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Bob Berwyn.
By Bob Berwyn
SUMMIT COUNTY — The spin machine for Colorado’s new national forest roadless rule cranked into high gear last week, as state and federal leaders sought to convince the public that the watered-down protections for some of the state’s most valuable lands are equal to, or better than the original national rule.
In a way, the establishment has it easy, because it’s been tough to follow all the twists and turns in the roadless saga — but it’s important to understand some of the background and nuance to make a valid comparison.
You certainly can’t rely on the Forest Service to for the real story in this situation. The agency’s follow-up press release to the roadless announcement touted “widespread support” for rule from conservation groups and quoted snippets of press releases selectively, using sections that praised parts of the rule while leaving out language that finds fault with the Colorado version and calls for additional protections.
It would have been questionable for the national agency to reject the Colorado petition; far better had the state backed away from its rule gracefully, perhaps keeping it in reserve, but when you this far down a planning road, it’s hard to put it in reverse. It’s also telling that the only unqualified statement of support came from the Colorado mining industry.
To give the Forest Service credit, it has provided a detailed and very accessible public online record of the rule-making and its history. All the information is there if you care to look.
Colorado’s newspaper of record, the Denver Post, gave up on trying to delve into some of those nuances in its Sunday editorial on the roadless rule, basically just saying saying, “It’s complicated, but trust us, this is a good thing,” without really ever explaining why. To its credit, the Post did include a link to previous coverage that helps explain the convoluted history.
But the Post also fell hook, line and sinker for one of the key talking points for the new rule — that it gives some of Colorado’s roadless areas more protection than the national rule. This myth of “greater protection” is clearly aimed at deflecting attention from the fact that the majority of the national forest roadless areas in the state will get less protection than they would under the national rule.
It’s hard to see how the state rule can possibly offer more protection, and I haven’t seen that explained anywhere in great detail. The original national rule was elegant in its simple thou-shalt-build-no-roads approach, and well-grounded in the realities of forest ecology and economy.
Instead, the Colorado rule touts limited road-building for specific purposes and flexibility, which can be a scary word, subject to a wide range of interpretation — sort of a “Thou shalt not except” approach. These days, wildfire is the bogeyman, and it’s easy to see how local and state officials could try to play on the public’s fear of fire to stretch the definition of what’s allowed in terms of “preventive” logging projects.
One man’s flexibility is another man’s loophole, and some of the loopholes in the Colorado rule are big enough to drive a truck through, literally, and it wouldn’t be surprising if the agency faces yet another legal test over what might better be called broad exemptions rather than loopholes.
Here’s the deal: Forest roads are one of the most impactful activities on backcountry forest lands, leading to an incredible amount of habitat fragmentation and erosion, and some studies suggest that fires are more likely in roaded areas.
There are already so many existing roads in Colorado that it’s almost impossible to get more than a mile or two away from the nearest one, and the Forest Service is not able to maintain the existing network up to its own standards.
Given those circumstances, Colorado and the Forest Service should have stayed with the national version of the rule, which offers the most far-reaching protections for state’s roadless wild areas.
In German-speaking countries, there’s a word — Extrawurst — for people who aren’t satisfied with the sausage on display in the butcher’s glass case; instead they want a special cut of meat, or an extra slice on their sandwich. It’s not exactly a complimentary characterization, but that’s how Colorado is coming across right now — and what makes us so special?
These are national forest lands, owned by all the people of the United States, and they deserve a consistent national rule that can be enforced across the board.
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The premise and the substance of this article are severely flawed. This is almost certainly the result of not reading the text of any version of the Roadless Rule and lacing the capability to analyze the maps defining the boundaries of the roadless areas. This article also does not reference the ability to study the actual location of any road or trail in the entire state (or the world, but let’s not get sidetracked). It is simply not a credible argument against the adoption of a Colorado-specific rule.
First, Colorado is a unique location with one-of-a-kind topography forming the headwaters of 7 of the major rivers on this continent. It is completely different than any other state in its needs, and the management of its public lands must be tailored to the specific circumstances of its geography. A “one-size-fits-all” approach to the establishment of roadless protection is the last thing any state needs, especially one as important to the nation’s water supply and commerce as Colorado.
