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Thursday, October 11, 2007

Forest District Faces Change

By Lee Ross
Mountain View Telegraph
    Even though she is not talking about hunting, Karen Takai said she's chasing a moving target in the Sandia Ranger District of the Cibola National Forest.
    Takai, fire information and public affairs officer for the ranger district, said a number of issues relating to forest health in the district continue to change.
    At the same time, the district is facing budget cuts, has seven unfilled positions and is looking ahead to what might be a dry winter and the resulting fire danger.
    Things might be turning around for the district, however.
    Potential candidates have been identified for all of the vacant positions. Within two weeks, Takai said, a selection may be made for one of the more important positions, fire management officer.
    The final selection for that position will be made by Nancy Rose, forest supervisor for the Cibola National Forest.
    A fire management officer is responsible for helping to rehabilitate areas that have burned and controlling and helping to prevent wildfires.
    The district's fire management officer left two months ago.
    The position is also important for the completion of an environmental analysis (EA). An EA is pending for a proposed thinning project near Cedar Crest.
    The project is in the Casa Loma and Cole Springs areas around Cedar Crest and north to the Cienega Picnic Ground area.
    District Ranger Cid Morgan said the ongoing environmental analysis for the project will encompass fewer than 2,500 acres.
    Among other things, the EA will report on the projected impact of the thinning project before it is done, and it is required by law before work can begin.
    Meanwhile, the ranger district has other, ongoing thinning projects. Non-native Siberian elms, listed as an invasive exotic species on the state noxious weed list, are being cut around the ranger station in Tijeras.
    The project may extend into the forest from the ranger station, which is south of Old Route 66 on N.M. 337.
    The district also has an ongoing thinning project along Forest Road 462, which parallels Old Route 66 from the ranger station to Tablazon.
    A crew that includes state inmates is currently finishing the last 50 acres of that project, which has gone on for about two years.
    The district is also working on a map of forest trails that limits where ATVs, motorcycles and four-wheel drive vehicles would be allowed to operate. That is part of an attempt to curb unmanaged recreation on national forest land.
    The proposed limitations are at the center of quite a bit of controversy. The final decision on which trails can be used by different types of motorized vehicles will also be made by the forest supervisor.
    That ruling was previously scheduled to be made by the end of the year, but has been postponed to around the beginning of March, according to Nancy Brunswick, recreation program manager for the Cibola National Forest.
    Meanwhile, things are heating up in the Mountainair Ranger District.
    Arlene Perea said a controlled burn of 100 acres in Ox Canyon was done this month. The burns help to reduce dangerous fuel loads in the forest.
    There are specific parameters for the burns, Perea said. High winds or high forest-use periods, for example, can put a stop to a burn.
    Perea added that her district is not permitted to burn during the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta. In part, that is because the leaves are usually changing colors at that time, which tends to draw crowds.
    Controlled burns are tentatively expected to resume Tuesday.
    Although the Mountainair Ranger District doesn't have the population or heavy use of the Sandia district, it still has its issues, Perea said.
    "There are groups that don't agree with what we're doing ... we have our share of challenges," she said.
    One issue her district has that the Sandia district doesn't is grazing rights, she said.
    "That's always an issue," she said.