10,000 shovels arrive in Nevada; Gov. Guinn backs protest

Scott Sonner

Saturday, Jan. 29, 2000 | 9:42 a.m.

WELLS, Nev. - Gov. Kenny Guinn added his backing to a protest against the Forest Service in Elko today as an estimated 10,000 shovels arrived in Nevada in a show of support from loggers, ranchers and miners across the country.

The Republican governor also applauded Idaho's lawsuit challenging the Clinton administration's latest forest protection plan, saying it would be a "travesty" to implement Clinton's roadless initiative without hearing more from the public.

"Since the vast majority of the public lands are in the West, perhaps the bureaucrats in Washington D.C. simply don't understand the impact their decisions have on our western way of life," Guinn said.

"Sometimes the only way to get their attention is to stand up for our rights," he said in a letter Friday to State Assemblyman John Carpenter, R-Elko.

Carpenter is one of the organizers of a "Jarbidge Shovel Brigade Parade" planned down Elko's main street at noon today.

The shovels are a sign of support for local activists determined to rebuild a road in a national forest that the Forest Service says would harm the Jarbidge River's threatened bull trout. The road washed out in a flood in 1997.

Jim Hurst, a Montana saw mill owner, came up with the idea of collecting the shovels for Elko activists who want to reconstruct the road by hand.

"At first he said maybe he'd get 400 or 500. We never dreamed this would happen. It is overwhelming," said Mike Nannini, an Elko County Commissioner who helped organize the parade.

A caravan of trucks picked up shovels along the way on an 800-mile trek from Montana and Idaho to Nevada on Thursday and Friday.

A fire truck and a half-dozen emergency vehicles with their lights flashing escorted the caravan into Wells about 6 p.m. Friday. A dozen pickup trucks were loaded down with shovels along with a dump truck carrying an estimated 1,200 shovels and a semi-trailer with 7,000 to 8,000. They'll head the last 50 miles west on Interstate 80 to Elko early Saturday in time for the parade.

"There's going to be well over 10,000 shovels in Elko," said Cary Hegreberg, executive vice president of the Montana Woods Products Association, who made the trip from Helena, Mont.

"It's the greatest thing that has ever happened. It's really a message of support," Elko County Commissioner Nolan Lloyd said Friday night.

The parade will end at the courthouse, where a 30-foot shovel has been erected with 4,000 names engraved in support of the Jarbidge Shovel Brigade.

The Elko County Commission claims the Forest Service has no jurisdiction over the South Canyon Road because it was there before the national forest was established in the early 1900s.

"If they start to shut one road down, then it will be another, then another," Carpenter said Friday as pickup trucks full of shovels began to show up at his real estate office in Elko.

"We've got shovels coming from everywhere," said Bob Secrist, who fears his firewood business in Elko is in jeopardy due to Forest Service policies.

Secrist was loading up shovels on his truck for the parade. They've been arriving via UPS from, among other places, the Moore Mill in Bandon, Ore.; Frank Taylor in Dallas, Texas; and Ken and Nancy Nebel in Duluth, Minn.

Guinn turned down an invitation to speak at the parade and rally Saturday. But in the letter, he told Carpenter he wanted to express his support for those gathering to "peacefully protest the persistent attempts of the federal government to close off access to more and more of the public lands."

He also praised Idaho Republican Gov. Dirk Kempthorne for filing suit in U.S. District Court in Boise challenging President Clinton's roadless initiative, aimed at protecting up to 50 million acres of national forests currently without roads.

"Closing off millions of acres of public lands without adequate input from local communities is a travesty, especially in light of the fact that more than 85 percent of Nevada's land is already controlled by the federal government," Guinn said.

Forest Service spokesman Bob Swinford said a draft environmental impact statement on Clinton's proposal isn't scheduled to be completed until the end of March, with a final decision on the plan expected at the end of the year.

"The roadless initiative hasn't closed anything yet," Swinford said Friday.

He said agency officials were taking note of the protest in Elko.

"It's obvious a lot of people have concerns, some of them with the Jarbidge situation but others about the president's roadless initiative and national forest access in general," he said.