Thanks to Rich J. for pointing out this chart from this GAO report:
It definitely tells a story. Not a good one IMHO. BLM land is important and conceivably people following the rules there is equally important. And my observations on public land recreation is that many people don’t follow rules unless they think they might be enforced. It would be great to have a guest post from a BLM or FS field law enforcement person (or recently retired) and hear from them how to improve the situation. If you have LE friends, please share this request.
A GAO Report released Monday documents incidents where employees of the Forest Service, BLM, Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service were threatened or assaulted. The security review was requested by the Democratic chairman of the U.S House Natural Resources Committee, Rep. Raul Grijalva, and there is a hearing today before a House subcommittee. According to Snopes (so it must be true):
Grijalva said the findings underscore growing concerns over the safety of government workers on public land. The Arizona lawmaker also criticized the Trump administration’s appointment of Bureau of Land Management Acting Director William “Perry” Pendley, who has expressed support for Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy. Bundy’s family played central roles in a 2014 standoff over grazing fees in Nevada and the 2016 occupation of Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. “Making a folk hero out of Bundy, that sets a dangerous precedent,” Grijalva said. “At the top of the agency, they reinforce and embolden some of these actions by doing nothing and previously being in support of them.”
Professor John Freemuth, an expert on U.S. land policies at Boise State University, said it was true that the Trump administration’s pro-development policies could help quiet resentments toward the government. But Freemuth added that anti-government rhetoric also gets legitimized when it’s espoused by prominent figures.
President Trump demonstrated his position last year on those anti-government ideologues who violate federal facilities, and it is not a comforting one for federal employees. He pardoned two men whose convictions on public-land arson charges helped ignite the six-week Malheur National Wildlife Refuge occupation in Oregon in 2016. He absolved Dwight Hammond Jr. and Steven Hammond, father-and-son cattle ranchers in southeastern Oregon whose convictions carried mandatory five-year sentences.
In a formal response to the GAO report, Interior Department Assistant Secretary Scott Cameron agreed with recommendations to carry out security assessments at hundreds of government facilities. In a separate response, Forest Service Chief Victoria Christiansen also agreed with the recommendation for security review. Neither response gave details on when the security work would occur.
This post is part of our effort to help journalists by providing expertise or links that may be difficult for them to easily find. This makes for better stories and a better informed public.
The question brought to us is “it has been documented that Forest Service law enforcement is not sending as many criminal referrals forward to the Department of Justice for prosecution since 2001, why would that be the case?” Law enforcement is one of the most important parts of the Forest Service organization, especially as lands get used more by growing populations.
I would ask if anyone has any ideas and/or evidence as to why this might be happening, please comment below. If you don’t feel comfortable in an open forum, please email me at terraveritas at gmail.com.
Special Agents are criminal investigators who plan and conduct investigations concerning possible violations of criminal and administrative provisions of the Forest Service and other statues (sic) under the U.S. Code. Special agents are normally plain clothes officers who carry concealed firearms, and other defensive equipment, make arrests, carry out complex criminal investigations, present cases for prosecution to U.S. Attorneys, and prepare investigative reports. Typically there is one special agent stationed in each geographic zone. All field agents are required to travel a great deal and usually maintain a case load often to fifteen ongoing criminal investigations at one time.
In addition, criminal investigators/special agents:
Work cooperatively with Federal, State, local and tribal law enforcement agencies
Conduct complex criminal and civil investigations involving Drug Trafficking Organizations, domestic terrorism and claims for or against the government
Conduct undercover and surveillance operations
Testify in court on behalf of the government
Some examples of criminal cases are:
Illegal outfitter and guiding
Theft of government property
Timber theft
Investigations of wildland fire origins
Manufacture and distribution of controlled substances
Assault of Federal employees or volunteers
Criminal investigators occasionally conduct internal and civil claim investigations.
