Idaho Wilderness Hearings

Statement:

Mr. Matthews. I'm speaking as a private citizen and although I'm not a member of any special interest group and I neither hunt nor fish, Idaho is a land I've come to greatly appreciate these 8 years that I've lived here. I hope that Idaho can maintain the qual ity of life that the people now enjoy. It takes many years for God to build a wilderness and only moments for man to wreck a wilder ness through foolishness or mismanagement. If we do lose a wilder ness, do we really know the impact on the environment when a wilderness disappears? Thus, I oppose a hard release of the roadless areas and support as a minimum the designation of the Endangered Idaho Wilderness Core, the Italian Peaks, Lionhead, Diamond Peak, Bear Creek, and Borah Peak as wilderness. The above named areas are excellent havens for many big game animals such as cougar, bighorn sheep, bear, elk, and also eagles. Human intrusion with roads and attendant activities will reduce the habitat of these animals. Just the aesthetic value of these ani mals is worth preserving in a pristine state to let them roam as free as possible. Many of these areas are not practical for logging either. Rugged terrain complicates roadbuilding. Furthermore, is the Forest Serv ice going to continue their unwise fiscal practice of constructing roads in an area when their revenues for timber sales are less than the cost of the roads? I would rather my tax subsidy support educa tion. Because of the fragile nature of much of the Idaho topsoil and steep terrain in these areas, increased erosion is also a real possi bility with the intervention of roads. Water quality is much superi or in roadless watershed areas as opposed to areas with roads. Also, increased siltation is a likelihood that reduces fish spawning grounds, and these can't be recovered. Also, how much wilderness will be destroyed before the oil and gas companies conclude that there are no resources to exploit here in eastern Idaho? Isn't several years long enough to conclude there are no resources to exploit? Is the destruction of wilderness worth the price for only hypothetical oil and gas? If we continue to lose wilderness in such pristine areas as those mentioned, will Chief Seattle's words to President Franklin Pierce in 1855 prove to be prophetic words? And these are his words: The whites too shall pass, perhaps sooner than other tribes. Continue to contami nate your bed and you will one night suffocate in your own waste. When the buffalo are all slaughtered, the wild horses all tamed, the secret corners of the forest heavy with the scent of many men, and the view of the ripe hills blotted by talking wires, where is the thicket? Gone. Where is the eagle? Gone. And what is it to say goodbye to the swift and the hunt, the end of living and the beginning of survival.