I have written a lot about CIEDRA (Wilderness, with side payments in the Boulder and White Cloud Mountains). I have written less about the Owyhee Initiative (Wilderness, with side payments in a huge region of arid, unpopulated steppe and canyon country in SW Idaho).
CIEDRA has already passed the House. This is the first legislative test of the Owyhee Initiative.
These bills are the product of years of negotiations. There is plenty for conservationists to dislike (and like) in both.
Rocky Barker has a feature in the Idaho Statesman today about several female activistis who both hate the legislation, but are on opposite sides of the fence. Article.
Of course, many other women, women in favor of the legislation could have been featured too.
I know a lot of the conservationists who are currently taking different sides on the bills.
Ralph Maughan
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University. He was a Western Watersheds Project Board Member off and on for many years, and was also its President for several years. For a long time he produced Ralph Maughan's Wolf Report. He was a founder of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. He and Jackie Johnson Maughan wrote three editions of "Hiking Idaho." He also wrote "Beyond the Tetons" and "Backpacking Wyoming's Teton and Washakie Wilderness." He created and is the administrator of The Wildlife News.
