Oregon would get 5 new wilderness areas under bill

Public lands package moves to House for final approval.

Oregon stands to see five new wilderness areas under a bill approved by the Senate Thursday.

If the Public Lands Omnibus Bill is approved by the House, as expected, Oregon would see 202,000 acres of new wilderness on federal lands stretching from Mount Hood in the Cascade Range to the Siskiyou Mountains along the California Border.

"President Bush had a quote to the effect that elections have consequences," said Steve Pedery of Oregon Wild, which has been a longtime campaigner for more wilderness in Oregon. "It is very heartening to see this greener Congress right off the bat moving forward and protecting public lands."

Pedery said the new areas would give wilderness protection to 3.7 percent of Oregon, still lagging far behind California with 14 percent, Washington with 11 percent, and Idaho 7.5 percent.

One of the longest battles was over the Cooper Salmon Wilderness on the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest in the Coast Range outside Port Orford, named for two mountains in the headwaters of the Elk River, a leading coastal salmon stream.

Former timber cruiser Jim Rogers and the Friends of the Elk River have campaigned for protection against logging to maintain pristine salmon habitat since 1996, and won support from country commissioners, the city council and the chamber of commerce in what used to be a timber town.

The high level of support is a measure of the changing attitudes within an area that once depended on timber for its economy, and now depends on sport and commercial fishing associated with the river, Rogers said.

Dave Willis has been working on wilderness protection for 23,000 acres around Soda Mountain outside Ashland since 1983. The area covers nearly half the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument, created in 2000 to protect the unique ecosystems of the region. It is managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

The bill also would require BLM to retire grazing leases on 106,672 acres of the monument — 98 percent of the land open to livestock — if the six ranchers who hold them accept buyouts with money raised by conservationists. A recent BLM study found grazing incompatible with plants and wildlife on the monument, but the agency has not moved to stop grazing.

The campaign for the Lewis and Clark Mount Hood wilderness has only gone on for six years. It would protect 128,000 acres of old growth forest, salmon habitat and popular hiking trails from logging. The local support among former timber communities represents a similar change in attitudes.

Relative newcomers to the wilderness battles are the Oregon Badlands area, 30,000 acres of high desert plateau east of Bend. Supporters hope to see it protected from off-road vehicle damage, mining and geothermal development.

The Spring Basin area, 8,600 acres near Clarno in Eastern Oregon, would protect big game habitat and grasslands along the John Day river, which is Oregon's longest undammed river.

The bill also would extend through 2015 a federal program that builds fish screens to keep salmon out of irrigation facilities, and give the secretary of Agriculture authority to use Forest Service money to work nonprofit groups and private landowners to restore fish and wildlife habitat.