The Smokey Wire : National Forest News and Views - Community Sourced, Shared and Supported

BLM’s New Centralized E-bike Approval Policy

August 17, 2023 by Sharon

Scott Streater had an interesting article in E&E News yesterday about a new BLM policy on e-bikes.

The Bureau of Land Management is clamping down on the use of electric bikes in areas where motorized, off-highway vehicles are prohibited — concerning some outdoor recreationists but pleasing conservation groups worried about protecting natural resources.
At issue is BLM’s instruction memorandum, dated Aug. 1 and sent to all field offices, that walks back a Trump-era rule exempting e-bikes from off-road vehicle regulations, thus allowing them to be used in some cases on backcountry trails and other areas where motorized transport is generally prohibited.
BLM says in the latest memo that when it comes to authorizing the use of e-bikes in certain areas — such as on remote mountain and backcountry trails — it warrants the bureau taking a more “cautious approach” to regulation than what was outlined in the 2020 rule.
Specifically, the memo signed by Thomas Heinlein, assistant director of the National Conservation Lands and Community Partnerships directorate, requires BLM state, district and field offices to obtain his department’s approval “before using the e-bike rule to exclude e-bikes from the definition of off-road vehicle” or before authorizing “e-bikes on trails on which motorized vehicles are otherwise prohibited.”
Doing so “will allow BLM leadership to carefully consider the issues raised by application of the rule in site-specific circumstances,” the memo says. The directorate “is better situated than individual state, district, and field offices to monitor new research on impacts and the compatibility of e-bike use on public land,” the memo says. It calls for the directorate to stay current on “relevant research” on e-bike use in the event that future studies indicate “e-bike use results in different — and potentially greater — impacts than what was assumed when the BLM promulgated the e-bike rule in 2020.”
The instruction memo requirements do not apply to people with disabilities who request “to ride an e-bike on trails where mechanized use is allowed and off-road vehicle use is otherwise prohibited,” it says.

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So going to the memo itself..

Moreover, the National Conservation Lands and Community Partnerships Directorate is better situated than individual state, district, and field offices to monitor new research on impacts and the compatibility of e-bike use on public land. To that end, the Directorate will monitor the status of relevant research. Staying apprised of recent developments will allow the Directorate to know whether new research indicates that e-bike use results in different—and potentially greater—impacts than what was assumed when the BLM promulgated the e-bike rule in 2020.

What’s interesting about this to me is the idea of running certain decisions through Headquarters and requiring a centralized approval. A person could argue that a centralized office would be better able than a field office to monitor “relevant research” on just about anything.

Second, it may be difficult for the BLM to enforce critical aspects of the e-bike rule. Under the rule, an e-bike can be excluded from the definition of off-road vehicle and, therefore, allowed on trails where off-road vehicle use is otherwise prohibited, only when the electric motor is not exclusively propelling the e-bike for an extended duration. Despite language in the rule’s preamble asserting that such enforcement challenges are not unique, this limitation, which is intended to help keep speeds down and prevent riders from venturing too far into the backcountry, may be difficult to police on remote, non-motorized trails.

I wonder if scarce BLM law enforcement resources are best employed checking to see that bikes are e-bikes or not on trails. But if there’s no enforcement people on remote non-motorized trails, it really doesn’t matter exactly what the rules are.

Conservation groups praised the move, saying it’s needed to ensure that increased public access to more remote areas afforded by the motorized bikes does not trump resource protection. “We are pleased the BLM is taking this issue seriously and recognizes that a ‘cautious approach’ is needed in managing e-bikes, particularly e-mountain bikes, on public lands,” Judi Brawer, a wildlands attorney at the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, said in a statement. Brawer said that adding motorized mountain bikes “to already crowded trails necessitates the caution and further study provided for in this new guidance.”

So the problem is too many people? And yet the same groups often advocate for “protection” designations based on the fact that they attract more people and revenue to gateway communities.

I asked Scott which conservation groups exactly, and he replied in an email: “SUWA. Sierra Club, PEER, Pacific Crest Trail, Backcountry Horsemen Association, some hiking conservation group whose name escapes me.”

