Idaho Wilderness Hearings

Statement:

Mr. Boomer. I'm a country lawyer from Kamiah, which is a logging town. And the majority of my clients are either loggers or millworkers. So I guess you could say that I indirectly earn my living from the paper industry. I want to see a stable, strong, productive timber industry in Idaho. But I also want my children and my children's children to be able to enjoy the same Idaho that I've been able to enjoy. I want to address my remarks and my testimony to the area that I know best. It's pictured there on the map. And that is the Kelly-Cayuse Creek area. I've only logged 3 months out of my life. So I sure can't consider myself a professional logger. But I tell you, that Toboggan Ridge area that the Forest Service has plans to log is as steep as a cow's face. The timber is so poor it's unreal. I think it's beyond question that that would be a deficit timber sale financed by the taxpayers of this country. I think it's beyond the question that the Forest Service's own research documents it that it would significantly reduce the quality and the amount of fish in the entire North Fork drainage. I think it's beyond the question that the lodgepole pine from that area would not go to Idaho mills but would go to the nearest mill, which is in Superior, Mont. So for all those reasons, Senator, I think the best thing that we could do is to let the Cayuse-Kelly Creek area grow what it grows best; that's elk and cutthroat trout. That will add to our economy, I think, in the future particularly as areas like this become fewer and farther between. Let's give the taxpayers a break and leave it the way it it. I don't propose closing off any roads. I don't think we have to keep motorcycles off the trails. I don't think we have to have those kinds of restrictions. But I don't see any sense whatsoever in logging it. It's a boondoggle. And I thank you for this opportunity to testify.