News and Events                               

Black Hills National Forest

Contents:

• Black Hills Schedule of Proposed Actions - Updated 7/1/06

• Black Hills Periodic Timber Sale Announcement Report - Updated 9/28/06

• Black Hills "Phase II" Forest Plan Amendment - Updated 2/13/2006

• Black Hills Travel Management Planning

BHNF Schedule of Proposed Actions

The Black Hills National Forest publishes a Schedule of Proposed Actions every three months, which shows project proposals which are in their various planning stages.  This report is published to keep us informed of upcoming projects, opportunities to submit comments, and is essentially the Black Hills' "plan of work."  The Schedules are posted here as a service to our members.  In the interest of saving space, we've omitted projects which aren't related directly to forestry (i.e., land acquisitions, grazing allotments, mining permits, etc.).  If you wish to view the complete list of projects, go to the Black Hills National Forest website.  If you have any questions or want to receive more information about any of the projects, call the Ranger District at the phone number indicated, and ask to speak with the contact person. 

As always, feel free to contact BHFRA with questions or if you are interested in reading our comments on these projects.  We comment on each and every project the Forest Service proposes.  For an introduction to the NEPA process and tips on letter-writing, visit our NEPA page.

-Back To Top-

BHNF Periodic Timber Sale Announcement Report

The Black Hills National Forest publishes an announcement of firm and tentative timber sale offerings on a semi-annual basis.  These notifications are a matter of public record and are mailed to all prospective timber sale bidders as an outline of the year's anticipated timber program.  Businesses interested in purchasing timber sales use the report to help plan their operations, and the up-to-date announcement, broken down by Ranger District, is posted here as a service to our members.

-Back To Top-

BHNF “Phase II” Forest Plan Amendment:

Background:  All National Forests are required to devise, using public input and current scientific information, a Land and Resource Management Plan (Forest Plan) every 15 years.  Forest Plans lay out goals, objectives, standards, guidelines, and a strategic framework for the way the Forest Service will manage their land.  All projects the Forest Service proposes to perform over the life of the Plan (e.g., recreation improvements, road-building, fire risk reduction, timber sales, etc) need to comply with Plan direction. 

In 1997, the Black Hills National Forest (BHNF) completed a wholesale Revision of its Forest Plan; the product of nine years’ hard work by the BHNF and many local stakeholders.  The plan was appealed by a host of interest groups, and in 1999, former Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck issued politically-motivated, bombshell decision on the appeals:  He declared the 1997 Revised Plan illegal and sent it back to the Black Hills on the grounds that it did not “adequately consider” habitat for certain wildlife species, and had not “adequately analyzed” the potential for designating “Research Natural Areas” on the BHNF (RNA’s are essentially mini-wilderness areas). 

Mr. Dombeck also issued with his decision something called “Interim Direction”, which was an unprecedented and basically illegal way of making a unilateral decision (without your input) about how the Black Hills National Forest ought to deal with the “problems” he identified until the “inadequate” analyses could be remedied.  The combination of Dombeck’s decision and “Interim Direction” had the effect of entirely shutting down management on the Black Hills for more than a year, while the Forest figured out what their next steps ought to be.  The uncorroborated restrictions that were put in place continue to hamper the BHNF’s ability to manage the forest to this day.

Here’s where the Phase II Amendment comes in.  In May, 2001, as-required by a lawsuit settlement related to Dombeck’s decision, the BHNF completed what was called the Phase I Amendment.  Phase I was a maximum-restriction measure put in hack until the Forest could actually perform scientific studies of the Chief’s issues (so that no species were “harmed” by the Forest’s activities in the meantime).  Phase II is the vehicle through which the Forest will study those issues and derive new management direction to address them if any is necessary.  The Phase II Amendment got underway in December, 2001, and is scheduled for completion in September, 2003.  Opportunities for public comment have and will continue to occur throughout the Phase II process, and we are happy to bring you up to date on the latest issues.

