wildidahorisingtide.org
Open in
urlscan Pro
192.0.78.25
Public Scan
Submitted URL: http://wildidahorisingtide.com/
Effective URL: https://wildidahorisingtide.org/
Submission Tags: @phish_report
Submission: On September 05 via api from FI — Scanned from FI
Effective URL: https://wildidahorisingtide.org/
Submission Tags: @phish_report
Submission: On September 05 via api from FI — Scanned from FI
Form analysis
4 forms found in the DOMGET https://wildidahorisingtide.org/
<form method="get" id="searchform" action="https://wildidahorisingtide.org/">
<label for="s" class="assistive-text">Search</label>
<input type="text" class="field" name="s" id="s" placeholder="Search">
<input type="submit" class="submit" name="submit" id="searchsubmit" value="Search">
</form>
POST https://subscribe.wordpress.com
<form action="https://subscribe.wordpress.com" method="post" accept-charset="utf-8" data-blog="26947833" data-post_access_level="everybody" id="subscribe-blog">
<p>Enter your email address to receive notifications and newsletters by email.</p>
<p id="subscribe-email">
<label id="subscribe-field-label" for="subscribe-field" class="screen-reader-text"> Email Address: </label>
<input type="email" name="email" style="width: 95%; padding: 1px 10px" placeholder="Email Address" value="" id="subscribe-field" required="">
</p>
<p id="subscribe-submit">
<input type="hidden" name="action" value="subscribe">
<input type="hidden" name="blog_id" value="26947833">
<input type="hidden" name="source" value="https://wildidahorisingtide.org/">
<input type="hidden" name="sub-type" value="widget">
<input type="hidden" name="redirect_fragment" value="subscribe-blog">
<input type="hidden" id="_wpnonce" name="_wpnonce" value="8c4fe13b49"> <button type="submit" class="wp-block-button__link"> Sign Up! </button>
</p>
</form>
POST https://subscribe.wordpress.com
<form method="post" action="https://subscribe.wordpress.com" accept-charset="utf-8" style="display: none;">
<div class="actnbr-follow-count">Join 161 other subscribers</div>
<div>
<input type="email" name="email" placeholder="Enter your email address" class="actnbr-email-field" aria-label="Enter your email address">
</div>
<input type="hidden" name="action" value="subscribe">
<input type="hidden" name="blog_id" value="26947833">
<input type="hidden" name="source" value="https://wildidahorisingtide.org/">
<input type="hidden" name="sub-type" value="actionbar-follow">
<input type="hidden" id="_wpnonce" name="_wpnonce" value="8c4fe13b49">
<div class="actnbr-button-wrap">
<button type="submit" value="Sign me up"> Sign me up </button>
</div>
</form>
<form id="jp-carousel-comment-form">
<label for="jp-carousel-comment-form-comment-field" class="screen-reader-text">Write a Comment...</label>
<textarea name="comment" class="jp-carousel-comment-form-field jp-carousel-comment-form-textarea" id="jp-carousel-comment-form-comment-field" placeholder="Write a Comment..."></textarea>
<div id="jp-carousel-comment-form-submit-and-info-wrapper">
<div id="jp-carousel-comment-form-commenting-as">
<fieldset>
<label for="jp-carousel-comment-form-email-field">Email (Required)</label>
<input type="text" name="email" class="jp-carousel-comment-form-field jp-carousel-comment-form-text-field" id="jp-carousel-comment-form-email-field">
</fieldset>
<fieldset>
<label for="jp-carousel-comment-form-author-field">Name (Required)</label>
<input type="text" name="author" class="jp-carousel-comment-form-field jp-carousel-comment-form-text-field" id="jp-carousel-comment-form-author-field">
</fieldset>
<fieldset>
<label for="jp-carousel-comment-form-url-field">Website</label>
<input type="text" name="url" class="jp-carousel-comment-form-field jp-carousel-comment-form-text-field" id="jp-carousel-comment-form-url-field">
</fieldset>
</div>
<input type="submit" name="submit" class="jp-carousel-comment-form-button" id="jp-carousel-comment-form-button-submit" value="Post Comment">
</div>
</form>
Text Content
Skip to primary content Skip to secondary content WILD IDAHO RISING TIDE WILD IDAHO RISING TIDE (WIRT) CONFRONTS THE ROOT CAUSES OF CLIMATE CHANGE, WATER DEGRADATION, AND AIR POLLUTION, BY ASSERTING DIRECT ACTIONS AND PROMOTING LOCALLY ORGANIZED SOLUTIONS, IN SOLIDARITY WITH FRONTLINE COMMUNITIES OF RESISTANCE AND AN INTERNATIONAL, VOLUNTEER, GRASSROOTS NETWORK OF ACTIVISTS. Search MAIN MENU * All Posts * About WIRT * Rising Tide Network * Small Green Groups * Megaload Campaign * Fracking Campaign * Events Calendar * Direct Action Manuals * Megaload Facts * Speak Out! * WIRT Song * Support WIRT * Contact WIRT POST NAVIGATION ← Older posts CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: PEOPLE’S HEARING TO STOP NORTHWEST GTN XPRESS METHANE PIPELINE EXPANSION, HIGH WASHINGTON COAL & OIL TRAIN NUMBERS, GREAT LAKES OIL LINE 5 RESISTANCE 9-4-24 FEATURED Posted on September 4, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 1 Vote The Wednesday, September 4, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features speakers at the February 13, 2023, People’s Hearing to Stop GTN Xpress, hosted by a Northwest coalition to gather testimony from community and tribal members threatened by the Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress fracked methane pipeline expansion. We also share news and reflections on unusually high Washington coal and oil train numbers before the Labor Day holiday and indigenous, environmental group, and state government opposition to the Line 5 tar sands pipeline in Michigan and Wisconsin. