ELKO — The Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest’s Mountain City-Ruby Mountains-Jarbidge Ranger District is seeking public comment for the next 30 days on the Notice of Proposed Action (NOPA) for the Deer Mountain Timber Stand Improvement and Hazardous Fuels Reduction Project. The proposal is a forest health and fuels reduction project in the Jarbidge area in Elko County, NV on Forest System lands. Public comments will be used to help improve the proposed action that will be analyzed in the Environmental Assessment.
“The forest has been experiencing declining health associated with insect-damaged and diseased trees, and subalpine fir encroachment in high elevation five-needle pine, aspen, brush, and riparian communities,” said District Ranger Josh Nicholes. “This project will address mortality and outbreaks associated with insects, manage conifer encroachment, reduce the moderate to heavy dead fuels, and reduce wildfire threats and impacts to the Jarbidge wildland-urban interface.”
The proposed planning area extends south to Coon Creek Summit, north to the forest border, west to the Coon Creek and Bruneau River confluence and east to Palomino Bench as shown on the planning map. Approval of this project would authorize treatments in timbered areas to reduce hazardous fuels and improve forest health.
Public comments will be accepted for 30 days following publication of the legal notice in the Elko Daily Free Press. The date of this legal notice is the exclusive means for calculating the time to submit comments. The draft NOPA and other project documents are available at: https://www.fs.usda.gov/project/?project=61084.
Electronic comments must be submitted in a format such as an email message, pdf, plain text (.txt), rich text format (.rtf), or Word (.doc). They can be uploaded to the “Comments/Objection on Project” section of the project website at https://www.fs.usda.gov/project/?project=61084 under “Get Connected.” Please put “Deer Mountain EA” in the subject line.
Written comments must be submitted to the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, Attn: Deer Mountain EA, Mountain City-Ruby Mountains-Jarbidge Ranger District, 660 S. 12th Street, Suite 108, Elko, NV 89801. For more information on this project please contact Stefan Goehring, Project Lead, (775) 778- 6119 or stefan.goehring@usda.gov
