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What's New at Wilderness.org
This is a list of stories, news items, maps and other documents posted at Wilderness.org in the past 90 days.
Inslee/Hinchey Bill Fills Holes Left by Interior’s Decision on Polar Bear
In response to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne’s decision to gut the polar bear’s threatened status, Reps. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., and Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y. introduced legislation yesterday that will give the species meaningful protections from global warming and oil and gas activity. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., introduced a similar bill in the Senate earlier this year.
| Protecting National Parks and Visitors from Damaging Jet Skis
Friends of the Earth and The Wilderness Society today filed a lawsuit to protect and preserve National Park System units by reinstating the agency’s previous decisions to discontinue jet ski use at Gulf Islands National Seashore (FL and MS) and Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore (MI).
| Congress Approves New Community Forest Protection Program
Congress created a new conservation program today that’s aimed at helping local communities protect prized forests for recreational purposes. The Community Forest and Open Space Conservation Program, which provides federal matching grants to local governments and qualified non-profit organizations across the country to acquire forests and open spaces for local ownership and management, now heads to the White House for consideration.
| Statement on Listing of Polar Bear as Threatened
The Wilderness Society welcomed a long-awaited decision by the Department of Interior to list the polar bear as Threatened under the Endangered Species Act but expressed concern that a special condition applied to the listing will leave the bear vulnerable to continued impacts of climate change.
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Riverside County Wilderness Bill Approved by House Committee
Local wilderness supporters and a broad coalition of conservation groups today applauded House Natural Resources Committee passage of the California Desert and Mountain Heritage Act (H.R. 3682). Representative Mary Bono Mack’s (R-CA) broadly supported desert, forest and river conservation bill for Riverside County next goes before the House of Representatives for a vote.
| Idaho Fire Story 2007 
Idaho saw 1.9 million acres – more than any other state -- burn in 2007. The number probably topped the historic 1910 fires. John McCarthy, the Idaho forest campaign director for The Wilderness Society, traveled through the vast landscape after the fires on many field trips with U.S. Forest Service fire managers and biologists. McCarthy’s report in “Idaho Fire Story 2007” uses text, maps and photographs to tell the story of fire effects, ecology, recovery and re-growth.
| Protest of the Proposed RMP/FEIS for the Yuma Field Office
The Wilderness Society and partners' protest of the Proposed RMP/Final EIS for the Yuma Field Office
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Wild Sky Wilderness Passes Congress
After years of work, supporters of the Wild Sky Wilderness Act (H.R. 886/S. 520) celebrated today as the legislation passed Congress and was sent to the White House for final approval.
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Measuring Forest Carbon: Strengths and Weaknesses of Available Tools Summary
As the U.S. moves toward registering and regulating emissions of greenhouse gases, we are hearing more about the potential for forest carbon sequestration to offset fossil fuel emissions. Whether at the national or project level, good decisions about forest offsets depend upon accurate estimates of the carbon stored in forests and the changes in those stores over time. This Brief examines four carbon measurement tools, and provides some general comparisons for broad regions. It also highlights limitations that users should keep in mind; data are particularly limited for very old forests and for carbon reserves in dead wood and underground.
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State Fire Assistance: Key to Successful Comprehensive Wildfire Management
State Fire Assistance (SFA) is a key part of a long-term strategy to reduce wildfire suppression costs by
providing funds for proactive community planning, fuels mitigation, preparedness, and education.
| State Fire Assistance Fact Sheet
Communities that are well-prepared for fire are key to
reducing these costs and ultimately restoring functional, and fire-resilient,
wildlands.
| Funding for Non-Federal and Federal Fire Management Needs to Be Better Balanced
Comprehensive fire management inherently transcends land ownership boundaries. Safe communities and healthy landscapes go hand-in-hand.
| Wildfire Suppression Budget Continues to Escalate; Solution is needed
Federal fire suppression costs have increased significantly in recent years, exceeding $1 billion in five of the last seven years. As suppression activities continue to increase, so does the suppression budget since it is based on a 10-year rolling average. Because the agencies’ budgets are essentially flat year to year, to off-set these increases funding for critical programs has been significantly reduced and more and more of the land management agencies’ budgets are being used for wildland fire management.
| Community Fire Assistance Budget Significantly Reduced in FY2009
While fire management is often perceived as a federal issue, fires do not respect jurisdictional lines. Wildland fire management must occur at the landscape scale, with federal agencies partnering with states and communities, and scarce resources must be spent where they are needed most.
| Facts About FY 2009 Wildfire Budget
Over the last five years, over $14 billion has been appropriated to the National Fire Plan (NFP). During this time of large federal deficits and increasing pressure to re-examine federal budget priorities, the question must be asked whether these taxpayer dollars have promoted safer communities and more resilient ecosystems.
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Lakeview Stewardship Group Success Story
The Lakeview Stewardship Group was formed to restore a unit in the Fremont-Winema National Forest. The award-winning collaborative effort that includes conservationists, timber workers, local government officials and other civic leaders has become an inspiration and model in forest conservation by incorporating ecological restoration and community values in land management goals.
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Wilderness Report # 209
1) West Virginia’s Wild Mon Act Hailed at DC Hearings, Concern Expressed for Omitted Areas; 2) Wilderness Brief: Friends of Nevada Wilderness Honors Volunteers; 3) The Wilderness Classifieds
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The Flathead River and Crown of the Continent
A shortsighted proposal to drill for gas in the headwaters of the Flathead River would industrialize a breathtakingly beautiful and biologically crucial river valley in the Crown of the Continent Ecosystem.
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Climate Change Implications for Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge
Alaska is experiencing visible signs of climate change, including melting permafrost, drying wetlands, and increased fire activity. To better understand what changes are taking place, and how land managers might deal with these changes on public lands, Dr. Wendy Loya, an ecologist with The Wilderness Society (TWS), initiated a project to apply climate change scenarios to Alaska’s federal wildlands. Together with TWS GIS analyst Anna Springsteen, and in partnership with the University of Alaska’s SNAP (Scenarios Network for Alaska Planning) program, Dr. Loya used temperature and precipitation data from five down-scaled global climate models to estimate how growing season length, climate variability, and water availability might change.
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Wilderness Science News #5
1) The Center for Landscape Analysis: Celebrating 20 Years of Spatial Analysis in Wildland Conservation; 2)Meet Janice Thomson
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Wilderness Report #208
1) Colorado’s San Juan Public Lands Draft Forest Plan Released; 2) Report Illustrates How Protecting Wilderness Benefits WV's Economy; 3) The Wilderness Classifieds
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