A federal judge on Thursday urged more study of how a proposed Forest Service management plan in Montana could affect the region’s grizzly bear population.
In a partial victory for critics of the plan, proposed for a piece of the Custer Gallatin National Forest, U.S. Magistrate Judge Kathleen DeSoto opined that the Forest Service should correct certain “deficiencies” in an environmental assessment prepared for the plan.
While not binding, DeSoto’s detailed, 41-page “findings and recommendations” carry weight in the federal courtroom where the lawsuit was first filed by a host of environmental organizations in September of 2022.
“We are encouraged by Judge DeSoto’s findings and agree that the agency needs to take a harder, closer look at these issues when authorizing activities in important areas like the Absaroka-Beartooth wilderness,” Matthew Bishop, an attorney with the Western Environmental Law Center, said Friday.