Update; February, 2006: The Forest Service made available the Final Environmental Impact Statement on the Phase II Amendment.  The Forest Service must now accept administrative appeals from people and groups who disagree with their decision for a 90-day period.  To no one's surprise, the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance has indicated its intent to file an appeal on the Decision; other groups, such as the Black Hills Sierra Club, appear undecided.  Following the appeal period, the Forest Service Chief, Dale Bosworth, has 160 days to decide on the appeal's merits.  However, implementation of the Phase II Amendment begins immediately with the FEIS's publication (despite the appeals process) after an initial 30-day waiting period.   

Update; October, 2005: The Forest Service has announced the signing of the Record of Decision on the Phase II Amendment.  Over the course of the past months, BHFRA has been busily amassing public support for the Healthy Forest Alternative.  The Alternative has gained the formal endorsement of US Representatives Stephanie Herseth (D-SD) and Barbara Cubin (R-WY), US Senators Tim Johnson (D-SD), John Thune (R-SD), Mike Enzi (R-WY), and Craig Thomas (R-WY), the members of the South Dakota Legislature (both Houses, unanimous vote on SCR ), the Lawrence, Meade, Pennington, Custer, Fall River, and Crook County Commissions, the Mayor and City Council of Spearfish, the Black Hills Sportsman's Club, the Black Hills Business Council (members include all major Black Hills Chambers of Commerce, and others), the SD Cattlemen's Association, the Ranch A Restoration Foundation, the Black Hills Community Economic Development group, and of course, the 40 member organizations of the Black Hills Regional Multiple Use Coalition, with special mention for the Bearlodge Multiple Use Association, Black Hills Fly Fishers, Black Hills Resource Conservation and Development council, Black Hills Women in Timber, Spearfish Livestock Association, the Wyoming Farm Bureau, and Wyoming Stockgrowers Association. 

Despite an overwhelming show of support, many of the important issues raised in the Healthy Forest Alternative were sidestepped or summarily ignored.  Such is the joy of the federal land management planning process, unfortunately.  Other aspects of the Alternative, such as establishing a distribution of forest structural conditions that is not as susceptible to large and severe wildfires and bark beetle outbreaks, were acknowledged.  On the whole, the Phase II Amendment will provide the building blocks necessary for a healthier Black Hills National Forest, despite missing some opportunities to improve upon its draft version using our Alternative's analysis. 

While the signing of the Record of Decision completes the Forest Service's analysis process, implementation will not begin until notice of the Decision is officially published in the Federal Register.  Because each forest management project the Forest Service proposes must comply with the Forest Plan, the Forest Service has decided to hold off on Federal Register publication while several large projects are completed.  This is anticipated to delay Phase II implementation until sometime in early 2006.

Update; January, 2005:  BHFRA and BHRMUC have submitted the Healthy Forest Alternative to the Black Hills National Forest per the public comment period.  We are very excited about the level of support our Alternative has garnered among local stakeholders, community groups, and local, state, and Congressional representatives of government.  We will work diligently in the coming months to continue our momentum, and bring the Healthy Forest Alternative to anyone and everyone who is interested in hearing about it.  The Forest Service now enters the time in the planning process where they analyze the comments they have received and decide if and how they will respond by changing their proposals.  It's important to remember that EVEN IF YOU DID NOT COMMENT ON THE PHASE II DRAFT EIS, YOUR VOICE IS STILL IMPORTANT.  You're free to write the Forest Service a letter, whether there's a formal comment period ongoing or not, and every letter counts.  The process the Forest Service goes through in analyzing public comments can sometimes be an institutional bean-counting exercise that's carried out in a way far-removed from the people who will actually make the decision on Phase II.  The decision-makers may never get a sense of the people and organizations to whom Phase II is important, let alone what their views may be about how the Forest Service should proceed.  At this stage of the process, sending a personal letter to the decision-maker expressing your feelings about the Phase II decision can be very influential.  To learn more about the Healthy Forest Alternative, as well as how to continue participating in the process, go here.

