The Newsletter of the Alpine Lakes Protection Society (ALPS) 2008 Issue No. 1 Wild Sky Passage Celebrated
On May 30th 2008, Senator Patty Murray, Congressman Rick Larsen, members of their staffs, and Undersecretary of Agriculture in charge of the Forest Service Mark Rey joined nearly a hundred conservationists and local residents on the banks of the North Fork Skykomish river at Index Washington to celebrate the recent enactment of the Wild Sky Wilderness. As low clouds broke up and sunlight illuminated the snowmelt filled North Fork with forested slopes and peaks of the Harry Romberg new Wilderness behind, Murray, Aerial view of Lake Isabel. Larsen and others reflected on the long, often rough trail that finally led to Wilderness designation for 106,577 acres of the Skykomish watershed north of Highway 2. When the Wild Sky campaign began in 2000, no one foresaw just how long and rough that trail was to be. A roadblock appeared in the form
Continued on page 2
Also in this issue: DNR Initiates “Reiter Foothills” Planning for ORV “park”...... 3 TrailsFest, July 19...... 3 ALPS and ALF Confusion...... 4 Kevin Geraghty Sultan Relicensing Progress Topping out on Ragged Ridge above the town of Index, Continues...... 4 looking toward Gunn Peak on left and Mt. Baring in center. Trustees Election Ballot...... 5 EIS Needed for Stevens Pass Expansion...... 7
ALPINE 1 Wild Sky Passage Celebrated Continued from page 1 of House Resources Committee chair Richard Pombo, Republican of California, who held up the bill for years because it included areas which had once been logged and contained some old roads. After California voters sent Pombo back to his ranch in 2006, the bill passed the House but then stalled in the Senate because Senator Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, decided it would “cost too much money,” based on a wildly inflated cost estimate from the Republican Congressional Budget Office. To their everlasting credit, Murray and Larsen held firm and never gave up. It’s possible that Mark Lawler they might have gotten the bill past Pombo had they removed Sunset Lake, in the center of the new Wild Sky Wilderness, 16,000 acres of critical lowlands with old growth forests in the valley of Trout Creek below. and salmon streams. Had they done so, no one could have blamed them. Indeed, even some in the conservation community urged are within the new Wilderness in they will be old growth within them to do so. But, displaying many places. Along with tributary the span of a human lifetime, a level of committment, and streams, it adds up to about 25 and are the heart of the Wild Sky perseverance all too rare in miles of salmon spawning streams Wilderness. politics, they kept the faith, and in Wild Sky, something almost ALPS is frankly delighted that kept the biologically valuable totally lacking in previously lowlands in the bill. Wild Sky is now a reality, and designated Wilderness areas in the wants to express its profound Their tenacity, and Murray’s Cascades. thanks to Patty Murray and Rick determined efforts to thwart Wild Sky also protects a lot of Larsen and their staffs, including, Coburn, have resulted in a forest, something near 80,000 acres. but not limited to, Jeff Bjornstad, new Wilderness area not quite There are about 60,000 acres of John Engber, Karen Waters, like any other. As an “on the higher elevation old growth forests Doug Clapp, Jamie Shimek, Jill ground” group, ALPS was (above 3000 feet.) The Wilderness McKinnie, Louis Lauter and involved from the beginning in also includes about 14,000 acres Jasper MacSlarrow. Thanks to determining boundaries for the of rare low elevation old growth their unremitting efforts, and the new Wilderness, pushing for the below 3000 feet, and, a particular efforts of many in the conservation inclusion of lowland forests and point of pride for ALPS, 6000 community, Washington’s 24 year salmon streams. Unlike most acres of low elevation naturally Wilderness drought is well and existing Wilderness areas which regenerated second growth forests. truly over. protect mostly high country, These forests grow on the lowest, fully 30 percent of the Wild Sky most productive sites, which Wilderness is below 3000 feet. is why they were the first to be Thanks to some unusual logged long ago. Never replanted, geography, salmon and steelhead they have grown back on their can ascend and spawn in the North own and now have many trees 3 Fork Skykomish to within five feet in diameter and over 150 feet miles of the Cascade crest. One tall. They line the banks of most or both banks of the North Fork of the salmon streams. Left alone,
2 ALPINE Dnr Initiates “Reiter The Great Outdoors Foothills” Planning for orv is Calling TrailsFest serves up a jam- packed day of outdoor “Park” adventure The Washington state there could never be any “right” Event details: Department of Natural Resources way to accommodate such an TrailsFest 2008 (DNR) has begun a planning inherently destructive form of Saturday, July 19, 9 am – 4 pm process for the “Reiter Foothills” “recreation.” Doing it “right” Rattlesnake Lake, North Bend area, comprising 10,000 acres of would require control of runoff www.trailsfest.org state lands north of Index and and sedimentation, closure of The great outdoors of Washington Gold Bar. user-made routes, construction is calling! Come to TrailsFest, of unbreachable barriers to keep Saturday July 19, 9am - 4pm at The Reiter Foothills have been Rattlesnake Lake in North Bend. completely and totally overrun by ORVs confined within the area, This outdoor extravaganza features ORVs. For years, these machines and continuous and effective enforcement of all rules. DNR clinics on everything from wilderness have been carving out new routes first aid to hiking with kids to everywhere in the area, and it is has no money for any