FNF Revision Team Responds to Questions and Concerns

SWAN VALLEY - Swan Valley Connections hosted an Open House with the Flathead National Forest (FNF) Forest Planning Team and Swan Lake Ranger District (SLRD) Rich Kehr Aug. 31. Nearly 50 people attended the event to better understand what is being proposed in the draft forest plan, what can and cannot be done on the ground and clear up misinformation. Comments on the proposed draft forest plan are due Oct. 3.

The FNF began forest plan revision in the summer of 2013. The planning team did field trips to the areas of the forest including the SLRD in September, 2013. They started the official public involvement on their original proposed action in October, 2013.

Many public meetings were held in Kalispell and one in Condon May, 2014. The intent was to gain involvement and feedback on what the public wanted to see on their forest.

The first document released from the team was in the assessment in April 2014.

"It was just designed to set the context for the new plan [by giving the current condition of the forest and identifying some of the key things to change in the new forest plan]," said Heidi Treschsel, revision specialist on the Revision Team.

The draft proposed action was released to the public in March, 2015. This was the official initiation of the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) process.

In May, 2016, the draft forest plan amendments and the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) were released beginning the formal comment period for the NEPA. Comments are due by Oct. 3.

The plan is to release the Final EIS and final version of the FNF Plan in June, 2017 with a draft record of decision (ROD).

"At that time there will be some certainty of the way the forest supervisor has chosen to go," said Treschsel. "The preferred alternative and the actual decision will show up in the final EIS and it will also have the alternatives in it as well."

During the comment period ending Oct. 3, the revision team welcomes feedback within the range of the alternatives presented, from the most restrictive management strategies (Alternative B) to the least restrictive (Alternative D). Alternatives B, C and D represent the feasible range of the final decision required by the NEPA process.

Treschsel said that Alternative B is often confused as the preferred alternative because it was presented as the proposed action in the March 2015 draft proposal.

"Often people will see a preferred alternative at this stage but our Forest Supervisor really did not have one," said Treschsel. "There was just too much and he wanted to hear more from the public and the draft EIS. That is why there is a not a preferred identified at this time. It will be some kind of blend of alternative B, C or D."

The designation for the Swan Front has been an area of concern expressed by the Swan Valley residents. In the 1986 forest plan, the management area (MA) assigned for the Swan Front was Recommended Wilderness Area. Recommended Wilderness MA has been recommend in the draft plan for Alternative B and C while Alternative D puts it into the Backcountry MA.

"It has been managed that way [since 1986]," said Treschsel. "We showed folks [at the Open House] where the [recommended] wilderness boundary is on the district map and it doesn't include any roads. It is actually inventoried roadless area."

Because the area of the Swan Front is designated inventoried roadless area and the FNF is subjected to the current travel plan that does not currently allow motorized recreation in the area, to include the area in a MA that allows management tools that require roads (i.e. timber harvest) is not feasible. The Plum Creek lands that have recently been acquired by the FNF and contain roads were not included in the recommended wilderness MA designation.

Treschsel said that the management in recommended wilderness in regards to fire suppression will remain relatively the same. Fire managers have told Treschsel that around 50 percent of the fires in the Mission Mountains and Bob Marshall Wildernesses are suppressed because they are not in a location or weather condition where they can be allowed to burn. The FNF is hoping to increase the flexibility to use prescribed burns in recommended wilderness allowing fire managers to have more management options.

"It is difficult to let natural fire burn because of the configuration of the [Swan] Valley," said Treschsel. "Fire is a really important tool that folks want to use to manage some of the fuels and create the kind of desired vegetation conditions. Fire has always burned in these landscapes and we shouldn't be suppressing it as much as we do necessarily, but we have to protect other values."

Treschsel said that the wildland urban interface (WUI) boundaries reflected in the Seeley-Swan Fire Plan 2013 Revision were not reflected in the draft alternatives presented. However, she said the maps will be updated because "it is never too late to refine those lines."

Mechanized treatments are not a tool that can be easily implemented in the Recommended Wilderness MA. However in the Backcountry MA, timber harvest is allowable for multiple resource reasons including fuels reduction.

"It is not a very feasible thing to do [because there are no roads], however, if you can helicopter log or put in a temporary road, it can be done and has been done in the past," said Treschsel. "It is very different from recommended wilderness and shouldn't be put into the same group of management expectations."

The areas designated as General Forest MA allow for roads, mechanical harvest and a suite of management options.

"The General Forest MAs reflect where we can actually do timber harvest on the landscape," said Treschsel. She continued that these areas have not changed since the 1986 plan but they are smaller due to the grizzly bear standards that have been in place for more than 20 years.

Swan Valley residents have also expressed concern over the limiting of recreational options when the economic base of the valley is shifting more towards tourism. Treschsel said that the allowable recreation options, such as the amount of mountain bicycle use, are reflected in a range across the different alternatives. There are strong arguments for both sides of the issue.

While not as prevalent in the SLRD, one of the main differences between the 1986 plan and the proposed draft plan is the identification of areas for designated recreation use, MA 7.

"Because of the increased front country use, the 'front country concept,' these are areas we could feature a little bit more when we have desires and funding to do some mountain bike trails, for example," said Treschsel. "These would be areas that we would look at first."

"The current plan I think it is not really going to change the way we currently manage the forest," said Treschsel. "It's more of a way to reflect how we have been managing it and the point that we have come to in the past 30 years."