Idaho County commissioner: Shutdown proves state should manage public lands

Idaho County Commissioner Skip Brandt isn’t pointing fingers at Democrats or Republicans in Washington for the fact that national wildlife refuges, Bureau of Land Management campgrounds, boat ramps, visitor centers and other developed recreation sites, national forest developed areas and all national parks are closed. ✧ “Federal employees have decided to make their furloughs as painful as possible for the public,” Brandt wrote in an email. ✧ “So apparently the ‘Federal’ lands/ facilities are not 'true public' lands/ property after all, but rather are the bureaucracy’s property,” Brandt wrote in a email. “Thus if the bureaucrats/ Federal employees do not have a pay check the properties are off limits to the ‘subjects’” ✧ Brandt has a solution: “It is time that the Federal lands become managed/ accountable State lands.” Read more at Idaho Statesman
(Hat tip: Jo Rae Perkins for U.S. Senate) Read More......

Road closure plan for Oregon's largest national forest targets a nearly 4,000-mile network

LA GRANDE (3/15/2012) -- Starting in June, passenger cars, ATVs, dirt bikes and four-wheel-drive rigs can no longer travel on almost 4,000 miles of roads in Oregon's largest national forest.  ✧ The final plan for Wallowa-Whitman National Forest -- to be entered today into the Federal Register -- is already drawing opposition. People have 45 days to appeal.  ✧ Earlier versions of the policy triggered one of the most vocal resistance efforts in the state, with more than 6,000 people signing petitions urging the U.S. Forest Service to leave all the forest's roads open. Read more: OregonLive.com Read More......