A18
NEWS
Blue Mountain Eagle
Investigation
Continued from Page A1
The Oregon Department of Jus-
tice has been assigned as lead
prosecution for the case, Palmer
said.
“We are not able to divulge fur-
ther information about this case as
we do not want to compromise what
work has been done,” Palmer said.
Social couple
Terry and Sharon Smith were
known to let people stay on the 80-
to 100-acre property in the Laycock
Creek area between Mt. Vernon and
John Day that the couple bought in
the mid-1990s, according to Sha-
ron’s sister Cathy Hinshaw, who
lives in Hawaii.
Terry and Sharon first met in
Forest
Continued from Page A1
attention to local communi-
ties, Trulock said. Admin-
istrators receive so much
direction, policy and regula-
tions that incorporating local
interests becomes difficult,
he said.
Trulock has been with the
Forest Service for more than
28 years. His early career
included positions in silvi-
culture, timber and plan-
ning in Idaho, Montana and
Alaska. He has extensive fire
experience and has served as
an advanced agency admin-
istrator, where he was the
responsible official for all
personnel involved on a
wildland fire.
Trulock served as the
Pinedale district ranger on
the Bridger-Teton National
Forest in Wyoming begin-
ning in 2002. He was
the Lochsa-Powell dis-
trict ranger on the Nez
Perce-Clearwater National
Forest in Idaho from
2007-2014.
While in Alaska, Tru-
lock also served as a plan-
ning staff officer, a National
Environmental Protection
Act coordinator and a for-
ester/silviculturist. The Nez
Perce-Clearwater National
Forest increased its timber
target by 50% with extensive
use of stewardship contracts.
In southwest Oregon,
Trulock prioritized strength-
ening the collaborative part-
nership between the forest,
community leaders, partners
and stakeholders.
Forest plan
After 15 years of work
and 120 public meetings, the
revised Malheur National
Forest Plan was withdrawn
in March. Casamassa has
said he will not make a deci-
sion on a path forward for
the revision process until
junior high school in Springfield,
Hinshaw said. He was 13, and Sha-
ron was 12. Even at 13, Terry was a
“go-getter,” Hinshaw said. He found
a job as a bus boy at a restaurant at a
large hotel in Eugene and one month
later was the assistant manager, she
said.
“His goal at the time was to have
a career in hotel management,” she
said.
The Smiths never had children.
They were always working and keep-
ing busy — Terry with his various
business interests along with hunt-
ing and fishing, and Sharon garden-
ing and reupholstering furniture or
working for senior homes and Hos-
pice. Hinshaw recalled them serving
food at homeless shelters on Thanks-
giving and Christmas.
“Terry would give you the shirt
off his back,” she said.
this fall, Trulock said.
Casamassa wants Forest
Service personnel to use the
time talking to stakehold-
ers who helped develop the
revised plan and objectors
to develop a consensus on
how to move forward, Tru-
lock said.
Casamassa is also consid-
ering options such as chang-
ing from the 1982 planning
rules to more streamlined
2012 rules for the revision,
Trulock said. The definitions
and data standards are dif-
ferent, with the 1982 rules
being too “data heavy.”
One explanation for what
went wrong with the Forest
Plan Revision was that plan-
ners met with special inter-
est groups one at a time and
then made changes, Trulock
said. When the draft plan
was put together with all
the changes, many interest
groups were not happy with
the changes.
It would have been bet-
ter for all these groups to
work together to incorporate
all the proposed changes, he
said. The Forest Service also
needed to “tell the story”
about how the plan changed
so the public could track all
the changes.
Wildfire strategy
Trulock said he spoke
with all three members of
the Grant County Court
about the recent Blue Ridge
Fire southwest of John Day.
While the fire was light-
ning-caused, still weather
allowed the Forest Service
to expand the burn area to
667 acres in order to reduce
wildfire fuels.
The Blue Ridge Fire pro-
vided a good test for the
new leadership at the Mal-
heur National Forest. Tru-
lock is the new forest super-
visor, Lisa Cook is the new
deputy supervisor, Robert
Foxworth is the new Blue
Mountain district ranger and
Wednesday, July 24, 2019
Contributed photo
Terry and Sharon Smith
went missing following a fire
at their remote cabin in the
Laycock Creek Road area on
July 17-18, 2018.
Josh Giles is the new Emi-
grant district ranger.
While they all have wild-
fire experience, they hadn’t
worked together as a group,
Trulock said. Establish-
ing lines of communication
with each other and with the
county court and the sher-
iff’s office ahead of time is
better than waiting until the
fire is coming over the hill,
he said.
Trulock noted that Forest
Service employees helped
county crews deal with this
year’s spring flood. Some of
the employees have 30 years
experience here and came
back with “high praise” for
the county’s organization.
Coordination
Trulock noted that he’s
not an attorney and didn’t
know all the legal nuances
of “coordination” in natural
resource planning, but that
the Forest Service supports
engaging on projects such as
the Bark Project in the Mur-
derers Creek area and the
Austin Project east of Prairie
City where they have shared
priorities around strengthen-
ing local economies, reduc-
ing wildfire risk, ensur-
ing access and supporting
healthier watersheds.
“We’re committed to
working with the counties as
early as possible, preferably
before we even do our pub-
lic scoping,” he said. Creat-
ing a Grant County Natural
Resource Committee would
be “a bump in their capacity
to participate in these plan-
ning efforts,” he said.
Forest Service planners
would welcome committee
members to early planning
meetings, when brainstorm-
ing was taking place before
a single polygon had been
placed on a GIS map, Tru-
lock said.
