Key lawmakers clash over Forest Service findings in Nevada

Scott Sonner

Thursday, Feb. 10, 2000 | 5:16 a.m.

RENO, Nev. - Dozens of allegations of harassment and intimidation of Forest Service workers in Nevada outlined in an investigative report are "disturbing and disgraceful," Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., said Thursday.

But Rep. Helen Chenoweth, R-Idaho, said the findings aren't as bad as ex-Forest Service supervisor Gloria Flora made them out to be. She said Flora appears to have been "prone to hysterical exaggerations."

The Forest Service sent an investigative team to Nevada for two weeks in December to interview more than 100 workers after Flora resigned in November in protest of what she described as a hostile atmosphere.

Flora said she was worried she couldn't guarantee the safety of her employees on the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, where tensions were mounting between the agency and the Elko County Commission over the closure of a road and protection of a threatened fish.

The team confirmed this week that dozens of agency workers told them they experienced harassment, intimidation and threats in Nevada in recent years based solely on who they work for.

Excerpts of their stories in the 25-page report range from one who said a bulldozer operator tried to run her over, to others who say they were denied service in restaurants, refused admittance to a club, cursed at bus stops or ridiculed at public banquets.

The agency team concluded none of the allegations rose to the level of warranting pursuit of criminal charges. It also determined none of the workers currently is in any danger.

Nevertheless, Miller said Thursday "the long list of threats, harassment and ostracism against employees and their families documented in this report is disturbing and disgraceful.

"No public employee should ever be intimidated because of the uniform they wear or the job they are carrying out, and no public official should minimize the unacceptability of such acts against those carrying out the law," said the ranking Democrat on the House Resources Committee overseeing the Forest Service.

Most of the worker's concerns spoke to an underlying climate of resentment against federal land managers in rural Nevada.

"Pressure is pervasive - my family doesn't want to talk about where their dad works," one Forest Service employee said.

Several workers said they make a point not to travel in marked Forest Service vehicles in parts of rural Nevada.

"When I travel in a Forest Service vehicle in central and northeast Nevada I often feel like a 'sitting duck', a target," one said.

When overnighting in Austin or Tonopah, the worker usually tells the motel clerk he is with the agency's parent U.S. Agriculture Department, "not the USFS for fear of a hostile response. ...

"It is an awful feeling to think that you need to travel in disguise. When I worked in California on the Eldorado and Tahoe National Forests, I never felt this way - I was very proud of what I did and who I worked for."

Although the internal investigation found no prosecutable crimes, the report acknowledged several employees "spoke of incidents where ... they encountered people whose actions or language they considered threatening causing them to be afraid for their well-being."

"Of the 35 employees we met with in Elko, the majority said that working and living in the setting affected their sense of well-being," the report said.

In fact, the team members, all senior agency officials, admitted they had never experienced anything like what was being relayed to them by the workers in northeast Nevada.

Flora's critics say the fact no prosecutable offenses were uncovered in the investigation proves she was wrong.

"This report clearly contradicts Ms. Flora's claims," said Chenoweth, chairman of the House Resources subcommittee on forests and forest health.

"In fact, the report seems to indicate that Ms. Flora may have been prone to hysterical exaggerations, which would certainly explain why she had such a difficult time working cooperatively with people in the nearby communities," she said.

Flora disagrees.

"They (agency investigators) gathered up very similar facts to what I had gathered and they displayed them. I am not surprised," Flora said in an interview Wednesday.

But are workers in danger?

"That boils down to a personal perspective or opinion," Flora said. "We could debate that all day long."

Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said Flora's concerns about worker safety "are certainly not verified by this report."

"I'm glad the report is finished," he said. "Now we can stop the finger-pointing, get this behind us and build a better relationship between the Forest Service and the people of Nevada."