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Comment from the Pacific Northwest Trail Association to the Environmental Quality Council Thank You for the Opportunity to Addre

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Comment from the Pacific Northwest Trail Association to the Environmental Quality Council Thank You for the Opportunity to Addre Comment from the Pacific Northwest Trail Association to the Environmental Quality Council Thank you for the opportunity to address, for the record, a proposal to relocate the Pacific Northwest National Scenic Trail (“PNNST”). We are respectively the President and Executive Director of the Pacific Northwest Trail Association – originally formed in the 1970s to advocate for the designation of the PNNST. Since the PNNST was designated by Congress in 2009, we have focused on providing educational opportunities for youth and, in connection with the U.S. Forest Service, on working to maintain and improve the PNNST. In addition, we have participated in the Advisory Council empaneled by the Forest Service in 2015, to help in the preparation of a comprehensive management plan for the PNNST. We will likely participate again once the Advisory Council has been re-appointed. There has been some misinformation in the press of late about how the PNNST came to be designated by Congress. There was no ‘secret midnight rider.’ Rather, a bill to designate the PNNST was introduced in the Senate by Senators Cantwell and Murray on April 30, 2008. It was assigned to committee, and the appropriate subcommittee (with included, at the time, Montana’s then-junior senator) held a hearing on June 17, 2008. PNTA’s acting director testified in favor of the bill, and noted for the record letters of support from the then-mayor of Eureka, Montana, and the Tobacco Valley Backcountry Horsemen, among others. The bill was marked up in committee on September 11, 2008, and reported out of committee on September 16, 2008. The Congressional Budget Office submitted a cost estimate for the bill on September 22, 2008. With the 2008 congressional session drawing to a close, Sen, Bingaman offered an amendment to a House bill that would include a number of public lands bills that had passed out of his committee. The session ended without further action on either the House or Senate bills, so at the start of the 2009 session, Senator Bingaman introduced a combined bill (S. 22) on January 7, 2009. On January 15, 2009, Sen. Bingaman and Sen. Murkowski proposed to amend the bill to include a number of public lands provisions that had passed the committee in the prior year; in her remarks set out in the Congressional Record, Sen. Cantwell specifically mentioned that the amendment included a provision designating the PNNST.1 The amendment passed unanimously that same day. The bill, as amended, passed the Senate in January 2009, by a bipartisan vote 73-21 (both Montana senators voting aye). It was combined with a House bill on March 19, 2009, was overwhelmingly passed by the 1 See 155 Cong. Rec. 428. House on March 25, 2009 (Rep. Rehberg voting no), and was signed into law on March 30, 2009. In sum. contrary to complaints that the designation was rushed through, there were numerous opportunities for any interested parties to have had a meaningful impact on the process. In the decades prior to the designation of the PNNST, PNTA had consulted with interested parties all along the route concerning the best route for a long distance scenic hiking trail. In the Yaak country, this consultation included members of the Yaak Trail Club, including members from Troy and Yaak. PNTA is currently collaborating with the University of Montana, the Forest Service, and the US Fish & Wildlife Service in a study to determine the impact of hikers on the grizzly population. We are as concerned as anyone about the viability of wildlife populations along the PNNST, and recognize that trail use must be managed with conservation of wildlife as a significant goal. Based on extensive consultation with our contacts at various levels of the Forest Service – local, regional, and national – we are convinced that the Forest Service shares our conviction on this. There is a proposal to change a portion of the PNNST in Lincoln County, Montana. This is a significant change, which would require an act of Congress. While, obviously, this is an issue for Congress, we have, in our communications with Congress, urged consultation with local officials in Lincoln County, and with state government. We have done so because the proposed re-route includes some 37 miles of private property over which easements would be needed, and may impinge, at points, on the right of way of a state highway. It certainly would utilize city and county roads, at least until Congress appropriates funds the build a new trail along the proposed route. It is only fair, then, and consistent with our position on consultation, that we provide the Council with our views concerning the proposed re-route. We do not support this proposal because in our view it replaces portions of the PNNST with significant scenic values with portions that do not meet the requirements for a National Scenic Trail. The current route has been hiked for four decades without, so far as we know, any significant impact on grizzly populations. Grizzly mortality in the Yaak country is higher than is optimal: this has nothing to do with the PNNST, however, because grizzly deaths arise mostly from confrontations with hunters, and never, so far as is known, with long distance hikers. Whatever the cause, PNTA agrees that the PNNST should be managed with the Yaak grizzly in mind. We believe that the Forest Service has both the will, and the management tools, to do so. Thank you for the opportunity to present our views. Jeff Kish Charles H. Carpenter Executive Director President Sedro Wolley, Washington Missoula, Montana .
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