USFS Terminations

[designgrizzly]

I recommend calling, but also write letters outlining your concerns from your specific perspective, and do it for Newhouse, Murray and Cantwell. Avoid the abstract - make it real. I think the description given by abrookes would be quite helpful, but tailor it to your circumstances - are you most worried about your own recreational opportunities? About the impact on tourism businesses (especially compounded with the impact from bullying our neighbors to the north)? About the short-term impact on wildfire risk reduction? About the long-term effects on forest health? About the long-term likelihood of these lands being sold to private interests? A friend brought this up yesterday - how long until you think the topic of the copper mine above Mazama comes up again?

In any event, write it up soon. While I have my own strong concerns about this topic, and am angry about the impact on local families, it will be pretty far down our list of concerns sooner than we'd care to admit.

Bret Richmond
Wolf Creek

[Reapward]

Thanks Bret. Great questions. I am not that concerned about my own trail use. I use animal trails mostly. But the other impacts and questions you present are what I will talk to a Newhouse staffer about. And I know I have to take a few of those, not the whole mass to present to Newhouse.

[emily_sisson]

The jobs that were terminated, was there money allocated for them but the Trump administration decided not to spend it? If so, the courts may be able to provide some relief, but I’m not exactly sure who needs to sue who.

In the meantime, let’s try to get Newhouse to take a stand, make a speech, something.

[Reapward]

Yes regarding Newhouse.

[BSMoran]

Because of the overwhelmingly negative responses from constituents at the townhalls about Trump and Musks unsubstantiated and poorly executed federal employee terminations, the Republican leadership is now advising all Republican Representatives and Senators to discontinue having townhalls. They are concerned about the optics in the media of having their angry constituents speak out in opposition. Good luck getting Representative Newhouse to hold a townhall. I note that his voting record has pretty much been in "lock step" with the Trump-Musk agenda, and he has been unwilling to speak out in opposition to what is going on with this craziness that is going to adversely affect many of our essential federal services, including in our district that he purports to represent.
Bruce Moran
Mazama

[Reapward]

He does back Ukraine at least.

[emily_sisson]

Bruce: I don’t see Newhouse holding a town hall meeting, but if we call his office often enough, we might get him to say they should nix the USFS job cuts.

I called his office 4 or 5 times this year, asking where he stood on birthright citizenship. Finally I wrote a letter to a Yakima newspaper asking the same question, and someone from his office called me within a few days with an answer! The guy said Newhouse does support birthright citizenship. Small victories.

[BCW]

I called his DC office this morning asking his receptionist to pass on the message that I wanted to know whether he was ever going to stand up to that gangster and his co-president and that I wanted to know what he was doing about the cuts to our ranger district. She started to defend him, saying “he was talking to the administration about this.” I told her I wasn’t interested in her defense of him, I wanted her to pass on the message to him that I voted for him (more the fool me, thinking he’d be the lesser of two evils over Sessler) and I didn’t see anything happening and there was a stock team going to be sold at auction because Elon Musk had fired all the “probationary” workers. I was polite but furious and said I wanted Representative Newhouse to take some action.
B Wilimovsky

[Solstice]

There's an excellent article in today's Seattle Times:

Trump’s Forest Service Firings Killed Dreams, Left Big Holes To Fill In WA.

Five Forest Service personnel were featured—two of them locals from the Methow Valley Ranger District. Real people and real services axed in many hundreds of indiscriminate, chaotic actions undertaken by the Musk/Trump's regime in a few short weeks.

[wildramble]

A concise and articulate write-up may also be found within the pages of High Country News [an award-winning journalistic outfit based in a similar community, Paonia, Colorado] as well numerous other articles following the current administrations' directives towards resource extraction and other privatization goals. HCN is a .org website allowing a few articles to be read per month. The journalism team is based throughout the west and freelance for many other noteworthy, high-integrity of journalism standards publications.