SEATTLE – Conservation groups welcome the departure of Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, saying it could take years to reverse the damage to America's public lands during his time in office.
President Donald Trump announced Saturday that the former Navy SEAL and U.S. representative from Montana will leave his post by the end of the year, amid ethics charges involving business deals, policy decisions and travel arrangements.
Despite high hopes that, as a Westerner, Zinke would be sensitive to public lands protections, Aaron Weiss, media director of the Center for Western Priorities, maintains he'll be remembered as the most harmful interior secretary for public lands in the nation's history.
"Secretary Zinke focused on slashing Bears Ears by three-quarters and Grand Staircase-Escalante by half,” Weiss points out. “And that's going to be the legacy that he leaves behind, is this attempt not to stand up and protect public lands, but to open them up to oil and gas drilling."
White House sources said Zinke was forced out of the job.
Zinke is the fourth Trump cabinet member to resign under a cloud of suspicion. The most serious of more than a dozen accusations involves a land deal with the chairman of oil services megafirm Halliburton in Zinke's hometown of Whitefish, Mont., now under investigation by the Justice Department.
Weiss says it isn't likely Zinke's successor will oppose more oil and gas leases, but he hopes he or she will be a better advocate for national parks and monuments.
"You do need someone who's dedicated to protecting wildlife corridors, to acknowledging there are some places that are too precious to drill,” Weiss stresses, “and that your job as a steward of America's public lands is to ensure the best possible return for taxpayers, rather than leasing all of these acres."
Weiss doesn't think there'll be much improvement in the short-term, as former oil and gas lobbyist David Bernhardt – Interior's deputy secretary – will likely be named interim director.
"For as cartoonishly awful as Ryan Zinke was, David Bernhardt is smarter and much more low profile,” he states. “So, we fully expect him to continue these policies, but without the laughable public face that Secretary Zinke brought with him to the job."
The Denver-based Center for Western Priorities is a nonprofit group that advocates for balanced conservation and energy practices in the West.
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An update to the Northwest Forest Plan is expected soon, and Washingtonians who enjoy the outdoors are being urged to follow the process closely.
While the plan doesn't specifically mention recreation, the Northwest Forest Plan is the land management plan for millions of acres of forest in the region.
Michael DeCramer, policy and planning manager with the Washington Trails Association, says the U.S. Forest Service should keep in mind the people hiking trails within the plan area.
"Outdoor recreation is the primary way in which the public interacts with those lands. So, this management plan is key to assuring that there's continued conservation of resources, but also opportunities to recreate and enjoy the forests in the Pacific Northwest," he said.
DeCramer added the outdoor recreation economy is also important to the region. It generates more than $26 billion annually in Washington, according to the Outdoor Industry Association.
The Northwest Forest Plan was adopted in 1994 for management of forests in Washington, Oregon and northern California. The U.S. Forest Service is set to release a draft Environmental Impact Statement for the plan amendment next month.
The Forest Service plans to address is the impact of climate change on the region, among other factors.
Betsy Robblee, conservation and advocacy director for Washington-state based group The Mountaineers, said increasingly frequent wildfires are hurting trails. She contributed recommendations with the federal advisory committee on the plan amendment to address this.
"Restore recreation sites after climate-related events and reopen them to the public. One thing that we're seeing is more lengthy closures of areas after wildfire," she explained. "Places can be closed for a number of years for public access."
Robblee encourages people who enjoy recreation to follow along as the Northwest Forest Plan amendment is released, because there will be an opportunity for the public to comment on it.
"It's easy for folks to think, 'Oh, this is all about logging or wildlife, and it doesn't affect me.' But it definitely affects people's recreation experience and the places that they love and care about," she added.
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From power outages to burnt farmland, North Dakota is coming to grips with the impact of several large wildfires that are linked to at least two deaths. The fires intensified this past weekend around the western half of the state, with crews working in recent days to get them under control. Gov. Doug Burgum said when they get the final numbers, it is possible the fires will have consumed as many as 50,000 acres of farmland.
Daryl Ritchison, North Dakota State Climatologist, said windy and dry conditions fueled the devastation, adding that there's no doubt the agricultural community was hard hit.
"Farmers lost cattle. Farmers lost grazing land. Farmers lost houses. Farmers lost their fencing," he continued.
The North Dakota Farmers Union reminds ranchers who lost cattle, pasture and equipment in the fires that the federal Farm Service Agency has resources to help them recover. Information can be found on the USDA website. Meanwhile, the governor has said this could be one of the worst groups of fires in state history when factoring in acreage.
Ritchison suggested it's too early to link this disaster to climate change, noting the state's history with prairie fires, especially this time of year, and added that if there is a silver lining, early warnings to farmers - to pause their fall harvest - appeared to be effective.
"If there's any good in this, I think it could have potentially been even worse considering the wind gusts up to 60, 70 miles per hour, how dry the conditions were, the low relative humidity," he explained.
Globally, scientists say climate change is one of several factors as to why wildfires are becoming more destructive and difficult to contain. It's prompting more calls for state and local governments to become better prepared and alert the public ahead of time. A recent report found that preparation lapses hindered evacuations during the deadly Maui fires in Hawaii last year.
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New legislation making its way through the U.S. Senate would conserve more than 730,000 acres of federal public lands in and around Colorado's Gunnison Basin.
Tony Prendergast, a cattle rancher near Crawford, was one of a number of stakeholders who worked for a decade to shape the legislation. He said farmers, ranchers, hunters, anglers, hikers, mountain bikers, wildlife advocates and others realized the lands were being "loved to death," and if nothing was done, everyone would lose.
"We came together to say, 'Well, how can we work together to protect what exists, and protect it well in the future and into future generations?'" Prendergast explained.
The Gunnison Outdoor Resources Protection Act, led by Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., and Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., taps federal wilderness and special management area protections for important fish and wildlife habitat. The bill would also transfer the Pinecrest Ranch into a sovereign land trust for the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe. Six Colorado counties and 16 advocacy organizations support the measure but some in Congress continue to oppose any increased public lands protections.
The measure would not affect water rights or existing land uses, such as mining or oil and gas leases. But Prendergast pointed out the legislation will give land managers the tools they need to mitigate conflicts after a surge in outdoor recreation.
"New mountain bike trails were appearing all the time," Prendergast noted. "The motorized recreation was spreading out across the landscape. Gates were being left open. There would be conflicts, livestock dogs chasing off mountain bikers."
He added the legislation would also allow land managers to prioritize the needs of wildlife during critical times, such as the end of winter when animals are weak and nutrition levels are at their lowest.
"In an area where wildlife is close to having their young, there may need to be closures from dusk to dawn from human activity, so wildlife can have a break," Prendergast added.
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