Injunction halts Kootenai timber project

A massive timber project in the Kootenai National Forest has been temporarily halted after a federal appeals court granted an injunction requested by the Alliance for the Wild Rockies on Tuesday.

The Helena-based environmental group is appealing U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen’s July ruling that the forest’s environmental review of the East Reservoir Project had adequately addressed potential impacts to threatened and endangered species.

In their order staying the project, 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judges Kim McLane Wardlaw and Consuelo Maria Callahan set a hearing on the appeal for February 2017.

Logging operations within the East Reservoir Project were scheduled to begin Sept. 15, according to court documents.

The project is the forest’s largest in recent years, spanning a 92,407-acre footprint estimated to yield about 39 million board-feet of timber. It is located east of Lake Koocanusa.

The lawsuit, originally filed in May 2015, names Kootenai National Forest Supervisor Chris Savage, Regional Forester Faye Krueger, the U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as defendants.

In its lawsuit, Alliance for the Wild Rockies alleged that the project’s authors failed to adequately consider impacts to grizzly bears, lynx and bull trout, all of which are federally protected under the Endangered Species Act. More than 30,000 acres within the project area are within designated critical habitat for lynx and over 18,000 acres overlap with a grizzly study area outside the bears’ established recovery zone.

Reporter Sam Wilson can be reached at 758-4407 or by email at swilson@dailyinterlake.com.