BILLINGS - (March 31, 2011) A representative of Senator Jon Tester, Tracy
Stone Manning, will present information and answer questions on the Senator's
Forest Jobs and Recreation Act at the Billings Conservation Round Table on
Tuesday, April 5. The presentation is open to the public and is from noon to 1
p.m. at the First Interstate Bank Operations Center, on the corner of 6th
Avenue North and 18th Street.
The Forest Jobs and Recreation Act, introduced
by Montana Senator John Tester in 2009, and reintroduced in 2011, is a
progressive attempt to create jobs in the woods, restore our forests, and designate almost 700,000 acres of new wilderness
areas and 300,000 acres of recreation areas. This bill will unlock the economic
engine of stewardship contracting to create jobs at local timber mills.
This bill is the result of the hard work of
collaboration between the conservation, hunting and fishing, recreation and
logging communities. Members of the Montana Forest Coalition include Sun
Mountain Lumber, Roseburg Forest Products, Trout Unlimited, Montana Wilderness
Association, and the National Wildlife Federation. Several other businesses and
organizations including Montana Audubon, Montana Conservation Voters, Montana
Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, and Montana Wildlife Federation and many
others support the measure, which narrowly missed passage in the last Congress.
The bill creates jobs, restores forests and
protects important hunting and fishing habitat, and prescribes timber harvest and stewardship
contracting predominately on the Beaverhead Deerlodge National Forest, with
some action on the Lolo and Kootenai National Forests over the next 15 years.
###