Next, let’s take on the insane claim that it is hard to get more than a mile or so from a road in this state. The mere fact of over 4 million acres of proposed roadless areas and the 4.3 million acres of wilderness area alone will convince anyone that there is no basis or proof of this in fact. Even the simplest first order level of analysis will show that in fact enormous areas of the state are pristine and have never been developed. Keeping it that way is the whole point of protecting areas from further road building.
Let’s look at why Colorado embarked on a separate path from the Clinton Roadless Rule of 2001. This poorly written and conceived document had boundaries that looked as if they had been drawn on a paper napkin with a crayon, encroaching on city boundaries, state and county roads, recreational access corridors, water access roads, ……. the list is endless as to the faults of this version of the act. It was pandering to a fringe constituency on a national scale with a flawed scope and inappropriate wording.
Added to that, the language of the 2001 Roadless Rule did not try to hide in any way that it was an attempt to create de facto wilderness areas – a right reserved exclusively to Congress by the 1964 Wilderness Act. The badly drawn pseudo-wilderness and the failure of the original legislation to meet even a single concern of the people of the state of Colorado made it mandatory that a response be generated. Thankfully this was undertaken by a concerned and responsible state government.
The creation of different tiers of protection specifically eliminates road construction in areas of a pristine nature. The Upper Tier areas do not impact communities needing added protection from fire danger, and are carefully designed to improve species habitat and environmental protection. Non-upper tier areas have specific issues that were not addressed by the original roadless proposals. Separation of these areas by tier is a well-thought out and a necessary change to this action.
The Colorado Roadless Rule is superior in every aspect to the National Roadless Rule and will accomplish the level of protection that the people of Colorado expect and deserve.
Nice try, Mark, but being a map guy, you should know the road densities in Colorado. Outside of maybe being in the center of a some of the largest wilderness areas in the state, it is almost impossible to be more than 2 miles away from a road anywhere you go. Check out some of the mapping done by the Southern Rockies Ecosystem Project years ago.
It is not a valid measure of solitude or isolation to use an enormous buffer of 2 miles to describe recreational experience. This is especially true when forest cover or terrain is available to absorb sounds and obscure line of sight. A single mile is a huge distance in the mountainous terrain of Colorado. It is not appropriate or reasonable to insist that a buffer of this size is required or desirable. The mapping of the Southern Rockies Ecosystem Project is not a valid measure of the impact of roads on recreational experience. It does not take into account the usage level of the roads – it is not reasonable to compare I-70 to a forest service road that sees 30 vehicles a year, and this comparison is vital to a proper analysis of impact.
While we are on the subject of maps, let’s use maps to derive some facts about Summit County and see how reasonable it is to add more roadless area to the already huge restriction of access on public lands that exist in Summit County.
Summit County is 396,098 acres in size. It has two major wilderness areas – yes, some of the largest wilderness areas in the state, right there in the neighborhood. The Eagles Nest and Ptarmigan Peak Wilderness Areas cover 147,256 acres in Summit County. That is 37% of the county where fire remediation is not possible, where no motorized use is allowed, and no development is allowed to occur. That is a lot of wood to burn when a wildfire gets started – and you can’t even use a chainsaw to stop it.
The proposed Roadless areas – which by the way are already effectively wilderness, and most of which border existing wilderness areas, increasing their size without the inconvenience of a wilderness act passed by congress – are 82,444 acres in extent, or 21% of the area of Summit County.
These facts show that the proposed Colorado Roadless Rule will result in a total of 58% of Summit County being designated forever as roadless. This is a 56% increase in the roadless area of Summit County. It is reasonable to say that Summit County is being properly conserved by this high level of protection – Can you imagine Denver County with a 58% level of wilderness? I suspect that this is the highest percentage of wilderness of any county in Colorado. What is the motive to increase this area further? How well is this restricted use serving the citizens of the county? When is it enough?
Summit County is a gem of natural beauty and deserves extraordinary protection, but there must be limits to restricted use based on proper analysis. In my opinion, the Colorado Roadless Rule provides this level of analysis and was generated after careful consideration of all the facts. It should be adopted over the poorly conceived and badly written 2001 National Roadless Rule.
If you would like to view the map that these statistics were derived from, please use this link:
http://blackicegeospatial.com/images/summit/SummitCRA.pdf
All of this data is available in the public domain. It is vital to the public interest that it be properly analyzed so that “spin” does not enter into the contest of public opinion.
