FSEEE: Press Release

June 5, 2001

P R E S S R E L E A S E

For more information -
George Nickas, Wilderness Watch (406) 542-2048
Bob Dale, FSEEE (541) 484-2692

FEDERAL JUDGE RULES THAT THE U.S. FOREST SERVICE ILLEGALLY ISSUED PERMITS FOR COMMERCIAL USES IN TWO HIGH SIERRA WILDERNESSES

On June 4, a federal judge in the Northern District of California ruled that the U.S. Forest Service has for years been illegally issuing special use permits to commercial outfitters and guides operating in the Ansel Adams and John Muir wildernesses. These two extremely popular wilderness areas, first designated by Congress in 1964, are located in the Inyo and Sierra national forests of California.

The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by three conservation groups in April of last year. The groups—the High Sierra Hikers Association, Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, and Wilderness Watch—cited the Forest Service's failure to protect the wildernesses from environmental damage in popular meadows and lake basins due to the excessive commercial uses of those areas. Many of the reports of damage had come from the agency’s own resource specialists and wilderness rangers.

The judge, Elizabeth LaPorte, in her ruling agreed that the environmental degradation associated with use by commercial horse packers "raises serious concerns." But it was the Forest Service's failure to document such impacts in an Environmental Impact Statement as required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) that formed the basis for LaPorte's ruling.

"This is an important breakthrough in our protracted efforts to convince the Forest Service that it has for years been remiss in its public duty to consider and disclose the significant impacts associated with these uses of the wilderness," noted Bob Dale of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics. "We hope that the agency will now come clean with a full disclosure of the environmental problems."

The Forest Service also failed to assess the propriety of issuing commercial use permits "in light of the cumulative impacts of the numerous permits," stated Judge LaPorte in her ruling. And the Forest Service failed to involve the public in its decisions to issue the permits to the commercial outfitters and guides, yet another violation of NEPA.

"At long last, the public will have an opportunity to provide meaningful input to the Forest Service about the terms and conditions under which these permits can be issued to commercial enterprises," stated George Nickas, executive director of Wilderness Watch. "This is a significant ruling, not only for Sierra wilderness, but wherever commercial uses are to be allowed in areas specially designated by Congress."

The three conservation groups have for years expressed concerns to the Forest Service that the agency was illegally allowing excessive use of the John Muir and Ansel Adams wildernesses by commercial enterprises, such as horse-packing outfits and mountaineering guides.

"We have no problem with appropriate commercial uses of wilderness," said Peter Browning of the High Sierra Hikers Association. "But we are concerned about the ongoing pattern whereby the Forest Service allows continual expansions of commercial outfits with no opportunity for public input and no serious evaluation of the environmental consequences."

The three groups and many other members of the public have also expressed concerns to the Forest Service about the inequitable distribution of limited permits between commercial outfits and private citizens. "The High Sierra has become overrun with for-profit outfits at the same time that restrictions have been dramatically increased on the majority of wilderness visitors who don't need the services of a commercial guide," Browning said.

The High Sierra Hikers Association, located in Berkeley, Calif., is a nonprofit organization that educates the public about issues affecting the High Sierra and works to protect wilderness values in the High Sierra for the public benefit. Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, based in Eugene, Ore., is a nonprofit conservation and education organization that works to forge a socially responsible value system within the U.S. Forest Service through a unique partnership of citizens and agency employees. Wilderness Watch, headquartered in Missoula, Montana, is a nonprofit conservation association that provides citizen oversight to ensure the long-term preservation of America's wilderness and wild and scenic rivers.

Plaintiffs in the lawsuit have been represented by Julia Olson of Wild Earth Advocates in San Francisco, California, and Pete Frost of the Western Environmental Law Center in Eugene, Oregon.