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Questioning the decision for prescribed burn

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Dear Fellow Montanans,

As I sit here at 3:30 a.m. unable to sleep with the smell of smoke, I am wondering how and why something this idiotic could happen? I refer to our current forest fire, which for all effective purposes, was set by the USDA Forest Service, or should I say the Forest Circus? This

was a prescribed burn, Duh, burning season is closed to everybody except the USDA Forest Circus, and you ask? Well let me say this, they don't have to follow the same rules that everyone else does? I have been involved with evacuations from two other fires since I moved to Montana in 1996; the first was the Stone Hill fires in the Kootenai back in 1999 or 2000, the other was a couple years ago from the Brush Creek fire. These were both lightning strikes and at least the first could have been put out directly after discovery. A friend of mine had a bulldozer at the gate below the fire and called the FS to report the fire and also told them he would be more than happy to put it out. He was told this is not allowed since, "You are not trained nor are you qualified to do this." So 86 thousand acres of timber later, when the fire came to an old clearcut, its progress was halted, and shortly thereafter, the weather turned wet and extinguished the flames.

As a logger and a conservation-minded landowner, I feel it is high time the Forest Service start following the same set of rules the rest of us must, or get out of Montana and let the DNRC manage the forest. At least then we would have people with the experience in proper forest management. I realize that I am only a lowly logger, but I go online each morning and check the weather forecast. I go to the NOAA site and for the days when these prescribed burns were lit the forecast was far above average temps and breezy conditions with wind gusts to 75 mph at the higher elevations. I have no idea what site the FS's fearless leader looked at, but this is what I saw. No, I am no genius but even I know

that the afore described conditions would be just about as bad as possible for prescribed burning, or any burning.

A while back my wife and I attended a meeting at the library about the bug problems with all sorts of bigwigs from the BLM, Forest Service, Blackfoot Challenge, the DNRC, and quite a few others. I can't recall all of them, but I came away from this meeting with the feeling that we were all supposed to be on the same page. I also had the feeling we were all supposed to act in a responsible manner. I sort of feel left out of the loop somehow! Nope, that's not it either; I forgot they're exempt, don't have to play by the rules. They make up the rules as they go along? Do you see anything

wrong with this picture? Hey, while I am on this soapbox, I would really like to know just who really holds the deed to the lands administered by the USDA Forest Service? I really don't think it is the federal government. I honestly believe it belongs to Montana; the state owns it but we, the people who live here, don't get any say in how our forest is managed or in this case mismanaged.

Mark Aquino Lincoln, Mont.



Copyright 2010 Blackfoot Valley Dispatch, Lincoln, Montana. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from SmallTownPapers, Inc.

© 2011 Blackfoot Valley Dispatch Lincoln, Montana. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from DAS.

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