Tag Archives: Nevada

State Efforts To ‘Reclaim’ Our Public Lands Traced To Koch-Fueled ALEC

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Think Progress 3/11/2013
Excerpt:        “Despite the many problems that states and municipalities face today—from budget shortfalls to unemployment—seven western states have decided to embark on unconstitutional and quixotic battles attempting to force the federal government to turn millions of acres of public lands over to the states. Doing so, however, would result in the eventual exploitation for private profits of these beautiful parks, refuges, forests, and other lands because the leaders driving such efforts would prefer to see quick economic gains from resource extraction rather than prioritizing these areas’ more sustainable economic uses such as recreation.   …..”
Read rest of article at http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/03/11/1698221/state-efforts-to-reclaim-our-public-lands-traced-to-alec/?mobile=nc

Lawyers, environmentalists continue court fight over trout

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Elko Daily Free Press 3/11/2013
Excerpt:      “RENO (AP) — The U.S. government says environmentalists are back in court on nothing more than a “fishing expedition” in a decade-old attempt to again close 1.5 miles of a gravel road along a threatened trout stream near the Nevada-Idaho line leading to some of the most remote, federally protected wilderness in the nation.

The conservationists insist they’re trying to save the fish — a job they say has fallen to them because the U.S. Forest Service has shirked its responsibility to enforce locally unpopular laws.  ….”
Read entire article at http://elkodaily.com/news/lawyers-environmentalists-continue-court-fight-over-trout/article_7139e06c-89ea-11e2-9275-001a4bcf887a.html

Plan for Road Damaged by Old Flood Ducks Suit

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Courthouse News 3/5/2013
Excerpt:        “    (CN) – The U.S. Forest Service did not violate environmental law in its nearly 20-year effort to repair a flood-damaged road near a Nevada wilderness area, the 9th Circuit ruled.
South Canyon Road, in Elko County, Nev., is the only way to the Snowslide Gulch Wilderness Portal in the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest’s Jarbidge Wilderness. The Jarbidge River flooded in 1995 and damaged the road, cutting off access to most vehicles.
For several years the U.S Forest Service worked on a plan to repair the road, while Great Old Broads for Wilderness and the Wilderness Society proposed replacing much of it with a hiking trail.   ……”
Read entire article at http://www.courthousenews.com/2013/03/05/55449.htm

Hage case’s impact on minor roads raises red flags

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Pahrump Valley Times 1/25/2013
Excerpt:      “The Hage family last Thursday filed a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court, appealing a claims court judgment that stripped away part of their $14 million award in a suit against the U.S. Forest Service over grazing rights in Monitor Valley.

Nye County Commissioner Lorinda Wichman said Tuesday she’s afraid the ruling by a court of appeals for the federal circuit overturning part of the judgment in the Wayne Hage case — that only hand tools are allowed to be used to maintain roads in the national forest — could jeopardize the $250,000 the county spent on the minor road inventory. The county inventoried more than 3,000 miles of minor roads to establish the public rights to use them.  ……”

Read entire story at http://pvtimes.com/news/hage-cases-impact-on-minor-roads-raises-red-flags/

No end to legal battle over Nevada forest road, fish

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Las Vegas Review Journal 11/10/2012
Excerpt:       “RENO – Environmentalists waging a legal battle for more than a decade that’s aimed at shutting down a national forest road that runs through the habitat of threatened fish in northeast Nevada say the laws of nature eventually will hand them a victory in the form of another flood that washes out the South Canyon Road leading to some of the most remote wilderness in the West.

But in the meantime, they’re trying to persuade the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to do it for them based on their claims the U.S. Forest Service illegally bowed to local political pressure and rebuilt the road after a 1995 flood in violation of a series of federal environmental laws.  …..”