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: IDAHO MEGALOADS & LAKE HERBICIDES, CANADA RAIL STRIKE, COSTLIER CALIFORNIA UTILITIES, GTN XPRESS REHEARING REJECTION, BC & WISCONSIN PIPELINE OPPOSITION 8-28-24 FEATURED Posted on August 28, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 2 Votes The Wednesday, August 28, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features news, music, and reflections on north Idaho megaloads bound for an Alaska refinery and reduced Union Pacific train traffic from a nationwide Canadian rail workers strike, toxic herbicide treatments in and around Lake Pend Oreille, increased customer utility bills from additional California methane gas infrastructure, an ongoing Northwest construction report and federal agency arguments against a request for a permit rehearing for the GTN Xpress gas pipeline expansion, indigenous land defender blockades and defense hearings refuting two British Columbia methane pipelines, and opposition and comments on the Line 5 tar sands pipeline in Wisconsin. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply 2024 PADDLE TO KALISPEL POWWOW FEATURED Posted on July 29, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 7 Votes On Monday, July 29, through Friday, August 2, Kalispel and regional tribal members and the River Warrior Society are holding the eighth annual Paddle to Kalispel Powwow canoe journey [1-7]. The paddle usually voyages from Lake Pend Oreille and Qpqpe (Sandpoint), Idaho, to the Qlispe (Kalispel) Village in Cusick, Washington, during the week before the yearly Kalispel Powwow and around the time of the Festival at Sandpoint music concerts. In this cultural journey, families and friends are again paddling in traditional, dugout, wooden and sturgeon nose canoes, as their ancestors did for travel, fishing, and fun, over 50 miles through their home lands and waters among the tributaries, lake, and river of the Pend Oreille watershed. While oil and gas pipeline and fossil fuels pipeline-on-rails transportation and infrastructure expansions impose and risk further harms to indigenous people and places locally and across Turtle Island (North America), Native neighbors continue to revive, uphold, and practice their ancient cultures and sustainable ways, through admirable endeavors like this canoe journey and culminating powwow. Paddle organizers invite and encourage tribal allies and everyone to contact them in advance or just join this joyful resurgence at various route locations, as they accommodate as many participants and observers as they can. The canoe journey tentatively begins on Monday, July 29, with setting up camp at Sam Owen Campground off Hope Peninsula Road near Hope, Idaho. On Tuesday, July 30, participants plan to paddle to the Bear Paw petroglyphs, share prayers and lunch there, then portage from the campground to Sandpoint. Like during previous years, and as depicted in linked photos and articles about prior journeys, Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) activists and area groups intend to welcome the paddlers at Sandpoint, during their arrival on Tuesday evening and departure on Wednesday morning, July 30 and 31 [1-7]. The voyage will re-start around 9 am on Wednesday, July 31, from the boat ramp on the south side of City Beach Park in Sandpoint, and break for lunch near the Dover Bay, Idaho, docks. Another portage may occur to/at the Riley Creek Recreation Area boat launch, 1099 Riley Creek Park Drive in Laclede, Idaho, before paddling to and camping on Kalispel tribal lands at the Carey Creek Game Management Area, on the north side of Dufort Road, near Hayden Ranch Road and Priest River, Idaho. On Thursday, August 1, paddlers will portage around the dam from Albeni Cove campground, 2141 Albeni Cove Road in Oldtown, Idaho, and enjoy lunch in Newport, Washington, before launching again from downstream Pioneer Park and pushing toward the Bear Paw camp. And on Friday, August 2, they will paddle, lunch at Davis Creek, and land at their destination of the Kalispel Powwow Grounds, 1981 Le Clerc Road North on the Kalispel Reservation. Please see the enclosed event schedule, which is subject to change, and join WIRT in supporting this adventure. If you would like further information about the trip itinerary, logistics, and ways to help, or if you hope to paddle, serve as ground crew, share a prayer or song, or feed participants breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, and/or drinks, please contact Warren, Nathan, and/or Betty Jo Piengkham, by calling, texting, or facebook messaging them. