A federal judge sided with an environmental group and recently ruled the Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forest erred by continuing to allow motorcycles and all-terrain-vehicles to use the Fish Lake Trail.
U.S. District Court Judge B. Lynn Winmill at Boise ruled the forest violated its management plan and travel rules when it approved motorized vehicles to access the remote lake in the upper reaches of the North Fork of the Clearwater River basin not far from the Montana state line. The lake is also within the Great Burn Inventoried Roadless Area that forest officials previously recommended Congress consider designating an official wilderness area where motorized travel is prohibited. Congress has yet to act on the proposal made in 1987. Last year, the Friends of the Clearwater, a Moscow-based environmental group, filed a lawsuit challenging a 2017 vehicle use rule issued by Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forest Supervisor Cheryl Probert, claiming motorcycle and all-terrain vehicle traffic on the trail would damage habitat for several species, including elk.
The suit was based in part on a 2015 ruling from Winmill that said a Nez Perce-Clearwater Forest Travel Plan allowing motorized access to the lake was in conflict with the agency’s Forest Plan requiring elk habitat in the area attain a high standard of protection. In the latest case, Winmill ruled that in allowing motorized vehicles on the Fish Lake Trail, the agency was attempting to “relitigate” an issue that the court had already decided. Essentially the judge said the 2015 case determined allowing motorized use on the trail did not meet elk security standards in the Forest Plan and the agency’s 2017 Travel Plan repeated the error. (Lewiston Tribune)
