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Brady Bashes Otter on Lands Bill: Measure Would Allow Federal Lands to Be Sold

Posted on: Tuesday, 20 December 2005, 12:00 CST

By Gregory Hahn, The Idaho Statesman, Boise, The Idaho Statesman, Boise

Dec. 20--The first volley of the 2006 race for Idaho governor was lobbed by the Democrats Monday.

Eastern Idaho newspaper publisher Jerry Brady attacked Congressman Butch Otter for co-sponsoring a bill that would sell 15 percent of both federal forest lands and land managed by the Department of the Interior to raise money for disaster relief.

With support from some Idaho sportsmen, Brady said the bill would be a blow to hunters and anglers in Idaho, as well as those who just enjoy the outdoors.

When the federal government unloads its lands, "no trespassing signs go up and you are locked out," Brady said.

Otter countered that the bill could help Idaho collect money in property taxes.

"I find it interesting that, at a time when many local governments are struggling to make ends meet, some would oppose an effort to restore to local property tax rolls and Idaho-based stewardship some carefully selected parcels of the nearly two-thirds of Idaho that is controlled -- and too often locked up from multiple use -- by the federal government," Otter said, in a prepared statement e-mailed to The Idaho Statesman.

The bill would direct the secretaries of Agriculture and the Interior to decide which lands to sell. It's in front of the House's Subcommittee on Department Operations, Oversight, Nutrition and Forestry but has not been scheduled for a hearing.

Idaho has some 33 million acres of public lands -- about 62 percent of the state's entire mass. If 15 percent of Ida-

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Copyright (c) 2005, The Idaho Statesman, Boise

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Source: The Idaho Statesman, Boise

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