I guess there’s two questions for me here.. if you don’t trust District Managers to make the right decisions, why start with e-bikes? One of my contacts pointed out that centralizing decisions like this was considered to be bad during the Trump Admin, and the local folks were thought to be better at making decisions. And so it goes…

Climate change in the courts – a win for Montana youth plaintiffs

August 16, 2023 by Jon Haber

I mentioned this Montana lawsuit in an earlier litigation update since it was going to be the first case going to trial nationally involving youth plaintiffs demanding action on climate change in a state court. Since then, we’ve been debating climate science a little here, so here’s an update. The trial happened and the court ruled in favor of Plaintiffs on one claim (2023.08.14-Held-v.-Montana-victory-order): a recent change in Montana’s environmental policy act (MEPA), which prohibited consideration of impacts on climate for proposed projects, “violates Plaintiffs’ right to a clean and healthful environment and is facially unconstitutional.” The state also failed to show that “the MEPA limitation serves a compelling government interest.”

The Montana state constitution includes this specific right, so the applicability of this outcome elsewhere is uncertain, but Plaintiffs’ attorneys (who are representing youth plaintiffs in other climate cases) are optimistic that it may provide some momentum.

The Washington Post had an interesting take on factual questions related to climate change:

In a pivot from its expected defense disputing the climate science behind the plaintiffs’ case, the state focused instead on arguing that the legislature should weigh in on the contested law, not the judiciary.
Michael Gerrard, the founder of Columbia’s Sabin Center, said the change in strategy came as a surprise: “Everyone expected them to put on a more vigorous defense,” he said. “And they may have concluded that the underlying science of climate change was so strong that they didn’t want to contest it.”
The state’s defense was unsuccessful. Judge Kathy Seeley determined that the state’s emissions could be fairly traced to the legal provision blocking Montana from reviewing the climate impacts of energy projects. She further wrote that the state’s emissions and climate change have caused harm to the environment and the youth plaintiffs.

If the WaPo article isn’t viewable, here’s another with more background on the case.

(It was interesting when I looked for a meme to include with this post – they seem to be dominated by not-very-clever climate change denialism.)

Transmission Line Build-Out Across the West: Impacts to Wildfire and from Wildfire

August 16, 2023 by Sharon

Bob Berwyn/Summit Daily NewsThe U.S. Forest Service wants to clear dead trees from powerline corridors in the White River National Forest. Falling trees or a fire have the potential to affect wide areas of the western power grid.(from this 2009 story) https://www.aspentimes.com/news/feds-want-forest-input-on-colorado-powerlines/

Folks have been telling me that transmission lines don’t have as much chance of causing wildfires as distribution lines. Naturally, I was interested in the details of why this is the case. A great big shout-out to BLM NEPA folks who have to examine all these things in detail. I’ll give you some highlights from the Transwest Express EIS (which actually is a generally magnificent EIS with info on everything anyone, or at least I, can possibly imagine). What I like about NEPA docs is that usually the authors don’t have a particular axe to grind, their job is to discuss the pros and cons, hopefully so regular people can understand them.

I’ve organized the risks about wildfire (causing them) and (being harmed by them). If we believe (I don’t, thanks to fire suppression folks) that wildfires will increase by 50 % (or whatever) due to climate change, does it make sense for us to decarbonize with sources that will need thousands of miles of transmission lines through wildfire-prone areas?

Workers Doing Construction and Maintenance

Impacts to ignition points from operation or maintenance activities such as welding, vehicle ignition, blasting, blading, and overland travel would be similar to those described under Section 3.21.6.1, Impacts from Terminal Construction and Operation. In addition, the presence of the energized transmission line could increase the risk of wildland fire ignition in areas of high fire risk and lightning strikes. Lightning protection would be provided by overhead shield wires on the top of the line.

Failure of Transmission Structures

Fires where power lines are located can be started by contact between the conductors and/or insulation and anything flammable or that could create a spark such as vegetation, floating or wind-blown debris, bullets, airplanes or helicopters, or other conductors. Failure of transmission structures could occur as a result of intentional damage (e.g., vandalism, terrorism), natural disasters, vehicle or aircraft collision, or a design or engineering flaw in a system component. However, the conductors and structures for high voltage lines tend to be of sufficient size to be resistant to physical damage. In addition, the transmission line would be protected with power circuit breakers and line relay protection equipment. If a conductor or component failure occurs, power would be automatically removed from the line. All buildings, fences, and other structures with metal surfaces located within 300 feet of the alignment would be grounded to the mutual satisfaction of the parties involved.

