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Public commenter alleges Forest Service demolished miners' cabins, cites Hanksville case
Summary
During public comment, a resident said U.S. Forest Service crews destroyed cabins tied to mining permits and suggested the Bureau of Land Management sought to provoke agitation and backlash.
A resident (public commenter) told a meeting that U.S. Forest Service crews destroyed cabins associated with mining permits and said the Bureau of Land Management sought to provoke a public backlash.
The commenter recounted working as a young teenager on road-building crews and using dynamite and said the Forest Service "goes out onto the mountain and blows up their cabin. It's a cabin that they had on their mining permit." The speaker said there was "a little bit of litigation," and that the Forest Service had argued the mine was closed and the permitholder could not keep the cabin. The commenter also said a similar demolition occurred "over in Hanksville to a woman's house." The speaker added: "Those kind of things tend to, create, you know, some agitation, which is exactly what the Bureau of Land Management wanted wanted to do is to create some agitation, to create a backlash, something that then they could respond to in an aggressive way."
The remarks were presented as first-person recollection and allegation; the commenter described involvement at about "12, 13 years old" during the work they recalled. The meeting record provided no documentation of agency actions or of ensuing court outcomes in the excerpts quoted. The comments appeared during the public-comment portion of the meeting and did not include a formal motion or vote recorded in the provided transcript excerpts.
