17 April 2016
Gianforte-Robinson bless loser of a land management proposal
At first blush, Lesley Robinson, Greg Gianforte’s choice for lieutenant governor, seems a lot more sensible on public lands than Sen. Jennifer Fielder. If Fielder could wave a magic wand, federal public lands in Montana would be transferred to the state, which then would manage them for the highest dollar, and just might sell all or most to private citizens who would invite drilling rigs and chainsaws in, and keep hikers and hunters out.
Robinson, however, writing in the Flathead Beacon, says:
In a recent interview with Hunt Talk Radio’s Randy Newberg he [Gianforte] said, “To be clear, I oppose any plan that would jeopardize keeping public lands public.”
This is an absolute. No one wants to see public land sold off. However, we have to be forward thinking and innovative when it comes to solving the current problems in our public lands management.
When it comes to the transfer of federal public lands to state ownership, we are opposed.
That sounds good.
But read on:
However, we do think that there are ideas worth looking at that would involve greater local control over public land.
There is currently a proposed pilot project in the Kootenai National Forest that would have the federal government contract with Lincoln County for management of part of the forest. These are the kinds of innovative ideas that we should be looking at for solving land management issues. Under this proposal, the forest sees greater local management, yet very much remains public land.
An idea worth looking at? Not according to commenter Dave23:
They want to subcontract forest management to Lincoln County. I’m from Lincoln County and the last people I want in charge is them. If the Forest service is properly funded it does a great job with many people who are educated in forest management, not elected officials who have no clue.
He’s right.
Boiled down to its essence, the complaint of the pilot project’s proponents is that the professionals managing the national forest are abiding by federal law instead of doing the bidding of locals who want to cut down more trees and dig more mines. Somehow, they’ve convinced themselves that if they were hired to manage the forest, all of those inconvenient federal laws could be circumvented while federal dollars would remain in the county.
To use Bernard DeVoto’s description, the idea amounts to “get out and give us more money.”
Gianforte and Robinson are more sophisticated than Jennifer Fielder. They use less inflammatory language. And they pay lip service to the policy of keeping public lands in public hands. But their embrace of contracting management of part of a national forest to a county commission is a de facto embrace of an attempted land grab reminiscent of the land grab that DeVoto stopped 70 years ago.
It won't be a winner in this campaign. As Simon and Garfunkle sang 49 years ago:
Sitting on a sofa on a Sunday afternoon.
Going to the candidates’ debate.
Laugh about it, shout about it
When you've got to choose
Every way you look at this you lose.