Week of October 27th, 2014
IFG named first recipient of Idaho Pacesetter Award
National business and political leaders acknowledged a top Idaho company Wednesday when Idaho Forest Group was named as the inaugural recipient of the Zions Bank Idaho Pacesetter Award. The award, presented during the GemState’s first Governor’s Trade and Business Conference at the Boise Centre, marked the capstone of a global trade conference which included Massachusetts governor and former presidential candidate Mitt Romney; Hewlett-Packard chairman, president and CEO, Meg Whitman; and Idaho Gov. Butch Otter among the notables in attendance. “The award honors a GemState company for its success, growth, leadership and contribution to the state’s economic vitality,” Zions Bank said in a statement. “Idaho Forest Group exemplifies the can-do attitude of business leaders across Idaho, and is poised to accelerate into the future. We applaud the leadership of Marc Brinkmeyer and Scott Atkison, who have grown Idaho Forest Group into one of the largest lumber producers in the nation and fueled job creation in northern Idaho.” “Our company is a vibrant and thriving business enterprise,” said Idaho Forest Group President Scott Atkison. “We are large enough to compete successfully in national and international markets, yet small enough to know who we are, how we got started and what an extraordinary effort it has taken – on the parts of many talented people – to get us to where we are today.” The Idaho Forest Group was formed in 2008 from the merger of two family owned companies: Riley Creek Lumber and Bennett Forest Industries. Based in Coeur d’Alene, the company operates state-of-the-art sawmills in Laclede, Moyie Springs, Chilco, Grangeville and Lewiston and now ranks as one of the Top 10 lumber manufacturers in the U.S. In his acceptance remarks, Atkison underscored IFG’s strong commitment to sustainable forestry, describing it as “a social contract with every man, woman and child in our country.” He also stressed the importance of the bond IFG has with its employees, contractors, customers and the communities it calls home. “Hometown ethics and belief in doing the job right are foundational to our company,” the president said. “The physical assets of our business are easy to build or replace. However, the intangibles of employee loyalty, commitment to quality, and customer satisfaction from a job well done give us confidence and inspire us to improve.” Atkison described Idaho Forest Group as “a closely held, family-owned, Idaho-grown business.” Interviewed from abroad, Marc Brinkmeyer, the company’s chairman, echoed those sentiments. “That’s important to us,” he said, “because we’re a family company with very strong family values. That’s what drives us every day.” The global trade conference was held at a time when companies in the Intermountain West are expanding their overseas business. In the 10-year period from 2003-2013, Idaho exports have almost tripled – from $2 billion to $5.7 billion, according to the Idaho Department of Commerce. Of the 1,757 companies which exported from Idaho in 2012, 83.3 percent were small- to medium-sized businesses and generated 25 percent of the GemState’s total merchandise exports, according the latest available data from the U.S. Department of Commerce International Trade Administration. In IFG’s case, exporting represented a vehicle for emerging as a stronger company following the economic downturn, as the company expanded into new markets in China and Japan with the help of the Idaho Department of Commerce. Also honored at Wednesday’s event was Boise firm Agri Beef Co., which was presented with the Idaho Global Pacesetter Award to acknowledge its success in exporting product. –Coeur d’Alene Press
Sandpoint airplane manufacturer inks second Asian contract
Quest Aircraft Co., the Sandpoint-based aerospace manufacturer that produces the rugged Kodiak light airplane, has reached a long-term sales agreement with a Chinese company that also plans eventually to manufacture Kodiak aircraft for the Chinese market. The agreement with SkyView Aircraft Industry Co., a company also known as Jiangsu, covers exclusive sales, distribution, and service of Kodiak Aircraft in mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau, says Julie Stone, a Quest Aircraft spokeswoman. For the first few years of the agreement, Beijing-based SkyView will take delivery of Kodiak airplanes from Quest Aircraft’s Sandpoint factory, Stone says. In the next phase, SkyView will purchase partially assembled aircraft kits, which will undergo final assembly at a SkyView plant in China. By 2019, SkyView will manufacture the Kodiak aircraft it sells, the agreement says. “They will be built to our specifications, and they will be exactly the same as the Kodiak aircraft built at the factory in Sandpoint,” Stone says. Meantime, Quest Aircraft expects to deliver to SkyView a minimum of 10 aircraft manufactured at its