Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The Blue Mountain eagle. (John Day, Or.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 12, 2018)
NEWS BlueMountainEagle.com Wednesday, December 12, 2018 A7 Beverlin transfers to position with Intermountain Region By Blue Mountain Eagle Steve Beverlin, for- est supervisor on the Mal- heur National Forest, has accepted the posi- tion of Director of Natu- ral Resources for the Inter- mountain Region in Ogden, Utah. He reports to his new position on Jan. 20, accord- ing to a Forest Service press release. Craig Trulock, dep- uty forest supervisor on the Rogue-River Siskiyou National Forest, will con- tinue as acting forest super- visor on the Malheur. Beverlin joined the Pacific Northwest Region in 2012 as the deputy for- est supervisor on the Mal- heur. He was selected as the supervisor in 2014. During his six plus years on the Malheur, Beverlin has over- seen higher timber harvests, private sector jobs created and investments in forest and watershed treatments — all under a collaborative approach working along- side partners and commu- nity members. Before com- ing to the Malheur, he served in vari- ous capacities for the For- est Service Steve Beverlin including dis- trict ranger on the San Juan National Forest in Colorado and the Regional Rangeland Program lead for the Rocky Mountain Region. “I am very proud of the Malheur National Forest staff and all that we have been able to accomplish since 2012,” Beverlin said. “I have confidence they will continue this essential work that has contributed so much to the health of the forest and local communities. The col- laborative approach in Grant and Harney counties is a national model for how to work together to implement forest-wide restoration.” Trulock has been with the Forest Service for over 28 years. While on the Rogue- River Siskiyou National Forest, he prioritized strengthening the collabora- tive partnership between the forest, community leaders, partners and stakeholders. “I am very excited to be here on the Malheur work- ing with the local commu- nities and providing leader- ship to the dedicated staff,” Trulock said. “I want folks to understand that the collec- tive efforts and the on-the- ground accomplishments that have been set in motion will continue as we move forward.” Trulock’s early career included positions in timber and planning in Idaho, Mon- tana and Alaska. He served as the Pinedale District ranger on the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming beginning in 2002. From 2007 to 2014 he was a district ranger on the Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forest in Idaho. While there the forest increased its timber target by 50 percent with exten- sive use of stewardship contracts. Ranchers see biological opinion as ultimatum By MATUESZ PERKOWSKI EO Media Group Though the U.S. Forest Service didn’t say so outright, Matt McElligott and other ranchers who graze cattle in Oregon’s Malheur National Forest believed they’d been given an ultimatum. Either bow to the agen- cy’s demands, or lose their grazing rights and suffer financially. The timing seemed to send a message, McElligott said. The ranchers were given less than a week to comment on the 335-page biological opin- ion that would govern graz- ing in the national forest for the next four years. In the days he had to read the document, McElligott said he found reasons to be alarmed that grazing restric- tions would increase, but his back was against the wall. The Forest Service released the document for ranchers to review in late May, when some would ordi- narily have already turned out cattle onto forest graz- ing allotments. But unless the biological opinion for the Mid-Columbia steelhead — a fish population protected under the Endangered Spe- cies Act — was finalized, there could be no grazing. No choice “If I’d objected, they’d just have put the brakes on it. Nobody would have gone out to graze,” McElligott said. “If you guys want to turn out,” he inferred, “you just have to accept this.” Seven months later, hav- ing endured one grazing season under the biologi- cal opinion, McElligott isn’t optimistic about next year. Because the Forest Ser- vice determined that some ranchers were out of compli- ance with the plan in 2018, certain repeat violations on those same grazing allot- ments in 2019 could trigger the need for yet another bio- logical opinion — and with it, further restrictions on the number of cattle that can be turned out and where they can graze. Ranchers turn out more than 24,000 cow-calf pairs a year between June and mid-October on 111 allot- ments in the 1.7 million-acre national forest, about 90 per- cent of which is grazed. The Forest Service estimates grazing generates roughly $200,000 in fees for the fed- eral government and approx- imately $7.7 million in labor income, which is farm reve- nues after expenses. Dissatisfaction with the current biological opinion, which governs grazing from 2018 until 2022, already runs deep among ranchers in the area, with some considering a lawsuit against the federal government