THE MAMMOTH-JUNE CASE STUDY

The Lake Tahoe Case Study

The Mediated Settlement Case Study

Ecosystems Under Four Different Institutions

Concluding Notes on the Case Studies

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The Mammoth-June Ecosystem Management Project (MJEMP) of the Inyo National Forest is one of the first attempts in the Sierra Nevada to follow the new Forest Service landscape-analysis policy for ecosystem management. This process is intended to guide national forests throughout California in analyzing capabilities and thresholds of moderate-sized landscapes (e.g., 20,00050,000 acres) for long-term health and sustainability. A primary goal of these analyses is to develop a desired condition, or a word-picture of the landscape as it would ideally be in the future. This would serve to guide the nature and extent of management practices and other land-use activities that may occur into the future.
SNEP chose this project as a case study to review and analyze the potential for this new policy process, as exemplified in the MJEMP, to help achieve health and sustainability of ecosystems on Forest Service lands in the Sierra Nevada. SNEPs primary interest was in evaluating the concept of historic condition and historic variability, specifically, the usefulness and limitations of historical information in determining a desired condition. Further, SNEP critically reviewed the role of public participation in the new Forest Service landscape process. Insight about these and other issues from the MJEMP case studyframed as answers to questions that followhelps clarify institutional potentials for and barriers to the integration of landscape analysis and ecosystem management into land management of the Sierra Nevada.

1. What is the history of interest in the Mammoth-June area that led to the current landscape analysis?

Lying between the resort towns of Mammoth Lakes and June Lake, Mono County, the 36,000 acres known as the Mammoth-June area (MJ area) have been the focus of use and public attention since the late 1800s. Dense red fir and lush mixed conifer forests blanket gently rolling topography and intermingle with several large flower- and wildlife-rich meadows against a backdrop of rugged cliffs and peaks that form the headwaters of the Owens River. Amid the otherwise steep, rocky, and semiarid landscapes of the eastern Sierra, the MJ area stands out for its abundance of forests, water, and wildlife. These scarce resources are the focus of continuing public controversy over developed versus undeveloped use in the area: grazing, timber harvest, geothermal development, alpine skiing, nordic skiing, wilderness appreciation, scientific study, and ecological reserves.
The Inyo National Forest, which administers nearly the entire area, has long tried to balance the shifting uses and competing public desires while maintaining what it perceived (also changing with the times) to be the integrity of the resources. The current MJEMP is only the latest in a line of formal planning processes and documentsdating back to 1950that systematically outline and coordinate management objectives for the MJ area. Most recently, the 1988 Inyo National Forest Land Management Plan wrestled with competing desires for development of a large alpine ski area in the MJ area versus wilderness designation. The Land Management Plan left many of the issues unresolved, deferring decisions until a future cumulative-effects study and an environmental impact statement (EIS) analysis were prepared. The EIS process began as the Mammoth-to-June Integrated Resource Analysis in 1990 but, with the release of the draft Forest Service Regional Handbook on Ecosystem Management, was changed in 1993 to the MJEMP.
Why was the Inyo among the first of the California national forests to embark on this new process? For several reasons the issues at the MJ area were becoming urgent enough in 1993 to demand imminent decision making. Because a cumulative-effects, or scientifically based, landscape analysis was called for by the Land Management Plan before any decisions could be made, the MJEMP (or something like it) was a prerequisite. Several key Inyo National Forest staff involved in planning, ecosystem management, and management of the MJ area had been deeply involved in developing and teaching the regional Forest Service ecosystem management process. They had the incentive, understanding, and peer and supervisor support to rapidly adopt its use on the Inyo National Forest. Promise of breaking the gridlock for decision making (e.g., over conflicts such as allocating the area for alpine ski development versus wilderness) in this area provided the essential priority at the forest level to fund the MJEMP.