US Navy, Department Of Defense And Environmental Impact Study

Rosalind Peterson
2/21/2009

The United States Navy and the U.S. Department of Defense have decided that their Northwest Training Range Complex, in the State of Washington, should be expanded, and have devised a draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), dated December 2008, for public review and comment. The expansion of their area of operation will include all of the State of Washington, all of the State of Oregon, part of the state of Idaho, and Northern California. This area will also include large areas of the Pacific Ocean from California to Washington. (The map designating this program area also extends throughout Northern California to the San Francisco Bay Area under a “warning area” designation.)

The U.S. Commander of the Pacific Fleet has given American citizens and residents of these states only a very short time to comment on their draft EIS: Published on December 30, 2008, with a final public comment deadline extended to March 11, 2009, this document is approximately 1,000+/- pages in length with attachments. In addition to a short comment time the Navy limited public hearings to five, with only one held in Oregon, one in California and no hearings in Idaho. The Navy has allegedly failed to place information about this EIS in major newspapers or inform our elected representatives about this program.

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