From my own position of very little knowledge, the reasons could be a) there are fewer people in the past (harder to recruit, less funding?, b) they are collaborating with others in a different way so the prosecutions don’t go through the FS, c) wildfire investigations are using more time, d) illegal marijuana grows are using more time. A regional breakdown will be helpful in testing hypotheses, but we don’t have that yet.
The federal government does go to court sometimes to protect our natural resources, here in North Dakota:
Three men accused of damaging U.S. Forest Service land four years ago while going mudding in the Little Missouri National Grasslands now face criminal charges in federal court.
Five full-sized pickups got stuck in the mud in the area known as Estes Springs. The individuals involved then got two road graders to try to recover the pickups, but then got the road graders stuck in the wet and muddy conditions.
The area has signs indicating it is National Forest Service land and directing the public to stay on established roads and trails.
Jan Swenson, executive director of the Badlands Conservation Alliance, saw photos of the incident four years ago and said it looked like the pickups had driven donuts in the mud following a rainstorm.
“It is great to see the Forest Service following through,” Swenson said. “It would be encouraging to see other government entities follow through on enforcement issues as well.”
Marijuana grow on PIke National Forest. Photo by Douglas County Sheriff’s Department.
The Colorado Springs Gazette had this lengthy piece today. A couple of interesting points.
1. More people are illegally growing marijuana on public lands in Colorado.
In a state where growing and selling cannabis have been legal for years, illegal marijuana grow operations in national forests have been on the rise for at least the last three years, officials say.
In 2017, 71,000 pot plants were eradicated in the U.S. Forest Service’s five-state Rocky Mountain Region. That’s up from 45,000 plants in 2016, 23,000 plants in 2015 and just 3,000 plants in 2014 – the vast majority each year in Colorado. In a report to Congress in 2016, the Forest Service estimated each plant to be worth $2,500, making the street value of the plants eradicated last year in the Rocky Mountain region more than $177 million.
As a resident of a Colorado county that is popular among illegal growers, it appears that legalizing has the effect of bringing folks in from outside the state who grow it m/l legally and then sell it illegally outside the state. But theoretically that shouldn’t matter as much on public lands as it was illegal there and continues to be illegal there.
2. But officials say it is more of a threat to the environment than a public safety threat.
In his eight total years with the Forest Service, Delbon said he’s helped eradicate more than 100 illegal grow sites, and has never once seen a boobytrap.
“It’s not like you have snipers out waiting for people or law enforcement to come into the grow site,” Delbon said. “Fortunately, the experience I’ve had, even in California, the growers themselves are typically the low worker bees. (When a raid happens,) they want to get out of there and avoid arrest.”
Most grows, for obvious reasons, are way off the beaten track and far from recreation areas, campgrounds and marked trails, Delbon added. “So, for the vast majority of the public recreating on our posted trails, the risk is very low.”
3. And some of the folks doing it are part of cartels but no one is sure how much is due to cartels.
In a review of court files from several prosecutions stemming from raids in 2017, Colorado Politics found examples of Mexican nationals working in coordination with outside groups to grow pot on public lands. In plea agreements, growers described moving to the state to be “weed farmers” for $200 a day, while being supplied by and connected to trafficking organizations.
And while several nationals of Mexico and other Latin American countries have been arrested and successfully prosecuted for growing marijuana on Colorado’s public lands, it’s unclear how many of those grow operations have connections to organized Mexican drug cartels.
“Generally, we find that it’s a mix, whether it’s local residents or maybe some other group that comes into the area, but to specifically tie it back to cartels, that’s probably not appropriate to make those connections at this point,” Delbon, the Forest Service agent, said.
4. They are not sure that the increase is due to legalization.
Delbon said he can’t weigh in yet on whether there’s a correlation between Colorado legalizing recreational marijuana in 2012 and the increased number of plants being illegally grown on federal lands in the state.
“Maybe the better answer for me is it’s too soon to tell,” Delbon said.
I’m not sure how you can tell what forces are driving something unless you pick one (legalization) reverse it, and see what happens, which seems extremely unlikely.
