Judge voids Bitterroot Forest road-density change
Laura Lundquist
(Missoula Current) A federal judge has ruled that, prior to approving more logging projects, the Bitterroot National Forest must analyze whether building more roads would affect grizzly bears and bull trout.
On Tuesday, Missoula federal district judge Dana Christensen issued his decision on what the Bitterroot Forest must do to correct the illegal steps it took to allow more road construction across the forest. He ruled that the Bitterroot Forest must void part of a recent amendment that eliminated previous road-density standards while the Forest Service analyzes how that amendment could harm threatened species.
A month ago, Christensen ruled in favor of wildlife advocates who said the Bitterroot Forest had failed to consider how a 2023 change to eliminate road-density standards - Amendment 40 - would affect threatened species like grizzly bears and bull trout. But he needed more information from the two parties before deciding the appropriate action, which he issued Tuesday.
“This Court found that the agencies failed to adequately consider, or consider at all, the Amendment’s impacts on grizzly bear and bull trout, which are both directly adversely affected by open roads. The errors are therefore significant,” Christensen wrote. “And Defendants do little to assuage these concerns. Indeed, Defendants simply argue that the agencies are likely to follow the same course of action on remand because the decision was based on valid elk considerations. But the fact that an action is intended to benefit one species does not offset that action’s adverse effects on other species, especially if those other species are protected under the ESA.”
The Forest Service requested to keep Amendment 40 in place while it conducted its analysis to prevent the Bitterroot Forest from having to write up similar amendments for each upcoming logging project. But Christensen pointed out that the Bitterroot Forest has had no trouble over the past few decades making such amendments for more than 10 projects and the Forest Service said that no prospective projects would need such an amendment.
“The fact the agencies did not consider those impacts is particularly concerning given the Forest-wide application of Amendment 40,” Christensen wrote.
The 1987 Bitterroot Forest Management Plan had included road-density limits of 1 to 2 miles-per-square-mile to protect elk habitat. In September 2023, the Bitterroot Forest adopted Amendment 40 to the Forest Plan, which changed the elk habitat effectiveness plan to include eliminating the limits on road densities.
The plaintiffs sued in December 2024 arguing that, even though the road density limits were intended to help elk, they had the added benefit of conserving grizzly bear and bull trout habitat. By approving Amendment 40 with little analysis, the Forest Service had approved the degradation of grizzly bear and bull trout habitat, the plaintiffs said.
Now, the Bitterroot Forest must do that analysis and write a new section of Amendment 40 addressing road density.
Earthjustice represented the plaintiffs, including Friends of the Bitterroot, Friends of the Clearwater, Native Ecosystems Council, Nimiipuu Protecting the Environment, and WildEarth Guardians.
“At a time when the Endangered Species Act and the wildlife it helps to protect are under constant attack by this administration, this is a welcome decision that will prevent harmful new road-building in Bitterroot National Forest,” said Maxine Sugarman, Earthjustice associate attorney, in a release. “Our environmental laws exist to give species like grizzly bears and bull trout a fighting chance at survival as pressures from industry mount. The Trump administration should be working to protect these iconic species and the ecosystems they call home, not sacrificing them for roads and motorized use.”
Contact reporter Laura Lundquist at lundquist@missoulacurrent.com.