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Published: 03 January 2020 03 January 2020

[Editor's Note: This is part 4 of a multi-part series of articles on the Grant County Commission work session and regular meetings of Dec. 10 and 12, 2019.]

By Mary Alice Murphy

The second presentation at the Grant County Commission regular meeting on Dec. 12, 2019 featured Gila National Forest Supervisor Adam Mendonca (pronounced men-dohn´-sa] giving an update on the revision of the Gila National Forest Plan.

Mendonca:
I appreciate the discussions we have had. Our timeline is that we have been working on the plan since late 2015. We are ready to come out with the comment period on the draft EIS (environmental impact statement). If you look at the document, it's over 1,000 pages with 90 days to look at it. We expect to start the comments in early January and the period will end in April. The draft documents show five alternatives. 1) No change, no action, and we would continue working under the current plan from 1986, with required amendments. 2) We tried to blend in as many comments that we have received leaving recreation, restoration and traditional uses and allowing the use of as many tools as possible to manage the forest. 3) This alternative has more on restoration of the grasslands and the forest, including treating some piñon/juniper. Changes include an emphasis on using all tools from mechanical to thinning to prevent fire. 4) The forest restoration in this alternative is more timber-based, with logging and thinning to prevent fire. 5) This one puts emphasis on the WUI (wildland-urban interface), with less mechanical tools and more natural processes in the back country.

The highlights, as an example, are looking at jobs. Alternative 1, the no-action one, has about 1,000 jobs linked up to a high of 1,150. The change of emphasis in alternative 3 provides grazing and logging. Grazing fluctuates, but we would see no major impacts.

Alternatives 2 to 4 provide forestry jobs, making timber production stable. Alternative 5 reduces logging.

We have tradeoffs. Wilderness areas to perhaps be added go from zero acres to about 745,000 acres.

I encourage you to look at the economic development section to help us work with the community. In the 15-20 years that this revision will be in effect, we want to manage the forest to maintain strong economies. I ask you to key in on your interest to read and comment. Overall, the revision tries to stay engaged with the community while maintaining watershed and forest health.

District 2 Commissioner Javier Salas:
Can you expand on the wilderness issue?

Mendonca:
Right now, we have 3.3 million acres of forest, with about 800,000 acres of wilderness in the three wilderness areas. Alternative 1 has zero potential wilderness acres. Alternative 2 has minimal impact, where the changes to wilderness would be less obvious. Alternatives 3 and 4 are similar with potential wildernesses not being areas that need treatment, and Alternative 5 has limited mechanical tool use and has the proposed 745,000 additional acres of wilderness.

District 3 Commissioner Alicia Edwards:
On the timber conversation, Alternative 4 takes into consideration logging. There are lots of different types of logging, all the way up to clear cut. If, as a community, we decided logging is economic development, who regulates it from minimal to huge impact?

Mendonca:
Treatments are always done in an ecological way. In Alternative 4, the size for logging would be 9 inches and bigger. We would have a certified person to write the instructions, so the logging is sustainable. We don't do clear cutting. If we have a stand of dwarf mistletoe, we will get rid of it all, but not more than four acres. If we have timber harvesting and logging, it will be sustainable. We want trees of all sizes and ages. We, as the national forest, will continue to regulate it. If the focus is on grasslands, with no trees, there may be a desire to cut the piñon and juniper to be grasslands just where it was grassland historically.

Edwards:
You say "we," is that the Forest Service overall or the supervisor? What will actually keep our wishes?

Mendonca:
We is Forest Service and a lot of me, but the Forest Service has a lot of regulations. The Forest Service says: 'This is how it should look.' But every time management changes, everything changes. We've tried to change things for the plan to be a contract we all collectively decided that this is what we want and what we expect. It's a new concept that hasn't been tried anywhere else, but it's what we're working on to describe it in a way to show what the local communities want. That is the intent we are trying to achieve.

Edwards:
Everything has to got to have consideration about climate. Do you mention it in the plan?

Matt Schultz, who has been in charge of managing the forest plan revision:
We have been incorporating suggestions on the effects of climate changes, including risks, but it's very collaborative and meant to be adaptable, using the best available science at the time. Some of it may change over time.

Edwards:
I really appreciate the intention you have used on this process.

District 5 Commissioner Harry Browne:
You have no maps yet?

Mendonca:
Not yet. We really worry when people get maps that they read things into them that aren’t there. In January, we will have all the maps and we will have interactive maps online.

Browne:
The briefing information you gave us, it seems to me must be picked from the alternatives.

Mendonca:
There is a proposed action and a preferred alternative. What you have is mostly from Alternative 2. I've been resistant to choosing a preferred action, but the paper you received is mostly data from Alternative 2. We can use bits and pieces from any alternative when we decide on a proposed action. The numbers you have are from Alternative 2. They matched the current uses most closely, while promoting some changes. I don't see the Gila becoming a huge developed campground, for instance. Fire is a key tool for us to promote restoration. This tries to balance timber and grazing as current uses but is sustainable. To me Alternative 2 keeps the traditional uses and promotes what the community is working on.

We are trying to include restoration every year. We want to push the forest to do this much work per year so that a sawmill that we encouraged to be added in Luna last year will have a confidence that it will have that much business and product each year. The Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program we have been working on will know it has a plan to drive the forest to action.

Browne:
I agree with the theory. I presume that every alternative also includes recreation.

Mendonca:
Alternative 5 has an increase in wilderness, but recreation is constant throughout the revision of the plan. The plan relates to dollars based on current funding and the bringing dollars into the community is an estimate.

Browne:
On climate change. At least one person says the Gila River provides a bulwark to climate change. What about the challenge of feral cattle?

Mendonca:
The plan shows desired and future conditions. We have a plan outside this one where we are working hard to address the feral cattle issue. The feral cattle belong to the state. We can't shoot them, or we would go to prison. We are trying to work through the issue and may have a way to solve it through the outside plan. Rounding them up has not been successful. And whatever happens to the cattle, the state keeps the revenue.

Edwards:
Did I dream this, or did we talk about using feral cattle for food banking?

Mendonca:
We had an interest in that. The USDA requires they be vaccinated and must know where they came from. We can shoot wild elk and deer and can donate the meat. I did a lot of phone calls on the issue. A lot of times, the cattle are not actually feral, and they belong to someone, but are not in the right place. My interest is to get rid of the feral cattle.

Edwards:
What about the 1,150 jobs? Is that current or more than current levels?

Schultz:
That number is current plus anticipated future numbers. We think with this plan, we can expect about 15 percent increase in jobs.

Billings:
Can you give us some history on wilderness? When was the first wilderness here?

Schultz:
The Gila Wilderness was administratively designated in 1924, and then the Wilderness Act in 1954 brought in the Gila and a lot of other wilderness areas.

Billings:
Is the wilderness in better condition than the rest of the forest?

Mendonca:
The Gila sits in a better position that a lot of other forests. Parts of the wilderness look good. In the past, we put out fires that we shouldn't have. Fire has been used for restoration for a long time for parts of the landscape. For other parts, fire would be negative. We looked hard at potential wilderness designations. We didn't include any for wilderness that could not be managed without fire. Alternative 5 with its 745,000 acres of wilderness, we would not be able to manage it effectively.

The next and final article will address the agenda and the decisions made at the meeting.