RMEF? Waste of money?

[JoseCuervo]

What they are doing up here is causing all kinds of problems for the FS, smart guy. You need to get a clue. You must be a member. Lawsuits upon lawsuits, they are obstructionists, pure and simple. Don't let the names fool you.

The Forest Service needs to have someone cause all sorts of problems for them. Until they start managing their lands for the game and the recreation and quit managing them for the extraction industries, they should keep expecting to be on the losing end of lawsuits upon lawsuits.

 

[BigHornRam]

Here is a case where sportsmens groups shut down a sweetheart deal between the state and a wealthy land owner, and also purchased a critical adjacent private inholding.

Wetzsteon's conservation land swap finalized
by KRISTIN KNIGHT - Ravalli Republic


The Wetzsteon family of Sula closed on an agreement yesterday with the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation to permanently conserve their 367-acre Lyman Creek property. The property was then conveyed to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, who will in turn trade the parcel with the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation to consolidate its holdings.

The acreage is surrounded by state and federal lands and will be made available to the public.

“We've had the property optioned for over a year now,” said RMEF Lands Program Manager Mike Mueller. “The Elk Foundation had control of the property from the family and had been raising money and going through bringing in partnerships to complete the project. We just got enough money raised a month ago, so we went toward going ahead to buy it.”

The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation bought the property yesterday and immediately sold it to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks on the same day.


William Wetzsteon, 82, who was born in Sula, is the grandson of a Montana pioneer family that migrated West in the late 1880s. The lives of his ancestors are chronicled in Montana's history books.

“We could have received more for the land, but this was the right thing to do,” Wetzsteon said after he, his wife Terry, his sister-in-law Betty and her sons Brian and Bob closed on the sale.

The land was appraised by the state for $1,700 per acre, making the total purchase price $623,900.

At an elevation of 5,500 feet, about 35 percent of the property is timbered with about 65 percent open grazing land. The 2000 fire near Darby burned some of the timber and Wetzsteon has been working with loggers to clear trees burned in the fire. The property is an in-holding within land managed by the DNRC and the Bitterroot National Forest. It supports a high density of wintering elk in the Bitterroot and has not been grazed in more than 20 years. Its only improvements are a small cabin without electricity and an outhouse.

“The property provides great elk and mule deer habitat,” said Bob Wetzsteon. “We've always allowed access through our part of the ranch for hunting, and that 367 acres is five or six miles away. It's never really been part of the contiguous ranchland. But William tried to keep it more private for himself and didn't really allow hunting access.”

The property is located on a Forest Service road that was locked during hunting season.

“The best access was on horseback or walking quite a ways,” Bob Wetzsteon said. “There wasn't that good of access to that part originally. Now, it's state land and we feel it's in its best use right now.”

“The hunter-conservationist organizations in Montana really stepped up to show support for this project,” Mueller said.

Mueller thanked the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Foundation, Ravalli County Fish and Wildlife Association, Safari Club International, the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep, the Rapp Family Foundation, and the Elk Foundation supporters and volunteers.

“This was a very special project and it's a great day for the Bitterroot Valley and the people who live here,” he said.

Mueller said because the land is surrounded by state and federal land and is a migratory corridor for elk and other wildlife, development would have had a serious impact on the entire landscape and its wildlife.

“The Wetzsteon Family has been here a long time and they've watched the changes in the valley,” he said. “Because of their love of the land and wildlife, they wanted to see this land made available to the public for hunting and other forms of recreation forever.”

Last year, the DNRC originally proposed swapping an 800-acre swath of state land in French Basin, south of Darby, for 1,400 acres of private land near Lincoln, Mont. The 800 acres were then going to be sold to a private landowner. After public outcry in the Bitterroot over access, the option to purchase the Wetzsteon property came up at a land board meeting and seemed to mitigate the public's interest. Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks wanted to buy the property, but had to go through an approval process to use Habitat Montana dollars, which are reserved to buy only crucial wildlife habitat in the state. Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation held onto the property until FWP could buy it. In January, the state Land Board in Helena approved the acreage for purchase by FWP.

