BUSH STABS ENVIRONMENTALISTS IN THE BACK:
This Item, courtesy of the fine folks at Wild Wilderness:
wildwilderness.org
Pasted below is an article published this morning about how former Deschutes National Forest Supervisor and current #2 person within the USFS, Sally Collins, took it upon herself to "postpone" (indefinitely) the upcoming national celebration of the 40th Anniversary of the Wilderness Act.
Pasted immediately below this article is a two week old internal USFS e-mail message which, if correct, would indicate that Ms. Collins is telling one enormous fib. If this USFS e-mail is correct, it would appear that Ms.
Collins and the Bush Administration have some very seriously explaining to do.
Editor
PS... NOTE the reference to "partnership" and appreciate that when the Bush Administration and the USFS speak of "partnerships" this is how they intend to treat their, so-called, "partners".
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sfgate.com
e1841EST7934.DTL&type=printable
Wilderness Act celebration postponed until after election
JEFF BARNARD, Associated Press Writer Tuesday, December 30, 2003
©2003 Associated Press
URL:
sfgate.com/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2003/12/30/state1841EST7934.DTL
(12-30) 15:41 PST GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) --
A federally sponsored conference to celebrate the 40th anniversary of The Wilderness Act has collapsed after the U.S. Forest Service told conservationists it had to be postponed until after the 2004 election.
Informed that the National Wilderness Summit and Expo scheduled for Oct. 1-7 in Denver could not be held before the Nov. 2 election, conservation groups jointly planning the event dropped out, feeling they were no longer full
partners in the event.
"What is frustrating to me is we have leadership at the Department of Interior and the Department of Agriculture talking about partnerships on public lands," said Don Hunger, director of national program development for
the Student Conservation Association, who served as co-chairman of the conference planning committee. "It pretty much turns that relationship on its head, and says we're not a partnership."
Sally Collins, associate director of the Forest Service, the agency's No. 2 position, said she alone made the decision to postpone the conference out of a general desire to keep it from being overshadowed by the Nov. 2, 2004
elections.
Collins said she found out the conference was scheduled for "before the presidential election and got really concerned. Because I didn't want anything to take away from the celebratory nature of this summit." [[RGD: GUFFAW!! Lying doublespeaking liar! ]]
Collins' statement is contradicted by a letter to Hunger from Dave Holland, Forest Service director of wilderness resources and chairman of the Interagency Wilderness Policy Council, made up of representatives of the Forest Service, U.S. Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service and U.S. Geological Survey.
Holland's Dec. 15 letter said the timing "became a concern" with the Departments of Interior and Agriculture, which oversee the five agencies planning the event.
"The Interagency Wilderness Policy Council agreed to move the conference to address the Departments concerns," Holland wrote.
Forest Service spokesman Joe Walsh acknowledged that the departments of Interior and Agriculture expressed concerns, but Collins made the decision on her own.
"If we don't want this to be political, it has to be in a neutral time frame," Walsh said. < LOL!! >
Mike Francis, national forest program manager for The Wilderness Society, expressed skepticism Collins made the decision without influence from the Bush administration.
"No bureaucrat in their right mind would make a call to call off a major conference on the 40th (anniversary of The Wilderness Act) without being told by one of the political bosses in the Bush administration to do it,"
Francis said.
"It's hypocritical for the Bush administration's Forest Service to be holding a wilderness celebration. Somebody might ask them some very tough questions in a political year that they don't want to answer."
Groups seeking designation of more wilderness suffered a setback this year when Interior Secretary Gale Norton struck a deal with Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt to discontinue protections for 2.6 million acres of potential
wilderness, opening the way for oil and gas drilling.
Hunger said Collins contacted him last weekend in an effort to resurrect the conference, but no decisions are likely until January.
The Wilderness Act was signed in September 1964 by President Lyndon Johnson. It restricts grazing, mining, logging and mechanized vehicles on public lands designated by Congress as wilderness. The areas have grown to 107
million acres, more than the national park system.
The five agencies in the Interagency Wilderness Policy Council each committed $30,000 for the conference, said Tinamarie Ekker, senior policy analyst for Wilderness Watch, who served on the conference program committee. The rest of the $243,600 budget was to come from fees paid by
people attending the conference and organizations buying space at the exposition.
Conference planners had hired consultants and negotiated use of the Colorado Convention Center in Denver, Ekker said. Those commitments had to be broken.
Conference planners meeting in June in Golden, Colo., considered the election as a factor for scheduling the gathering, and decided it was outweighed by a desire to assure that people working in wilderness areas during the summer could attend and to avoid conflicts with the holiday
season, Ekker said.
"Wilderness is not an issue that has any relevance for an election outcome," Ekker said. "What we were hoping was if we could get the administration on stage before the election saying some good things about wilderness, maybe we
could hold them to that after the election."
At the agencies' insistence, conservation groups had agreed to keep the conference apolitical, staying away from hot-button issues such as designation of new wilderness areas on federal lands, Ekker said.
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On the Net:
Wilderness Summit website: www.wilderness.net/index.cfm?fuse=40th&sec=summit
©2003 Associated Press
=====BEGIN USFS E-MAIL=======
To: x@yz.gov
16-12-03
Subject: Postponed - Wilderness Summit and Expo for 40th Anniversary from Oct. 1-7, 2004 to unknown date.
Hello all,
Yes, it's true, due to political concerns within the Administration, the Wilderness Summit and Expo, celebrating the 40th Anniversary of the Wilderness Act, which was set for Oct. 1-7, 2004 in Denver Colorado has
been postponed to a post-election date. I will provide more information as it becomes available, but just wanted to get the word out for those planning that far ahead.
Please see the note below from Don Fisher, the national wilderness program manager in the WO.
"Folks - I'm sure you have likely heard (at least rumors!!) that the 40th anniversary summit will not take place in October, as originally planned, but will take place after the election in November. Attached are some notes from the conference call held with the Wilderness Policy Council and
the cochairs of the summit planning committee. Bottom line is this - the administration (Dept. of Ag) knew of the plans for the summit, including the date, for some time. However, the possible political ramifications didn't hit their radar screen, apparently, until recently. The concern
relates to a Congressional race. Administration does not want to provide any event where democratic challenger can use to slam the administration's environmental record, etc. So, that required moving the summit to post election to eliminate that possibility associated with the wilderness
summit event. Unfortunately, the summit planning committee was well along with planning, including a great deal with the Denver convention center. So at this point, we don't even know if the facility is available after the election, and if not, where alternative locations cities for summit may be. But with decision made, all are focused on making the necessary adjustments and moving forward for a successful summit. "
Don Fisher
Wilderness Resource
USDA Forest Service
P.O. Box 96090
Washington, DC 20090-6090
(202)205-1414
Fax: 202-205-1145
E-Mail: dfisher@fs.fed.us |
