The Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest’s Mountain City-Ruby Mountains-Jarbidge Ranger District released for a 30-day public comment period the East Humboldt and Ruby Mountains Fuels Reduction and Landscape Resilience Project’s Notice of Proposed Action to prepare an environmental assessment.
The purpose of this comment period is to allow the public and relevant agencies to provide feedback and identify key environmental issues that should be considered during the environmental assessment.
The objective of the East Humboldt and Ruby Mountains Fuels Reduction and Landscape Resilience Project is to restore fire to fire-dependent ecosystems and mitigate wildfire risk to communities and resources. It is located primarily in Elko County, Nevada, with the southern portion of the Ruby Mountains lying in White Pine County.
“The District needs to address increasing fuel loads, lack of defensible space in the wildland urban interface, and changing climate conditions that favor larger, faster fires,” explained District Ranger Josh Nicholes. “If left untreated this landscape is vulnerable to detrimental effects of wildfire including threat to human life; loss of infrastructure, livelihood, property, wildlife habitat, watersheds, ecosystem function, biodiversity; impact to airsheds; and many other consequences.”
Goals of the project are to reduce hazardous fuels to provide defensible areas near the wildland urban interface, private lands, critical infrastructure, and heritage resources while increasing ecosystem resilience and improving wildlife habitat.
The project would also prolong the effectiveness of previously implemented vegetation treatments in the project area.
To achieve these goals, the District plans to use mechanical equipment, hand thinning, prescribed fire, and prescriptive grazing to implement approximately 20,000 acres of fuels treatments per year across the 245,537-acre project area within the Elko Front Wildfire Crisis Strategy landscape.
Additional actions to support treatment implementation will include noxious and invasive weeds treatments, seeding, and road maintenance. Treatments would occur over several years and some areas would require multiple types of treatments.
Public comments will be accepted through Thursday, Dec. 5, 2024. Project documents are available at: https://www.fs.usda.gov/project/?project=65063
Written comments must be submitted to Josh Nicholes, District Ranger, 660 S. 12th Street, Suite 108, Elko, Nevada 89801 or hand-delivered during normal business hours from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, excluding federal holidays. Facsimiles can be sent to 775-752-1799.
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=65063 under “get connected.” Please put “EHRM Project” into the subject line.
For more information on this project please contact Aryn Hayden at 775-296-1107 or aryn.hayden@usda.gov
In 2022 the Forest Service designated the Elko Front as a Wildfire Crisis Strategy Landscape to increase pace and scale for mitigating wildfire risk. Located in northeastern Nevada, the Elko Front includes 20 rural communities at high risk of catastrophic wildfire due to dense fuels, declining forest health, noxious weed infestations, persistent drought, and human-caused ignitions. The Elko Front Wildfire Crisis Strategy Landscape coincides with the Elko-Spring Creek-Lamoille and South Ruby Mountains Shared Stewardship high-priority landscape and the Upper Humboldt/O’Neil Basin Restoration Landscape. State, federal and local partners are working together to restore these lands and mitigate the risk of wildfire to communities, wildlife habitat and rangeland forage, watersheds, infrastructure, recreation assets, and historic and cultural resources (forestry.nv.gov/natural-resource-management/shared-stewardship).