High Voltage vs. Lower Voltage and Distribution Lines

Here’s the answer to our question about the different kinds of lines, it’s about height and spacing:

While the risk of wildland fire ignition does increase with power lines, high-voltage power lines are much less likely to cause wildland fires than lower voltage and distribution lines due to their height and spacing, which limits contact with other lines, vegetation, and debris. In addition, the applicant will implement the Vegetation Management Plan described in Section 3.5, Vegetation, and Appendix D, POD, to minimize contact and or arcs with vegetation. The Vegetation Management Plan is designed to maintain trees and shrubs within certain heights to limit direct contact with the line, as well as prevent arcs from the power line to trees. A key component of the Vegetation Management Plan is the identification of hazard trees. Hazard trees are defined as trees located within or adjacent to the 250-foot-wide transmission line ROW that present a hazard to employees, the public, or power system facilities.

Looking for more exact numbers, I found a cite in this article

For example, per mile of power line, distribution lines are three times more likely to cause ignitions compared with transmission lines [19]

And that cite was to this paper: Pacific Gas and Electric Company, “Pacific Gas and Electric Company Amended 2019 Wildfire Safety Plan,” Tech. Rep., 2019

I don’t know if there is better info out there somewhere, please put in comments if you find any.

Impacts to Fire Suppression Activities (Good and Bad Impacts)

If a wildland fire occurs near the Project, wildland firefighters and fire suppression efforts could be negatively and positively impacted. The ROW and structures could be an obstacle, and another feature requiring fire suppression efforts. The energized line during fires could be a risk to fire fighters on the ground, and could limit the area in which aircraft could assist in fire suppression activities. The Project would alter fire suppression priorities during wildland fire events. In portions of the route, the Project may be the only infrastructure in the area, and as such may be an obstacle to letting a fire burn safely to natural or engineered containment boundaries. The energized line and broken conductors can deliver currents long distance, especially if the line or conductors come in contact with linear features such as fences. Smoke particles can carry electrical charge, and dense smoke can allow arcing from the
conductor to the ground. If the Project is not de-energized during a wildland fire event, buffers would be required around structures and conductors for the safety of fire personnel. Positive impacts from the Project on wildland fire suppression would include the development of a 250-foot-wide transmission line ROW and additional access roads acting as fire breaks, and providing access to fire personnel. In addition, the vegetation management associated with the Project could decrease fuel loads, and fire intensity and severity within the ROW.
The presence of the transmission line does increase risk of ignitions through increased access. However, more importantly, it prevents the use of certain fire and fuels management tools (prescribed fire or wildland fire use) in the vicinity of the transmission line. Additionally, it requires a prioritization to suppress fires in and around the line to protect human lives and infrastructure. This, in turn, can result in fiscal impacts to the agency due to the risk of ignitions to suppress, additional values to protect, and the reduction in areas that wildland fire can be used to meet land management objectives. Additional risks include increased potential for undesirable fire effects and increased risk to fire suppression personnel.

But the Same ROW and Roads That Are Good For Fuel Breaks Are Also Bad For Ignitions

Increased access through the new and upgraded network of access roads and the maintained ROW would increase recreation traffic, and trespassing which would increase the potential for more vehicle and human caused ignitions. However increased access roads would increase fire breaks, and allow easier access for fire suppression activities during wildland fire events.

And Some Places Won’t Be Fuel Breaks

Level 1 and 2 (Wire Zone) vegetation management levels (as described in Section 3.5, Vegetation), would create fuel breaks within forested areas. Fuel breaks can assist in wildland firefighting by slowing down fire growth, reducing fireline intensity, and providing enhanced fire suppression opportunities. Level 2 (Border Zone) and 3 vegetation management levels would not receive intensive vegetation management within the ROW, and may not provide a substantial fuel break should a fire occur near the Project. In sage-grouse habitat, the BLM’s WO-IM 2013-128 (Sage-grouse Conservation in Fire Operations and Fuels Management) includes forming partnerships with linear ROW holders to maintain fuel breaks, which reduce fuel continuity and serve to protect at-risk landscapes. As the majority of sagebrush is under the height limits outlined in the Vegetation Management plan, vegetation clearing in TransWest Express EIS Section 3.21 – Wildland Fire 3.21-23 Final EIS 2015 sagebrush would typically not occur. However, the implementation of fuel breaks of sagebrush habitat
could provide a benefit to sage-grouse management by facilitating fire suppression, reducing the acres of habitat burned, and limiting vegetation clearing in suitable habitat.