“Researchers from the University of California, Davis, and the California Academy of Sciences tested 10 northern spotted owls found dead in the region. Seven of the owls tested positive for rat poison, used by pot farmers to keep rodents away from their irrigation systems and crops.”
“California officials argue that legalization will allow them to increase oversight and regulation of cannabis farms in fragile forests.” Is there an opportunity here for California to work with Attorney General Sessions on federal lands since they have a shared interest? Could the revived “war on drugs” lead to more money for the Forest Service? (This is slightly tongue-in-cheek, but …)
(Another opportunity … for those cut-over private timberlands to improve their cashflow? Not that this would be any better for the spotted owls, though rat poison would also work on barred owls attracted to the clearcuts.)
Post-fire rehab coming to California?For my California NCFP friends: hope this doesn’t happen to you…(my italics). This is from an editorial in the Colorado Springs Gazette here that touches on some of the problems we are experiencing here. I personally agree with legalization, but we can’t pretend that unexpected problems don’t exist, and we need to consider that some of the massive amounts of money that this new industry is generating should be used to help (duh!).
Dave Condit, deputy forest and grassland supervisor for the Pike-San Isabel and Cimarron-Comanche National Grasslands, recently accompanied Forest Service officers on the raid of a Mexican cartel’s major grow operation west of Colorado Springs. It was among at least 17 busts of cartel operations in the past 18 months. He describes the type of operation mostly based in Mexico, before legalization made Colorado more attractive. Condit said the agency lacks resources to make a dent in the additional cartel activity in the region’s two national forests.
“It was eye opening to put on the camouflage and sneak through the woods at 4 in the morning,” Condit told The Gazette’s editorial board Friday. “I had no idea the scope of these plantations. These are huge farms hidden in the national forests. The cartels de-limb the trees, so there is some green left on them. Other trees are cut down. They fertilize the plants extensively, and not all these fertilizers and chemicals are legal in this area.
“This is different than anything we have experienced in the past. These massive plantations are not the work of someone moving in from out of state who’s going to grow a few plants or even try to grow a bunch of plants and sell them. These are massive supported plantations, with massive amounts of irrigation. The cartels create their own little reservoirs for water. These operations are guarded with armed processors. They have little buildings on site. The suspects we have captured on these grows have all been Mexican nationals.”
Condit said the black market invading Colorado’s national forests has grown so large the entire budget for the Pike and San Isabel forests would not cover the costs of removing and remediating cartel grows in the forests he helps supervise.
“There’s a massive amount of resource damage that has to be mitigated,” Condit said. “You’ve got facilities and structures that have to be deconstructed. We would need to bring in air support to get materials out of there. There are tens of thousands of plants that have to be destroyed.”
Condit hopes the Colorado Legislature will channel a portion of marijuana proceeds to the Forest Service to help pay for closure and reclamation of cartel operations.
“For every plantation we find, there are many more,” Condit said.
Authorities captured only two cartel suspects in the raid Condit witnessed, and others escaped by foot into the woods.
“This operation had a huge stockpile of food. Hundreds and hundreds of giant cans (of food), and stacks of tortillas two or three people could not consume in months,” Condit said. “So it appeared they were planning to bring in a large crew for the harvest. I wouldn’t have thought you could hide something like that in our woods, but you can.”
Officers seized a marijuana stash and plants worth an estimated $35 million that morning. Merely destroying the plants presented a significant expense.
“Whether you’re a recreational shooter, a weekend camper, or you’re going to walk your dog in the woods, you should be concerned,” Condit said. “Some of these people have guns. If you stumble into $35 million worth of illegal plants, I’d be concerned. We are concerned for our own personnel.”
Aerial view of pot grow found on forest service land. An armed suspect was arrested. (HCSO) Here’s a news story from California.
Below is an excerpt.
