Forest Service to Release Draft Motorized Travel Plans

Forest Service officials will hold public meetings in March to familiarize the public with new draft plans for motorized travel management on the Black Hills National Forest.

The meetings are scheduled for two hours each, 6-8pm, March 9, 10, 11 & 12.

Meeting attendees will hear a presentation and join Forest Service personnel who will help people to get to know the documents. Detailed maps illustrate five alternative approaches to motorized travel in the Forest. The public will be able to participate in a question and answer period, officials said.

Forest Supervisor Craig Bobzien said the alternatives reflect hundreds of public comments gathered at Forest Service meetings and meetings hosted by the Black Hills National Forest Advisory Board, a citizen advisory board appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture to advise the Forest Service on Forest management.

The Forest Service has prepared a Draft Environmental Impact Statement with five alternative approaches for motorized travel management in the Black Hills National Forest for further review and further comment, Bobzien said.

“We will have public comments on the alternatives presented in the Draft EIS to further refine alternatives in the Final EIS,” he said.

The public will have 45 days during the official comment period to comment on the proposals, beginning March 20 and ending on May 4. Officials said people should comment during the formal comment period because of legal requirements in the National Environmental Policy Act process.

“People will have an opportunity to listen, look, and ask questions, and then to tell us what they think,” said Frank Carroll, forest planner. Carroll said the formal public meetings will be followed by individual ranger district meetings that will be announced later in March.

Bobzien said he intends to make a final decision and select an alternative in late 2009. The Forest Service will publish a Motor Vehicle Use Map implementing the decision in 2010.

Schedule:
Monday, March 9: 6pm – 8pm
Sundance, WY
Crook County Courthouse
Tuesday, March 10: 6pm-8pm -
Spearfish, SD
Holiday Inn Express
Wednesday, March 11: 6pm-8pm -
Rapid City, SD
Ramkota Hotel
Thursday, March 12: 6pm-8pm -
Custer, SD
Crazy Horse Memorial

For more information call travel planner Tom Willems or Forest Planner Frank Carroll at 605-673-9200 or visit the Black Hills National Forest website at www.fs.fed.us/r2/blackhills

Source: http://blackhillsportal.com/npps/story.cfm?id=2930

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