 

[BigHornRam]

Here is what elk states like Montana face in the next 20 years.

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyoming (AP) -- John Kerr wasn't dreaming of palm trees and balmy winters when he retired from WGBH, the Boston public TV station known for producing such hits as "Antiques Roadshow." His thoughts had gone West.


Seasonal ranger John Kerr discusses wolves wtih Laurie Lyman in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming.

The 69-year-old put on a green uniform and Smokey Bear hat and became a seasonal ranger in Yellowstone National Park, where snow can fall every month of the year, including July.

"That's why they have wood stoves and furnaces," Kerr said. "Warm weather isn't the issue for me. It's keeping vital and interested and involved."

Demographers say thousands of people like Kerr are heading to the Rocky Mountain West in their later years. Forget the warmth of Florida and Arizona. Baby boomers, in particular, are gravitating toward the peaks and sagebrush basins of Wyoming and Montana, promising to turn these states from relatively young into two of the nation's oldest.

They're drawn by low crime, fresh air, little traffic and abundant outdoor activities, said Larry Swanson, an economist and director of the Center for the Rocky Mountain West in Missoula, Mont.

Although people of all ages like those things, older people tend to be flexible enough in their careers, families and finances to finally kick up their boots on a porch rail, he said.

"If you're 25, you say, `I'd like to live here, but maybe someday in the future,"' Swanson said. "But if you're 45 or 55, the future is now."

The populations of Montana and Wyoming are not very old. In 2000, Montana ranked 18th and Wyoming 43rd for the relative size of their 65-and-over populations. But by 2030, the Census Bureau predicts Montana will rank fifth and Wyoming third in the nation for their over-65 populations.

Florida is expected to remain on top, though Wyoming and Montana will both likely be a good deal older than Arizona -- even as the Grand Canyon State moves up from 22nd to 14th.

The two states are not seeking out older people; they are being discovered.

Laurie Lyman, 55, was an elementary school teacher in San Diego when she began traveling to Yellowstone on long trips to watch wolves. In 2005, she decided it was time to get as close to the wolves as she could.

"I said to my husband, `You know what? Life's too short. I'm going,"' she said, adding that many people like her are snapping up property around Yellowstone.

Officials with the two states are preparing for the influx. This year, Montana established a trust fund so the state's older population will have access to health care and other essential services, even in rural areas.

"We've done projections of stuff and seeing our elderly population doubling in the next 10 to 15 years," said Charlie Rehbein, chief of the Montana Aging Services Bureau. "I think it's going to have a tremendous impact."

One challenge is that the two states already have very low unemployment, around 3 percent, and could face a real labor crunch when the oldest baby boomers hit 65 in 2011.

"We haven't seen anything yet, because the exodus has not really begun out of the work force," said Swanson, the economist. "That's going to begin in two or three years."

Rather than struggle with a labor shortage, Wyoming officials hope to get older people to stay in the workplace and persuade business owners to hire older workers, said Rob Black, policy analyst for Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal.

Swanson said most of the baby boomers moving in plan to work. Kerr, for example, said he would continue working -- for now.

"My life hasn't slowed down," he said. "I've found a lot of sustenance -- spiritual sustenance, I suppose -- in the natural world. I think it helps put our fast-paced world into balance."

Working was what Lee and Beth Dix had in mind in 1999 when they began thinking about leaving Washington, D.C., where he was a systems analyst for IBM Corp. and she was a corporate planner for Fairchild Corp.

Lee Dix, 62, said the couple researched dozens of communities in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, then flew to Denver and started driving. The couple ended up in Cheyenne, the first overnight stop on their trip.

Lee Dix said the couple did not even consider Florida or Arizona after sweltering in Washington.

"Except for the wind here, this is a pretty ideal place for us," he said.