I wonder if groups that are against hazard tree removals from roads are also against 250 foot transmission ROW’s? Or in Bob Berwyn’s story

The proposal would allow the Forest Service or utility companies with powerlines on the three forests to fell and remove all hazardous trees within approximately 200 feet from the centerline of transmission lines and within 75 feet of centerline of distribution lines.

And finally, are wildfires bad for transmission lines? The flip side of the other question. I couldn’t find the answer easily in the voluminous BLM EIS (maybe we need machine learning to help find things in lengthy environmental docs) but here is one from Southern Cal.

The potential for wildfires to impact the operation of transmission facilities is a concern which must be considered when siting new transmission lines. This is particularly true for transmission lines passing through the southern portion of San Diego County due to the history of wildfires in this area. SDG&E’s existing 500 kV line, the Southwest Powerlink (SWPL), has experienced a number of outages as a result of wildfires along this transmission corridor. A second 500 kV line, collocated for the entire distance between the Imperial Valley and Miguel substations, would be expected to experience a similar outage frequency. The simultaneous loss of both transmission lines could pose a significant reliability concern for SDG&E.

Then there was the threat to California’s electricity grid from the Bootleg Fire. Now, I think that NEPA wise, solar and wind build-out to feed those transmission lines would be a connected action (?) but I didn’t go there. Finally burying transmission lines is a thing, but apparently too expensive, and not even doable for cross-mountain transmission.

When Mitigation and Adaptation Collide: Wildfire Ignitions and 57% More Transmission Lines by 2030

August 15, 2023 by Sharon

https://netzeroamerica.princeton.edu/the-report

Increasing risk of wildfire in 2050 (not that I necessarily believe this, but) from First Street Foundation

Power Lines Start Fires

1. As we have seen in various wildfires, power lines can start fires. This particularly seems to happen under windy conditions, which makes for fires that are hard to control and in some cases, air resources can’t be used during these high wind events. Large transmission lines are not as susceptible, we would think. But how do people know when a major one is proposed in their neighborhood if it’s the “safe” kind or the “unsafe” kind?

Too Expensive to Protect, Need to Shut Off Instead

2. It’s a lot of work and money to maintain power lines, so much so that PG&E is thinking of changing their strategy to “just shut them down” instead, see this WSJ piece. Fires start, people sue, and ratepayers ultimately pay the bill, raising rates. Do we expect more bad fire weather conditions due to climate change? That would mean more times for electricity to be turned off. Who is likely to be able to afford back-up generators or batteries? If we’re cutting down on gas and there may be a shortage of battery minerals… This might be difficult as well.

Instead, the company will rely more heavily on new power-line settings in areas at high risk of fire. The lines shut off within a tenth of a second when branches or other objects touch them, reducing the risk of sparks.
Industry officials say customers may experience more power outages in coming years if the company’s scaled-back approach to tree trimming results in more branches hitting wires. The company said it would work to assess outage-prone circuits and address the issues with targeted tree clearing and other safeguards.
PG&E says the new approach will be both safer and less expensive as it works to permanently reduce wildfire risk by burying 10,000 miles of power lines in the coming years, an ambitious plan expected to cost at least $20 billion. The company is challenged in its ability to raise capital following a complex bankruptcy restructuring and has been working to cut costs in order to fund the work.

So people sued them, so they went bankrupt and have to do the best they can with the funding available. At least until the next cycle of wildlife/litigation/bankruptcy where one might expect them to have even less money.

From a Reuters story on the power grid:

“We shouldn’t have to worry about people dying because someone flips off the electric switch.”
Jana Langley, of Mesquite Texas, whose father had several strokes during a prolonged outage in the 2021 Texas deep freeze.