When deputies arrived on scene they located a large marijuana growing operation containing 5,266 growing marijuana plants ranging in size from 1′ to 4′ in height. They also located an armed suspect in the garden who was arrested. The suspect was identified as Andres Montes-Deoca, 21 years old, from Mexico. When deputies arrested Montes-Deoca he was wearing a loaded 9 mm semi-automatic handgun.
Officers also located a Rodenticides and Carbofuran in the garden site.
I remember using carbofuran on pine seedlings for (root weevils??) It was 35 or so years ago. I remember that stuff being very bad and here’s a wikipedia entry that it’s indeed very, very bad for many organisms including humans.
Carbofuran is highly toxic to vertebrates with an oral LD50 of 8–14 mg/kg in rats and 19 mg/kg in dogs.[citation needed]
Carbofuran is known to be particularly toxic to birds. In its granular form, a single grain will kill a bird. Birds often eat numerous grains of the pesticide, mistaking them for seeds, and then die shortly thereafter. Before the granular form was banned by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 1991,[11] it was blamed for millions of bird deaths per year. The liquid version of the pesticide is less hazardous to birds since they are not as likely to ingest it directly, but it is still very hazardous. The EPA announced on July 25, 2008 that it intends to ban all forms in the US.[12] The ban requires that no residue be present on domestic or imported foods.[13]
Carbofuran has been illegally used to intentionally poison wildlife in the US, Canada and Great Britain; poisoned wildlife have included coyotes, kites, golden eagles and buzzards. Secondary fatal poisoning of domestic and wild animals has been documented,[14][15] specifically, raptors (bald eagles and golden eagles), domestic dogs, raccoons, vultures and other scavengers. In Kenya, farmers are using carbofuran to kill lions and other predators.[9][16]
In a number of publicized incidents worldwide, carbofuran has also been used to poison domestic pets.[17][18]
Toxicity to humans
Carbofuran has one of the highest acute toxicities to humans of any insecticide widely used on field crops (only aldicarb and parathion are more toxic). A quarter teaspoon (1 mL) can be fatal.[citation needed] Most carbofuran is applied by commercial applicators using closed systems with engineered controls so there is no exposure to it in preparation. Since its toxic effects are due to its activity as a cholinesterase inhibitor it is considered a neurotoxic pesticide.
Carbofuran is also a powerful endocrine disruptor that can cause transient alterations in the concentration of many hormones in animals and humans even at extremely low doses. These alterations may consequently lead to serious reproductive problems following repeated exposure.[19][20] In one study, the exposure of rats to sublethal amounts of carbofuran decreased testosterone by 88%, while the levels of progesterone, cortisol, and estradiol were significantly increased (1279%, 202%, and 150%, respectively).[19]
Carbofuran can also be toxic to testes in sublethal amounts. A decrease in sperm motility, sperm count along with increase in percent abnormal sperm was observed at 0.4 mg/kg dose level.[21]
The fisher is of particular interest. Despite its name, the furry mammal does not live in or near the coast but instead occupies remote, closed-canopy forests, sites that are prime landscapes for illegal marijuana grows. Akin to a weasel, it pursues a wide diet ranging from fruits to small mammals to birds, and has been known to take on the most bristly of forest creatures. It is the “only animal tough and clever enough to prey regularly on porcupines,” observes the Center for Biological Diversity — “no easy feat.”
However skilled a killer it might be, the fisher is not able to discern whether its dinner is laced with rodenticide. This has led to a spike in its mortality, further diminishing its already declining population. That’s the word from scientists working for the Sierra Nevada Adaptive Management Project, out the College of Natural Resources at UC-Berkeley; they have launched the first in-depth analysis of the threats this toxin poses to this rare species. Of the 58 fisher carcasses they autopsied, the data revealed some troubling patterns:
79 percent were exposed to one or more AR [anticoagulant rodenticides] chemical. The number of AR compounds detected per animal ranged from 1 to 4. Both first and second generation ARs were detected, with brodifacoum being most common and detected in 44 of the 46 (96%) exposed fishers, followed by bromodiolone (16 of 46; 35%), diphacinone (8 of 46; 17%), chlorophacinone (four of 46; 9%), difethialone (one of 46; 2%), and wafarin (one of 46; 2%).
