Appeals court blocks Mount Ashland ski expansion in Southern Ore.

A federal appeals court Monday blocked expansion of the Mount Ashland ski area in Southern Oregon until the U.S. Forest Service assures protection of the city of Ashland's drinking water supply and protection of habitat for a rare mink-like mammal.

In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sent the case back to U.S. District Judge Owen Panner in Medford to oversee revisions to the environmental impact statement the Forest Service did on the project.

The ruling could be a fatal setback for efforts spanning 20 years to expand Ski Ashland with more intermediate and beginner runs to attract more skiers.

Marianne Dugan, attorney for environmental groups that won the appeal, said she saw no way for the Mount Ashland Ski Association to go ahead with its current plan because it would remove trees on steep slopes with a high risk of erosion, sending silt into a tributary of Ashland Creek that feeds the city of Ashland's drinking water reservoir.

"They can't move the landslide hazard areas," she said. "They have to move the project."

The plan calls for building two new chairlifts to serve 16 ski trails, and expanding the parking lot by 200 spaces. The expansion would require clearcutting about 65 acres of forest, where biologists have spotted the Pacific fisher, a rare predator that looks like a large mink.

Ski Ashland marketing director Rick Saul said the board of directors would have to evaluate whether it is better to spend more money for further studies in hopes of winning permission to expand or do the best they can with what they have.

The ski area has already decided to stop operating on Mondays and Tuesdays to reduce costs.

"A large part of the discussion will be how profitable can the ski area be given the current size," said Saul. "There are some limitations we feel would be very challenging in the future if we are not allowed to expand."

The Forest Service regional office in Portland had no immediate comment on the ruling, spokesman Tom Knappenberger said.

Oregon Wild and Sierra Club had argued that the Forest Service failed to fully analyze the harm clearcutting the expansion area would cause Pacific fishers, despite sightings of fishers by one of their own biologists and rules demanding they manage the forest so fishers do not go on the endangered species list.

They also argued the Forest Service failed to fully analyze whether the expansion would comply with their own standards for protecting watersheds and used a flawed computer model to predict future erosion.

Judge Milan D. Smith wrote that the Forest Service analysis finding fisher habitat would not be harmed by the expansion was "devoid of supporting or explanatory data," and insufficient to satisfy demands of its own management plan.

He added that the Forest Service ignored its own findings that the expansion was in an area at high risk of erosion.

"The risk of permanent ecological harm outweighs the temporary economic harm that (the ski area) may suffer pending further study," the judge wrote.