[MCN] MONTANA GROUPS TO SENATORS, FOREST SERVICE––NO MOUNTAIN BIKE DEALS IN PROPOSED WILDERNESS, GRIZZLY BEAR HABITAT

[Dawn Serra]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 4, 2017

Contact: George Nickas, 406-531-2355; Keith Hammer, 406-755-1379; Mike 
Jarnevic, mountain bike user/Sierra Club member 406-544-8671

*MONTANA GROUPS TO SENATORS, FOREST SERVICE––NO MOUNTAIN BIKE DEALS IN 
PROPOSED WILDERNESS, GRIZZLY BEAR HABITAT*

MISSOULA–– Nine conservation organizations from throughout Montana today 
sent a letter (http://bit.ly/2j188Ow)to Senators Jon Tester and Steve 
Daines and the U.S. Forest Service opposing a mountain bike play area in 
a proposed Wilderness Area on the Lolo National Forest.

The letter states the deal announced between the Blackfoot Clearwater 
Stewardship Project, Montana Wilderness Association and the 
International Mountain Bike Association proposing a 3,000 acre “play 
area” for mountain bikes is /“both a terrible idea and a terrible 
precedent.” /

//

/“This deal between user groups, prior to the forest plan revision 
process, is an end run around the greater public and the public 
involvement process. Please adhere to the established land management 
planning and public involvement process so that the broader American 
public can be involved and not just a handful of self-selected special 
interest user groups. These lands belong to all of the American people 
–– not just the political elite special interests. The American people 
are absolutely fed up with political insiders making deals that affect 
them. “ /

The roadless areas in the Monture Creek and Swan Front have been 
proposed for inclusion in the Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex for 
decades and support a host of primitive recreation activities as well as 
being prime elk habitat accessed by hunters. It is also primary grizzly 
bear habitat within the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem Recovery Area.

"This is another unfortunate example of humans and their machines 
penetrating deeper into our few remaining wildlands," stated Wilderness 
Watch executive director, George Nickas.  "Places like Monture Creek 
need to be preserved intact for wildlife and wild nature, not divvied up 
amongst the ceaseless demands of recreation user groups.”

The groups object to the inherent conflict of mountain biking in grizzly 
bear habitat, noting the Forest Service has not fully learned the 
lessons from the tragic mountain biking death of Forest Service employee 
Brad Treat, who collided with a grizzly bear and was fatally mauled. The 
groups emphasize that /*“for the purposes of public lands management and 
planning and assessing the impacts to wildlife, we strongly believe that 
mountain bikes should be re-classified as mechanized recreation vehicles 
with impacts more similar to motorized vehicles than traditional hiking 
or stock use.”*/**

"State and federal agencies have long warned against high-speed mountain 
biking in bear habitat," said Swan View Coalition Chair Keith Hammer. 
"Mountain bike play areas don't belong in the backcountry and wilderness 
designation should instead be pursued for the protection of wildlife."

“As a mountain biker, I believe mountain bikes have their place, but 
that place is not in roadless areas that have potential for wilderness 
designation. And mountain bikes, by their very nature, are disruptive to 
the concept of ‘an area where the earth and its community of life are 
untrammelled by man,’" explained Mike Jarnevic, a mountain bike user and 
Sierra Club member.

Jonathan Matthews, chair of the Montana Sierra Club and a Helena 
resident said, “I love mountain biking, but mountain bikes do not belong 
in wilderness areas or areas with wilderness character. These places are 
sanctuaries from the mechanized world. There are so few of these truly 
wild places left and we need to preserve them, not surrender them to 
mountain bike play areas."

A copy of the letter is here: http://bit.ly/2j188Ow

# # #


-- 

Dawn Serra
Communications and Outreach Coordinator*
Wilderness Watch
*P.O. Box 9175
Missoula, MT 59807
P: 406.542.2048

www.wildernesswatch.org <http://www.wildernesswatch.org>
“Like” WW on Facebook 
<https://www.facebook.com/pages/Wilderness-Watch/130160330396668?sk=wall>

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Donate <https://wildernesswatch.crm.salsalabs.org/webDonation/>
/
/*/Wilderness Watch/*///defends our 110 million-acre National Wilderness 
Preservation System.

/

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