of this, and backcountry cooking. Take a guided impossible to go anywhere there apparently believes it can simply hike, tie a fly on, or climb a rock without seeing the tremendous designate the area as an ORV wall. Try out a new s’mores recipe, or hang out with packgoats. Visit damage being done. DNR has sacrifice zone and walk away from it. dozens of exhibitors, including gear done nothing to prevent hundreds companies and outdoor groups. It’s of miles of motorcycle, quad and ALPS and other conservation all at TrailsFest! jeep routes from being carved groups are determined to Been wanting to explore the North through Foothills forests. These prevent this from happening, Cascades? Attend a clinic with machines have transformed much and want DNR to stop the Craig Romano, author of Day of the area into something looking ongoing destruction at Reiter. No Hiking – North Cascades published by Mountaineers Books. Learn like a World War I battlefield, private timberland owners put how to whip up a tasty backcountry with muddy, eroding quagmires up with ORVs and the damage meal in no time from the author of everywhere. they do. ALPS believes that Freezer Bag Cooking. Want to be a responsible hiker with your dog? It appears that DNR wants by allowing uncontrolled ORV use at Reiter, DNR is failing in Check out the clinic on hiking with to turn the area into an officially dogs and trail etiquette. Wanting to designated ORV “park.” They its most basic responsibility of try backpacking? Go to Hilleberg the have set up a “Recreation Advisory protecting public trust assets. Tentmaker’s clinic on smart packing Committee” comprised almost DNR may also be in violation and learn how to take less, still be of the Endangered Species Act comfortable and safe, and have lots entirely of motorized recreation more fun! advocates. ALPS believes that by allowing uncontrolled runoff TrailsFest is presented every the Reiter area, sandwiched as it from Reiter to pour into Chinook salmon spawning grounds in summer by Washington Trails is between the newly-designated Assocition. Sponsors for the braided channel reach of the TrailsFest Wild Sky Wilderness, Wallace 2008 include Hilleberg the Falls State Park, and Forks of the Skykomish. ALPS will continue Tentmaker, KPLU, Green Trails Sky State Park, is the wrong place to follow all developments closely, Maps, REI, CLIF Nectar, Outdoor Research, Gregory, Chaco, for such a facility. The area is and will take appropriate steps as necessary. Teko, Helly Hansen, Erin Baker’s located directly above the “braided Wholesome Baked Goods, Freezer channel” reach of the Skykomish Bag Cooking, and Marmot Mountain River, the most productive Works. spawning area for anadromous TrailsFest is your passport to the fish in the entire Snohomish great outdoors this summer, and watershed. Streams from the admission is free! Reiter area are delivering ORV- To get to TrailsFest, take I-90 to generated sediment directly into exit 32, then turn right on 436th Ave SE. Follow this road 2.7 miles to these spawning grounds. Rattlesnake Lake. ALPS believes it would cost For more information on TrailsFest: tens of millions of dollars to put (206) 625-1367 / www.trailsfest.org. an ORV “park” there, although
ALPINE 3 ALPS and ALF Confusion
A recent incident has made make. Sometimes the company Tax-deductibility was the reason your ALPS board realize that even will place additional restrictions. the Alpine Lakes Foundation our own members still confuse For example, Boeing restricts its was founded back in 1994. After the Alpine Lakes Protection matching gifts to organizations receiving some sizeable gifts, Society (ALPS) with the Alpine that are primarily education or ALPS decided that there should be Lakes Foundation (ALF). The cultural in nature. But foremost, a tax-deductible organization to confusion is understandable. We the gifts have to be to tax- receive them and spend the money have similar names & goals and deductible charities. on educational projects like the even share board members, but This issue was made clear by map. The ALF board members are there are definite pocket-book the afore-mentioned incident, current and past board members of differences. which is too complicated to ALPS but the two organizations do While both organizations describe in detail. An ALPS keep a respectable distance apart. seek to protect the Alpine Lakes, member, who is a Boeing Any organization with an ALF does it through funding employee, made a contribution to appropriate request can apply for educational projects such as the ALPS and asked Boeing to match funds from ALF. If ALF approves, Alpine Lakes map. ALPS does it. ALPS was not on Boeing’s the two parties sign a Fiscal it primarily through advocacy. list of qualified recipients, so Operations Agreement whose Most importantly, ALF is a 501 Boeing asked ALPS to provide form was established when ALPS (c) 3 organization, which means the information needed for it to requested money for creating and your contributions to it are tax- determine whether or not ALPS printing the current Alpine Lakes deductible. ALPS intentionally is qualifies. map. not; being a 501(c) 3 would limit It does not, so the intended So the bottom line is, please our ability to lobby. Therefore you match was lost. The member later keep paying your membership cannot deduct any contribution to admitted that he realized after-the- dues to ALPS. But if you want ALPS. fact that ALPS would not qualify. to make a special tax-deductible There is an even bigger pocket Since then, ALF has submitted contribution, and possibly get book issue. Many companies, such its own information to Boeing to your company to match, send that as Boeing, will match charitable make sure it qualifies. to ALF. And please be sure you gifts their employees and retirees remember the difference.
