Montana Wilderness News

Sen. Jon Tester defended his wilderness bill from criticism Wednesday that it was drafted in secret at the behest of a couple special interests.

Rather, Tester said during a meeting with The Standard editorial board that parties that were willing to compromise were included in the talks that helped shape his Forest Jobs and Recreation Act.

BUTTE (AP) - U.S. Sen. Jon Tester is touting his big logging and wilderness bill in travels around the state this month, even as the health care debate is on the minds of most.

Tester says his forest bill will have to wait until after the health care debate in Congress wraps up later this year. That means the forest plan probably wouldn't reach the Senate floor until next year.

He says it will create jobs by mandating logging, while preserving recreation and animal habitat by establishing more wilderness and protected areas.

Sen. Jon Tester looked out the window of a downtown office building Friday and noted the red, dead trees coloring the slopes of Mount Helena.

The phenomenon isn't specific to Montana, he said. Beetle-killed trees pepper the Rocky Mountains, demonstrating just how the environment has transformed the West's forests.

"We've got a choice with trees," Tester, D-Mont., told members of the IR editorial board Friday.

Some internal polling done on Sen. Jon Tester's Forest Bill has supporters of the bill excited that the bill is off to a goodstart in the state.

A poll commissioned by lumber companies and conservation groups that helped craft the bill suggests that seven of every10 Montanans support the bill.

The bill would designate hundreds of thousands of acres of new wilderness, mandate thousands of acres be logged inwestern Montana and create special recreation areas for motorized users.

To some, Sen. Jon Tester's wilderness bill is a way to circumvent environmental laws and give away trees to timber companies at taxpayer's expense.

To others, it's a massive land grab by environmentalists that is meant to keep people out of public land in vehicles and ATVs, while limiting development of natural resources that providegood jobs.

But Aaron Murphy, Tester spokesman, said the bill is neither.

The Montana map on Jon Tester's forestry bill Web page ends just east of Bozeman and Great Falls. It shows that this isn't a bill to end all wilderness bills. It wouldn't decide forever the decades-old argument of whether Montana has too much or too little public land protected from roads, motorized use and development.

The Montana map on Jon Tester's forestry bill Web page ends just east of Bozeman and Great Falls. It shows that this isn't a bill to end all wilderness bills. It wouldn't decide forever the decades-old argument of whether Montana has too much or too little public land protected from roads, motorized use and development.

However, Senate Bill 1470 is the first effort in a generation to set aside Montana wilderness and also the first effort to combine forest conservation and logging. By calling the bill "Forest Jobs and Recreation Act," Tester even avoided that controversial W word.

My friends from Norway were astounded a few years ago as we drove through the forests of Western Montana. Their shock was at the waste they saw. In Europe, timberland is intensively managed for the sustained use of forest resources. What is not milled into building material becomes biofuel for heating and electrical generation. There are almost no forest fires in Europe because there is no jungle of combustible material helter-skelter across the landscape, and no massive insect infestations.

As a teenager I discovered the thrill of hunting elk, climbing peaks and fishing in high mountain lakes. I suspect I’ll continue doing this for a long time. Part of the enjoyment is being able to see vast areas untouched by man, places that look and feel as they likely did hundreds of years ago. Unfortunately, as I hike through the mountains of southwest Montana I also see land damaged by pine beetles, illegal motorized trails, weed infestations and camping practices which fall short of Leave No Trace.

I'm writing in support of Sen. Tester's forest jobs bill. The ability to enjoy clean water, to hunt and fish in beautiful forests, and for families to take their children camping and teach them about the great outdoors are all activities that are easy for us to take for granted.