The lethality of the chemicals listed is only part of the picture. Another facet is the spatial distribution of the dead Pacific fishers; their bodies were widely distributed across northwestern California and in the southern Sierra Mountains. The fact that there was no clustering of deaths by specific location “indicates that fishers are encountering these poisons in remote, natural forest regions within their home ranges.”
CBD litigated and the fisher listing proposal is due in 2014.. on the CBD website they say the problems are logging and development that caused “habitat destruction”; yet if people are finding them dead scattered around, it might indicate that the habitat is OK. And if people are already doing things that are illegal to fishers, it doesn’t seem like the threat of violating ESA will stop them. Unless you can litigate counties or the Feds to force them to do more law enforcement? But you gotta wonder if the threat of citizens in the forest being killed is not enough to get sufficient law enforcement, why fishers would apparently count more than forest visitors. Not to speak of “what is the rural equivalent of the “broken window” theory?” in terms of letting lawlessness go forth..
It makes me wonder whether some of the toughest environmental problems might not being addressed by groups that specialize in litigation, due to litigation not being the tool to solve the problem. Kind of an example of the old joke..
“Man searches diligently under lamp-post at night. Explains to passer-by that he has lost his keys. “Did you lose them under the lamp-post?” “No.” “Then why are you looking under the lamp-post?” “Because there’s no light anywhere else.”
I’m not saying litigation shouldn’t be a tool in the toolkit, but if we are to have safe and economically vibrant rural communities and sustainable forests, it will take a great deal more than that. Or as I used to say when I wored in NEPA, documenting environmental effects is necessary, but not sufficient, to meet section 101 goals, i.e.:
Federal Government, in cooperation with State and local governments, and other concerned public and private organizations, to use all practicable means and measures, including financial and technical assistance, in a manner calculated to foster and promote the general welfare, to create and maintain conditions under which man and nature can exist in productive harmony, and fulfill the social, economic, and other requirements of present and future generations of Americans.
In a way, this is off the topic, but my feeling is that we have a patchwork of federal and state and private lands and any problems and mistrust among the authorities can reverberate across topic areas. I have to wonder why this is an issue in Utah and neighboring parts of Colorado, and not so much elsewhere.
Should there be some kind of federal/state/county hearing process where each side is required to state its side of the story for everyone’s mutual understanding? I wonder why this hasn’t happened.. is there a lack of mechanisms? Clearly there is a problem that seems to affect public safety. What could be more important?
The sheriff relayed the story of a BLM ranger who chased down a speeding motorist on a state highway using GPS to track down the offender. Because there’s not a federal code for speeding, Smith said the motorist was written up for erratic off-road driving.
Noel said such citations become problematic because violators are forced to deal with federal magistrates often long distances away.
In contrast, San Juan County Sheriff Rick Eldredge said his county has a signed agreement with the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs in which violators are handled locally and prosecuted on the reservation, providing transparency and accountability in the system.
Garfield County Sheriff James Perkins said he didn’t have enough time to brief committee members on the problems he’s had with overzealous federal employees over the past few years, and his concerns have gone unanswered.
“I’ve gotten absolutely nothing but stonewalled,” Perkins said. “I’ve tried my best to work with these people.”
While the sheriffs emphasized they have often enjoyed cooperative working arrangements with federal agencies such as the FBI or Drug Enforcement Administration, it has not been the case with land management agencies, with law enforcement missions at times compromised.
Perkins said a raid on a 20,000-plant marijuana cartel garden was botched because the federal land agency conducted a “confirmation mission” the day before.
“It was a total failure,” he said.
Some lawmakers questioned if they were only hearing one side of the story and wondered aloud if there had been serious attempts to hammer out the problems.
