‘Repulsive’ position
Dear Editor:
I served on the Methow Valley Citizens Council (MVCC) board and find their position on the U.S. Forest Service “Mission Restoration Project” repulsive.
MVCC’s 2017 Valley Voice Newsletter states in regards to the NCW Forest Health Collaborative (NCWFHC) that “MVCC closely follows the work of this group, which includes a diverse membership of timber industry representatives, conservationists, tribal government, elected officials, and local, state and federal land managers working together to restore the Okanogan Wenatchee National Forest (OWNF) in Chelan and Okanogan Counties. MVCC provides feedback on restoration proposals in the Methow Valley.”
The “diverse group” includes only those who “go along to get along,” conspicuously excluding the Libby Creek Watershed Association, where most of the “thinning”/commercial logging will occur, and all voices that question logging as a solution to forest health issues. Residents have cited expert opinions and posed logical, well-informed questions with most remaining unanswered.
The planned Mission Restoration Project requires an amendment to the Forest Plan which will allow reduced winter cover for mule deer. It will open old “healed” logging roads and build new ones, increase “transitional forage” (for cattle) encouraging rapid fire growth, increase stream sedimentation which the Forest Service classifies as “critical habitat” for production of ESA-listed steelhead, bull trout, and a spring Chinook population in danger of extinction, as well as endangering Methow Valley residents traveling on narrow, ice-covered roads during winter commercial logging.
It’s a plan driven by commercial timber and cattle interests, under-funded public agencies protecting staff positions, and county commissioners. There is no evidence for any beneficial watershed effects for residents, including fish and wildlife, and the Forest Service is proposing it as a necessary 20-year cyclic activity that will result in long-term disruption for at least three to five years each cycle.
Much more information is available in project public input at https://cara.ecosystem-management.org/Public/ReadingRoom?project=49201. Those abundant fact-based comments have resulted in no positive Forest Service responses.
Thank you for doing what you can to inform others concerned for the protection of Methow Valley watershed values.
Don Johnson, Retired professor of biology, fisheries scientist, Okanogan PUD commissioner, Libby Creek Watershed Association, La Paz, Mexico
Only the rich win
Dear Editor:
Where to start with the tax bill being shoved through Congress at breakneck speed?
According to the Tax Policy Center, in the first year, almost 50 percent of the benefits will go to the wealthiest 5 percent. But wait! To limit the increase of our national debt to $1.5 trillion — a budgeting gimmick that allows Senate Republicans to pass tax “reform” with only 50 votes — tax cuts to individuals will expire! According to the Congressional Budget Office, by 2027, the average household making under $75,000 will be paying higher taxes than it does now.
Tax cuts enacted since 1980 have had more public support than opposition. This time is different. Averaging 17 recent national polls (including Fox News), the Washington Post reported that just 30 percent of Americans support the Republican plan. The public understands that this “reform” stinks. The 52 Republican senators come from states representing only 46 percent of the U.S. population, yet they try repeatedly to hastily pass deeply unpopular legislation without working with Democrats or Independents representing the other 54 percent.
What is going on? Fundamentally, almost all our representatives in Congress are more afraid of their major donors than they are of the electorate. For most Republicans, that means wealthy conservatives. Sen. Lindsey Graham told NBC News, “financial contributions will stop” if corporate tax cuts are not delivered. Rep. Chris Collins told The Hill, “My donors are basically saying, ‘Get it done or don’t ever call me again.’”
The rich will receive enormous benefits from the upcoming “reforms,” but some of the biggest donors have additional motivations: to starve government and eliminate the entire social safety net. Growing deficits will pave the way to slashing Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act — name your program. A win-win for ultra-conservative billionaires.
Big Money has the upper hand right now, but what to do? Get involved, if only in a small way. Keep reminding Rep. Newhouse that he is accountable to the people that put him in office. And, as difficult as it seems, let’s work to overturn the Citizen’s United decision that opened the floodgates to unlimited campaign spending.
Gina McCoy
Winthrop
Thanksgiving thanks
Dear Editor:
The Methow Valley United Methodist Church would like to say thank you to the people in the valley who worked to help make the community Thanksgiving dinner a success. A thank you to Hank’s Harvest Foods, Cinnamon Twisp Bakery and The Cove for their continued support.
Susan Stone, Winthrop
No Enloe electrification
Dear Editor:
Three individuals, Jerry Asmussen, Scott Vejraska and Bill Colyar, currently serve as the Okanogan County PUD board of commissioners. They set the policy. The electrification of Enloe Dam is one policy that needs to be reversed. The PUD board urgently needs to hear from its ratepayers.
The new powerhouse has no economic value. It requires $30 million in borrowing to finance and it will produce $1.2 million to $2.4 million in annual losses for at least the next 20 years, according to the PUD. This will require rate increases and limit our utility’s ability to make the improvements in infrastructure needed today.
We do not need power from the Similkameen. We have signed a new agreement with Grant County PUD for an additional 22 percent of Wells Dam’s 775 megawatts of Columbia River power. This hydropower will supply all our growth for the next 50 years without creating debt. This is equal to having 38 Enloe Dams producing power at one-third the cost of Enloe power.
Dam removal could be accomplished through means established by the federal agencies responsible for dam removal at little expense to the Okanogan PUD. If a new powerhouse is constructed, the Right-of-Way Agreement, signed with the BLM in 2013, obligates our utility to remove Enloe Dam.
Some $21 million is available annually for salmon/steelhead habitat restoration in the Columbia Basin. The Similkameen’s 3,000-square-mile watershed, with over 300 miles of river and stream habitat, represents the largest potential expansion of steelhead habitat in the entire Columbia Basin. A natural, self-sustaining steelhead fishery would benefit Okanogan county and the region.
E-mail, phone or write to you PUD commissioners today!
Joseph Enzensperger, Oroville
