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Wildfire, fire management and air quality news for western Montana and the Northern Rockies.

Bitterroot National Forest Offers Clarification On Westside Forest Thinning Project

 A sign for the Bitterroot National Forest.
A sign for the Bitterroot National Forest.

In response to our August 4 interview with Bitterroot National Forest District Ranger Eric Winthers about the forest thinning project in the area of the Roaring Lion Fire, and the litigation over it, Forest Spokesman Tod McKay offered the following clarifications:  

"We were a couple of weeks away from working on the contract to implement this project—i.e., not a couple of weeks away from on-the-ground thinning or logging. We expected to award a contract in September (before the end of the fiscal year) and that work would begin in the winter."

And:

"The lawsuit was filed July 26, 2016. Plaintiffs requested an injunction but none has been issued to date. In other words, we had no reason to, nor any plan to alter the Westside Project timeline at the point in time when the Roaring Lion Fire started."

A copy of the lawsuit is available here. And background on the logging and thinning project is available here.

We have reached out to the attorneys for the plaintiff in the lawsuit requesting comment, but have not yet heard back. 

Eric Whitney is NPR's Mountain West/Great Plains Bureau Chief, and was the former news director for Montana Public Radio.
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