Update; December, 2004:  The BHFRA has partnered with the Black Hills Regional Multiple Use Coalition to advance a new Alternative to the Phase II Amendment.  BHFRA, BHRMUC, and many other organizations interested in Phase II have come to the conclusion that none of the Alternatives proposed by the Forest Service are acceptable from a either forest health, wildlife, or socio-economic perspective.  Rather than simply complaining about it, we have hired a professional environmental consulting firm called Ecosystem Research Group, who have at their disposal a wealth of biology, hydrology, forestry, and environmental science expertise to help us craft a scientifically sound and defensible new strategy.  We have called it "The Healthy Forest Alternative," and we're very excited to bring it to you.  This proposal will better integrate the management of insects and wildfires with maintaining key wildlife habitat using proactive management techniques -- we believe we've found a way to have our cake and eat it too, in other words.  Visit the Healthy Forest Alternative page on this site to learn more.

Update; December, 2004:  The Phase II comment period has been extended to January 15, 2005.

Update; September, 2004:  The Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the Phase II Amendment has at long last been released to the public for review and comment.  The DEIS is over 3000 pages long, which is a testament to, among other things, how complex the forest planning process has become.  The DEIS is available at the Black Hills National Forest website in PDF format, or on compact disk at any of the local District offices.  BHFRA is greatly disappointed with many aspects of the draft, but the greatest among them is the manner in which the Forest Service is proposing to take care of forest health and wildlife species viability.  Most Alternatives in the Draft would make the densest areas of the Forest -- those most at risk from mountain pine beetle infestation and wildfires -- off-limits to management in an attempt to "preserve" them as wildlife habitat.  We believe this is a flawed strategy, because it puts in peril the very habitat the Forest Service is seeking to protect.  BHFRA will be in the process of analyzing and responding to the DEIS over the next 90 days.  The public comment period will close December 15, 2004.  Look for more updates between now and then to see how you can get involved in this process!

Update; July, 2003:  The Black Hills NF continues to work with various contractors and the States of South Dakota and Wyoming as Cooperating Agencies on the analysis and alternatives for the Phase II Amendment.  They have outlined six Alternatives with differing approaches toward addressing the various issues which comprise the scope of Phase II.  The Alternatives include:

• Alternative 1; the 1997 Revised Forest Plan.  This would essentially be a determination of 'no change' from existing management direction, and the BHNF would go back to implementing the Plan which was surreptitiously overturned on appeal.

• Alternative 2; the Phase I Amendment.  The BHNF would make permanent the restrictive interim measures for species viability, among others, which were part of the Phase I Amendment of May, 2001.

• Alternative 3; Diversity Across the Landscape.  Focuses on vegetative diversity designed to address species viability concerns with some elements of the landscape closer to the vegetative diversity that existed prior to settlement.

• Alternative 4; Phase I With Additional Mature Forest.  Retains more areas for mature forest and has more of the forest condition determined by natural processes (would allow more of the forest to grow dense, then let fire and bugs have their way with it).

• Alternative 6; Reduce Fire Hazard and Risks of Insects and Disease.  Emphasizes vegetative management to reduce the occurrence of insect and disease epidemics and catastrophic fire.

• Alternative 5; Harvest Equal to Growth.  The BHNF has decided it will no longer consider this alternative in detail, "as it would require many changes in Management Areas, which is outside the scope of the Phase II decision."  Instead, the alternative will serve as a benchmark to compare key issues with other alternatives.  (Currently on the BHNF, annual growth outpaces the maximum allowable harvest by 225 percent)

When the Forest Service performs an EIS of this kind, they craft Alternatives such as the above and then perform 'effects analysis' on these Alternatives to determine how each of them will affect forest resources and people's various uses of the forest.  This is the stage which Phase II sits in now.  Regrettably, the time line for completion of the Amendment has slipped.  The BHNF anticipates publication of a Draft EIS in the fall of 2003 (prior timeline was for release this spring).

