Texas fat cats to Idahoans: Eat cake
In a Lewiston Tribune editorial over the weekend, Opinion Editor Marty Trillhaase comments:
If you want to know why ordinary Idahoans view the idea of transferring federal lands to state ownership with such skepticism, start with what’s going on in Adams and Valley counties.
There, 172,000 acres of forest land formerly available to hunters, snowmobilers and four-wheelers is now off limits.
As the McCall Star-News’ Tom Grote noted, Idaho Fish and Game sent out 305 letters to people who had controlled hunt permits, informing them access had been denied. Meanwhile, Valley County’s leases to groom roads on the parcel for snowmobile trails have been canceled.
Explained the Idaho Statesman’s Rocky Barker, Potlatch Corp. - which allowed public access on these acres - sold them to Farris and Dan Wilks of Cisco, Texas, who are painting their fence posts orange.
This is one more hit for a local economy already buffeted by a hollowing out of its timber industry and setbacks at the Tamarack golf and ski resort.
The sealed off snowmobile trails alone were linked to $832,000 worth of business in Valley County, Barker reported. If four-wheelers also are forced to go somewhere else, the local economy’s losses will mount up.
But the Wilks brothers apparently feel no obligation to explain themselves. Barker can’t get his phone calls returned/Marty Trillhaase, Lewiston Tribune. More here.
* This story was originally published as a post from the blog "Huckleberries Online." Read all stories from this blog