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, BNSF Bridges, Coal/Oil Trains/Ports, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | Leave a reply STOP OIL TRAINS 2024 FEATURED Posted on July 9, 2024 by WIRT 2 i 8 Votes July 12-15 annual actions remember the Lac-Mégantic, Mosier, & Custer disasters Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) and allied activists invite everyone to participate in eleventh annual, Stop Oil Trains, direct actions and a training workshop in Sandpoint, Idaho, on Friday, July 12, through Monday, July 15. Five events commemorate the 47 lives lost and downtowns devastated by oil train derailments, spills, explosions, and fires in the lakeside village of Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, on July 6, 2013, in the Columbia River Gorge town of Mosier, Oregon, on June 3, 2016, and in the northwestern hamlet of Custer, Washington, on December 22, 2020. These demonstrations also support pipeline-on-rails resistance across the Northwest and in trackside and pipeline corridor communities and environments threatened and polluted by dangerous oil and gas infrastructure and transportation. Spotlight Message Projection Friday & Saturday, July 12 & 13, 10 pm, Downtown Sandpoint As the sun sets, WIRT organizers will provide brief, light projection displays of social and climate justice messages on buildings in downtown Sandpoint, Idaho. Meet after 10 pm on Friday and Saturday, July 12 and 13, wherever you see this light show, for discussions among activists and curious passersby, about Northwest oil train and terminal and gas pipeline expansion issues. Resistance Outreach Saturday, July 13, 9 am to 1 pm, near Farmin Park, Sandpoint Visit volunteer activists between 9 am and 1 pm on Saturday, July 13, at the WIRT outreach table at the corner of Fourth and Oak Streets near Farmin Park, during the Farmers Market at Sandpoint, Idaho. We plan to talk with residents and visitors of the one-mile-wide, north Idaho, “bomb train blast zone,” offer updates on Northwest oil and coal trains and infrastructure and Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) Railway’s doubled tracks and three new communication towers and second railroad bridges, and provide #No2ndBridge and other petitions, letters, brochures, and flyers [1-5]. Oil Trains Protest Saturday, July 13, 2 pm, Farmin to City Beach Parks, Sandpoint At 2 pm on Saturday, July 13, bring your family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, protest signs, and creative spirit, to show community opposition to dangerous crude oil trains, refineries, export facilities, and railroad infrastructure, like the BNSF rail bridges in and near Sandpoint. Starting from the Farmin Park clock, we will walk with banners and signs objecting to the Northwest pipeline-on-rails and its expansion, through downtown Sandpoint to City Beach Park. At these public march origin and destination places, we will share reflections and stories about the isolated vulnerability of rural, rail corridor communities to oil and hazardous materials derailment catastrophes and industry invasions of local environments and economies. Train Watch Workshop Monday, July 15, 5 pm, Zoom & East Bonner County Library, Sandpoint For the annual training sessions on regional oil and tar sands trainspotting, David Perk of Pacific Northwest Oil Train Watch will present methods for trackside observing, documenting, and reporting Northwest fossil fuels train traffic with photos, videos, and social media. He will discuss rail routes from the plains to the coast, train descriptors, refinery and receiving facilities, rail system operations, stopovers, and transit times, and train watch motivations and resources. Please RSVP to WIRT at wild.idaho.rising.tide2@gmail.com, for required registration to join this teleconferenced conversation with David generously sharing images, skills, and insights, beginning at 5 pm on Monday, July 15, via Zoom and at the East Bonner County Library, Community Room B, 1407 Cedar Street in Sandpoint, Idaho. WIRT requests more train monitors along the tracks of the north Idaho, fossil fuels frontline, to document all westbound, unit trains of cars hauling Bakken crude oil, Canadian tar sands, and Powder River Basin coal. Issue Background Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, Coal/Oil Trains/Ports | 2 Replies GTN XPRESS PIPELINE CONSTRUCTION PROTESTS & TALKS FEATURED Posted on May 8, 2024 by WIRT 2 i 9 Votes Regional, volunteer, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), Veterans for Peace Spokane Chapter 35, and allied organizations invite the inland Northwest and especially Idaho community to again respond with public, forceful concern to the climate-wrecking, federally