§460gg–5 Management Plan for Recreation Area

Summary

Within five years after December 31, 1975, the Secretary must create and send a full management plan for the recreation area to the appropriate Senate and House committees. The plan must allow a wide range of land uses and recreation options. The Secretary must list and study historic, archaeological, and paleontological sites and may recommend some for the National Register of Historic Places. The plan must include ways to protect those sites and allow controlled research. The Secretary must also study scenic roads and other travel routes into and inside the area, including upgrades to existing roads and routes that give access to views from the Western rim of Hells Canyon. The Secretary must review whether the Lord Flat–Somers Point Plateau, West Side Reservoir Face, and Mountain Sheep areas should be preserved as wilderness and report the findings to the President. The President must tell Congress his recommendations within five years after December 31, 1975. The Secretary must follow the procedures in section 1132(d), give at least 60 days’ public notice before hearings about the wilderness studies, and manage lands so they could still become wilderness later. The public must be fully involved, and the Secretary must consult the Nez Perce Tribe and the States of Idaho, Oregon, and Washington. Other federal agencies must help when asked and can be reimbursed. Activities that fit the rules, such as selective timber cutting, mining, and grazing, may continue at the same levels and in the same places they were on December 31, 1975, and the plan must consider keeping them.