[Vision2020] Could it -- or has it -- Happen in this Area?

[lfalen]

Regardless of ones position on this issue, It should be done in public.
Roger
-----Original message-----
From: "Saundra Lund" sslund_2007 at verizon.net
Date: Sat, 05 Jul 2008 00:10:16 -0700
To: vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: [Vision2020] Could it -- or has it -- Happen in this Area?

> Closed-Door Deal Could Open Land In Montana
> Forest Service Angers Locals With Move That May Speed Building
> 
> By Karl Vick
> Washington Post Staff Writer 
> Saturday, July 5, 2008; Page A01 
> 
> MISSOULA, Mont. -- The Bush administration is preparing to ease the way for
> the nation's largest private landowner to convert hundreds of thousands of
> acres of mountain forestland to residential subdivisions. 
> 
> The deal was struck behind closed doors between Mark E. Rey, the former
> timber lobbyist who oversees the U.S. Forest Service, and Plum Creek Timber
> Co., a former logging company turned real estate investment trust that is
> building homes. Plum Creek owns more than 8 million acres nationwide,
> including 1.2 million acres in the mountains of western Montana, where local
> officials were stunned and outraged at the deal. 
> 
> "We have 40 years of Forest Service history that has been reversed in the
> last three months," said Pat O'Herren, an official in Missoula County, which
> is threatening to sue the Forest Service for forgoing environmental
> assessments and other procedures that would have given the public a voice in
> the matter. 
> <snip>
> 
> <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/04/AR200807040
> 2772.html?nav=rss_nation>
> OR
> http://tinyurl.com/58g4bm
> 
> 
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