Stimson Lumber owner critical of U.S. Forest Service

The downsizing of a lumber mill in northern Idaho has a timber company owner voicing his displeasure with the U.S. Forest Service's management of the wildland urban interface.

Stimson Lumber Co. President Andrew Miller had pointed words for Kootenai National Forest Supervisor Chad Benson last month. Stimson’s mill in Plummer, Idaho has dropped about two-thirds of its workforce by the end of last week.

“It’s very unfortunate, but some of our employees will have the opportunity to work at some of our other locations in Idaho and Oregon,” Miller said in a phone interview with The Western News on Sept. 21. “Maybe 10 or 15 may stay with us, the rest will receive severance packages and for others, there are no shortage of jobs in Coeur d’Alene or the Spokane Valley for quality people with skills because they are in demand.”

Miller, like many in the lumber industry in the Inland Northwest and others seeking more management in the wildland urban interface, had hoped that smaller scale thinning projects in places such as Libby and Troy would help an already sagging industry while improving wildfire safety for those living in the interface.

The mill in Plummer processes smaller trees, but Miller said a lack of them fueled the downsizing of the facility that’s located about 30 minutes south of Coeur d’Alene.

“[Benson] has a chance to do a lot of projects and he’s not really interested,” Miller said. “His whole operation is suspended in litigation.”

Benson shared his feelings on the downsizing of the Plummer operation while sharing the agency's plans for work in the interface.

“We are saddened by the news affecting the Stimson Lumber Company -- a long time partner in our efforts to address forest health and reduce wildfire risk across our communities in the Northern Region of the USDA Forest Service,” Benson said in an email to The Western News. “We will continue to collaborate with our timber industry partners on this important work.”

Benson elaborated on the Kootenai's plans for forestry work.

"The Kootenai National Forest currently has multiple priority landscape level projects planned in the Wildland Urban Interface. For fiscal year 2024, the KNF has approximately 8,590 acres of planned timber sale harvest within the [Wildland Urban Interface]. Plus, the forest also has an additional 7,282 timber sale harvest acres that are already approved to occur within the [Wildland Urban Interface] but are currently under litigation," Benson said.

Benson said that along with the timber sales, the Kootenai completed over 12,000 acres of fuels mitigation work in fiscal year 2023, all of which occurred in the Wildland Urban Interface. Additionally, this year alone, $1.8 million has been awarded to private contractors under 22 individual contracts for fuels mitigation work. A majority of these were awarded to local contractors.

"The main objective of these projects is maximizing fuels reduction around our communities and they continue to be a main priority for the KNF," Benson said.

U.S. Sen. Steve Daines also weighed in on the mill downsizing.

“The downscaling of Stimson Mill after years of service is a huge blow to communities in Northwest Montana and the surrounding region,” Daines said. “Out of control regulation from the Biden administration and frivolous litigation thanks to their army of liberal judges is stopping key forest management projects, killing good-paying jobs and leaving our communities more susceptible to forest fires. We have to reverse course. The Forest Service must use the funding and authorities that Congress has provided to get on-the-ground work done to address the wildfire crisis we are facing.”

Part of the hope for forest management in the region was due to a federal designation by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack in April 2022. The designation included 10 fire prone landscapes across the western United States as initial priorities for implementing the Wildfire Crisis Strategy. This strategy outlines dramatic action that Vilsack said must be taken to treat hazardous fuels and reduce the risk of wildfire to communities, infrastructure and municipal watersheds.

The Kootenai Complex, which includes the Kootenai and Idaho Panhandle national forests, was included in the initial landscape designation with plans to treat nearly 45,000 acres in three priority fire sheds by 2026.

While Miller was critical of Benson, he also placed blame at the feet of John Podesta, a senior advisor to President Joe Biden for Clean Energy Innovation and Implementation at the White House.

“Podesta was a Clinton-era advisor and Biden brought him back,” Miller said. “The Forest Service has been told by Podesta that these projects aren’t going to happen. He’s put a real chill on forestry projects. They want to see a few projects for photo opportunities and nothing more.”

Three large-scale forestry projects in Lincoln County on the Kootenai National Forest are currently on hold after federal judges said the Forest Service needs to give more consideration to the impact of roads in grizzly bear habitat.

The Black Ram (95,000 acres), Knotty Pine (56,000) and Ripley (29,180) have all been halted this summer.

Miller said Benson’s desire for large-scale projects is the biggest problem.

“He blames litigation, but he continues to walk into the spider web of it with these large projects,” Miller said. “We’ve said not to mix big forest projects with [Wildland Urban Interface] projects. These big, complicated projects, a judge is going to find something to stop a project.

“Projects in the [Wildland Urban Interface] can be accessed by county roads and we’ve offered our roads to access Forest Service land for some of the projects. By not having to build more roads, these smaller scale projects would stand a better chance of avoiding litigation,” Miller said.

Kootenai National Forest officials have proposed a few projects in the Wildland Urban Interface in the Libby and Troy areas.

The Norman McCedar Project, about 3,600 acres in size, is located about one mile southwest of Libby in the Cedar Creek area. It will include nearly 2,500 acres of commercial treatments and about 1,000 acres of non-commercial treatments.

According to Matt Bienkowski, the operations supervisor for the Libby Ranger District, there are nearly 1,000 structures within 1.5 miles of the project area and nearly 3,000 within three miles. Within one-half mile, there are 179 structures, 413 within one mile, 939 within 1.5 miles and 2,980 within three miles.

But the McCedar and Ripley projects are on hold until Benson gives final approval to the Bears Outside of Recovery Zone (BORZ) amendment. He proposed adding 167,452 acres to the 2015 Land Management Plan for BORZ in a draft decision memo on Sept. 21.

The plan is currently in the 45-day objection period that began Sept. 23.

In the Troy area, the proposed Trojan Defense Project would encompass 4,300 acres of Forest Service land from the South Side Road to Iron Creek Road including McConnell Mountain, Callahan Creek and Iron Creek on the Three Rivers Ranger District.

According to information from District Ranger Sam Martin, the project area is located within the Wildfire Crisis Strategy–Kootenai Complex and the Lincoln County Wildland Urban Interface, which was designated to treat hazardous fuels surrounding the community of Troy.

One Kootenai National Forest project that is currently underway is the Rabbit Tracts Partnership, a nearly 30,000-acre project north of Troy.

Bruce Vincent, a Libby native and former logger, said the prospect of losing the mill in Plummer is chilling.

“We can ill afford to lose the infrastructure for small trees,” Vincent said. “For [Wildland Urban Interface] projects, thinning the forests around here near our towns requires a mill that can take the smaller trees and there’s no other place except Plummer.”

Vincent said the issue isn’t just a Kootenai National Forest problem.

“A two-thirds reduction in the workforce at Plummer leaves us dangerously close to not having a mill,” Vincent said. “The question is how forest officials approach projects. They need to start going after the low-hanging fruit, the smaller projects.

“They’d better be going after that vigorously or we won’t have the infrastructure to do larger projects if they are ever approved.

“135,000 to 150,000 acres in the [Wildland Urban Interface] should be enough to keep a mill going,” Vincent said.

Vincent also said if the 2021 memorandum of understanding between the Forest Service, Lincoln County, Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources and Conservation Service were being followed, “This discussion wouldn’t be occurring.”

The memorandum explained that in the Montana Wildfire Risk Assessment, Lincoln County ranked among the highest in the state for percentage of structures and critical infrastructure that are at very high or extreme risk from wildfire.

The intended result, as stated in the document, “is to focus coordination by the parties to increase public safety and community resiliency by increasing the number of forested acres treated to reduce wildfire risk and impacts.”