over the doc- 1809 First Street • Baker City • (541)523-5439 ‘Embedded bureaucracy’ That’s probably because the deregulation message can have trouble filtering through multiple layers of fed- eral government, said Rep. Greg Walden, R-Oregon, whose congressional district includes the national forest. “This administration is not doing as much as many of us thought it would on the national forests and grazing,” he said. “Driving change through the embed- ded bureaucracy is very difficult.” Walden noted the biolog- ical opinion is based on a lot of work that occurred before President Trump came into office, setting a foundation that’s tough to budge. If the political route is slow-moving, the legal route isn’t necessarily any faster. Lawsuits over grazing in the Malheur National Forest are nothing new. Complaints have been filed over the years by environmentalists who claim the government’s biological opinions insuffi- ciently protected the threat- ened fish species. One case over bull trout was finally thrown out this year after 15 years of litigation, but the decision is now under appeal. The potential for court battles highlights the com- plexity federal agencies face when analyzing the effects of grazing on riparian habitats. In basic terms, the For- est Service develops man- agement plans for regulating grazing to avoid harming fish protected under the Endan- gered Species Act. Those plans are then sub- mitted to the National Marine Fisheries Service, which issues a biological opinion determining whether the spe- cies or their habitat will be jeopardized by the proposed activity. The steelhead popula- tion within the tributaries of the John Day River is esti- mated at roughly 4,500 to 20,000 fish, depending on the year, according to the Forest Service. In the past, when the agency found the graz- ing plans were “not likely to jeopardize” steelhead as long as restrictions were fol- MOVIE SCHEDULE DEC 14 - DEC 19 lowed, environmental activ- ists claimed they were arbi- trarily lenient. Now, ranchers believe those regulations are arbi- trarily excessive. ‘You’re demonized’ “The problem is the sci- ence they used to build this goddamn document,” said Loren Stout, a rancher in the area. For example, federal agencies have developed their environmental data about steelhead populations by studying areas where fish are unlikely to travel, such as upstream of multiple “check dams” installed by the Forest Service to slow water flow, Stout said. Though ranchers aren’t responsible for the problem, grazing cattle nonetheless get the blame, he said. “If you go against their agenda, you’re demonized,” he said. Ken Holliday, another area rancher, said the biolog- ical opinion is just one ele- ment in a broader pattern of mismanagement within the national forest. For example, riparian fences prized by federal agencies for keeping cat- tle out of creeks can actually backfire, he said. A fence across one creek got clogged with scraps of wood and other debris, which accumulated and eventu- ally burst through the struc- ture, severely damaging the stream bank, he said. Efforts to slow down streams can cause them to become overgrown with sod, whereas steelhead need fine gravel in which to lay their eggs, Holliday said. “What this is, is science gone wrong.” Some restrictions within the biological opinion hav- en’t been scientifically val- idated but are based on decades-old conjectures Did you know Grant County Veterans Services Officer is available to assist YOU in applying for all VA benefits you may be entitled to? See your Grant County Veteran Services Officer today for more information. 10am-4pm Monday-Friday • 541-620-8057 530 E. Main, Ste. 5, John Day, OR 65198 and theories that have been cited in federal documents so long that they’ve essentially become sacrosanct, said Shaun Robertson, a natu- ral resources consultant who works in the area. “The more times it’s translated, the more it’s insti- tutionalized,” he said. Bank alteration Among the more con- troversial measures of cat- tle impacts in the biological opinion is bank alteration, or the percentage of hoof prints on the stream bank. In the most sensitive riparian areas, 10 percent bank alteration triggers the need to move cat- tle, while more than 15 per- cent is a violation. McElligott said he hit the 10 percent threshold in 10 days on one allotment, forc- ing him to devote manpower to moving cattle instead of rebuilding water structures at several springs, which would keep livestock away from streams. In the eyes of the Forest Service, it doesn’t matter if the bank alteration was caused by elk or wild horses, he said. Meanwhile, the agency regularly tears up brush along creek banks with heavy machinery when con- ducting in-stream restoration work. Amy Unthank, natural resources and planning offi- cer with the Forest Service, said the agency is aware of complaints about a double standard in regard to resto- ration work. However, using heavy equipment to create “ana- log beaver dams” and rebuild stream channels is a one-time impact to the riparian area from which it quickly recov- ers — unlike an impact that occurs year after year, she said. As for tensions about bank alteration, Unthank said they’re largely a matter of stricter enforcement rather than stricter standards — the benchmarks haven’t changed from the previous biological opinion. Unthank said the stan- dards in the biological opin- ion are based in science, with some measures of impact serving as a proxy of actual “take” — killing or harming — of fish or their habitat. There has been an uptick in “non-compliance” let- ters to ranchers, though that doesn’t necessarily mean the frequency of violations has risen, Unthank said. Rather, the agency is try- ing to live up to its forest plan standards and Endangered Species Act commitments at the behest of the National Marine Fisheries Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Ser- vice, which consult on threat- ened and endangered species in the forest, she said. “You guys have an uneven record of enforcing the range policy,” Unthank said, sum- marizing the two agencies’ concerns about the For- est Service. Another issue is stubble height, or the length of grass. Along riparian areas it must be no shorter than 6 inches at the end of the sea- son, she said. That’s more stringent than the previous plan, which allowed stub- ble height as low as 4 inches in some cases, but it’s still lower than the 6 to 8 inches the consulting agencies had pushed for, Unthank said. The short amount of time that ranchers had to review the biological opinion was a result of the complex- ity of putting the document together with a limited num- ber of staffers, she said. Hard choice “Do you really want to review it, ranchers, or do you want to go out and graze, was the hard choice it came down to,” she said. If the ranchers were per- mitted to graze their cattle without a biological opin- ion, they’d have no protec- tion for “incidental take,” or harming, of threatened fish, leaving them vulnerable to environmental lawsuits, said Dale Bambrick, who heads the Columbia Basin NMFS branch of the National Oce- anic and Atmospheric Administration. While NMFS often gets blamed for more stringent restrictions in the biological opinion, the agency merely approved proposals submit- ted by the U.S. Forest Ser- vice, Bambrick said. In some respects, such as stubble height and the allow- able number of “redds” — fish egg nests — that can be trampled, the new document is actually fairly liberal in favor of grazing, Bambrick said. The previous biological opinion allowed two redds to be trampled, while the cur- rent one allows for three. In the future, NMFS hopes to coordinate with ranchers and the Forest Ser- vice more closely to avoid such a drawn-out process for the biological opinion, he said. Holiday Dining & Lodging • 11 8 8 B re w in g Co mp a n y • America’s Best Value Inn • The Austin House • Best Western Motel • Boulder Creek Ranch • Da i ry Qu ee n • Dreamer’s Lodge Motel • Fi g a r o’ s • Fish House Inn and RV Park • Silvies Retreat and Links • Grant County Senior Center • T Th h e G r ub st ea k Min in g C o. • Hotel Prairie • John Day Motel • John Day Valley Rentals • Lands Inn • Little Canyon Food Cart Catering • Long Creek Lodge • Mabel’s Cafe and Eve’s Sweets • Monument Hotel & RV Park • T h e Out p os t Piz z a , Pu b & G r i l l • The Corner Cup • Cowboy Cottages • Hillcrest Cottages • Pine Shadows Getaway Resort • Sq ue e ze In R e st a ur a n t • Su b w a y o f Jo hn D a y • Timbers Bistro Re s ta u ra n ts t h at wi l l b e op e n d u ri n g th e c e r e mo n y a re i n g r e e n T r e e Li ghtin g Cer em ony Friday, D ec. 14th – 5:30 p.m . Bridge S treet and M ain Watch for new members each week! 94729 SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER- VERSE (PG) Miles Morales comes across the long-dead Peter Parker. With Parker’s guidance, Miles will become Spider-Man FRI & SAT (4:00) 7:00 9:35 SUNDAY (4:00) 7:00 MON - WED 7:00 WIDOWS (R) Four women with nothing in common except a debt left behind by their dead husbands’ ciminal activities, take fate into their own hands. FRI & SAT (3:45) 6:45 9:30 SUNDAY (3:45) 6:45 MON - WED 6:45 INSTANT FAMILY (PG-13) A couple find themselves in over their heads when they foster three children. FRI & SAT (4:10) 7:10 9:40 SUNDAY (4:10) 7:10 MON & TUES 7:10 MARY POPPINS RETURNS (PG) Opens Wednesday, 12/19! WEDNESDAY 7:10 Mateusz Perkowski/Capital Press /Capital Press Ranchers Ken Holliday, left, and Loren Stout discuss grazing restrictions in Oregon’s Malheur National Forest associated with a new biological opinion for threatened steelhead. Attention Grant County Veterans: Katee Hoffman BARGAIN MATINEE IN ( ) Adults $7 ALL FILMS $6 ON TIGHTWAD TUESDAY $9 Adult, $7 Senior (60+), Youth ument’s scientific validity, McElligott said. McElligott and others say they hoped the Trump admin- istration, with its emphasis on deregulation, would be more “reasonable” regarding grazing policy. Two years in, however, they say there’s lit- tle evidence of that in the bio- logical opinion. 90630 Grant County Chamber of Commerce 301 W Main St., John Day, OR 97845 541.575.0547 www.gcoregonlive.com
