1977-04-01 Char-Koosta News

              VOLUME 6 NUMBER 23        FULL MOON OF THE BUTTERCUPS
THE MAGNIFICENT MISSIONS
A Question of Values
Two proposals to set the Mission Mountians aside as a Tribal Primitive Area would do so by Council action, not through the 1964 Wilderness Act. As private property not subject to national restrictions and control, the proposed area "could fully reflect the cultural, spiritual and traditional values unique to the area and its people," according to a proposal worked out of University of Montana's Wilderness Institute in cooperation with the Council's Lands Committee.
The other proposal was made by Doug Allard, spokesman for the Save the Mission Mountians  Committee  at  a  March   15
St. Ignatius district meeting. The Committee's petition requests a "Tribal Primitive Area", "bounded on the South by St. Mary's lake access road and the North Fork of the Jocko, to the West by the Pablo Feeder (or A Canal); to the North by a line running due East from the town of Pablo; and to the East by the Flathead Reservation boundary." Allard\s primary concern was removing the land from commercial logging. Allard and his committee are currently circulating a petition to accomplish their objectives.
The proposals differ somewhat in their objectives.   Allard s proposal is bent on
•saving the face of the Missions from logging. The University of Montana's proposal primarily selected areas with little or no existing impacts by man. Its line was placed higher, since a good share of the Mission's face has been logged with horse and dozer skid trails in the past. This skidding down the mountian left few usable roads behind. Present reservation logging practices rely upon an extensive system of truck roads every 600-900 feet. The University of Montana's proposal includes the higher slopes of the mountians from Hellroaring Basin south.   It would
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