“There was a lot of pent-up frustration at the first meeting and people let it rip,” said Nan Christianson, the Bitterroot National Forest's public affairs officer. “Since then, this community has come together and said we can do better than that. ... I've really been proud of this community.”
At subsequent meetings in Hamilton and Stevensville, hundreds of people pored over maps and offered their views in relative calm.
The last time the Bitterroot forest updated its travel plan forestwide was in 1978.
In September, officials released an initial proposal they said was a starting point for discussion to the long process of updating the plan.
Among all of the challenges that face the U.S. Forest Service these days, nothing is more controversial than seeking to balance motorized and non-motorized recreation on public lands.
As of a couple of weeks ago, the agency had received nearly 9,000 comments on the update. Close to 8,000 of those were generated through Internet mass mailings, Ritter said.
“We've definitely received hundreds of individual comments so far,” he said. “I probably read through at least 15 a day and we still have a month to go before the end of the comment period.
“That just shows how people are interested in this topic,” Ritter said.
To further accommodate that interest, Bitterroot forest officials began offering extended hours on Wednesdays to provide opportunity for the public to come into the supervisor's office in Hamilton to make comments and learn more about the process.
“We had a good turnout for the first day this week,” Christianson said.
Each Wednesday between now and the end of the comment period at the end of February, people can meet individually with Forest Service employees between 9 a.m. and 7 p.m. to talk about the travel plan update proposal.
Christianson said the agency is taking appointments for people who don't want to wait to see someone. Walk-ins are also accepted on a first-come, first-served basis.
Citizens will get another chance to comment in a public venue sometime in mid-February.
Ritter said the agency is still working determine the format of that hearing to accommodate the potential for a large crowd.
“We know if we get 100 people who want to talk, we can probably handle that with one recorder,” he said. “But if there's going to be a lot more, then maybe we're going to need to have simultaneous recorders working.”
More than 400 people attended the meeting in Hamilton.
“One thing is for sure,” he said. “If people want to give a verbal comment to us, we're going to figure out a way that they can do that.”
Reporter Perry Backus can be reached at 1-800-366-7186 or at pbackus@missoulian.com
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