Environmental groups sue over roads, winter use

Two local environmental groups have filed a lawsuit challenging recent biological opinions related to road management and snowmobiling access on the Flathead National Forest.

The Swan View Coalition joined Friends of the Wild Swan in the lawsuit filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Missoula. It involves legal themes similar to those in two other active lawsuits the groups are pursuing against Flathead Forest.

At issue in this case, filed against both the Flathead Forest and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, are two recently released biological opinions - one related to the Flathead Forest Plan Amendment 19 for road management, and the other for the pending Amendment 24, which will establish rules for winter recreation on the forest.

The groups claim the Endangered Species Act has been violated by failing to adequately limit motorized access to the forest.

Based on a grizzly bear study conducted in the South Fork of the Flathead, Amendment 19 established a formulaic approach toward forest road densities aimed at improving habitat security for grizzly bears. It set five- and 10-year deadlines for reducing open, closed and total road densities across the forest.

The Flathead Forest failed to meet those deadlines, forcing it seek a new consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The result of that consultation was a biological opinion issued last October that allowed the road schedule to be relaxed. The standards can now be implemented through 2011, as forest management projects are carried out and funds become available.

The plaintiffs assert that runs counter to the service's 1995 finding that Amendment 19 standards are both mandatory and urgent.

They are asking the court to require the Forest Service to bring each grizzly bear management subunit on the forest into compliance with the standards before it can spend money on timber sales "and other activities that harm bears."

"This is an illegal attempt to renege on restoration work [the] Fish and Wildlife Service previously found the Forest Service must accomplish quickly to protect bears, fish and other wildlife," said Keith Hammer, chairman of the Swan View Coalition.

Joe Krueger, the Flathead forest's environmental compliance coordinator, said the Flathead has done nothing illegal.

The plaintiffs, in this case as well as the two other active lawsuits, are insisting on a rigid interpretation and implementation of the road density formula, Krueger said.

But, he added, Amendment 19 itself includes a provision that gives the forest flexibility to account for "unintended or impractical" consequences encountered as the standards are implemented from one area of the forest to the next.

"We have to take this on a site-by-site, case-by-case basis," he said, noting that the Fish and Wildlife Service has concurred with that interpretation of Amendment 19.

The forest's legal counsel presented arguments of that nature this week in U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy's court room in a case pertaining to the management project approved for the area burned by the 2001 Moose Fire.

The project included a site-specific forest plan amendment that allowed the forest to maintain a road, with culverts intact, to accommodate a settlement to another lawsuit over snowmobile access. That settlement led to Amendment 24, which is expected to be adopted within the next couple of months.

It's a perfect example of the forest having to make adjustments for unintended or impractical conflicts that arise in implementing the road density standards, Krueger said.

The forest used similar site-specific amendments for projects in areas burned by the Robert, Wedge Canyon and West Side Reservoir fires of 2003. Hammer's organization led a lawsuit challenging those deviations as well.

The groups also say that the Flathead Forest has never consulted with the Fish and Wildlife Service to determine whether bull trout would be affected by delaying road reclamation required under Amendment 19. That amendment requires that stream-bearing culverts be removed from roads taken out of commission, to prevent dumping sediment into streams when they fail, which the service has found is certain to occur over time.

"It's not a question if culverts will plug up and fail, but when," said Arlene Montgomery of Friends of the Wild Swan. "This is a serious concern on closed roads where culverts are not monitored or regularly maintained."

The groups contend that a recently issued biological opinion for Amendment 24 goes even further in relaxing Amendment 19 standards for grizzly bear habitat security, by extending dates for snowmobiling in specific areas to as late as May 31.

In the opinion, the service concludes that only about 6,700 acres of potential bear denning habitat would be included in the late-season areas and that Amendment 24 "is not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of the grizzly bear."

Reporter Jim Mann may be reached at 758-4407 or by e-mail at jmann@dailyinterlake.com