A new approach

COEUR d'ALENE - The U.S. Forest Service gave its new process for addressing objections from the public its first test in Coeur d'Alene on Tuesday.

Associate Deputy Chief Jim Pena traveled from Washington, D.C., to chair an all-day meeting at The Coeur d'Alene Resort, designed to resolve objections to the Idaho Panhandle National Forest's Revised Forest Plan and Final Environmental Impact Statement before they are adopted.

While there were about 200 individual objections filed against the forest plan, Pena said the Forest Service wanted to focus on four areas that encompass the majority of those objections.

Those four topics included county coordination, Wild and Scenic River eligibility determinations, recommended Wilderness and Wilderness Study Areas, and Management Indicator Species.

Pena explained that he was there to make sure the decision-makers understand what the objectors were concerned about before trying to remedy those concerns.

"We want to know 'did we get it right?'" he asked.

Several county commissioners from North Idaho and Montana attended or phoned in to participate in the county coordination portion of the meeting.

Three North Idaho county commissioners and a school superintendent filed formal objections to the plan saying the forest service failed to adequately coordinate with them during the creation of the plan. Those objectors included Shoshone County Commissioner Larry Yergler, Benewah County Commissioner Jack Buell, Bonner County Commissioner Mike Nielsen and Robin Stanley, superintendent of Mullan School District.

Pam Secord, chairman of the Benewah County Natural Resource Team, read the official definition of coordination to Pena and said coordination is not merely asking local government for comments and treating those comments like general input.

"It appears that the forest service is in error in its internal understanding of what it means to coordinate with entities such as local governments as defined in law," she said, adding the forest service failed to coordinate with them during the creation of the forest plan.

"Our commissioners have only had one forest service official meet with them about this plan in the last 12 years," she said. "Your agency has omitted the step of coordination from the very beginning."

She said the laws require the agency to take local land use plans into account when creating a forest plan, but that did not occur in Benewah County.

"Have you ever looked at the Benewah County Natural Resource Plan?" she asked. "Has anybody at that table read our plan and looked at it and coordinated it with what is going on here?"

Secord was told the forest service was just there to listen.

"I will take the silence as an answer of no," she said.

Bonner County Commissioner Nielsen had a similar message for Pena.

"I do not believe you got it right," he said. "Cooperation is not coordination, and the county is not in a subordinate position. We are at an equal level."

He said he recognizes that the agency isn't required to follow the county's plan, but where there is conflict there needs to be coordination.

"Areas were arbitrarily designated as primitive or wilderness near Priest Lake. That was arbitrarily done, and it was not coordinated," Nielsen said.

Stanley, the Mullan School District superintendent, said he has sent several letters to the agency inquiring about the level of coordination they would be having with his county or district.

He said he was told that there is no special status for those with which they coordinate.

"That led us to believe that local government coordination doesn't exist," he said.

Shoshone County Commissioner Larry Yergler said he wanted to point out some errors in the process as well.

"The county governments have a responsibility to protect their citizens," he said, adding that is why coordination is important.

He said the economic impact statement was grossly understated, and was done in a way that shows there would not be much impact.

"But in the last 20 years our budgets have continued to go down," he said.

Pena said the agency is looking at remedies to resolve those issues, which could include sitting down with local governments and the tribes to have a discussion about their concerns.

"This is a government-to-government issue," he said, adding that he hoped regional forest officials would agree to hold discussions.

Jason Kirchner, spokesman for the Idaho Panhandle National Forest, said Pena heard from several other objectors, and will now take that information back to Washington, D.C., and talk with the national experts on the issues discussed.

Kirchner said Pena will then determine what the agency can legally change and what it cannot.

"He will then issue a final response to the objectors," he said, adding that will be part of the final determination or approval of the Revised Forest Plan.

Kirchner said despite Tuesday's meeting being the first time the agency has used this process, things went pretty well.

"It's certainly not a polished process by any means," he said. "But it was a good listening session."