Source: United States Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND)
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND) joined Senator Steve Daines (R-MT) and Representative Matt Rosendale (R-MT) on a letter to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Acting Director Martha Williams urging the Biden Administration to resolve challenges stemming from the disastrous Cottonwood decision which threatens responsible federal forest management projects.
“During a congressional hearing on October 2021, the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) testified that unless action is taken to resolve challenges stemming from the 2015 Cottonwood Environmental Law Center v. U.S. Forest Service, (Cottonwood) decision, the agency will have to go through re-consultation, regardless of the merit, on over one-hundred forest plans that ‘will take years and cost millions of dollars,’ threatening to undermine the Administration’s 10 Year Wildfire Crisis Strategy. Despite the impending deadline, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS) continues to delay finalizing a rule that would provide immediate relief to the agency,” the members wrote.
“We urge you to work together to finalize the proposed rule, ‘Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Regulations for Interagency Cooperation,’ in order to preserve the forest planning process, remove legal ambiguities that obstruct important forest projects, and ensure finite agency resources are no longer diverted from conservation needs for this purely procedural exercise,”the members continued.
Senators Cramer and Daines and Representative Rosendale are joined on the letter by Senators John Barrasso (R-WY), John Boozman (R-AR), James Risch (R-ID), Mike Crapo (R-ID), Mitt Romney (R-UT), and Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) and Representatives Bruce Westerman (R-AR), Doug LaMalfa (R-CA), Dan Newhouse (R-WA), Russ Fulcher (R-ID), Liz Cheney (R-WY), Yvette Herrell (R-NM), Cliff Bentz (R-OR), and Chris Stewart (R-UT).