Collaboration brings more funds to land managment

The smell of pine and the buzz of mosquitoes leads the way down the shrub and deadfall of a slope to a still pond on the Condon Loop

The water that now fills the lowland was not there in 2010. In fact, it hasn’t been there for a long time.

A drainage ditch was dug by settlers of the area to drain the wetland of its seasonal water and create a wet meadow for hay production. In 2011, the Forest Service filled the drainage ditch back in to restore the area to the natural wetland it was.

The $11,500 project was paid for in part by funds from the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program which awarded 10 years of funding to the Southwestern Crown Collaborative for landscape restoration work in 2010.

The Condon Loop wetland restoration is just one of 94 projects, both big and small, that have been completed in the Flathead National Forest using those CFLR Program funds, according to Richard Kehr of the Swan Lake Ranger District.

“Normally we wouldn’t have the money to do this kind of thing,” Kehr said as he pointed out a gravel pit restoration project where the Forest Service replanted trees that were just starting to produce little seedlings.

The same goes for the wetland restoration project on Condon Loop and for a proposed project that could restore 50 acres of wetlands at Cold Ponds in the Swan. The $668,545 Swan River bridge replacement project at Piper Creek also wouldn’t have been possible without those funds.

The Southwestern Crown Collaborative is made up of a mishmash of environmental groups, three Forest Service ranger districts and lumber companies. It’s purpose is to collaborate on land management projects to restore forest land, wildlife habitat and keep the forest as a working landscape in the Flathead, Lolo and Helena National Forests.

It’s all getting input from those who will be affected by a project before coming up with a land management plan for an area.

“The way business is being done on national forest land is changing,” said Anne Dahl of the Swan Ecosystem Center in Condon. “It’s coming from a groundswell of public interest and the agencies are starting to see that.”

Gone are the days of Forest Service proposals where environmental assessments are performed, plans are outlined and then the public is informed of the project after the work is completed. The guiding purpose behind the CFLR Program funding is to get the public and interested parties involved earlier in the process, Dahl said.

Dahl is a member of the collaborative and has worked in cahoots with the Forest Service on projects in the Swan since the 1980s. She said part of the reason they were awarded the funds is because the whole Southwestern Crown of the Continent area has a history of working collaboratively on land management and restoration work.

The maximum allocation of $10 million in funding was awarded to the collaborative for both the 2011 and 2012 fiscal years. This funding is more or less evenly distributed among the three ranger districts and 10 percent of the funding goes to monitoring work. Monitoring work essentially checks the effectiveness of the land management practices to inform future project proposals.

According to Dahl and Kehr, monitoring work is just getting off the ground this year.

Up until this year, the projects completed with CFLR program funds were projects that began the planning process before 2010, so projects that will use the public in the pre-planning stages of land management proposals are also just getting started this year.

One example in the Swan is in the Beaver Creek area. The Forest Service is asking area residents what they think needs to happen in the Wildland Urban Interface that surrounds residential areas.

Feelings are mixed on what to do, said Megan Birzell of the Wilderness Society, who is also a member of the Southwestern Crown Collaborative. Some residents want to leave things the way they are and some residents want to thin out the trees to protect their property.

“It has been different, and really, I’ve been really impressed because they (the Forest Service) held a public meeting before the scoping letter was sent out kind of asking what the public thought should happen up there,” Birzell said.

Birzell said a scoping letter is usually sent out to residents informing them that a project is planned.

Involving the public before that point is a huge step forward, she said. And while the process is far from perfect, it’s a step toward land management practices that are decided by all who are affected by each project.

“In order to implement anything you have to plan for it,” Birzell said.