Dec. 18, 2019

Dec. 18, 2019

Liz Writes Life

Christmas is coming – fast! All the parties, festivities and get-togethers are great traditions. I just wish I had more energy for them! Ha, ha. Hope you all are having a good time enjoying the season of love and giving. May you all have a very Merry Christmas!

Good News

At the last Scott Valley Protect Our Water meeting on Dec. 5, 2019, Ray Haupt, our Dist. 5 Siskiyou Co. Supervisor, shared positive results from several lawsuits that will affect Siskiyou lands, timber and our economy. Years of frivolous lawsuits by environmental groups have damaged our local and regional economy as well as the environment in Siskiyou County. Most of the time, the county was on the losing-end of these lawsuits, so these two wins are huge. Hopefully, the tide has turned with sensibility and true facts affecting court decisions.

After being elected to our county supervisor position, five years ago, Ray encouraged the county to join the American Foresters Resource Council, so we could partner on a variety of issues. The AFRC gives voice to practical management of healthy forests, public lands and neighboring private lands.

Recently, the Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center, based in Ashland, Oregon, lost a major lawsuit. The enviro group brought an injunction to stop salvage, clean-up and fuels treatment leftover from the 2016 Gap Fire. This salvage project was by the Klamath National Forest in the Horse Creek community area that was hit hard by the Gap Fire.

AFRC was the lead in fighting the injunction with its attorney Lawson Fite working with outside attorney, Julie Weis, and Siskiyou County’s own attorney, Natalie Reed. Ray praised these attorneys, “who worked really hard” on the case, and was truly “grateful” for this win that was in the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Surprisingly, the Ninth Circuit Court totally dismissed the lawsuit. Yep, it did! This is a really good start for USFS to have the ability to clean-up the forests, especially after fires.

Then, another win was enjoyed regarding President Obama’s executive order to expand the Soda Mt. Monument. The AFRC challenged the expansion claiming Obama illegally used the Antiquities Act and abused his executive powers by nullifying the O&C Act. The D.C. Circuit Court ruled the O&C lands must be managed for sustained timber yield, which was the O&C Act’s original purpose.

The ability to harvest green timbers sales and salvage timber sales was greatly diminished by Obama’s nullifying of the O&C Act. Because of the continued reduction of allowable timber harvests, which hurts these counties taxable income, the AFRC reached out to Oregon’s Jackson Co. and Siskiyou Co. to partner on this lawsuit, which they did.

Ray said this decision is a “big deal”, because government agencies must now go back and look at policy created on the spotted owl, which stopped a multitude of timber harvests. Actually, agencies must now evaluate all policies related to Endangered Species Act and listed species.

The case was brought against the executive branch of government and stated Obama’s decision was an over-reach of his power. The court agreed.

This is such good news! Reducing the strangling policies and regulations that have stopped thinning and harvesting our timber lands will be a boon to our economy and the environment.

I have always heard of the O&C Lands, but didn’t understand how they worked, especially because there seemed to be more lands in Oregon than California. So, I looked to the internet and found a good, fairly short explanation.

From Wikipedia –

“The Oregon and California Railroad Revested Lands (commonly known as O&C Lands), are approximately 2,600,000 acres of land located in eighteen counties of western Oregon. Originally granted to the Oregon & California Railroad to build a railroad between Portland, Oregon and San Francisco, California, the land was reconveyed to the United States government by act of Congress in 1916 and is currently managed by the United States Bureau of Land Management.

“Since 1916, the 18 counties where the O&C lands are located have received payments from the United States government at 50% share of timber revenue on those lands. Later as compensation for the loss of timber and tax revenue decreased the government added federal revenues. The governments of several of the counties have come to depend upon the O&C land revenue as an important source of income for schools and county services.

“The most recent source of income from the lands, an extension of the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000, was last renewed in 2013 but at vastly reduced spending levels, leaving some counties scrambling to find new sources of funding. In late 2013, the United States House of Representatives was considering a bill that would resume the funding and increase timber harvests to provide additional income to the counties.”

So, this win against Obama’s executive order will make more land available for timber harvests, which are greatly needed to fund schools and to reduce the unhealthy, dense forests that must be thinned to protect from devastating wildfire events.

Congressman LaMalfa

Last week, our Dist. 1 Congressman, Doug LaMalfa, praised the completion of bipartisan negotiations on the United States Mexico Canada Agreement. This agreement will replace NAFTA and was delayed for over a year, because of Democrat political concerns and labor union opposition.

LaMalfa said: “Despite a year of partisan delays, news of a final agreement on USMCA is great for America and our citizens. This trade deal will open new markets for our farmers and protect America manufacturing. It sets a new standard for digital and intellectual property that should be the model of all agreements moving forward. I’m happy to see this deal finally come up for vote after a year. It is a credit to President Trump and his negotiating team to have won support for such a far reaching reform of an outdated trade deal. I hope we can pass this rather than focusing on the sideshow of impeachment.”

Because of the bipartisan aspects of this final agreement, hopefully both Houses of Congress will pass USMCA immediately. We shall see!

Liz Bowen began writing ranch and farm news, published in newspapers, in 1976. She is a native of Siskiyou County and lives near Callahan. Columns from the past year can be found at: lizwriteslife.blogspot.com. Call her at 530-467-3515.

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