Senate Avalanche Bill

[AltaPowderDaze]

good oportunity for resort skiers, backcountry travelers and those that enjoy TR's to show their support. every little bit helps. this just happens to be a big bit.

i'll x-post this in the main forum for added visibility.

Representative Don Young's House companion bill to the avalanche bill introduced in the US Senate by Senator Stevens, HR 2039, has a good chance of moving but needs calls and notes from supporters, especially from Utah, Colorado, Washington, and California.

If you'd like to do something positive and concrete to prevent avalanche deaths in the US, this is your chance. The bill deals with availability of weaponry and ammunition for avalanche explosive delivery and prevention of catastrophic urban avalanche events, as well as education and forecasting.

These issues should all be of concern to us. War and age are rapidly depleting the supply of surplus artillery and ammunition that ski areas and transportation corridors depend on, driving the cost of ammunition up and leading to a situation where in ten years most avalanche programs will have no guns or ammo unless we act now to provide alternatives.

Threatened communities need forecasting and longterm buyout or structural protection plans, and of course all of us snow enthusiasts benefit directly from backcountry forecasting and education programs.

Government support has become so weak in the last ten years that volunteer-based nonprofit avalanche centers have sprung up in an attempt to fill the vacuum, but none of these well-intentioned programs will survive in the long term without government funding, and even the forecasters for the existing government-run centers have to spend much of their time seeking grants and other scraped-together funds to make ends meet.

The money has been cut sharply from the $15 million the Senate had initially proposed, but this bill is still a good start. The bill is to be amended and funded as detailed in a briefing paper I posted on my download site as "20060530HamreStevensBillFinalBriefHR2039.doc"

House cosponsors are particularly needed, and members of the Forest Subcommittee of the Resources Committee are key, in particular:
Utah-Chris Cannon
Washington- Cathy McMorris and Jay Inslee
California- Dennis Cardoza and Richard Pombo
Colorado- Mark Udall and Thomas Tancredo

[cj001f]

Ask them to amend the bill to proportion the funds based on user days/user risk (unless you are an Alaskan). I may be a 'conspiracy theorist' but it still doesn't smell good for everyone in the lower 48 - namely, their is no language to specify how the funds would be dispersed/apportioned.

[lemon boy]

?? Looks like the last action on this bill was in April of 2005 ??????

[cj001f]

?? Looks like the last action on this bill was in April of 2005 ??????

Yup. S.225 is the Senate version which passed with $15 million in funding.

[lemon boy]

??? I'm asking if this is dead or not ????

[cj001f]

Here's an interesting article from the post on this very bill (which had house subcommittee hearings 7/27)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...093001008.html