In early March,
the County Commissioners
of Idaho's Benewah,
Shoshone, Bonner, Boundary and Kootenai counties requested a 45-day extension
of the public's comment period for the Idaho Panhandle National Forests Draft
Management Plan and were granted a 30-day extension. The new public comment
deadline is May 7, 2012.
The Idaho Panhandle
National Forests consist of three individual proclaimed national forests-the
Kaniksu, the Coeur d' Alene and the St. Joe-and
of the total 2,500,700 acres, about 2,351,100 acres are in North
Idaho.
Given that the
activities in the Idaho Panhandle National Forests are vital to the economic,
cultural and social well being of each county, the Commissioners feel it is
vital that the proposed draft be understood and analyzed in-depth as to the
potential effects on each county.
Therefore, the
Commissioners requested a presentation of the Draft Management Plan. The
Kootenai County Commissioners are sponsoring this presentation on Monday, April
23 at 5:30 p.m. in the Kootenai
County Administration
Building, Room 1A/1B.
Kent Wellner, Forest
Planner with the Idaho Panhandle National Forests, will present a PowerPoint
presentation of the proposed plan with a question and answer session to
follow. Mounted maps will be on display
for the public's viewing.
We invite and
encourage the public to attend this presentation.
If you have any
questions, please feel free to contact the Kootenai County Commissioner's
office at 446-1600 or kcbocc@kcgov.us.