Dear Secretary and Chief:
My water in Snohomish County, WA comes from the Glacier Peak K Roadless area. The Roadless Rule has protected this watershed since 2001. The proposed rescission would foreseeably degrade conditions in our upstream watershed. I respectfully submit that the 2001 rule should be retained.
Spada Lake, the reservoir that gathers the snowmelt and precipitation for our county, is an easy drive from my home. I've stood above it many times. I grew up hiking in Glacier Peak K Roadless Area: Big Four Ice Caves as a kid and now with the next generation of children, or up to Vesper Peak or the other looming peaks of the area. I have boated down the Skykomish River that drains part of Glacier Peak K. My history as well as my water lives here.
The taste of clear, cool water from the Cascades is better than any water I've ever tasted. I feel safe knowing this water comes from a roadless area because my family and I won't be exposed to water tainted by mining or sediment.
Regarding the Glacier Peak K in the Mt Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington:
The aquatic ecosystems of the Glacier Peak K IRA, Mt Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, depend on the absence of road-generated fine sediment. Clean gravel substrates support macroinvertebrate production and fish reproduction. Intact riparian canopy maintains the cold water temperatures that govern dissolved oxygen levels and species composition. Roads eliminate both conditions.
The combined effect of low infiltration capacity of road surfaces and interception of surface flow and throughflow by cutslopes is increased surface runoff, leading to frequent erosion from the road surface (many events per year) and periodic mass failures from the adjacent hillslopes. The ecological consequences of sediment chronically supplied from roads (press), may be more detrimental than from sediment periodically supplied from post-fire debris flows (pulse). — USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, 2012 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2011.06.021)
I'm asking from the bottom of my heart – please retain the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule and select the No Action Alternative.
In earnest,
Leah Scott-Zechlin