PRESS RELEASE

U.S. DISTRICT COURT UPHOLDS WILDERNESS ACT

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Tacoma – U.S. District Court Judge Franklin D. Burgess found that the Olympic
National Park’s plan to erect two newly constructed trail shelters in park Wilderness
is “a clear error of judgment” and in violation of the Wilderness
Act, according to Olympic Park Associates, Wilderness Watch and Public Employees
for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

The three-sided shelters, previously constructed in a park maintenance yard
were to be flown by Chinook helicopter into remote subalpine meadows in the
Olympic Wilderness. One was scheduled to be installed at Low Divide, the other
at Home Sweet Home. They would replace trail shelters built in the 1930s that
were destroyed by snow in 1998.

The Park Service argued that it was required by law to preserve the shelters
as historic resources that are essential for visitor safety and would enhance
the area’s wilderness character.

“The Home Sweet Home and Low Divide shelters have collapsed under the
natural effects of weather and time,” Judge Burgess wrote, referring to
the natural processes the Wilderness Act allows for. To reconstruct and fly
in new shelters by helicopter, he declared, “is in direct contradiction
of the mandate to preserve the wilderness character of the Olympic Wilderness.”

The three organizations brought a lawsuit to halt the project in U.S. District
Court in Tacoma, WA, in October of last year. The plaintiffs charged that the
action was in violation of the 1964 Wilderness Act. That law specifically prohibits
unnecessary “structures or installations” as well as “mechanized
transport” in designated Wilderness.

Ninety-five percent of Olympic Park was designated as Wilderness by Congress
in 1988.

“This decision resolves a long-standing, contentious issue at Olympic,”
said Donna Osseward, president of Olympic Park Associates, “and it’s a
landmark victory for Wilderness everywhere.”

Since the National Park Service manages 44 million acres of Wilderness, more
than any other federal agency, this decision could have widespread significance.

“The Court strongly reaffirmed the agency’s paramount responsibility
to preserve the Olympic’s wilderness character,” stated George Nickas,
executive director of Wilderness Watch. “And that means the wild and primitive
character of the land, free of permanent improvements or other modern conveniences.”

“This case stood on its own merits,” noted Chas Offutt, PEER’s
Communications Director. “The court’s ruling further upholds Congress’
attempt to preserve and protect the integrity of the Wilderness Act.”

“[F]or a wilderness user to come across a brand new structure in a subalpine
meadow would surely be disconcerting and obviously detract from experiencing,
in the Park Service’s words, ‘wilderness on its own terms,’”
Burgess wrote in a strongly worded 13-page decision. He determined that, if
the shelters were placed in Wilderness, the Park Service “would not be
administering the area in accordance with its mandate under the Wilderness Act…
‘to preserve its wilderness character’.”

“The Court ruled that the creation of the Olympic Wilderness has placed
a ‘new value’ on the land, one that is more important than reconstructing old
buildings,” said Donna Osseward. “That’s something we’ve been arguing
for close to a decade,” she added. “I hope the Park Service finally
get the message.”

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Read
the court’s decision

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