More Than $9 Million Wasted by Payette National Forest

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After unlawfully imprisoning the entire town of Yellow Pine and surrounding communities while using "fish habitat improvement" as an excuse, the $9 million the Payette National Forest spent on "sediment reduction projects" has been found to be a complete squandering of tax-payer money!

Story about USFS unlawfully imprisoning Yellow Pine here:

The South Fork of the Salmon River has MORE   sediment unfavorable to salmon and trout spawning conditions than almost any time in history, and the trend is getting WORSE!!.

Jakie Creek Bridge as seen May 2010, located on the South Fork of the Salmon River. Three years after 800,000+ acres of public lands were turned into charcoal by incompetent USFS management and their policies, tens of millions of dollars damage are still being inflicted upon state and county entities. Seen here, ultrafine sediment, logs, debris, silt which the USFS says is "detrimental" to the health of endangered species continues to fill the South Fork of the Salmon River. Destruction on such large scales negatively impacts several endangered species of fish, such as bull trout, cut throat, salmon and sturgeon.


More Pictures, USFS FOIA documents prove that FIRE, not roads are not the major source of sediment here: https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B70-4LPNNbOzMjc0ZGI2NWEtODYxNi00N2NiLThmOTItZDJiNWE2ZTQ3OGVj&hl=en


USFS HEAVY MACHINERY CLEARING FIRE DEBRIS AND SEDIMENT FROM THE RIVER

Pictured above, the 800,000+ acres of wildfires and subsequent flooding have cost millions of dollars damage to county roads, inudated salmon and trout spawning beds with millions of cubic yards of sediment, burned alive thousands of animals protected by the Endangered Species Act and left the entire forest looking like a filthy cheap charcoal grill after a 4th of July barbecue. A more fitting analogy to what's left of the forest after Suzanne Rainville unleashed HELL ON EARTH: AN ASHTRAY AT A HEMP FEST, WHICH IS APPARENTLY WHERE THE PAYETTE NATIONAL FOREST HAS BEEN GETTING IDEAS FOR NEW POLICIES!!!..


That's according to the latest USFS sediment monitoring report for the South Fork of the Salmon and other major rivers, entitled
 DEPOSITION OF FINE SEDIMENT IN THE SALMON RIVER WATERSHED, PAYETTE AND BOISE NATIONAL FORESTS, IDAHO STATISTICAL SUMMARY OF INTRAGRAVEL MONITORING, 1975-2007
After spending millions of dollars buying private lands, burning privately owned homes to the ground and destroying Buckhorn Bar Road, Jakie Creek Trail, Cow Creek road and close to 100 miles of public right-of-ways, vital to the economies of rural towns, river sedimentation continues to increase!!!!

Could it then be true that the latest "Big Creek and Yellow Pine Travel Plan" and the "2008 Travel Plan" will have no sedimentation decrease as the USFS has stated in their EA and preliminary reports?

Could it be that the American people have been sold a sham? Been given a negative percent return on investment for tens of millions of dollars? Could it be that the USFS, who continues selling their phony product, I.E., "closing roads helps fish" should join the likes of Bernie Madoff in federal prison, for bilking the investors out of their hard earned money in the years preceding the greatest recession since the great depression?

I didn't say it folks, the official afore mentioned USFS report did. Excerpt from page 20:hat we can conclude from this monitoring in the\

 SFSR (South Fork of the Salmon River) is that the major spawning areas, while relatively favorable for salmon and steelhead spawning, are probably somewhat worse than they were before the floods of 1964-65 and have not improved as anticipated by implementation of the SFSR Road Reconstruction Project BO:" (I.E., what the Payette National Forest was ordered by a federal judge to spend $9 million on).
 
The report goes on to say "The net effect of the SFSR road project cannot be quantified. However, it is expected to reduce the level of human-induced mortality to Snake River spring/summer chinook salmon and Snake River fall chinook salmon (if present) and to result in an improvement from the base period of 1986-1990. The level of improvement is considered to be consistent with the estimate of reduced
mortality assumed in the combined effects analysis."
 
