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As the principal author of CIEDRA, I feel it is appropriate to respond to you directly.

CIEDRA will provide little, if any, additional protection for these special areas, their character and the landscape.

From an absolute legal standpoint you're absolutely correct. From a practical standpoint you and I both know that before they overturn the rule that we worked on it's going to be over our collective dead bodies.

If the roads never end, there never will be any wilderness.

I share your concern about the damage that invasive and noxious species can do to native vegetation and wildlife.

CIEDRA is not a perfect bill. It is a complicated bill that forces each side to give a bit in order to find the balance that is needed to resolve outstanding land management issues.

You have always been up front with me regarding your opposition to additional wilderness in Idaho.

I cannot support protection at the cost of access, sacrificing recreational or hunting opportunities or impacting state endowment lands.

Those three are three areas that, in the Roadless rule, when you and I worked on that that we designated for what is essentially wilderness designation.

If this were easy it would have been done by now.

I'd like to offer my thanks to Sen. Jim Risch on the committee for your support of this bill.

I am proud of the finished product.

CIEDRA is an example of statesmanship and collaboration at its finest.

Together we have worked on collaborative conservation measures before including the Idaho Roadless Rule.

I am committed to providing the funding necessary to implement such an agreement.

Many Idahoans have decided that leaving land management in the Boulder-White Clouds in flux, as wilderness study areas and under the threat of closures and lawsuits, is not acceptable.

This bill is the product of a decade of collaborative discussions and negotiating.

S. 3294 is a well-constructed piece of legislation that is the right thing to do for Central Idaho both economically and ecologically.