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In response to our letters, we were orally advised that 

 there was indeed local coordination through the Eastside 

 Ecosystem Coalition of Counties. We replied that this 

 Coalition did not constitute a substitute for Owyhee County. 

 Our coxinty has a local land use plan relating to management 

 of the public lands. A copy of that plan was furnished. 

 Copies of the plan had already been furnished to the federal 

 agencies. We pointed out that neither the Coalition nor the 

 Association of Counties substituted for Owyhee County. The 

 Board of Commissioners of Owyhee County are responsible to 

 the taxpayers of our County to engage in local land use 

 planning efforts which will preserve our tax base, our way 

 of life, our very existence as a community. We pointed out 

 that the coordination requirements of federal law coxild be 

 satisfied only through coordination of ecosystem planning 

 WITH : OUR COUNTY . 



Finally, we managed to get Mr, Mealey's attention 

 sufficienty that he came to Murphy, the County seat, to meet 

 with the Board of Commissioners. In spite of our prior 

 detailed letters explaining the coordination requirements of 

 federal law, he again stated that he did not understand our 

 ' concerns . with Association of Idaho Counties personnel in 

 attendance we carefvilly explained again the mandates of ■ 

 coordination set forth very clearly in federal law. Mr. 

 Mealey then assured us that he would see to it that 

 ecosystem efforts were coordinated with Owyhee County's land 

 use planning process. 



To what length did Mr. Mealy 's assxirances take us? He 

 attended one meeting of the Owyhee County Land Use Planring 

 Committee, hurriedly skimmed through the first draft of the 

 EIS which he had seen, acknowledged that perhaps the grazing 

 language appeared negative, assured us that such was not; the 

 Intent of the planning team, said that when the draft was 

 finished we could review it, and left the meeting. He did 

 not leave us a copy of the draft. That ended the ' 

 "coordination" and meaningful participation in planning. 



On January 19, 1996, we received a notice regarding release 

 of a. draft EIS "in late spring". That notice assured us 

 that' counties had peirticipated in the development of the 

 preliminary draft, and that the preliminary draft had been 

 released for "internal" review by agencies, counties and the 

 tribes. This notice was inaccurate and misleading. There 

 had been no "county" participation in the development of the 

 draft and no "county" review. There had been review only by 

 the Coalition of Counties members, and they did not share 

 the draft with Commissioners of our County. 



i 



Moreover, the members of the Coalition of Cotinties were , 

 admonished not to share the draft with other persons. So, 

 the members of the Coalition were instructed not to share 



