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| MONDAY May 1, 2000 Vol 4, # 27 |
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| MONDAY May 1, 2000 Vol 4, # 27 |
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| Site Search | Support Yellowstone! Discussion Free Internet, Email, More Email Newsletter | |
YELLOWSTONE ROAD
REPORT PUBLISHER EDITOR-IN-
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 PROTECTING YELLOWSTONEby Bruce Gourley Yellowstone is a national treasure which is owned by the American public. Protecting Yellowstone is the responsibility of the American public. This weekly feature will help identify and explore the issues which are crucial to the ongoing, healthy existence of the "Crown Jewel" of America's National Park system. YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (YNET) -- The Yellowstone snowmobiling controversy took on a renewed sense of urgency last Thursday when the National Park Service announced a ban on snowmobiles in many national park units, including Gunnison (Colorado), Crater Lake (Oregon), Mount Rainer (Washington), North Cascades (Washington), Rocky Mountain (Colorado), Sequoia and Kings Canyon (California), Theodore Roosevelt (North Dakota) and Zion (Utah). The ban comes on the heels of National Park officials admitting that that the agency had been lax on enforcing existing environmental standards for Parks. Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks are not included in Thursday's ban, as the Park Service is in the midst of impact studies in these parks, and is not expected to make a declaration until later this year. Last week's ban has left fans of snowmobiling in Yellowstone National Park all the more certain that sleds will ultimately be banned from Yellowstone. Politicians, county officials and some business owners in the Yellowstone region are speaking out against a ban, fearing that taking snowmobiles out of Yellowstone will devastate the gateway communities who have come to depend upon snowmobilers during the winter months. Park Service officials are indeed facing a huge decision in the coming months. Yellowstone, already devastated financially because of decades of congressional neglect, faces possible increased environmental problems from snowmobile pollution if sleds are not banned in the Park. On the other hand, some of the gateway communities will certainly lose some revenue if snowmobiles are banned. In an ideal world, neither Yellowstone nor the gateway communities would have to worry about money and all means of transportation used in the Park would be pollution-free. However, the ideal world does not exist. In the face of this dilemma, perhaps it is time to think "outside of the box." Possible alternative solutions could include one or both of the following: -- Congress could allocate a special one-time appropriation of $1 billion to assist Yellowstone in catching up on backlogged maintenance ($750 million) and to help the gateway communities explore alternative means of winter tourism revenue. The American economy is doing very well and could easily support such an allocation. To put this amount in perspective, America spends more than $1 billion on one unit of certain types of military aircraft. -- Congress, snowmobile manufacturers, Yellowstone officials and business owners in the gateway communities could collaborate on an intensive effort to produce and manufacture low-pollution snowmobiles (emitting no more pollution than an automobile does) which run quietly. These machines could certainly be on the ground within a few short years. The technology has been around for years, but for some reason has not been utilized. Fast, high-performance snowmobiles are unnecessary in Yellowstone in the first place. These are solutions which would benefit both Yellowstone and the gateway communities in the short term and the long term. Yellowstone National Park, following decades of Congressional neglect, is certainly worthy of the extra money and effort needed to restore it to its rightful state. At the same time, the gateway communities play the important role of meeting the needs of tourists to the Yellowstone region. And in the final analysis, working together is always a better option than working at odds with one another. (Yellowstone Net provides you opportunity to voice your opinion regarding the various Yellowstone issues to your congresspersons and to editorial sections of magazines and newspapers by clicking here.) |
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CONTRIBUTING WRITERS AND COLUMNISTS Ralph Maughan
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PARK
SERVICE BANS SNOWMOBILES
"The time has come for the National Park System to pull in its welcome mat for recreational snowmobiling," said Assistant Secretary Barry. "Snowmobiles are noisy, antiquated machines that are no longer welcome in our national parks. The snowmobile industry has had many years to clean up their act and they haven't." The renewed enforcement effort on snowmobiling was prompted by a rulemaking petition that the Department of the Interior received last year from the Bluewater Network and over 60 other environmental organizations in the United States. The rulemaking petition requested that the NPS ban snowmobiling in all units of the Park System. In responding to the Bluewater petition, NPS first sent a questionnaire survey to the 42 units of the Park System that currently allow recreational snowmobiling. The surveys were designed to assess the extent to which affected units of the system had complied with existing Park Service regulations and past Executive Orders regulating snowmobile use. "Quite frankly, we were surprised and disturbed by the results of the snowmobile survey," said Park Service Deputy Director Denis Galvin. "The surveys graphically demonstrated that years of inattention to our own regulatory standards on snowmobiles generated the problem we have before us today. In almost every instance, our administrative records were incomplete or inadequate to allow snowmobiling in parks to continue. Let me reaffirm for the American public that our national parks will be managed in full compliance with our environmental laws." A wide range of Executive Orders, National Park System legislation and NPS regulations establish high environmental management standards that must be satisfied before recreational activities such as snowmobiling are to be allowed in a national park. Executive Orders No. 11644 (Feb.8, 1972) and No. 11989 (May 24, 1977) close all public lands to off-road vehicles including snowmobiles except where specifically authorized. Moreover, these Orders require agencies that allow off-road vehicle use such as snowmobiling to actively monitor the effects of these uses on the lands under their jurisdiction, and to immediately prohibit such uses whenever it is determined that further off-road vehicle use will cause, or is causing, considerable