3. The New York Times editorial board opined:

The United States needs 47,300 gigawatt-miles of new power lines by 2035, which would expand the current grid by 57 percent, the Energy Department reported in February. A 2021 report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine arrived at a similar figure. To hit that target, the United States needs to double the pace of power line construction.

and what could go wrong with the well-intentioned “federal pre-emption of state and local authorities” which “would only apply to major projects of national importance..”

According to CNBC:

Building transmission lines is more important for distributing renewable energy than it is for using fossil fuels because with coal, natural gas or nuclear baseload energy, the source of energy can be moved to where it is needed.
“With renewables, you can’t do that,” Robb said. “You’ve got to generate power where the sun is shining and where the wind is blowing.” Insufficient transmission lines have become a major “bottleneck” in deploying renewable resources, Robb told CNBC.

Does anyone think (no, I don’t think nuclear is a fossil fuel) maybe nuclear has some practical advantages- if we didn’t have to build new power lines (which we’re not probably going to actually build), plus wouldn’t it be safer and more secure than running new transmission lines across the country? Plus, I will predict that we’re actually not going to expand the grid by 57% by 2035; people, supply chains, funding and practicalities of all shapes and sizes, including pushback by those affected. There’s a vaguely colonialist undertone as well.. like negatives accruing to some states and cheaper energy to others.. as in this Reuters story:

A swathe of grid expansions are needed in Central U.S. to pursue national renewable energy goals and lower power prices in neighboring regions, the Department of Energy said in a draft transmission study.

This kind of “some win some lose” does not go unnoticed by affected communities.

In this Reuters story, apparently we have enough problems with the power lines we have, that need to be fixed.

As the weather gets wilder, the grid gets older. The U.S. Department of Energy found that 70% of U.S. transmission lines are more than 25 years old in its last network-infrastructure review in 2015. Lines typically have a 50 year lifespan. The average age of large power transformers, which handle 90% of U.S. electricity flow, is more than 40 years. Transformer malfunctions tend to escalate at about 40 years, according to research by reinsurance provider Swiss Re.

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Some Impacts of Transmission Lines and Audubon’s Point of View

Firewise Coercion vs Cooperation?

August 15, 2023 by andystahl

“After the great fires in London in 1666 and Chicago in 1871, building codes started addressing the risks one building posed to adjacent buildings and the public,” from a nice summary of building codes history in Mother Earth News.

How many “great fires” will it take before we wise up to the fact that cooperation isn’t sufficient to protect communities from fires that ignite out-of-doors? As was the case with building codes, the insurance industry is taking the lead. But not by constructively developing model Firewise codes (e.g., for vegetation management and home design that resists exterior ignition) and urging state and local governments to adopt them. Instead, the insurance industry is taking a hike, refusing to underwrite homes in potential high-loss areas. In response, state and local governments are either coercing the insurance industry to underwrite or subsidizing insurance for the newly uninsured. Neither tactic addresses the underlying problem.

Unless and until governments adopt enforceable Firewise regulations to protect against catastrophic community loss, we will continue to suffer catastrophic community losses.

Why Weren’t Hawaii’s Firewise Websites Enough to Prevent Maui Tragedy?

August 14, 2023 by andystahl

Hawaii has several Firewise websites that seek to educate homeowners about best practices. The state has also written fire mitigation plans and developed fire risk maps. Notwithstanding these planning efforts, Lahaina was obliterated by a wind-driven wildfire. The catastrophe is likely to exceed 100 fatalities and cost billions to rebuild the town.

A series of vegetation-related events set the stage for this catastrophe. First was the 20th-century elimination of the native fire-resistant forest vegetation by pineapple and sugar cane plantations. Next was the abandonment of those plantations and their replacement by invasive grasses. Add in terrain-driven high winds common to parts of Hawaii plus seasonal drought and all that was missing was an ignition source, which has yet to be determined, but, once again, wind-downed power lines may prove to be the culprit.

After I made these observations last week on a firefighter’s website, which got me banned from the site (🤣), Sharon suggested I re-visit the topic here.