Sandpoint plant through 2015. The Kodiak is a 10-seat, single-engine turboprop airplane designed for short takeoffs and landings. It can take off with a full payload in less than 1,000 feet of runway. The Kodiak also has the ability to land on and take off from unimproved surfaces, and it can be equipped as a float plane. Quest Aircraft is one of the largest employers in Bonner County with more than 175 workers at its 84,000-square-foot headquarters and manufacturing facility near the Sandpoint Airport, about 75 miles northeast of Spokane. Stone says the company’s workforce is growing steadily, but she adds that she doesn’t expect the SkyView agreement will spur an immediate surge in employment. “We probably will continue to grow and add positions as we increase production,” she says. “We’re not expecting huge growth, but we’re certainly not shrinking.” Quest Aircraft currently produces about three Kodiak airplanes a month. The base price of a Kodiak plane is just under $2 million. See more here. –Spokane Journal of Business
Return of the Rocky Mountain high
While the boom in energy production – coal in Wyoming and oil and gas in the Bakken formation of eastern Montana and the Dakotas – gets most of the attention, experts say the New Economy growth, rooted in the region’s scenic wonders, is one of the most important forces shaping the West. Call it the rise of the Green Coast. “The notion used to be that if you weren’t mining the landscape of its ore, or cutting down the forest for its trees, or covering the range with cattle, you were doing something wrong and your economy would stagnate,” says Ray Rasker, the cofounder of Headwaters Economics, a think tank in Bozeman that analyzes socioeconomic-environmental trends. “But Bozeman and a handful of other communities in the West have evolved beyond that frontier mind-set. They’re thriving not in spite of being surrounded by protected public lands and putting certain kinds of development off limits, but because of it.” Read the rest of the story here. –Christian Science Monitor
Missoula, CSKT lawsuit blasts DEQ for ‘absurd’ Clark Fork River pollution permit
Local government agencies, Indian tribes and a nonprofit environmental group have filed suit against the Montana Department of Environmental Quality. A representative of one of them calls it “absurd” that DEQ has transferred a wastewater discharge permit allowing high levels of pollution from the former Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. pulp and paper operation outside Missoula to a nonexistent facility at the site of the former mill on the Clark ForkRiver. “It’s hard to imagine how this permit, which maximizes pollution allowed in the river, fits in with the good work now underway to restore the Clark Fork,” says Karen Knudsen, executive director of the Clark Fork Coalition, one of the plaintiffs. “It’s absurd for the state to allow this level of pollution without taking a good hard look at the changed conditions on the landscape,” Knudsen goes on. “It’s contrary to the agency’s charge, and contrary to the law.” DEQ spokesman Chris Seager said the agency has not yet received a copy of the lawsuit, and once it does, “We’ll let our attorneys review it and decide how to respond.” The director of DEQ, Tracy Stone-Manning, is a former executive director of the Clark Fork Coalition. Joining the coalition in the lawsuit are the Missoula City-County Health Board, the Missoula Valley Water Quality District and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. They’re asking a judge to void the Montana Pollution Discharge Elimination System permit that DEQ granted to M2Green, the new owner of the 3,200-acre riverside property near Frenchtown. The lawsuit was filed in Helena this week, in Lewis and Clark County District Court. –Missoulian
International Kootenay Lake Board of Control public meeting Oct. 30
SEATTLE – The International Kootenay Lake Board of Control will hold a public meeting Oct. 30 in Bonners Ferry, Idaho. The annual meeting will review the requirements of operation of Corra Linn Dam by Fortis BC under the International Joint Commission’s Orders of Approval, and the associated KootenayLake water levels for 2014. The Board will hear comments from the public regarding their concerns and suggestions on the Board’s activities. The meeting will be held 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 30, at the Kootenai River Inn, 7169 Plaza St., Bonners Ferry, Idaho. A similar meeting was held last year, and will be held again next year, in Nelson, B.C., Canada. The International Kootenay Lake Board of Control chairs are Bruno Tassone for the Canadian Section and Col. John Buck for the United States Section. For more information about the meeting, contact Gwyn Graham in Canada at 604-664-4052, or Amy Reese in the United States at 206-764-3595. –Army Corps of Engineers
Feds chase criminal case against artist who marred rocks in parks