Sultan Relicensing Process Continues ALPS has weighed in with the logged landscape of the Sultan Department of Fish and Wildlife relicensing of Snohomish PUD’s watershed. (WDFW) to weigh in. In a very “Jackson” hydroelectric project ALPS and the other groups encouraging move, WDFW told on the Sultan River. ALPS, along believe the PUD should cease FERC that the PUD needed to with Pilchuck Audubon Society logging and manage its lands look at updating its 20-year-old and North Cascade Conservation for older forests, which are habitat plan, recognizing that Council, believes that the PUD scarce and valuable, instead of much has changed in two decades, could provide far better mitigation managing for early-successional including widespread logging of for the project than it currently species, which are abundant. surrounding lands in the Sultan does. Much of the “mitigation” ALPS and the other groups sent watershed. The WDFW also stated land for the project is timberland a letter to the Federal Energy that late-successional species managed on 60-year rotations, regulatory Commission (FERC), are now considered much more essentially indistinguishable from the licensing authority, detailing valuable and endangered than any other industrial timberland. our concerns. As expected, the early-successional ones. The PUD touts “deer forage” as PUD responded that it was doing ALPS will continue it efforts to one of the benefits from these a fine job, and saw no need to insure that the PUD provide real lands — something that is widely change anything. However, mitigation for the project instead available throughout the heavily FERC asked the Washington of clearcuts.
4 ALPINE Trustees Election Ballot
It’s time for our annual ALPS Karl Forsgaard, Mercer Please mark the ballot below, fold Trustees election and we need you Island, has been doing volunteer it and tape it closed. Mail to the to vote. work with ALPS since 1991, address on the backside of this Trustees Art Day and Thom and was appointed a Trustee in sheet. Peters are running for re-election January 2008. Also a board to 2008-2011 terms. Newly member of North Cascades Art Day Conservation Council and appointed trustee Karl Forsgaard Thom Peters is running for the first time. Mountains to Sound Greenway There is room for one more Trust, he works as a Staff Attorney Karl Forsgaard trustee. The ALPS Board has at Washington Forest Law Center. ______provided a place for you to suggest (Suggested New Trustee) someone. If you yourself are interested or would like to attend one of our meetings, please contact Don at 425-883-0646 or dlparks@ verizon.net. Here are brief biographies of the candidates.
Art Day, Seattle, has been a Trustee since 1990 and has edited the Alpine newsletter since 1999. Interests include hikes both high and low, all types of natural history, and the human history of the local area. He works as a physicist at Boeing.