In my original comment on the firefighter site, I noted that Hawaii has no “Firewise-type program.” The firefighter blog’s owner responded to me with links to Firewise information websites. Although helpful, I explained to her that information is not a “program” that will move the needle at a community-wide level. Moving the needle requires enforceable building and vegetation codes, zoning, and ordinances, as I explained in a subsequent comment before being censored.

If it is to be effective, “Firewise” must be more than putting information on a website, doing analyses, drawing maps, and formulating plans. Firewise must also include on-the-ground actions. In Maui, that would have included replacing the invasive weeds with native species plantings. In their abandoned status, these former plantation lands are a time bomb — a deadly nuisance — that tragically blew up, as knowledgeable folks had warned for years. In other words, but for the invasive grasses, this tragedy would likely not have happened. Government is in the best position to require the former pineapple and sugar cane plantation owners to abate this nuisance. Unless and until that happens, the Lahaina tragedy will repeat itself elsewhere.

Mitigating the invasive grass threat would also have been much less expensive than wholesale Firewise refurbishment of Lahaina’s existing housing stock. Now, of course, Lahaina has the opportunity to replace its housing fire-wisely, with, one hopes, new and enforced building codes and zoning.

What Do Resort-y Parts of Hawaii, the Mountain West, Great Britain and Australia Have in Common? Housing Affordability and Displacement

August 14, 2023 by Sharon

Summer Auty is living in her van because rents are so high in Frome (England)

A RV stands on a street in Bozeman, Montana, in December 2022, a housing “fix” many locals are turning to as rents rise. Photo by Janie Osborne

I’m curious about gentrification, and whether residents of an area (Native or not) should some kind of right to continue to live there, given that it has become an area where young people are priced out of housing and costs of living. You can think of say, Jackson in Wyoming. I don’t know the answer, but I’m raising it as a question. And would current natives have more of a right than new migrant low income people with jobs there?

We have our own Jacksons, Vails, and so on in the US, sometimes near federal lands, and the amenity migration plus tourism has been spreading post-Covid. Here’s one of many articles on that in Montana.

The Hawaiians have their own (at least Native Hawaiians according to this WaPo article)

The displacement of Native Hawaiians is a particularly acute concern now, as much of the island has been targeted for gentrification, driving up the costs of living and forcing many Native Hawaiians to move to mainland cities like Las Vegas.

And the short-term rental phenomena and displacement also occurs in England, as per this BBC story.

In nearby Bruton, the chair of the town council, Ewan Jones said the rise of holiday lets had taken many rental properties out of the market.
“We have the UK’s biggest farmhouse cheese manufacturer in this parish, you talk to them and their number one concern is ‘where do our workers live?'”

He said schools in particular were worried about the supply of homes their teachers and support staff could afford to live in.

This statement could be about Durango or any number of communities in the US… it’s just interesting this seems to be a common trend across many countries (at least those whose news is in English).

After I read this excellent article in the The Times Sunday Magazine, I went down a curiosity rabbit-hole on Airbnb and influences on housing availability. The Times has a six month deal for one pound. Seems like this would be a great interactive map and story for the US.. I wonder if someone’s done it?

From the story..

Devon locals complaining about how Devon locals are being priced out of Devon — so far, so unsurprising. But in the past few years the focus of complaint has changed. The main threat used to be second home owners. In 2011 local councillors formed a steering committee to promote affordable housing and local jobs; their charter firmly stated that stemming the tide of second homes was a priority. But now that threat has been overshadowed by a new and more virulent one. The area has seen a huge, Silicon Valley-charged influx of Airbnbs. Of the 1,022 residential properties in Lynton’s EX35 postcode, 163 of them are available for short-term rental on Airbnb. That’s almost one in six properties, making it one of the most Airbnb’d places in the UK. But not the most.
Airbnb was originally presented as a pocket-money booster for people with a spare room — the company’s pitch to investors in 2008 was “book rooms with locals, rather than hotels”. But data compiled exclusively for The Sunday Times Magazine illustrates just how pervasive Airbnb has become in many of Britain’s most popular tourist areas. That the demand for holiday homes should be higher in these areas is to be expected, but the scale of the shift to short-term lets — and the knock-on effect this is having on villages, towns and cities and the people who try to live in them — is dramatic.

