The good, bad and ugly
Published 8:09 pm Tuesday, July 23, 2013
We know from Ecclesiastes, there is a time to break down and a time to build up. When it comes to America’s wild places, an ambidextrous Congress manages to build up and break down simultaneously.
On the prudent-conservation side, the news is promising. Tuesday marked the culmination of a bipartisan push to expand Alpine Lakes Wilderness and designate the Pratt and Middle Fork Snoqualmie rivers as wild and scenic. Thanks to the leadership of Republican Rep. Dave Reichert and Democrat Rep. Suzan DelBene, the Pratt River Wilderness bill received a hearing before a subcommittee of the House Committee on Natural Resources. No easy feat that, with a recalcitrant committee chair, Doc Hastings, an animated opponent of all things wilderness.
Protecting 22,000 acres of wilderness adjoining the existing Alpine Lakes Wilderness Area, which includes a dense low-elevation forest supporting bobcats, cougars, elk and other wildlife, has generated support from hunters, fishers and small business owners. Wilderness skeptics, while never assuaged, shouldn’t fret. As DelBene told the subcommittee, “It is important to know that this bill would not include any private land within the proposed wilderness boundaries or close any mountain bike trails.”
The other hearing win — inspired news for hikers and the Darrington Historical Society — was the bill to protect the Green Mountain lookout. As Rep. Rick Larsen, a cosponsor along with DelBene, said. “It is one of few surviving fire lookouts in the West, and is only one of six such lookouts within a wilderness area.”
The lookout bill should pass, but Alpine Lakes will be a bear for a wilderness-averse House.
On the “break down” side, the list is longer. On Tuesday, a House Appropriations Subcommittee zeroed out all funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (!)
The LWCF, which uses money from offshore oil leases, not taxpayer dollars, is the nation’s main tool to conserve wildlife refuges and parks. And there’s this: On July 31, a Senate Energy and Natural Resources subcommittee will hear testimony on North Cascades fish stocking. The proposal is a trump to weaken the authority of the National Park Service, with the NPS already in accord with the state to allow limited stocking. Sens. Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray should help quash it.
Lastly, there is a precedent-smashing proposal to carve out part of Fort Vancouver and give it to the city. DOA, we hope. Along with fish stocking, it’s being floated with short term economic interests in mind, not long-term stewardship.
And so, a time to mourn and a time to dance. Northwesterners prefer dancing.
