Robert, I have been digging into economic reports for months and the picture is far from feasible, yet none of this info is even being addressed from the Stepford cookie cutter tranfer of Federal Public Lands drones. I submitted comments to the EQC on the SJ15 Work Group report. The document was extremely skewed. In addition to a number of statements concerning the economics, Public Trust, access, etc, I addressed some aspects of their draft report that I believe fell short in providing balanced information and our tax dollars paid for that.
- Your county surveys were biased to produce the results intended to promote the agenda that state management would be better, therefore promoting transfer of Federal Public Lands
- Information on Fuel load/fire was biased towards fire suppression or timber harvesting as an idea to preventing fires. I did not see information from Sam Fuhlendorf of the University of Oklahoma's academic papers, one of the experts on fire as a land management tool, including forests (Pyric Herbivory in Action on Boreal Rangelands) or other experts/organizations. Neither was there scientific data on the contribution of old growth forests to biological diversity. Also missing are the Congressional Reports and papers by Ross Gorte on the bogus hypothesis that logging reduces forest fires, wildlife management costs and climate change factors affecting forest fires.
- Biased information was also provided concerning the timber industry and revenue generated. Missing are reports such as Below Cost timber Sales by Ross Gorte and the fact that the majority of Montana is classified as Unprofitable and Highly Unprofitable with only a tiny corner of the northwest being classified as Profitable. From the Congressional Research Service, Historical Profit and Losses on National Forests, Montana consistently reports net financial losses (except Kootenai), the fact that with the Timber industry reports (Aug. 2014), "Demand is not showing an upward trajectory from new construction at this time...Unsold inventory is holding at a low level, albeit not as low as 2005."
I told them, "Not being paid to do a line by line refutation of this draft, I will simply state that I am disappointed with the focus on materials provided by the American Lands Council with an agenda to prepare the draft, rather than a balanced perspective of scientific data that would benefit all of Montana, not just a special interest group agenda."
I was digging into something last week, cant remember all the bloody rabbit trails or how I got there anymore, but stumbled on transfer of Fed Public Lands to cities and counties of Nevada. After I read through all the bills and such, not finding news articles or position papers on this from a "you cant have our federal public lands" perspective, I called a number of people the next day to find out their perspective. No one knew anything about it and asked for my links. One of the people I called was Travis Brunner at WWP. He said he was going to call their Nevada guy and check up on it. I posted the info in the last EMWH newsletter. Theres just so much of it going on and so few watch dogging with not nearly the monetary resources that the agenda people are working with.
Bills to sell Federal Public Lands to cities - this is how they will do it, piece by piece
H.R. 5205 - "That title would allow the city of Yerington to partner with Nevada Copper to acquire at fair market value approximately 12,500 acres of federal lands, which would be annexed into the city... That bill also includes a Title 4, the Fernley Economic Self-Determination Act, which would transfer certain federal lands to the city of Fernley." They also would sell land to the city of Carlin, Storey and Elko counties.
Nevada Copper Advances Lyon County Bill "The project is located near Yerington, Nevada, close to road, rail, and power infrastructure, and with all future water supply requirements met." The water is part of the bill.
Also on the transfer of Federal Public Lands in Nevada front
Nevada panel’s land control move killed
"The discussion of such a public lands transfer has received heightened interest since the recent cattle grazing dispute between Bunkerville rancher Cliven Bundy and the BLM.
But the effort to take over federal lands dates back to the Sagebrush Rebellion, a controversial movement involving public land use in the West during the 1970s and 1980s. Other Western states, including Utah, are pushing the lands transfer issue as well."