enforced, fossil fuel industry threat of the Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress fracked methane gas pipeline expansion. In Boise, Moscow, and Sandpoint, Idaho, and Kennewick and Spokane, Washington, in mid-May, we propose another week of not only demonstrations, similar to two previous endeavors, but also local presentations offered to describe two-plus years of ongoing, Northwest resistance to GTN Xpress and to consider direct actions against impending construction of compressor stations [1-3]. So many destructive fossil fuels and highway expansion projects have received permits or concluded construction during this last year, such as the Highway 95 reroute on Paradise Ridge near Moscow, the Coastal GasLink pipeline through unceded, Wet’suwet’en, indigenous territory in British Columbia, the Trans Mountain tar sands pipeline expansion across western Canada, and now GTN Xpress. Despite the annual, privileged polluter panaceas of Earth Day, this increasingly unbreathable, unlivable planet needs all “hands on deck” and “boots on the ground” to stop the climate hell imposed by our industrialized life ways. Please join with us and learn about the growing campaign to prevent plans by TC Energy, GTN, Cascade Natural Gas, Intermountain Gas, and other utilities, to push unneeded methane through aging, unsafe, GTN infrastructure and connected pipelines across Idaho, Washington, and Oregon. We gratefully welcome your participation, strategy ideas, and responses in-person and/or via phone, text, or email, as we coordinate these upcoming events and provide a slide show, banner, and T-shirts. Organizers also ask that you print, post, and share this announcement and flyer and bring protest signs, friends, and family to these public gatherings and discussions. Saturday, May 11, Moscow, Idaho Protest & Outreach: 10 am to 1 pm Moscow Farmers Market, Friendship Square, 400 S. Main Street Talk: 6 to 8 pm The Attic, 314 E. Second Street (rear stairs) Monday, May 13, Boise, Idaho Protest: 3 to 5 pm Intermountain Gas, 555 S. Cole Road Talk: 6 to 8 pm Boise Downtown Public Library, William Hayes Memorial Auditorium (first floor), 715 S. Capitol Boulevard Tuesday, May 14, Kennewick, Washington Protest: 3 to 5 pm Cascade Natural Gas, 8113 W. Grandridge Boulevard Talk: 6 to 8 pm Mid-Columbia Library, conference room (first door on right), 1620 S. Union Street Thursday, May 16, Spokane, Washington Protest: 3 to 5 pm TC Energy, 201 W. North River Drive, Suite 505 Talk: 6 to 8 pm Liberty Park United Methodist Church, social hall, 1526 E. 11th Avenue Friday, May 17, Sandpoint, Idaho Talk: 3 to 5 pm East Bonner County Library, Community Room B, 1407 Cedar Street Saturday, May 18, Sandpoint, Idaho Protest & Outreach: 9 am to 1 pm Farmers’ Market at Sandpoint, Farmin Park, 301 Oak Street Issue Updates On the morning of April 16, 2024, Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN), a subsidiary of Keystone and Keystone XL tar sands pipelines owner TC Energy (formerly TransCanada), filed a request with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), for a prompt decision allowing construction to proceed at three Northwest compressor stations, to increase the gas capacity of the GTN Xpress fracked methane pipeline, FERC docket CP22-2 [4]. Also on April 16, in another probably industry-ghostwritten comment to FERC, Idaho Congressional members urged the commission to approve construction of this Canadian fossil fuels invasion “bringing more supply to the communities that the pipeline safely serves” [5]. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 2 Replies GTN XPRESS TALK, PARADISE RIDGE WALK, & MOSCOW ACTION WEEK FEATURED Posted on April 15, 2024 by WIRT 1 i 10 Votes Please join Extinction Rebellion (XR) Palouse, Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), and allied groups at multiple, upcoming gatherings in Moscow, Idaho, during the mid-April week before Earth Day, to interactively discuss and resist destructive fossil fuels and infrastructure expansions and their implications for climate change, biodiversity loss, and resident harms across north Idaho and the Northwest. GTN Xpress Gas Pipeline Expansion Talk On Thursday, April 18, from 6:30 to 8 pm, activist Helen Yost of WIRT welcomes everyone to learn about and resist plans by TC Energy, owner of the Keystone and Keystone XL tar sands pipelines, to expand its Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) fracked methane gas pipeline with the GTN Xpress project across the Idaho panhandle, eastern Washington, and central Oregon [1, 2]. This free, public event in the Fiske Room of the 1912 Center, 412 East Third Street in Moscow, will talk about the health, safety, and climate impacts of this unnecessary, Canadian fossil fuels invasion on pipeline corridor communities from Sandpoint and Athol, Idaho, to the Spokane, Washington, and Bend, Oregon areas. The states of Washington, Oregon, and California