She calls it art, proudly signing her urban-influenced sketches and posting photos of them online, like a sort of Banksy in the wild. The National Park Service calls it criminal. The agency on Thursday announced it was investigating 21-year-old Casey Nocket’s recent cross-country jaunt during which she allegedly painted faces and sketches on rock formations in as many as 10 national parks, including RockyMountainNational Park. The agency, which did not name Nocket, said its investigation spans the nation’s most iconic Western parks. Investigators said the woman’s vandalism was found in Yosemite and Death Valley national parks in California, Crater Lake National Park in Oregon and Zion and Canyonlands parks in Utah. National Parks Traveler on Thursday posted a photo of Nocket’s trademark scribble inside RockyMountainNational park. The Park Service was awaiting confirmation of vandalism in Grand Canyon, Sequoia Kings, Joshua Tree and Bryce national parks. Park officials said in a statement it takes seriously the issue of vandalism, which can be a felony when committed in a national park. “National parks exist to preserve and protect our nation’s natural, cultural and historic heritage for both current and future generations. Vandalism is a violation of the law, and it also damages and sometimes destroys often irreplaceable treasures that belong to all Americans,” Park Service spokesman Jeffrey Olson said in a statement. Nocket, who hails from Highland, N.Y., posted her coarse scribbles — sometimes even photos of herself sketching — on her Instagram and Tumblr accounts under the name Creepy-Tings. After a backpacker posted photos of a Nocket painting along a trail near Yosemite’s Vernal Falls on the website Reddit, the site’s savvy Internet sleuths tracked the photo to Nocket’s social media accounts. Steve Yu, a special agent with the Park Service in Yosemite, saw the post and launched an investigation. Yu declined to comment when reached Thursday. The Internet rage grew with Nocket’s apparent lack of remorse. A painting she posted on her Instagram account of a blue-haired lady on a rock overlooking Oregon’s Crater Lake prodded one of her followers to ask if she was using paint or chalk. Nocket responded that it was acrylic: “I know, I’m a bad person.” In response to angry posts on her Tumblr site early Thursday, she defended the paintings, saying, “It’s art, not vandalism. I am an artist.” Read more here. –Denver Post
Bridger Bowl receives grant to install biomass burner
The biomass boiler being installed at Bridger Bowl Ski Area is not big, but Montana Department of Natural Resources staff think it might lead to bigger things at other ski areas. Bridger Bowl Ski Area will join 10 schools and a handful of other facilities that have installed biomass heating systems since 2003 with the help of U.S. Forest Service grants administered through the DNRC. Bridger Bowl was of three successful applicants in this year’s grant process. Next summer, it will install a $40,000 high-efficiency, cordwood-burning system to heat its maintenance shop using beetle-killed timber from its property. The boiler heats water that then provides radiant heat. “That’s a pretty low price tag — it’s now the smallest project we’ve funded,” said Julie Kies, DNRC biomass program manager. “Before that, the SuperiorCommunityHospital was the smallest with a system that cost more than $450,000. The largest so far is a $1.4 million system at the University of Montana Western in Dillon. We’re excited to see applications of wood energy at all these scales.” Bridger Bowl spokesman Doug Wales said the ski area managers decided to make the best of the beetle infestation around the ski area. “We have this resource so this was a effective way to make use of it,” Wales said. The Forest Service Woody Biomass Utilization Grant — created to increase the use of forest resources in each state by promoting projects that use wood products — provides up to half of the project cost, Kies said. In Montana, biomass boilers burn wood chips, pellets or waste mainly to provide heat, not energy. That’s because biomass electricity is still too expensive to produce when compared to existing electrical costs, Kies said. But biomass boilers can help facilities eliminate 50 to 90 percent of their fossil fuel use, saving up to 75 percent of fuel costs, Kies said. –Bozeman Daily Chronicle
Company officials lament available timber as Forest Service hits regional harvest goal
