WASHINGTON – In October, Apple Valley News Now’s Emily Goodell spoke with Congressman Dan Newhouse about a meeting in Okanogan County that discussed the proposed plan to bring grizzly bears back to the North Cascades. Newhouse reiterated his opposition to the plan and said most people in Washington State opposed it too.
However, Goodell was contacted by several supporters of the plan, who said it’s more complicated than agreeing or disagreeing with the move.
Newhouse said that out of the approximately 200 people who met in Okanogan County on October 30th to discuss bringing grizzly bears back in the North Cascades, most were against it.
“Obviously, not every single person had time to speak,” Newhouse said. “In our rough tally of the speakers that did express their opinion, almost 50 opposed and maybe only about six people spoke in favor.”
Supporters who were there, including Jasmine Minbashian, reached out to Goodell and said it was because they weren’t comfortable speaking up.
“I think people’s fears were stoked specifically by our elected representatives,” Minbashian said. “That meeting was just people shouting each other down and booing and a lot of disrespect to the representatives from the federal agencies.”
Minbashian is the director of the Methow Valley Citizens Council. It has about 1,000 members across Okanogan County, which is in Newhouse’s district, and many of them support the plan.
“The way he frames it is that everyone in his district opposes grizzly bear recovery,” Minbashian said. “That’s simply not true. Just at the Winthrop meeting alone, at least half the people there voiced their support for grizzly recovery.”
Some of the supporters have taken issue with statements made by Newhouse, and said they were misleading. Newhouse said grizzly bears are more than 20 times as dangerous as Black Bears, citing a website dedicated to Black Bears in Minnesota.
However, comparing statistics from Yellowstone National Park about the risk of bear attacks for campers in backcountry, with a population of 1,000 grizzly bears, the risk of a grizzly bear attack is about 1.7 million overnight stays. The population is lower for black bears; 500-600, and the risk of a Black Bear attack is 1 in 850,000 overnight stays. Last month, Newhouse said if the bears were brought to the North Cascades, it could be trouble for people in Kittitas and Yakima counties.
“Fish and Wildlife and Parks plan is eventually to allow grizzly bears to cover more than just this area, but other areas throughout the state,” Newhouse said. “These bears have the ability to migrate within a 500 mile radius and so by placing up in the north central part of the state, if that is the case, they could easily end up in Kittitas County or even Yakima County.”
But the proposal calls for a small amount of bears to be released in remote areas and a management plan to make sure the bears stay within a certain area. “For example,” Minbashian said, “If a bear went down into an orchard, the federal agencies would have more tools at their disposal to deal with that bear, including moving the bear out of the area or hazing it.”
Whatever happens with the plan in the end, supporters are hoping the discussion can be more respectful moving forward. “It’s easy to be heard when you’re loud and intimidating,” Minbashiam said. “But there are a lot of people who are watching carefully and are quietly supporting in the background. Unfortunately, those folks are not as visible, but they’re just as important.”
The public comment period closed Monday and the National Park Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are taking those comments under consideration.
Source: Apple Valley News Now