[Explanation of paragraph above:

 In extreme flood events, where fire damage has caused the SFSR to run OVER the road, drivers probably should not run over salmon when possible. Wouldn't want any "dead bloated salmon carcases" hanging out of PNF Ranger Erin Rohlman's tires, especially if she were to operate a county road grader.

 More likely explanation:

USFS following CYA principle, attempting to explain to US taxpayers why they unlawfully imprisoned towns, denied residents medical attention, spent $9 million, yet the desired results were not obtained, and the situation substantially deteriorated!]
 
Report continues:

et al. (2007) reported that the five-year mean concentration of large fine sediments for the mainstem SFSR spawning areas cited for reference in the BO (NMFS 1993), excluding the aberrant Oxbow site, for the 1986 to 1990 base period was 28.1%, significantly less than the five-year mean for 2002 to 2006 of 31.3%. Why this is true is unclear, but fines appear to have started increasing at these sites in the mid-1990s. This seems to coincide with changes in streamflow pattern that occurred at about the same time (Figure 113), the most memorable event associated with that pattern shift being the floods of early 1997. Despite considerable annual variation in large fine sediment concentration at all areas, the index does tend to correspond loosely with annual variation in mean annual discharge (Figures 113 and 114) such that lower sediment concentrations are more likely than high ones during low flow periods and vice versa. For example, the very low sediment levels between 1984 and 1994 correspond to a period of sustained drought in this area, with generally higher flows subsequently. Consultation on the SFSR Road is being reinitiated this year with our consultation on ongoing Forest Faurot and Burns 2007).



In the summer of 2006, fires comprising about 34,000 acres burned in the upper frontispiece)
"In fact, Nelson actions SFSR, but primarily under a strong weather inversion that maintained relatively cool temperatures and little wind. The result was that much of the area burned at relatively low intensity and there were few concerns related to damage to fish habitat from increased water yield and destabilized slopes (R.L. Nelson, personal observation as fisheries specialist for Burned Area Emergency Response [BAER] analysis). This conclusion appears to have been justified because 3 of the 5 upper SFSR spawning areas appeared to have a lower concentration of fine sediments in 2007 compared with 2006, and the two sites that seemed to increase were actually little different in 2007 than in 2006. In 2007, however, there was considerably more wildfire in the upper SFSR and these fires burned with much greater intensity than in 2006 (R.L. Nelson, personal observation as fisheries specialist for Burned Area Emergency Response [BAER] analysis). Included in this area was the Poverty Fire Timber Salvage area that was responsible for much of the spawning area damage following the 1964-65 flood events. In the fall of 2007, extensive slope stabilization efforts, including mulching and aerial application of straw, were undertaken to help stabilize these exposed areas."



In Conclusion:

Instead of spending money to replant trees and restore the forest, which would reduce sedimentation: The USFS is spending money destroying rural economies along with rural roads. Unlawfully spending tax-dollars on burning privately owned homes to the ground.

 This report, beyond the shadow of a doubt, shows that roads paved or destroyed already did not have a significant sedimentation reduction effect. The USFS will continue to deny they are wasting money, simply to save their jobs.

USFS MISMANAGEMENT OF FOREST DOCUMENTED IN PHOTOS BELOW, ALONG WITH IRREVERSIBLE DAMAGE TO WATERSHED



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Help us stop USFS waste, abuse and corruption. Join our cause on facebook: http://www.causes.com/causes/556811
For more information I can be contacted at information listed below.

Scott Amos
208-353-8907

1 comment:

  1. Scott,
    The way I see it here is that you and others are going about your fight with the USFS the wrong way. I.E. you are using the legal way when you should be using the LAWFUL way. yes there is a difference between the two.
    The legal way is in Law and the Lawful way is AT LAW. At Common Law.
    You need to file your suit AT COMMON LAW.
    You need to find someone who knows Common Law inside out.
    The courts hate this but they have to oblige. It's the LAW.

    ReplyDelete