Tag Archives: Forest Jobs and Recreation Act

Tester’s forest bill passes Senate committee

A tweaked version of Senator John Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act made it through the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this morning . . .

A new version of Sen. Jon Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act passed a divided Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Thursday morning, clearing a path for the full Senate to consider it.

The latest draft of the four-year-old bill keeps a mandate to harvest or thin 100,000 acres of timber in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge and Kootenai national forests over 15 years. But it switches about 23,000 acres of proposed wilderness into less-restrictive recreation areas.

That brings the tally to about 637,000 acres of new wilderness and 360,000 acres of recreation areas allowing some motorized or commercial use in Montana.

Other changes include a requirement for the U.S. Forest Service to file a compliance report if it fails to meet the bill’s performance requirements, and a guarantee the Montana pilot program won’t draw funds from other state programs or Forest Service regions.

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Tester’s forest bill set for markup this week

Jon Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act gets its first real hearing when it comes in front of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this week . . .

Sen. Jon Tester’s bill authorizing more logging and more wilderness in Montana goes before a Senate committee review on Thursday, four years after it was introduced.

“This is the first time the bill has been voted on anywhere in Congress,” said Paul Spitler, wilderness campaign director for the Wilderness Society in Bozeman. “It’s a pretty important day for this legislation for it to see a vote.”

The Forest Jobs and Recreation Act gets a markup hearing in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee – a crucial step in moving legislation toward a vote of the whole chamber.

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Tester and Baucus make another push to get their forest bills through the system

Senators Baucus and Tester took another swing Tuesday at getting their respective forest bills back under consideration in the U.S. Senate . . .

U.S. Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester told their colleagues Tuesday that it is time to pass their bills expanding forest protections.

Both Democrats testified in Washington, D.C., to the U.S. Senate Public Lands, Forests, and Mining Subcommittee on measures that failed to clear the last Congress.

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Groups want action on Forest Jobs and Recreation Act

According to an editorial in today’s Flathead Beacon, a bunch of the groups behind the development of the Forest Jobs and Recreation Act are getting cranky about its slow passage through the halls of Congress . . .

Yet another year of gridlock has passed. It’s time for our lawmakers to finally come together and pass the Forest Jobs and Recreation Act (FJRA). If implemented, here’s what will happen locally on the Kootenai National Forest (KNF)…

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Tester’s wilderness bill back in play

U.S. Senator Jon Tester has gotten his “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act” included in a current Interior Department appropriations bill. Again. The Missoulian has a write-up . . .

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester announced the inclusion of his Forest Jobs and Recreation Act in a Senate appropriations bill at a rally Friday on the University of Montana campus.

“If you join me, we’ll be able to get it across the finish line,” Tester told some 100 supporters from UM and the woods and sawmills of western Montana.

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Tea Party group proposes change in Forest Jobs and Recreation Act

From today’s Daily Inter Lake . . .

The Northwest Montana Patriots Association, one of more than a dozen Tea Party groups in the state, is weighing in on the Montana wilderness issue with Sen. Jon Tester.

The group is doing it with an unusual states’ rights suggestion to turn over management authority of some federal lands to the state as other federal lands are designated as wilderness under Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act.

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Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act dead for 2011

It’s official, Sen. Jon Tester’s “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act” is dead for this year . . .

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act was not included in a House version of the 2012 omnibus bill to fund the federal government that was released Thursday morning, setting off a round of finger-pointing between his office and that of Rep. Denny Rehberg.

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Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act might get a shot before year-end

From today’s Missoulian . . .

Sen. Jon Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act may get a last-minute vote before Congress closes out 2011.

But a lot of other Montana-related legislation will probably give the hurly-burly of December’s must-pass congressional action a pass. That includes Sen. Max Baucus’ Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act, Rep. Denny Rehberg’s Montana Land Sovereignty Act, and the Flathead Watershed Protection Act that both Baucus and Tester co-sponsored. However, Rehberg may get a vote on a measure to fast-track permitting of a U.S.-Canadian oil pipeline.

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Sen. Jon Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act draws mixed reviews

This is a pretty good report on yesterdays’ hearings before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee regarding Sen. Jon Tester’s proposed Forest Jobs and Recreation Act . . .

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., got some unexpected support from potential critics of his Forest Jobs and Recreation Act and doubts from assumed allies during a congressional hearing on Wednesday.

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Tester’s “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act” gets new Senate hearing

From an AP article posted in today’s Flathead Beacon . . .

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester’s bill to increase both logging and wilderness areas in Montana was the focus of another Senate hearing Wednesday as the Democrat hopes to move forward a plan that has already become an issue in his high-profile election challenge from Republican U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in Washington again took testimony on a re-introduced version of a bill Tester first put forward nearly two years ago. Committee members expressed interest in working with Tester to advance a measure that died late last year as part of a last-minute budget bill.

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