the map left intact two ideas described in the report Roy Lee presented to the commission on Jan. 24.
The Jan. 24 report stated that there is "overwhelming, almost universal support for the 'No Action Alternative' from the general public in Idaho County." It noted two minority opinions on land selection, but did not describe either in much detail.
Also, it stated: "The Task Force members are supportive of an alternative course of action wherein an exchange involving only the checkerboard lands in the Upper Lochsa River drainage occurs, blocking up ownership so that there would be only one inholding when the land exchange process is finalized."
But the report Lee presented had not included the Peterson study. |
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