adverse effects on soil, vegetation, wildlife, wildlife habitat or cultural or historic resources. The NPS Organic Act and General Authorities Act impose additional protective standards by requiring that the Service "shall promote and regulate the use of Federal areas known as national parks, monuments and reservations to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wildlife therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations." Long-standing NPS national regulations (36 CFR 2.18) prohibit snowmobile use within units of the Park System except where designated, and only when their use is consistent with the park's natural, cultural, scenic and aesthetic values, safety considerations, park's management objectives and will not disturb wildlife or damage park resources. The questionnaire surveys completed by those park units allowing snowmobiling revealed that virtually no monitoring of environmental effects had taken place despite this requirement under Executive Order No. 11644 (Feb. 8, 1972). The surveys also demonstrated minimal environmental information or analysis regarding possible adverse environmental effects upon park resources and values. Deputy Director Galvin said, " there has been a growing concern within the Park Service recently regarding the appropriateness of recreational snowmobiling as a winter use in national parks. This concern has been triggered in part by the on-going winter use planning effort currently underway for Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks, which has focused on the significant adverse environmental effects generated by heavy snowmobile activity in those parks." Under the Service's new snowmobile enforcement program, snowmobiling for general recreational purposes will be prohibited throughout the Park System, with a limited number of narrow exceptions. These exceptions would apply to units of the Park System in Alaska and Voyageurs National Park, due to provisions in their enabling legislation regarding snowmobile use, and Yellowstone & Grand Teton National Parks due to the current on-going Winter Use EIS planning process. On-going planning efforts in these units would delineate the extent to which, and under what conditions, recreational snowmobiling would be allowed. In addition to park units in Alaska and Voyageurs NP, another limited set of exceptions would apply where snowmobile use was deemed necessary or essential to provide access to adjacent private lands or to inholdings within a park. The last category of exceptions involve situations where snowmobiles would be allowed to transit across a small amount of park land in order to go from one area of public or private land to another, where snowmobile use was permitted. Under the new regulatory enforcement effort, superintendents at parks that previously allowed snowmobiling would now be expected to rigorously apply existing Executive Orders and NPS national regulatory standards and to assess whether past snowmobile activity would be consistent with any of the narrow exceptions identified by the Service. Unless the standards can be met and exception is found to apply, such activity will be terminated in the particular park. The NPS has completed a study of the effect snowmobiles have on air quality, "Air Quality Concerns related to Snowmobile Usage in National Parks" (February 2000). The study indicated that air quality in national parks is negatively impacted by snowmobile use. Air quality degradation, videotape evidence of negative impacts on the soundscape, wildlife and air resources of Yellowstone National Park, and the compilation of public comments about the Draft winter use plan for Yellowstone NP, are all factors in the decision to uniformly enforce existing rules and to consistently apply the current standards regarding snowmobile use. |
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| BISON UPDATE by Buffalo Nations WEST YELLOWSTONE, Mont. -- A bull buffalo sustained injuries when it was hazed through a barbed wire fence during a Department of Livestock (DOL) operation over the weekend. DOL agents on horseback, accompanied by a Ranger from Yellowstone National Park and the local Fish, Wildlife & Parks warden, carried out several hazing operations, chasing approximately 70 animals back into the park.
The previous week, DOL agents flew a helicopter over Zone One of the Eagle Closure on Horse Butte, within a quarter mile of one of three active bald eagle nests in the immediate area. Two bald eagles circled above Horse Butte as DOL agents and Park Rangers on ATVs (all terrain vehicles) and horses frightened between 55 and 60 pregnant cows and yearlings from the Butte. The Special Use Permit which allows the DOL to operate on the Butte specifically states that "helicopter activities will NOT be permitted in the Horse Butte area." "The abuse that the entire ecosystem suffers during these extensive hazing operations is hardly worth it. All ungulates are in the final stages of their gestation periods, birds are nesting and the risk is not worth taking", stated Michael Mease of the Buffalo Field Campaign. The three grazing allotments on Horse Butte bring in $750.60 to the US Forest Service a year (from 1997 Forest Service records). Last winter the DOL spent $225,854 on bison management in this contested area. This amounts to a cost of $1,536 to "protect" each of the 147 cow-calf pairs that summer on the Butte grazing allotments from the supposed threat of brucellosis. |
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| YELLOWSTONE TO DEDICATE
ENTRANCE News Brief YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. -- A renovated historical northern entrance to Yellowstone National Park will be dedicated during a May 6 ceremony in Gardiner. Arch Park was developed in 1903 as part of the Gardiner train depot. In the earlier years of the 20th century, the depot was a main center of tourist activity as visitors to the Park boarded horsedrawn stagecoaches to tour Yellowstone. The ceremony will begin at 1 p.m on Saturday in conjunction with the 21st Annual Park to Paradise Triathlon. |
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WASHINGTON,
D.C. -- Interior Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks, Donald J. Barry, has
announced a renewed commitment by the National Park Service (NPS) to immediately begin
enforcing existing NPS national regulations regarding snowmobile use in the National Park
System. The net effect of this renewed enforcement effort will be the significant
reduction of recreational snowmobiling in most units of the System. 
Today's hazing took place in Gallatin
National Forest, on land originally designated as a buffer zone for park wildlife.
Two major hazing operations in the past week have targeted bison grazing on Horse Butte,
within the National Forest. Horse Butte is the buffalo's traditional calving ground,
as well as protected habitat for the threatened bald eagle.