Here’s an article about how it works in Australia, with some interesting ideas..

Given holiday homes will remain an important part of tourism infrastructure in regional areas, could we make use of them in more strategic ways? For instance, during natural disasters or housing crises?
An estimated 65,000 people were temporarily displaced during the 2019-20 bushfires that ravaged the east coast. Some 3,100 houses were also destroyed, leaving around 8,000 people in urgent need of accommodation.
Similarly, over 14,000 homes were damaged in NSW by last year’s floods, and more than 5,000 were left uninhabitable.
A year later, many people in NSW continue to live in inadequate accommodation. Government-issued temporary homes, such as campervans and “pods”, are in woefully short supply.
Housing generally takes a long time to build, making it difficult to respond to such short-term increases in demand.
More strategic and creative use of the short-term rental stock might be the answer. We have seen some gestures by Airbnb and other platforms to support people displaced by disasters, but these responses have largely been ad hoc and uncoordinated.
When disaster zones are declared, Commonwealth and state governments could mandate and coordinate access to short-term rental accommodations for displaced residents and relief workers.
We could even extend such declarations during housing crises like the one we’re experiencing now, as the mayor of Eurobodalla on the NSW south coast has suggested. This would give governments time to deliver longer-term housing solutions in areas of heavy demand.

Recreation effects on wildlife conference

August 14, 2023 by Jon Haber

The effect of recreation on wildlife is a topic that has come up a few times here. It has apparently reached the visibility of a “conference theme,” at least in Canada: “Responsible Recreation: Pathways, Practices and Possibilities.” This conference in May focused on the Columbia Mountains in southern B. C., but may be of broader interest. You can still sign up to see the recorded conference until the 16th, but the written proceedings are available from this website.

From the conference description:

Recreation and adventure tourism opportunities and activities are expanding globally, with the Columbia Mountains region being no exception. From hiking, mountain biking, snowmobiling, dirt biking, cross-country skiing, to motorized and non-motorized watercraft use, all activities can have an impact on wildlife and ecosystems. However, empirical measures of impacts are often difficult to obtain, with unknown thresholds that ultimately affect the viability of wildlife populations and ecosystems. This limits policy development and impact management. Furthermore, the cumulative effect of multiple overlapping recreational and industrial activities on the landscape are seldom considered or addressed.

New Wolf Pack on the Sequoia, and WaPo Story on German Wolves

August 14, 2023 by Sharon

Apparently a third wolf pack in California has been confirmed on the Sequoia National Forest. Here’s a news story.

The WaPo had an interesting story titled “Wolves, once confined to fairy tales, are back in Germany, stirring debate.”

The spread of wolves — through Germany and into Belgium, the Netherlands and beyond — has become an issue at the highest levels of the European Union. Last fall, it touched a personal nerve for European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, when a wolf killed her pony outside her home in northwest Germany. She wrote later that the E.U.’s executive body recognizes “that the return of the wolf and its growing numbers lead to conflict.”
At a local level, the conflict pits farmers against conservationists. People on both sides have been accused of taking matters into their own hands: Hunting shelters have been burned down and wolves have been illegally shot and dismembered.
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As the wolf population has grown, attacks have become more frequent. There have been 216 in Lower Saxony so far this year — killing 601 animals — compared to 174 attacks in the same seven-month period last year. Across Germany, 4,366 farm animals were killed by wolves in 2022, including 30 horses and four llamas. That marked a 30 percent rise from the year before.

“It’s emotional,” Jahnke said. “It really makes you crazy.”
The protection of wolves is enshrined in E.U. law, though last year the European Parliament passed a nonbinding resolution calling for a downgrade. The European Commission, which would oversee such a change, is conducting an analysis.

E.U. member states have split into camps over the issue, with environment ministers from a dozen countries — including Germany — arguing against any weakening of protections; while Austria, Finland, Sweden and Norway have tested the teeth of existing protections by allowing recent wolf culls.
For now, Germany only allows a wolf to be shot if it’s deemed a particular nuisance to livestock. After each attack, a DNA swab is taken from the dead animal to find out which wolf was responsible. If a wolf is found to have jumped electric fences or gotten past protection dogs twice, a special shooting permit can be granted.
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Les Joslin Returns with Wilderness Ranger Stories

August 12, 2023 by Les Joslin

Les Joslin returned to U.S. Forest Service work in 1990 in the Three Sisters Wilderness in Oregon.

