Photo: Howie Garber, from Backcountry Magazine, November 18, 2021.
Short and sweet: Targhee Resort is trying to expand into two new areas of the National Forest not currently within their permitted resort boundary – South Bowl and Mono Trees. The Alliance will oppose expansion into both of these areas and you should too. Here’s why: South bowl provides important winter range for bighorn sheep, moose, mule deer, and elk. It also abuts the Jedidiah Smith Wilderness Area. A ski lift and mechanized recreation here will severely diminish the wilderness character of the Jedidiah Smith as well as in neighboring Grand Teton National Park. Mono trees proposed expansion is at a lower elevation and would disturb a large slope of closed canopy conifer forest – important winter habitat for moose, elk, and mule deer.
The Caribou-Targhee National Forest just delayed the release the Draft Enviromental Impact Statement (DEIS) for the proposed expansion again. Though the date of release is unknown, we expect the DEIS to be released later this fall or winter. Once it is released, we will only have 90 days to submit public comment. This is our chance to give public voice to this process and for local stakeholders to get involved. The Alliance will publish our comments and we need you to provide your own public comment as well. Watch this space for further information, lawn signs, and other public outreach and opposition events.
For more information from the community, see this website: https://notargheex.org/
Targhee is a successful, family-friendly, right-sized resort on the west side of the Tetons – let’s keep it that way! NO to the Targhee Expansion on Public Land!
The longer, more detailed version
Except 120 acres of private land in the base area, Grand Targhee Resort is on public lands managed by the Caribou-Targhee National Forest. The resort operates under a Special Use Permit (SUP) issued by the Forest Service. In addition to issuing a SUP and charging a use fee based on a ski area’s income derived from use of the national forest, the Forest Service requires ski areas to prepare Master Development Plans (MDPs). The MDP articulates a resort’s long-term vision and identifies proposed changes and developments within – and beyond – the permit boundary.
Grand Targhee completed a new MDP in 2018, which envisions a major expansion onto National Forest lands and significant development within the existing resort footprint. In 2020, Grand Targhee asked the Forest Service to approve implementation of the projects articulated in their 2018 MDP. In response, the Caribou-Targhee National Forest is evaluating the proposal through an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), which should come out in draft form (Draft Environmental Impact Statement – DEIS) later this fall or winter, after many delays.
Grand Targhee is seeking approval to expand into Mill Creek (Mono Trees) and Teton Canyon (South Bowl), both of which are outside of the current Special Use Permit boundary and would require changing the 1997 Targhee National Forest Plan to allow resort development in an area currently protected to maintain high scenic values.
In addition to analyzing Grand Targhee’s proposal (the “proposed action”), the Forest Service has developed several “alternatives” that it feels would be responsive to Grand Targhee’s application and are based on input received during the initial (2020) public comment period. The DEIS analyzes the environmental effects of each alternative, including the proposed action.
The 2018 MDP also envisions significant commercial and real-estate development within the privately-owned base area, but approval of those proposals falls under the jurisdiction of Teton County, WY – who greenlighted Targhee’s first private development plan with a 3-2 split vote of County Commissioners. The Alliance was opposed to the cabin configuration and the fact that only a 10 foot buffer from the National Forest boundary was allowed for siting some of the cabins – too small a space to adequately provide wildfire defensible space, making it likely that forest will be cleared on public land to protect these private cabins. Likewise, the recently constructed Colter Lift was approved under a prior Forest Service process and is outside the scope of this DEIS.
The Caribou-Targhee National Forest just delayed the release the Draft Enviromental Impact Statement (DEIS) for the proposed expansion again. Though the date of release is unknown, we expect the DEIS to be released later this fall or winter. Once it is released, we will only have 90 days to submit public comment. This is our chance to give public voice to this process and for local stakeholders to get involved. The Alliance will publish our comments and we need you to provide your own public comment as well. Watch this space for further information, lawn signs, and other public outreach and opposition events.
For more information from the community, see this website: https://notargheex.org/
Targhee is a successful, family-friendly, right-sized resort on the west side of the Tetons – let’s keep it that way! NO to the Targhee Expansion on Public Land!