Read entire article at http://www.lvrj.com/news/no-end-to-legal-battle-over-nevada-forest-road-fish-178457801.html

Forest Service finds middle road elusive

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Reno Gazette Journal 10/7/2012
Excerpt:  “It was supposed to take the U.S. Forest Service four years to decide which roads and trails throughout the nation’s vast network of forests should be designated for travel by motorcycles, four-wheelers and other backcountry vehicles.Seven years have passed, and forests from Oregon south to Arizona and New Mexico are still struggling to balance the demands of environmentalists, off-roaders and ranchers.    ….”

Read entire article at http://www.rgj.com/viewart/20121006/NEWS/310060059/Forest-Service-finds-middle-road-elusive

Conservation groups intervene in lawsuit over off-road vehicles in Tahoe National Forest

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Reno Gazette Journal 10/3/2012
Excerpt:  “A coalition of conservationists intervened Wednesday in a lawsuit challenging a travel management strategy for Tahoe National Forest, insisting rules to better control off-highway vehicle use are needed to protect a sensitive landscape.Requiring dirt bikes, Jeeps and other vehicles to use designated roads and trails as identified in the U.S. Forest Service’s 2010 travel management plan is “crucial” to protecting the 800,000-acre forest west of Reno-Tahoe, the groups contend.   …”

Read entire article at http://www.rgj.com/article/20121003/LIV08/310030141/Conservation-groups-intervene-lawsuit-over-off-road-vehicles-Tahoe-National-Forest?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|Local%20News

After 21-year legal saga, case central to the ‘sagebrush rebellion’ suffers defeat

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Washington Post 9/1/2012
Excerpt:   “SAN FRANCISCO — America’s sagebrush rebellion has suffered a major setback far from the western rangeland where a modern battle was joined over grazing rights on public lands.

Over the past 21 years, firebrand Nevada rancher Wayne Hage and his survivors waged a legal war against federal land managers who were seeking to restrict cattle grazing on public lands and became a heroic symbol for those who yearned for bygone days and bridled at the growing reach of government.

Then in a little noticed decision on July 26, a three-judge panel of the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., overturned Hage’s hard-fought multi-million-dollar legal victories.   ….”

Read entire article at http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/after-21-year-legal-saga-case-central-to-the-sagebrush-rebellion-suffers-defeat/2012/09/01/2379a05e-f45a-11e1-b74c-84ed55e0300b_story.html

Global warming: New Forest Service report outlines risk to grasslands, other western ecosystems

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Summit County Voice 8/29/2012
Excerpt:   “SUMMIT COUNTY — Some of the most widely accepted climate change models suggest that, by the end of this century, more than half of all western landscapes won’t be able to support the type of vegetation that exist there now.

Specifically, habitat for Rocky Mountain subalpine conifer forests and Great Basin alpine tundra could shrink to nearly nothing; habitat for pinyon-juniper woodlands will move northward and uphill, and semi-desert grassland areas will expand four-fold, according to a new report issued by the Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station.…..”

Read entire article at http://summitcountyvoice.com/2012/08/29/global-warming-new-forest-service-report-outlines-risk-to-grasslands-other-western-ecosystems/

Nevada judge refuses to toss ‘Shovel Brigade’ deal

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Reno Gazette Journal 8/20/2012
Excerpt:   ” LAS VEGAS— A federal judge on Monday refused to grant a request by environmentalists to throw out a settlement agreement between the federal government and local officials in Elko County that would legitimize the existence of a controversial road in northern Nevada.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Roger L. Hunt means the 13-year-old case is likely to grind on for some time yet unless those involved reach a new agreement. Hunt encouraged all sides to do that.

He called the settlement being contested by two environmental groups “a good effort” and questioned whether closing the road — which the groups contend is the ideal option to protect a population of threatened bull trout — would be all that helpful for the fish. ….”

Read entire article at http://www.rgj.com/viewart/20120820/NEWS07/308200050/Nevada-judge-refuses-toss-Shovel-Brigade-deal?odyssey=mod|newswell|text|Local%20News|s