A dark cloud overshadowed this year’s public tour of the valley’s forest products industry, as logging officials and forest managers expressed frustration over the lack of access to timber. Recent litigation and court orders have cast a pall of gloom over the industry, cracking open old divisions as sawmills reduce production. Last week’s Timber Tour, an annual event hosted by the valley’s chambers of commerce and the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, was intended to showcase the industry and its role in managing forests, but the event concluded in a dim tone. “We are having a serious issue with log supply and it’s become a big challenge,” said Paul McKenzie, lands and resource manager for F.H.StoltzeLand and Lumber. In the last month, two large timber sales — a 36,700-acre project in the StillwaterStateForest and a 37-000-acre project in the FlatheadNational Forest near LindberghLake — were halted in U.S. District Court. A group of environmental organizations challenged the proposed logging projects, arguing the agencies failed to adequately study or respond to the needs of sensitive wildlife, including grizzly bears, lynx and bull trout. Sonya Germann, forest management bureau chief for the DNRC, which was involved in the Stillwater project, said District Judge Donald Molloy’s decision was a surprise and “has profoundly affected our program” moving forward. “The StillwaterForest is in the heart of timber country and it’s really important for the infrastructure around here,” she said. “It’s incredibly frustrating. It really affects the income that we’re able to bring in for the trust beneficiaries. And something that I hope you’re all realizing here today, it effects individual lives, too.” Around the same time the timber sales were halted, Stoltze and Plum Creek both announced reductions in production hours, citing a lack of available log supply. Stoltze also laid off 10 employees. Speaking to a crowd of over 50 people who attended the Timber Tour, McKenzie said the situation needs to be addressed otherwise Montana’s sawmills will continue to shrink and maybe even disappear, leaving the state without a tool to manage its forests. “Once this all goes away, we’re never coming back, folks,” McKenzie said. Others refute claims that logging companies are struggling to find available timber. Mike Garrity, executive director of the Alliance for the Wild Rockies, a regional group that commonly opposes timber sales over environmental concerns, pointed out a recent announcement by the U.S. Forest Service that it had met its timber harvest goal for fiscal year 2014 in Region One, which encompasses Montana, North Dakota, Northern Idaho and Northwestern South Dakota. Last week Faye Krueger, regional forester for the USFS, said roughly 280 million board feet of timber were harvested from Oct. 1, 2013 through Sept. 30, 2014. It was the first time the region had met its target in over 14 years, according to the agency. “They’re making stuff up,” Garrity said of timber companies complaining about supply shortages. “We haven’t shut down the forests. These people just want to get rid of all environmental law so they can clear-cut everything. Until they can do that, they won’t be happy.” –Flathead Beacon
Facing lawsuit, California oil train terminal to shut down
WASHINGTON — A legal victory in California this week over crude oil operations could have a spillover effect, emboldening critics of crude-by-rail shipments to press their concerns in other jurisdictions. EarthJustice, a San Francisco-based environmental group, won its battle to halt crude oil train operations in the state as InterState Oil Co., a Sacramento fuel distributor, agreed to stop unloading train shipments of crude oil next month at the former McClellan Air Force Base. Sacramento County’s top air quality official said his agency mistakenly skirted the state’s environmental rules by issuing a permit for the operation. EarthJustice contended the Sacramento air quality district should not have granted InterState a permit to transfer crude oil from trains to tanker trucks bound for Bay Area oil refineries without a full environmental impact review. The court reversal in California could bolster efforts by environmental groups to slow or stop crude-by-rail projects elsewhere, particularly in Washington state. A proposed terminal in Vancouver, Wash., would transfer oil from trains to tanker ships that could supply California refineries. Patti Goldman, a managing attorney in the Seattle office of EarthJustice, said the decision sounded “a wake-up call” for permitting authorities to consider community input. “We have been seeing local authorities blindly approve crude-by-rail projects without being open with the public and without considering the full effects,” she said. Read more here. –Idaho Statesman
Working Forests Action Network Update
