They agreed to write a letter of support for a grant to provide public transportation in Custer and Lemhi counties, but disagreed with the Forest Service’s recent denial of Custer County’s appeal of the Salmon-Challis National Forest travel plan.

They also interviewed candidates for a new Road and Bridge Supervisor to replace Jim Sugden, who is retiring later this month.

Public transportation

JoAnn Wolters, co-chair of the Horizons Transportation Action Team in Salmon, talked the commissioners into writing a letter of support for a $300,000 grant to fund public transportation in Custer and Lemhi counties.

The team is applying to the Idaho Office of Energy Resources and is looking into other grants to restore bus transportation to the Thompson Creek Mine from Challis and to expand public transportation in both counties, Wolters told The Challis Messenger after the meeting.

The group will know by February 18 if it gets the grant, which would be administered by the City of Salmon, Wolters said. She said the Custer and Lemhi county commissioners support the idea.

The commissioners liked that the grant would not just fund a feasibility study, but something tangible that could benefit both communities, Commissioner Wayne Butts said.

Thompson Creek Mine discontinued a partial subsidy for employees to ride the Access Bus to work and that service ended last fall. Besides restoring bus service to the mine, Wolters and fellow team members would like to see public transportation routes from Salmon and Challis to Missoula. Eventually, they would like to see routes from the two cities to Idaho Falls, from Mackay to the INL site and from Stanley to Boise.

In the grant application, the team is specifying that the private company providing the service would have to be local, based in Lemhi or Custer county. That would provide local jobs, stimulate the economy, increase safety by decreasing accidents and provide better public transportation service than is now available, Wolters said.

The Idaho Falls-based Targhee Regional Public Transportation Authority (TRPTA) now offers a Wednesday route from Salmon to Idaho Falls with stops in Challis, Mackay and Arco, but Wolters and her team believe a local company based in Custer or Lemhi county would provide better service.

TRPTA is partially subsidized by Federal Transit Administration grant funds and Wolters and her team also hope to obtain FTA funding to help subsidize a local, private company.

Mark Troy’s Access Bus Company, which provided service to the Thompson Creek Mine, and other local companies would have to submit bids to take over the proposed routes.

Forest travel plan

Custer County appealed the Salmon-Challis National Forest travel plan in 2009 and received a Forest Service reply December 17 denying the appeal. The commissioners appealed the plan on 37 separate issues, all of which were denied by the agency.

Among other things, the county contended the Forest Service did not do a complete inventory of roads and trails and illegally closed historically traveled rights of way under R.S. 2477. Also, the travel map is incomplete; the agency incorrectly prohibits cross-country motorized travel under its Travel Management Rules; the plan denies access to private land by property owners and mining claims, does not help handicapped people gain access to the forest under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and does not do a site-specific fisheries analysis of roads crossing streams that have species listed under the Endangered Species Act.

The commissioners contend the agency did not fully coordinate with Custer and Lemhi counties. The appeal also takes issue with provisions of the travel plan for dispersed camping and its prohibition of game retrieval off-road by hunters; says the wildlife analysis was arbitrary and not site-specific; notes the lack of a safety plan on roads shared by ATV riders and drivers of other vehicles; says the plan doesn’t specify how firewood gathering or inventoried roadless areas under the Idaho Roadless Plan would be affected; and finally states that the travel plan would stifle economic growth.

The Forest Service disagreed with all of the above, saying it had considered in depth all 37 of the appeal issues the county raised in the travel plan. But the commissioners in turn disagree with that contention, believe the county was denied due process and are now considering an appeal in court, Butts said.

They plan to first consult Meridian resident Fred Kelly Grant of American Stewards of Liberty, who developed the concept of coordination between local and federal governments as found in the Federal Land Policy and Management Act. Coordi-nation is a process that allows local governments more input on federal land use policies than traditional cooperation.

“I think we had legitimate complaints and thought we prepared and did our homework well,” Butts said of the county’s appeal.

“I think the system sucks,” said Butts, because the Forest Service’s regional office, not a neutral third party, considered the county’s appeal and predictably sided with Salmon-Challis National Forest Supervisor Bill Wood’s decision.

“I think they just hoped when they denied it [the appeal], it would be the end of it and we’d go away,” Butts said. “That’s certainly not the case. We’re not going to cower. They’re going to answer some questions.”