North Fork Recommendations Waiting For Action Shoshone County Commission Hasn’T Given Green Light To Use Report

Members of a task force that wrote 47 recommendations to protect the North Fork of the Coeur d’Alene River are worried that their report is gathering dust.

Just like the last one.

In March, the task force presented a report to the Shoshone County Commission. It was an appendix to a 1983 Coeur d’Alene River Master Plan, which was never acted upon but dealt with the same issues: development, erosion, sanitation and scenery. Threats to the once-pristine river have only increased in the intervening years, as its popularity among campers, hunters, floaters and anglers also goes up.

Ken Lustig of the Panhandle Health District was asked to work with various governments and agencies to act upon the recommendations - as soon as he got a green light from the commission.

He’s heard nothing from them.

“The asked me to put the group together, I did. They asked me to facilitate it. We worked all winter,” he said Thursday. “They have to give me the high sign to move on.”

Commissioner Sherry Krulitz said the report is “certainly not being put on the shelf.”

“We probably need to have another meeting and get back to some of those people,” she added.

Commissioner Jack King was out of the state when the report was first completed, she noted. King is considered a key player because he lives along the North Fork at Prichard.

County planner Nila Jurkovich said the recommendations are being reviewed, but no changes in county ordinances have been proposed so far.

The task force had planned to meet again this fall to review progress on North Fork protection. The U.S. Forest Service is ready to proceed with recommendations that affect its land, said Lustig, but is waiting for the commissioners to approve the report.

Meanwhile, summer - the busy time on the North Fork - is in full swing without the additional sewage dump sites, trash containers, public toilets and strict camping sanitation rules recommended by the task force.

The absence of limits on personal watercraft, another recommendation, caused tension in June when a Jetski event was scheduled upstream of Enaville. It was canceled only after the sheriff declared it illegal because it was billed as a “poker run.”