Sportsmen for Boulder-White Clouds Congratulate Simpson on Wilderness Bill Passage, Urge Protection for East Fork Salmon
(BOISE, IDAHO)—Following news of the passage of the The Sawtooth National Recreation Area and Jerry Peak Wilderness Additions Act (formerly CIEDRA), Sportsmen for Boulder-White Clouds, released a statement thanking Congress for protecting Idaho’s crown jewel. The bill was championed by Congressman Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) and pushed through the upper chamber by Senator Jim Risch (R-Idaho).
Michael Gibson, Outreach Coordinator for Sportsmen for Boulder-White Clouds noted, “On behalf of the many Idaho sportsmen and women who treasure this area, I want to thank Congressman Simpson for his tireless efforts to provide wilderness protections to the Boulder-White Clouds. Wilderness provides the highest level of protection for big-game security and watershed health. We also appreciate that the Administration and USDA Under Secretary Robert Bonnie have listened to sportsmen and are fortunate Congress has acted to protect the area as wilderness. We are glad that our Idaho representatives, and everyone in Congress, recognize the importance of this area and the need to protect it in perpetuity.”
Sportsmen for Boulder-White Clouds is a growing group of Idaho hunters and anglers seeking greater protections for the area in the form of a national monument. Because of congressional gridlock on wilderness, a monument designation became the most viable vehicle for increasing protections for fish and game habitat. Administration officials had engaged with local stakeholders on the issue and had tentatively scheduled a visit in August to hear from Idahoans about this treasured landscape.
The new wilderness protects some of Idaho’s best high alpine big-game habitat. It does, however, release four wilderness study areas located on Bureau of Land Management lands adjacent to the proposed wilderness units. Reduced protections here would leave the East Fork Salmon watershed, an area included in the proposed Boulder-White Clouds National Monument because of its world unique fisheries resource, vulnerable to future development pressures.
“There is still work to be done in protecting the East Fork of the Salmon watershed,” Gibson continues. “The East Fork is the highest spawning habitat for salmon and steelhead found anywhere in the world. Although we made a huge leap forward today, it is critical that Idaho sportsmen and women continue working to provide protections for that area.”
Compared with the nearly 600,000-acre monument proposal, the new wilderness legislation will provide protections to 295,960 acres of the Hemingway-Boulders Wilderness, the White Clouds Wilderness, and the Jim McClure-Jerry Peak Wilderness.
Sportsmen for Boulder-White Clouds looks forward to celebrating the new Boulder-White Clouds Wilderness with Congressman Simpson, Senator Risch, the Administration and USDA Under Secretary Bonnie at the Sawtooth Brewery in Ketchum, Idaho on August 10th.