Thom Peters, Snohomish, has been member since 1987 and a Trustee since 1990. His main interest is recreational impacts on the physical and social settings in Wilderness. He is a board member of North Cascades Conservation Council as well as chairperson for the North Cascades chapter of Wilderness Watch. Thom is an Associate Broker in Real Estate. Harry Romberg ALPS president Don Parks making friends in Hubbard Grove. ALPINE 5 DON PARKS, PRESIDENT ALPINE LAKES PROTECTION SOCIETY P. O. BOX 27646 SEATTLE, WA 98165
6 ALPINE Reprinted with permission from the newsletter of the Cascade Checkerboard Project: EIS Needed for Stevens Pass Expansion
Stevens Pass Ski Area agreement was forged within the proposed to start implementing has submitted proposals to EIS process. That same approach their new plan (which has not dramatically expand its operations. can be used at Stevens Pass. been approved) with “phase Since all of its facilities are on 1”, a major new construction national forest lands, the Forest Expansion into Unroaded of mountain bike trails next Service must approve a Special Lands & Mature Forests year. Five miles are proposed, Use Permit and project plans. The proposed expansion including substantial grading, Last year, the agency approved a would add 279 acres to the permit clearing of trees, bridging creeks 40- year extension of that permit, area, and delete 137 acres down and wetlands, and constructing which essentially is an exclusive Hwy. 2 by Tunnel Creek for a net large wooden ramps and banked lease for those 2,400 acres of increase of 140 acres. The draft tracks. The scale of this project public land. Inexplicably, the Master Development Plan (MDP) could easily be determined to have Forest Service made that long- proposes to build three new lifts significant impacts and require term commitment of public land and create 350 acres of new runs, an EIS. While Stevens Pass says without an environmental impact add snowmaking, clear four acres it may write an EIS on the rest of statement (EIS). An EIS requires of new parking lots, and increase the MDP, the company’s claim that an examination of alternatives, capacity by 17 percent, to 8,710. the bike development is somehow consideration of cumulative This will impact hundreds of not connected to the proposed effects, identification of mitigation, acres of unroaded lands, late- grading, clearing and construction and has a major role for public successional forest, wetlands, and for new winter facilities is part of involvement. Now, Stevens Pass meadows, as well as areas used our disagreement over compliance wants to start constructing more by snowshoers and cross country with NEPA. facilities, and the Sierra Club has skiers. New lifts and runs would Under the Bush Administration, raised the issue of complying be punched into the unroaded we have seen the Forest Service with the National Environmental basin of forests and meadows and other agencies attempt to Policy Act (NEPA). NEPA requires around Grace Lakes and east of avoid their obligations under an EIS on federal decisions that the Pacific Crest Trail along Big NEPA, and we will continue to be have a significant effect on the Chief Mtn. Stevens Pass says that vigilant that the agency must obey environment- this is not optional. not all those facilities will likely be the law. We have seen repeatedly The other ski areas in the Cascades built in the next seven years, but that agencies make better decisions have used this process, and we NEPA requires an analysis of the with broader support when it is question why Stevens Pass is cumulative effects of all reasonably done with an EIS. We will work avoiding this legal requirement. foreseeable projects. If any of with Stevens Pass towards that In fact, we question whether the these facilities are approved, the goal. Forest Service was in compliance Forest Service should require with NEPA when it approved the substantial mitigation for the loss A scoping notice on the “phase permit for 40 years. and fragmentation of habitat, 1” mountain biking facility is especially unroaded lands and expected in early June. Get on the The Sierra Club, along with mailing list to provide comments. other conservation groups, will late-successional forest. At this look at the proposals and evaluate point, mitigation discussions have For more information: them carefully, and has already not addressed those impacts. discussed the proposal on several Segmenting Decision John Meriwether at Stevens Pass, occasions with ski area staff. Contrary to NEPA [email protected] At Snoqualmie Pass, the Club A major controversy is over Sean Wetterberg, Mt Baker and other organizations were “segmenting” the decision, Snoqualmie National Forest, able to reach an agreement on a which is contrary to NEPA. This [email protected] substantial upgrade to ski facilities is when a plan is broken up into there, while deferring projects smaller parts, so that the agency in one area until substantive can claim that each decision is studies on wildlife habitat and not significant, and thus does not connectivity are conducted. That require an EIS. The ski area has
ALPINE 7 alps Non-Profit Org. alpine lakes protection society U.S. Postage PO Box 27646 PAID Seattle, WA 98165 Seattle, WA Permit #1053
ALPS Officers & Trustees: 2005-2008 2006-2009 2007-2010 President: Don Parks Art Day Bill Beyers Natalie Williams Vice President: John Villa Thom Peters James Chapman Mike Pierson Membership: Natalie Williams Karl Forsgaard Kevin Geraghty Karyl Winn Treasurer: Frank Swart Charlie Raymond Secretary: James Chapman
The newsletter of the Alpine Lakes Protection Society (ALPS). ALPS is dedicated to protection of the Alpine Lakes area in Washington’s Cascades. Editor: Art Day Layout: Pat Hutson For membership information, contact Natalie Williams 5627 47th Ave. SW Seattle, WA 98136 Mark Lawler View from West Cady ridge toward the Monte Cristo peaks. [email protected]
8 PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER ALPINE