Forest Service Withdraws Cooke City Deforestation Project on the Border of Yellowstone National Park After Being Sued by Conservation Groups

Alliance for the Wild Rockies,  Dr. Jesse Logan, Native Ecosystems Council, and the Gallatin Wildlife Association secured another significant win for the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem after the Forest Service withdrew a deforestation project that would have affected one of the healthiest whitebark pine forests in the nation and thousands of acres of Inventoried Roadless Areas on the northeast border of Yellowstone National Park.

Plaintiffs sued to stop this project in March, alleging, in part, that the project ignored legally-mandated protections for whitebark pine, grizzly bears, and lynx under both the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.

The Cooke City Fuels Project would encompass 19,221 acres in Park County, Montana, within the Absaroka-Beartooth Mountains, bordered by Yellowstone National Park on the west, the Wyoming state line on the south, east of Colter Pass along the Highway 212 corridor, and north to the boundary of the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness Area. The project would have included 3,128 acres of commercial and non-commercial logging and burning, including 1,225 acres of deforestation in the Beartooth, North Absaroka, Reef, and Republic Mountain Roadless Areas.

The Forest Service claimed the project would protect the town of Cooke City from wildfire. However, the plan called for logging well beyond the wildland urban interface  — a key reason why the vast majority of Cooke City residents who commented opposed it. 

Authorized logging on 2,014 acres would have logged trees up to 30-feet from individual whitebark pines in an unscientific attempt to protect whitebark pine  from the white pine blister rust. The rust, native to Asia, has spread to 38 states since being introduced to North America in the 20th century and caused substantial damage. However, all peer-reviewed scientific studies show that this type of logging, known as daylight thinning, does not help whitebark pines survive their primary threats of climate change, blister rust, and mountain pine beetle. 

Waste of Money 

The Forest Service disclosed the clearcutting project would have resulted in a $2.8 million net loss to federal taxpayers. As the national debt is at a record $38.8 trillion, there is simply no reason the Forest Service should have authorized spending $2.8 million for this illegal logging project.

The money the Forest Service would have wasted on this project could be directed to planting rust-resistant whitebark pine trees, which research shows prevents whitebark pine from going extinct, and to harden homes and businesses from wildfire.

We sued the Forest Service last year and won to stop the South Plateau logging, burning, and road-building project on the western border of Yellowstone National Park. One of the issues on which we prevailed was the agency’s attempt to shrink the definition of secure habitat for grizzlies from 2,500 acres to 10 acres. The Court’s ruling in that case stated that there was an “absence of any scientific evidence” to show that a 10-acre patch provides adequate habitat for grizzly bears. 

Despite the Court’s ruling the Custer Gallatin National Forest again applied this 10-acre definition in evaluating the effects of this Cooke City deforestation project. Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Dr. Logan, Gallatin Wildlife Association, and Native Ecosystems Council sent a letter to the Forest Service and Fish & Wildlife Service indicating they intended to pursue an Endangered Species Act claim on this issue as part of their lawsuit

Please consider helping the Alliance for the Wild Rockies protect the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and helping Counterpunch inform the American people about what our government is doing.

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