Michael Garrity recently (Aug. 15) attacked U.S. Rep. Ryan Zinke about forest reform, claiming Zinke thinks we have spotted owls in Montana. Zinke actually wrote: “Frivolous lawsuits are at the heart of forest reform. The Alliance for the Wild Rockies launched more than 150 predatory lawsuits targeting legal and healthy forest projects in just the last 10 years alone. During one such project they litigated on the grounds of preserving spotted owl habitat, the forest actually caught fire and burned down for a second time during the time it took to try the case, destroying the entire area, along with the owl’s habitat.” Why would Garrity misrepresent Zinke?
You don’t have to look far to find motive. The Helena Independent Record published an article last year about the high level of litigation in the United States Forest Service Northern Region. The USFS revealed that over half the region’s timber harvest was encumbered by litigation. The leading litigant was the Alliance for the Wild Rockies — with 212 lawsuits against the USFS, Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service since 1989. The General Accountability Office revealed AWR filed more appeals of USFS projects than any other organization in the nation —putting them on par with Earthjustice and the Sierra Club — which collected millions of taxpayer dollars suing the government.
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Fortunately, Zinke and Congress acted. The House approved the Resilient Federal Forests Act of 2015, sponsored by Rep. Bruce Westerman, R-Arkansas, and Zinke. This bill provides necessary forestry reform, including ideas for forest management and reduced incentives for obstructive litigation.
The bill doesn’t reduce public review, or nullify First Amendment rights to challenge federal government actions. It authorizes collaboration with more efficient review to help projects get out of the courtroom and into the forests. If a group or individual has an interest in a project, they may participate in the collaborative process. If they wish to litigate, they must post a bond that will be surrendered if they lose. Opportunities for litigation remain, but groups like Garrity’s will need to make sure they’ve got legitimate reasons.
The AWR playbook is always the same. Last month they stopped a fire fuel reduction project near Red Lodge and a collaborative stewardship project near the Clark Fork River. Both lawsuits claimed the USFS failed to address economics and impacts to certain species. Of course, they also seek attorney fees.
Challenging collaborative projects is nothing new to this group. Three years ago, AWR got a district judge to stop a timber sale in the Swan Valley because they felt it didn’t adequately analyze lynx habitat. The project was endorsed by wilderness groups, state agencies and two retired Forest Service chiefs. Even though the plan included 10 years of lynx research and the court admitted the project “complied with lynx critical habitat standards,” it still ruled for additional analysis.
AWR doesn’t just oppose collaborative timber projects; they’ve also challenged collaborative wilderness projects. Garrity fought to derail the Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act—a 275,000-acre project 10 years in the making. Garrity objected to some of the acres being open for hunting, firewood and mountain biking rather than the entire area being protected as wilderness.
Montanans should be alarmed current laws allow groups like this to profit from obstruction. The funds to pay AWR don’t come from designated agency budgets—they come from individual forests—taking away tax dollars that could be used for important projects that benefit all of us instead of just Garrity and his attorneys.
Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation suggests using these funds to improve forest health and wildlife habitat, and to create more public land access and recreation opportunities. Frivolous lawsuits have nearly eliminated logging from forest management. Forests have suffered and wildfires are the result.
We must allow the USFS and other land management agencies to do their jobs. If Garrity wants to “secure the ecological integrity of the Wild Rockies Bioregion,” as his website states—instead of filing lawsuits, he should mobilize his members to get their hands dirty working on habitat enhancement projects like thousands of RMEF volunteers do every year. We have not filed a single lawsuit to accomplish them.