All good points, Mark, and I respect your opinion on the two rules. Also, I don’t think the Colorado rule is a bad thing. As the Post editorial said, the Colorado version does, at some level, acknowledge the value of conservation.
In talking about road densities, though, the impact on recreation is not the only factor. Habitat fragmentation, invasive species, erosion and runoff into streams are also part of the equation.
I’m saying, let’s cap those impacts as much as we can in the true spirit of conservation. That’s not to say that, at some point down the road, we couldn’t decide that a given area might have some other and higher use than as a roadless area. We can always change the management, but at least it gives us some options.
As far as Summit County, I think you’re right about the level of conservation here. Between federal wilderness areas and local open space, we’ve been very fortunate to preserve huge tracts of land for natural resource conservation.
But outside the high altitude wilderness areas, many of the remaining areas are not as pristine as you might think, given the high level of recreation, not to mention historic mining activities.
Thank you for providing this high-quality publication for opinions to be expressed and for your amazing photography. My initial position 10 years ago was to oppose the roadless rule in any form, but some education and serious analysis in the interim revealed a better approach: Impact must be capped and even reversed, but not at the expense of all use; conservation is a primary objective, not an obstacle; local knowledge is critical to determining a proper course of action; local opinions are not a substitute for local knowledge and fact.
We have a rule of proximity that basically states that everything has a spatial relationship, but things that are closer have a greater effect than things that are farther away. The mining in Summit County is very closely coupled with many effects on the environment, and repairing those effects has to take higher priority than the effects of building ventilation shafts for coal mines on the western slope or preventing the cutting of beetle-killed trees. Those miners that need clean air to breathe and those communities that need to prevent damage from wildfires are good reasons to support a rule that achieves so many objectives of conservation, especially when the remediation and repair of the resource is built into the rule, not just a blanket authority to construct and abandon.
I hope everyone enjoys the map. It is an attempt to characterize ground truth and develop intuitive understanding of an issue through a striking visual presentation. I think this approach serves all stakeholders in a process, so I spent a few hours creating a tool that we can all use to reveal key information about the issue.
The 10th and 9th US Court circuits both disagree with your claim on the Wilderness Act.
My OPINION will always be that the original Roadless rule proposal was a blatant attempt to create de facto wilderness. The 2001 Roadless rule was overturned based on this characterization. I agree, it was subsequently re-instated, based on another more liberal court’s judgement that wilderness and Inventoried Roadless Areas are different and one does not create the other. It is interesting that this formed the basis for defining the ways in which an IRA and a wilderness area are exactly alike, and how they are different. This decision is the driving force for creating a separate Colorado Roadless Rule to repair the deficiencies of the 2001 Rule – which remains badly written, with poorly drawn boundaries and flaws in location and implementation. In this regard, wilderness advocates did not so much “win” as to help set the stage for corrective legislation, which I find I can support because it addresses the severe flaws in the 2001 rule.
Seems we are all going to win with the Colorado Rule, but everyone will lose with the 2001 rule. The 2001 rule provides endless opportunity for litigation and endless squabbling, while the Colorado rule resolves those issues and creates a majority of support based on judicial guidelines.
Please provide appropriate information with your next comment instead of making a “we win you lose” simplification. Issues are rarely as simple as that. This one certainly isn’t, and a clear level of support is developing to have Colorado control it’s own destiny instead of a distant partisan federal administration. We should all welcome that development.
When states begin to tamper with national rules that have been carefully worked out over years–perhaps decades– the process smacks of immediate political or economic gain for the few. We the people need thoughtful articles such as the one in Summit Voice so we can see the long- term implications of states’ tampering.
I probably wouldn’t call it tampering. I think the state set out to do a good thing, but they went a little too far in trying to “tailor” it to Colorado.
The Clinton Roadless Rule was not “carefully worked out over years-perhaps decades”. The Environmental Impact Statement for 58 million acres was completed in a little under 1 year and 3 months, which is probably some kind of record. The Forest Service was in such a big hurry they didn’t even take time to make corrections to the inventory of roadless areas. That’s why there are inventoried roadless areas with roads in them. Talk about a process that smacks of immediate political … gain for the few!!
