The Mineral County Resource Coalition recently added their support to the Liberty Fire Salvage and Restoration Project. The Liberty Fire is a project on the Seeley Lake Ranger District and burned 28,694 acres last summer. Of the acres burned 9,452 were on National Forest Service land, of which 5,766 were on Lolo National Forest System lands. Over 60 percent of these acres have been allocated to timber production in the Forest Plan.

The project is important to local Mineral County contractors because 100 percent of the harvesting will be done with ground based logging systems. “We support all efforts to maximize the economic value of commercial products made available through post fire salvage and reclamation efforts on the fires of 2017,” a report from the MCRC stated. The report went on to state that the Coalition supports two items identified as the Purpose and Need for Action with the project.

One is to recover the economic value of forest products in a timely manner to contribute to the employment and income in local communities and avoid loss of commodity value and two, re-establish forested conditions and/or facilitate recovery to meet management objectives outlined in the Forest Plan. The plan also calls for planting approximately 6,600 acres to speed up the reforestation process and could take up to 10 years to complete depending on funding.

In a letter to the project team leader, the Coalition hoped the projects could be completed and out for auction by June or July of 2018, “fire killed trees begin deteriorating and losing value immediately after burning with the rate of deterioration accelerating with time. Potential bidder interest and participation as well as the bid values are directly impacted by extended time periods to offer salvage projects for auction.”

The Public Comment period ends on April 4 and can be found online at: comments-northern-lolo-seeley-lake@fs.fed.us. The Mineral County Resource Coalition is made up several local interest groups with the mission of “restoring economic stability to our rural counties, schools, hospitals and communities by partnering with state and federal land management agencies for sensible management of our natural resources on our public land.”