Judge Agrees River Seriously Damaged By Slides But Lodge Wants More Data Before Ruling On Salvage Logging Sale

A federal judge agrees there’s been serious damage to the North Fork of the Boise River after massive slides plugged the river in late August.

But he wants more information before deciding whether to order the U.S. Forest Service to stop a huge salvage logging program in the area.

Documents filed by the Idaho Sporting Congress “clearly demonstrate that there has been serious and irreparable injury to the North Fork of the Boise River and the plaintiff’s legal interests,” U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge said earlier this week.

It is difficult, however, to tell whether continued logging and road building will cause more problems, Lodge said. He denied a temporary restraining order. But he agreed to put the hearing for a preliminary injunction on the fast track.

“We thought that it would be obvious that there will be more damage” if logging and road building continue, said Ron Mitchell, executive director of the Sporting Congress.

The Sporting Congress filed suit last week to stop the Boise River fire salvage sales. The Sporting Congress charges the Forest Service failed to upgrade the logging roads to handle storms and some of those roads blew out. The North Fork of the Boise is so plugged that it may take dynamite to return it to normal.

Researchers and environmentalists warn that Eastern Washington and North Idaho forests are ripe for similar disasters.

The Forest Service, meanwhile, says it is upgrading roads for the Boise River salvage sales. It also denies that the logging byways had anything to do with the disaster.

The 1994 wildfires seared the soil, making it impossible for water to soak in. That diverted more water to the streams, creating floods that caused the slides, the agency said.

If anything, the roads helped slow the slides, said Frank Carroll, spokesman for the Boise National Forest.

, DataTimes