UPDATE; December, 2002:   After hosting open houses and taking comment letters, the BHNF summarized the sentiment they received in a newsletter mailed to all who participated or wrote letters.  People who commented successfully conveyed that, 1) maintaining species viability was important, but the focus should not be singularly upon species who depend on dense forest conditions and the overall evaluation of species viability should be balanced with other uses and concerns, 2) Research Natural Areas should not be designated unless they have a distinct scientific purpose, 3) in response to many of the comments in consultation with the States of South Dakota and Wyoming, the scope of Phase II was expanded to address the risks from fire, insects, and disease upon the forest and interspersed communities.  Mission accomplished.  The Forest Service now states, "The Phase II Amendment seeks to move the Black Hills National Forest to a condition that provides for species viability, public safety, property protection, sustainability, and the goods and services people demand -- in the words of Gifford Pinchot (first Chief of the Forest Service), 'the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people in the long run.'"  The Black Hills National Forest has now set about crafting the Alternatives and environmental analyses for the Phase II Amendment, and have scheduled a Draft Environmental Impact Statement to be released in the spring of 2003.

UPDATE; September 16, 2002: The Phase II Amendment to the Black Hills’ Forest Plan is progressing, and another opportunity to provide input is upon us.  Right now, the Forest has completed a lot of preliminary analysis, and is moving into the alternative development stage.  A Forest Service newsletter was recently published, summarizing of the comments they received back in January, outlining the framework of Phase II’s decision elements, and identifying some of the preliminary issues they’re addressing in their range of alternatives.  If you didn’t receive one, the newsletter is available on the Web at:

http://www.fs.fed.us/r2/blackhills/fp/planning/99Amend/Amend.htm 

or from any of the BHNF District Offices.

The Forest conducted a series of open houses from September 9-13 to help get everyone more informed about the Amendment.  These meetings were a good conduit to provide comments and suggestions to the Forest Service, so thanks to all who attended.  The deadline for the last submission of written comments was September 16, but this shouldn’t discourage you.  If you’re interested in commenting on Phase II, send your letter to:

Mr. Jeff Ulrich

BHNF Phase II Amendment

25041 N. Hwy 16

Custer, SD 57730

The following are some key issues that will be important to bring up as the Forest Service begins to craft its alternatives: 

1.  In the latest newsletter, the Forest asserts that, “the current Forest Plan has ample direction to reduce fire-and-insect risks”.  This is plainly false; one need only look around at the stirring amount of charred or insect-eaten acres on the Black Hills NF to realize that Forest Plan direction promoting aggressive forest health treatment is insufficient.  If fire and insect problems are not to be analyzed formally in Phase II, the Forest’s alternatives ought to, at minimum, include the following:

• A new Goal in the Plan’s Goals & Objectives section to acknowledge the importance of these concerns to the forest and to the public.  All perceived protections for wildlife habitat are moot if the act of ‘protection’ causes it to burn or be eaten by bugs.  We like wildlife, and we like a healthy forest; the two things are not, however, mutually exclusive and are, furthermore, dependent on active management.

• The Forest’s discussion and analysis of alternatives ought to clearly address and disclose the interrelation between targeted habitat levels, forest health, and fire risk.

• Currently, the Forest is harvesting far less timber than the Black Hills grow annually.  Many of the Forest’s fire and insect problems are related to this over-growth issue.  The re-evaluation of Forest outputs should include an analysis of how changes in output levels will affect forest health and fire risk in the long-term.

2. Ask the Forest to cast aside the politicized idea that healthy wildlife populations and active forest management cannot coexist.  We’ve been making it work here in the Black Hills for 100 years, and we can make it work another 100!

• Alternatives should contain an honest analysis of their social and economic impacts as well as their ecological ones.

• Management ought to occur wherever it is needed on the Black Hills National Forest.  Under their current system, the ability of the Forest Service to manage a given piece of land begins with whether or not the land is designated “suitable”.  In Phase II, the Forest is re-evaluating their “suitability” classifications.  As the Forest does this, they should give themselves as much opportunity to manage as possible.  The Forest can address this issue two ways; either designate more land as “suitable” to help promote active management or develop management strategies that work on non-suitable lands.

• Wildlife is one of the many tremendously important multiple-uses, not the trump card of multiple-use.  The alternatives’ approach to wildlife species viability should be framed in the context of all other multiple-use considerations because the cornerstone of good natural resource management is balance.

• Wildlife standards should be constructed to give considerable discretion to scientists on the ground, so that they have the ability to assess and prioritize resource management concerns when working on a given project.  They are the experts, and deserve expert judgment in setting management priorities.