On the path to a prosperous green future, we should be guided by science. That’s the track private forest landowners and state government policymakers have walked together since 1999, when we made the positive choice to adopt adaptive forest management practices that put science — not politics — in the driver’s seat on decisions we make about our natural environment. What’s adapative management, you say? We’re glad you asked. By gathering and analyzing scientific data to measure how well specific forest practices are doing at meeting our shared goals — ensuring that our healthy working forests preserve clean, cool water and habitats for salmon — adaptive management practices are an invaluable tool. Using the data, policymakers will be able to set regulations with greater precision to do the most good for our environment without going so far that sustainable forestry is harmed. But on the way to a good thing, it’s easy to get lost and earlier this year the state government went missing on keeping its commitment to this shared goal. Although the state Senate unanimously passed a bill to fund adaptive management, and an overwhelming bipartisan majority of legislators in the state House pledged support for the measure, time ran out on the session and the legislation failed to get a hearing or a vote. There is still hope to maintain Washington state’s position as a place where science guides our public policy and our environment truly matters. The governor has indicated that he wants to see adaptive management move forward, and strong support is still present in the legislature. Next year, the state budget will be as hot a topic as ever. Funding adaptive management holds the potential to be a net revenue positive for the state, because adaptive management identifies when specific practices can be modified to allow more work to be done in our forests without cutting corners on our environmental commitments. Adaptive management is a win for the environment, a win for everyone involved in our working forests, a win for the state, and a win for science. We will keep you informed on developments in this important issue affecting our working forests. –WFAN
Payette Forest Coalition projects lead to jobs, restoration
The U.S. Forest Service approved an 80,000-acre project to restore Ponderosa pines and improve wildlife habitat on the PayetteNational Forest. Forest Supervisor Keith Lannom signed the Record of Decision for the Lost Creek – Boulder Creek Landscape Restoration project. It’s the second of five landscape level forest restoration projects under the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program, where loggers, conservationists sportsmen and others work together on the plan. “The key ingredient in development of these restoration projects is the collaborative efforts of the Payette Forest Coalition,” said Lannom. “The Coalition represents groups that in the past didn’t see eye to eye on Forest Service activities.” The project includes timber harvest and thinnings, prescribed fire, road decommissioning, road maintenance, trail maintenance, trailhead parking expansion, decommissioning unsustainable recreation facilities, creating sustainable dispersed camping sites, installing vault toilets, designating twelve miles of off-road vehicle routes, and culvert replacement. “This project truly has all the elements of effective forest management, and we look forward to starting and completing this effort to restore forest health,” said Lannom. The projects come in an area with some of the highest unemployment in Idaho. Already timber sales that have come out of the collaborative process have prompted the Evergreen Mill in Tamarack near New Meadows to add a second shift. The sales also have raised $6 million for restoration work and attracted another $2.6 million from the Forest Service for road work. “The project may take up to ten years to be fully implemented,” said Kim Pierson, New Meadows District Ranger. “But as these activities are completed the forest will become more resistant to catastrophic wildfire and pest epidemics, fish and wildlife habitat will be improved, recreation and camping experiences will be enhanced, and the open road system will be in better condition.” Read more here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/2014/09/06/3360657_payette-forest-coalition-projects.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy
Fake News from The Onion: NYC Officials Assure Public Most Puddles Of Bodily Fluid On Streets Not Contaminated With Ebola
NEW YORK—Hoping to downplay fears of a potential Ebola outbreak in New York City, health officials assured residents Friday that most puddles of bodily fluid found on the streets are not contaminated with the deadly Ebola virus. “I want to emphasize that the pools of vomit, urine, and other fluids people may notice as they walk around the city are very unlikely to be contaminated with Ebola,” said New York City health commissioner Dr. Mary Bassett, adding that such fluids, as well as occasional clumps of feces, were almost certainly not deposited onto the streets and sidewalks by an infected individual. “While we are confident that these substances are free of Ebola specifically, contact with them may pose other health hazards, so we encourage all New Yorkers to continue stepping over them as always. There is no reason for anyone to change their normal routine.” Bassett went on to say that any individual who displayed the symptoms indicative of Ebola should immediately refrain from discharging bodily fluids in public.