Albert is completely correct. Once the actual proposed boundary information was obtained ( it took YEARS – they did not want us to see the truth), it was painfully obvious that the 2001 Roadless Rule was a blatant and unscientific attempt to create de facto wilderness and deny proper due process and intelligent use of the land. It was characterized as a “land grab” and any attempt to implement any form of the 2001 rule is a further obvious land grab and an attempt to create wilderness by ignoring due process. The carefully designed Colorado Roadless Rule will protect millions of acres, increase the effective size of virtually all Colorado Wilderness Areas, and is an acceptable compromise that will satisfy all stakeholders – except the ones who still want to get away with a rip-off of the citizens of Colorado.
Uh, huh, and that’s why the 2001 rule was upheld by several different courts, up to the federal appeals court level. I guess those darn federal judges are in on the “land grab.”
You and Albert are just mindlessly repeating the empty rhetoric of the land abusers and exploiters who tried these arguments in every court they could find, and were rejected.
To be sure, the original national rule was not perfect. Nothing is. But it’s preferable to the weakened standards announced for Colorado.
I absolutely agree with Bob Berwyn’s take on the spin machine from a Summit County perspective. Summit County gave detailed input numerous times through the many iterations of this process, and it was consistently ignored. Summit County did considerable work in cooperation with the local Dillon District and with numerous citizen stakeholders in public meetings. The county public meetings were held by basin planning commissions with county planners and local residents, all of whom actually live next to and use the roadless parcels. There was also an extensive public process conducted through Congressman Polis staff prior to the introduction of the Eagle and Summit Wilderness Preservation Act. None of this local, ground truthed information was included in the Roadless Rule. For those parcels in Summit County, the State process simply took USFS recommendations based on the White River National Forest plan revision dating back to data collection from 1990 – 2000 looking at maps from the Glenwood Office. None of the recent data, stakeholder meetings and extensive studies by our County Wildfire Council since the pine beetle epidemic, the intensive public process looking at roadless parcels with county basin planning commissions or most recent detailed evaluation related to the Eagle and Summit County Wilderness legislation was included. It was ignored.
Thanks, Karn, I was thinking about the Summit County planning department’s incredible effort in ground-truthing the original rule, but wanted to write something a bit broader. But all the GIS mapping, basin planning meetings with input from residents in those areas … all went out the window in the final Colorado version.
It is unfair to say on one hand that all of this information was prepared, presented in public meetings, discussed at multiple levels of government, and then try to argue that none of it was included in the final result. The discussions on bark beetle resulted in exceptions being made to combat the spread of the disease and the obvious fire danger. The boundaries were modified to be accurate representations of the true roadless areas and resolve all conflicts. The fact is, virtually all of the original roadless areas are in the final version – the boundary modifications are minor and resolve serious conflicts with the intent and purpose of the rule. The water basins will be better and more completely protected than ever. The input from all of these organizations and the public was carefully considered over a period of many years, it was not ignored. I feel that all of the stakeholder input was properly considered and had a significant impact on the final result.
I am frankly shocked to hear a person who participated in these proceedings claim that this carefully designed addition to the protected lands of Colorado ignored due process and failed to consider information provided by government and the public. I think any thoughtful person would reason that quite the opposite is true.
The Colorado Roadless Rule is the best choice for Colorado, not guesswork from the federal administration in Washington D.C. Every state needs a tailored solution, and the environment and the citizens will be best served by this course.
Not to speak for Karn, but I’m pretty sure she was referring specifically to Summit County, where the final state version appears to disregard local input. Can’t say if that’s the same for other areas.
As a matter of principle, I agree with Karn and Bob’s underlying point that local input should receive a higher degree of consideration. That principle should also apply to other counties, including some flexibility to address issues related to a coal mine, a ski area, or a subdivision.
Hits the nail on the head, thanks for calling it the way it really is, Bob. This is spot on.
The coal mining exemption is particularly galling. It’s bad enough to carve out an exemption for an activity that is so directly linked to climate change (which Forest Service Chief Tidwell himself has described as creating the most urgent forest and grassland management problems of the last 20 years), but in this case the exemption is to facilitate coal mine methane venting, the abhorrent practice of blowing millions of dollars worth of methane gas (a potent greenhouse gas, to boot) into the air. When it comes to adding insult to injury, it doesn’t get any worse. The Forest Service can spin all it wants, but it doesn’t change the fact that this is poor stewardship of our publicly owned forests and resources (and seemingly just another string of giveaways to big coal, http://climatewest.org/2012/05/07/colorado-coal-welfare-at-its-worst/).
Thanks again.