A quarter century after the five Toiyabe National Forest summers he recently shared with The Smokey Wire readers, Les Joslin—a retired U.S. Navy commander—returned to U.S. Forest Service work. He did so in 1990 as a volunteer wilderness ranger on the Deschutes National Forest—a volunteer because the Dual Compensation Act of 1964 prevented retired regular officers of the armed forces from pursuing federal civil service employment without significant reduction of their earned retirement pay. Les served 10 summers in the Three Sisters Wilderness without federal compensation until Congress repealed the Dual Compensation Act in late 1999, then another four summers as a GS-5 forestry technician before he accepted a full-time GS-11 appointment as team leader for recreation, heritage, wilderness, special uses, lands and minerals, and roads on the million-acre Bend-Fort Rock Ranger District in which he served until shortly after his sixty-second birthday. “All the great stories,” he says, “happened during those 14 field seasons in the wilderness.”

A Three Sisters Wilderness Volunteer

By Les Joslin

During spring 1990, almost two years after I’d retired from the U.S. Navy in Washington, D.C., and moved with my wife and two daughters to Central Oregon, I got wind of an opportunity to serve on the Deschutes National Forest as a Three Sisters Wilderness volunteer wilderness ranger. In addition to regular trail patrols, the person chosen for this position would conduct visitor impact surveys of every identifiable place anybody had ever camped along the trails and around the lakes of the roughly fifty-thousand-acre portion of that wilderness managed by the Bend Ranger District (later lumped with the Fort Rock Ranger District).

This wilderness, like the Hoover Wilderness in the Toiyabe National Forest on which I’d worked the summers of 1962 through 1966, was one of the original fifty-four designated by Congress when it passed the Wilderness Act of 1964 which established the National Wilderness Preservation System and provided for its management. A unique, closely-grouped cluster of four major volcanic peaks—the Three Sisters for which it is named and Broken Top—and surrounding Deschutes and Willamette national forest lands comprise the 286,708-acre preserve then administered by five ranger districts on these two national forests. I’d not had reason—other than compelling desire—to visit this wonderful area. This volunteer opportunity gave me that reason.

I applied, was interviewed and signed up, issued a uniform and a badge, oriented to my duties by a supervisory wilderness ranger named Deb, and soon on the job. As explained above, I began working on the Deschutes National Forest that summer of 1990 as a volunteer. I worked as a volunteer because this was work I wanted to do and knew I could do well. My five summers on the Toiyabe National Forest had included Hoover Wilderness patrols.

The work involved campsite condition surveys (pursuant to a “limits of acceptable change” management concept) and visitor contact in the Three Sisters Wilderness. This entailed walking to all the lakes along the trails—and cross-country to lakes not along trails—within the Bend Ranger District part of the wilderness. That’s a good-sized piece of country stretching from the popular Green Lakes in the north to the relatively isolated and much-less-visited Irish and Taylor lakes in the south, and westward to the Cascade crest.

Along those trails and around each lake I located all—or as close to all as possible—the places people had camped, then evaluated and recorded the impact of camping at each campsite on both the wilderness resource and the visitor experience. In addition to entering some thirty measurements and judgements reflecting those impacts and the condition of each site on a form that would eventually find its way into a computerized database, I sketch mapped and photographed each site. Assessing the situation along each trail and at each lake as a whole, I made recommendations regarding each site’s continued use for camping or closure for rehabilitation. The purpose was to produce a wilderness use and impacts baseline to inform wilderness management decisions.

And, as I traveled the trails, I represented the Forest Service and its management efforts to visitors and provided information and assistance they needed. Many visitors were surprised to see a Forest Service representative in the wilderness. Most were pleased.

By the end of that summer of 1990 I had worked twenty-five sunrise-to-sunset days, located and evaluated 254 campsites at 29 lakes and along many miles of trail, and pretty well learned the country. I had walked hundreds of miles, slapped thousands of mosquitoes that ignored my government-issued bug dope, and met 338 wilderness visitors.