That kind of participa-
tion would help shape how
a project might move for-
Annual Wellness Exam
will include a OSAA
Sports Physical
Grant Union Jr/Sr High
July 25, 2019 • 7am - 6pm
All Grant County Junior
High and High School Stu-
dents including those who
have just graduated in 2019
are encouraged to attend.
Best Practice recommends a
full annual wellness exam be
completed each year instead
of just a sports physical. All
junior high and high school students regardless of their intentions
of playing sports are encouraged to attend.
Event will include: musculoskeletal movement evaluations, behav-
ioral health screenings, recommended immunizations, dental and
vision screenings, age appropriate reproductive health and rela-
tionship safety counseling along with a full exam by a provider.
Students under the age of 15 will be required to have a parent or
guardian present at registration or to send a signed consent to treat
with the student.
Please be prepared to fill out demographic, insurance and health
history information. Insurance will be billed, however if insurance
does not cover the event, or a copay is required, the fee will be
waived.
For questions please contact the Grant County Health Department
at 541-575-0429.
Contributed photo
The cabin owned by Terry and Sharon Smith on Nan’s Rock Road burned
July 17-18 and the case was later declared a homicide.
ward, the issues to consider
and the alternatives to com-
pare during the NEPA analy-
sis. Forest Service guidance
calls for a reasonable range
of alternatives, he said.
Pointing to a binder on a
shelf in his office contain-
ing a Harney County com-
prehensive plan, Trulock
explained that county man-
agement plans inform the
Forest Service “here are our
values, here are the things
we’re looking for on the
landscape.”
Trulock said it would be
“fantastic” if Grant County
would craft an alternative
for the Austin Project. Fuel
reduction is the driver for
the project, but road closures
will be considered to pro-
vide elk security in order to
get elk to move from private
land to forest land. He said
he would love to see more
alternatives during analysis.
Grazing rules
Grazing regulations on
the north side of the Mal-
heur National Forest are
heavily influenced by fish
habitat concerns, Trulock
said. Portions of the for-
est are governed by a fed-
eral biological opinion that
makes grazing regulations
seem overly complicated.
“When I got here, I felt
like we as a forest were not
speaking with one voice
regarding range manage-
ment,” he said.
The position of range
program manager had been
vacant for a year but is now
filled. Trulock felt insuf-
ficient transparency and
“multiple conversations”
affected Forest Service
communication with graz-
ing allotment holders.
The ultimate goal for
federal agencies is to get
endangered fish delisted,
he said, and anything the
Forest Service can do to
attain that goal will reduce
the complexity of managing
public lands, he said.
Trulock cited recent train-
ing Forest Service personnel
and local ranchers under-
went to understand monitor-
ing protocols. Many national
forests have gone to cooper-
ative permittee monitoring
programs, he said. The data
is needed to defend forest
policies, he said.
The Forest Service
wants to work with allot-
ment holders as partners
and to help them be suc-
cessful, Trulock said.
Ranching is also a tradi-
tional and cultural practice
that should be allowed to
continue.
“By and large, we as
a forest are in an upward
trend in our grazing and our
rangeland health,” he said.
Timber harvest
Critics of the 21-inch
regulation limiting the har-
vest of large trees say rev-
enue from the sale of mer-
chantable timber could help
pay for stewardship projects
that improve forest health.
Trulock said large trees
are being harvested in cur-
rent projects, including dead
or dying trees impacted by
western pine beetle out-
breaks, but a lengthy For-
est Plan amendment pro-
cess was needed. In those
cases, large trees were har-
vested for landscape res-
toration purposes, such as
fuel reduction or aspen res-
toration, but revenue from
the timber sale also helped
the forest.
“Every time we can
ratchet up the economics
that way, we get more acres
treated of that non-com-
mercial component, that
understory of small trees
that we’re trying to get off
the landscape from a fuels
standpoint, so making the
economics better means we
get more done out there,” he
said.
About three more years
remain for Iron Triangle’s
10-year stewardship con-
tract. Trulock said the For-
est Service is generally
happy with the results and
will want another stew-
ardship contract. Improve-
ments in the language need
to be made based on what’s
been learned, and the con-
tract needs to be put out to
public bid, he said.
Travel management
With 9,600 miles of roads
on the Malheur National
Forest, a proposed Travel
Management Plan became a
major issue during the For-
est Plan Revision, Trulock
said. Some people believed
land-use designations, stan-
dards and guidelines in the
Forest Plan Revision were
acting as de facto travel
management planning, he
said.
Casamassa has posed
the question of whether
the Travel Management
Plan should be completed
before the Forest Plan Revi-
sion, Trulock said. Under a
travel plan, any road that is
not designated open is by
default closed.
“We’re one of only a
couple forests that have not
done travel management
yet,” he said.
Agriculture
Secretary
Sonny Perdue recently told
state Sen. Cliff Bentz the
Forest Service hasn’t yet
had time to consider a peti-
tion by the Eastern Ore-
gon Counties Association
to exempt the Malheur and
Wallowa-Whitman national
forests from the travel man-
agement rule, but the peti-
tion was still in review.
In some cases, the Forest
Service can’t just let roads
“grow closed,” Trulock said,
especially in steep coun-
try where a plugged culvert
could blow out, damaging
another road lower down or
impacting a nearby stream
with sediment. On the other
hand, road maintenance is
expensive.
Trulock hoped some kind
of middle ground could
be found between closing
roads with berms or install-
ing gates that could be
opened during emergencies.
“If people would stop
pulling out gates or dam-
aging gates, then the road
would be available for fire
suppression, search and res-
cue, administrative use or
permittees,” he said.