and dozens of climate, conservation, faith, and health advocacy organizations have opposed GTN Xpress since its initial, autumn 2021 applications to federal and state agencies, through environmental review and public input processes in 2022, via numerous citizen and state official protests, media outreach articles, and government appeals in 2023, and by legal challenges filed in 2024. XR Palouse and WIRT event hosts encourage participants to engage in a question and strategy session concluding this insightful presentation. Mo(u)rning Walk on Paradise Ridge From 10 am until 12 noon on Saturday, April 20, community members are meeting at the south parking lot and barn of the University of Idaho Arboretum and Botanical Garden, 1200 West Palouse River Drive in Moscow, to attend a guided walk up Paradise Ridge with representatives of the Paradise Ridge Defense Coalition (PRDC) [3, 4]. Over the last three decades, PRDC has refuted deficient, Idaho Transportation Department (ITD) environmental studies and applications and has delayed flawed ITD attempts to realign U.S. Highway 95 between Thorn Creek Road and Moscow, on this ridge that hosts some of the last, significant remnants of native Palouse Prairie. Through four court challenges, expert wetland analyses, public records requests, and a lawsuit settlement, PRDC has forced suspension of wetland damage permits that ITD later revised and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved during 2023. As contested construction activities resume on Paradise Ridge, walk participants intend to share information about this ongoing preservation campaign and to collectively witness and grieve the degradation of this globally endangered ecosystem. Allied Week of Actions in Moscow Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion, Highway 95 Re-Route | 1 Reply 13TH ANNUAL CELEBRATION OF WILD IDAHO RISING TIDE FEATURED Posted on March 21, 2024 by WIRT 2 i 10 Votes Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) is celebrating its March 31 anniversary and thirteenth year as a regional, climate activists collective confronting the root causes and perpetrators of air pollution, water degradation, and resulting climate change, through direct actions and locally organized solutions, in solidarity with frontline communities and grassroots networks of fossil fuels resistance [1-5]. We welcome everyone of all ages to enjoy this milestone at two 13th Annual Celebrations of WIRT, held as benefit performances and potluck gatherings in Sandpoint and Moscow, Idaho, with provided pizza, requested snacks and beverages, a background slide show of WIRT and allied activism, and updates on six Northwest campaigns. WIRT invites and extends our hearty thanks to the remarkable core activists, board members, friends, and allies who have coordinated and shared the successes of ongoing citizen challenges of the corporate and government sources of climate chaos. Please join WIRT activists on two early spring evenings, for convergences full of lively music, spirited conversations, invigorating camaraderie, wholesome food and drink, and creative works offered by north Idaho and regional residents. At each of these free, public events, we eagerly anticipate community members sharing their admired talents and participating as volunteers and/or sponsors. These yearly festivities not only strive to raise awareness and funds supporting relentless, earnest, WIRT climate activism, but also seek to further attract and involve cross-cultural and youth diversity in the climate justice movement in Idaho and the Northwest. Thursday, March 28, 7 pm: Community Open Mic & Desiree Aguirre Gardenia Center, 400 Church Street, Sandpoint WIRT encourages poets, writers, musicians, creative peers, and allied groups to participate in an open microphone and potluck meal, at one of the last community events at the Gardenia Center, a beloved gathering place currently for sale and as endangered by development as the Earth [6]. A local poet will host reading and sharing of odes and tributes to the decades of community service bestowed by and through the Gardenia. Multi-instrumentalist, roots musician Desiree Aguirre will sing stories and play banjo and maybe guitar for 30 to 45 minutes, and organizers will “pass the hat” for donations covering event publicity and travel. Friday, March 29, 7 pm: Campaign Updates & the Eclectrix The Attic, 314 East Second Street (rear, second story), Moscow During this year’s celebrations in both Sandpoint and Moscow, WIRT and allied group representatives plan to lead discussions about resistance campaigns and upcoming events, including Northwest tar sands mining and refining megaloads and Alberta tailing pond breaches, southwest Idaho oil and gas extraction and waste injection wells and plant emissions, Paradise Ridge highway construction through wetlands and rare native habitat, Idaho Panhandle fossil fuels and hazardous freight trains and railroad infrastructure and wrecks, Lake Pend Oreille-adjacent timber sales, and Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress pipeline expansion. The high-energy Eclectrix duo of Jessica Amy Cowitz and Fiddlin’ Big Al Chidester will also play a variety of folk, blues, and country music as well as original compositions on guitar, mandolin, fiddle, and banjo. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, Annual Celebrations, Wild Idaho Rising Tide | 2 Replies 2023 TAR SANDS MEGALOAD PROTESTS FEATURED Posted on December 9, 2023 by WIRT 3 i 10 Votes Megaload Information During early December 2023, a Korean-manufactured steam boiler transported as a megaload has been slowly moving north from southwestern Montana toward the Rocky Mountain front and a tar sands exploitation site in northern Alberta, Canada. According to the Montana Department of Transportation (MDT), several local, national, and international articles, and eyewitness conversations, the rectangular, oversized load weighs about 360,000 pounds, stands more than 22 feet tall, and spans 29 feet of width [1-7, videos at 3]. While suspended on a main frame between two 12-axle, front and rear trailers with numerous wheels, tires, and at least four pull and push semi-trucks, the combined transport weighs up to one million pounds and stretches almost 500 feet long. Although some observers say that the cargo originated after ocean shipping at a Corpus Christi, Texas, port (purportedly one of few North American places that can handle transferring such a large load), media sources report that a Scappoose, Oregon, company called OXBO Mega Transport Solutions is bringing the megaload from Vancouver, Washington, over the U.S.-Canadian border. Apparently, the behemoth has parked all summer at a DuBois, Idaho, rest area, indicating that it previously traveled across southern Idaho, perhaps like prior megaloads, from the Port of Umatilla, Oregon. Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) and allies, among thousands of Northwest residents who have protested megaloads and tar sands mining since 2010, are working to further discern the identity, owner, origin, and destination of this fossil fuels industry monster. The onslaught of this heavy industrial equipment poses significant challenges to local traffic and infrastructure, as the massive size of this machinery requires specialized, hopefully expensive, transportation permit arrangements, lane and entire road closures, and delays, stops, and temporary rerouting to alternate routes of other traffic. This transportation fiasco is also imposing planned, overnight, electricity service outages on notified residents and businesses in its vicinity, during the cold of winter. Utility crews are de-energizing and lifting power lines and other electrical components out of the way for supposed safety, mostly affecting street lights and nearby power for no more than 15 minutes. However, unforeseen circumstances, such as megaload equipment failure and/or severe weather conditions, could potentially inflict unexpected power supply interruptions and further inconveniences, particularly in rural areas with limited infrastructure near megaload-abused highways. Even larger urban populations, as in the Helena and surrounding area of Toston, Townsend, Winston, and Wolf Creek, could experience brief power outages from Thursday through Wednesday, December 7 to 13. Preparations for such off-grid living could include provisions like non-perishable food, bottled water, medicine, flashlights, batteries, fully-charged communication devices, and other precautions and resources ready for any emergency losses. This impactful megaload and its extensive convoy of flaggers, pilot trucks, and accompanying vehicles without police escort begin their dark, regional passage every Sunday through Thursday night at 9:30 pm, to avoid disruptions of daytime travel. The exact itinerary of this (and other similar?) transport varies with weather circumstances, daily changes, and the remainder of the later scheduled move. Justifiably concerned citizens can visit the MDT 511 map and application and read the Oversized Load Movement web page under Alerts, to find further, revised information [2]. Transport proponents expect the megaload to conclude its journey through Montana by December 16 and arrive at its final destination by the end of the month. WIRT has mapped and lists here its recent and upcoming path across Montana [8]. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alberta Tar Sands, Alerts, Megaloads | 3 Replies INLAND NORTHWEST GTN XPRESS WEEKS OF ACTIONS FEATURED Posted on October 26, 2023 by WIRT 5 i 10 Votes On October 19, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved the Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress expansion of an unsafe, potentially explosive, six-decade-plus, methane (“natural” gas) pipeline across Idaho, Washington, and Oregon to California [1-7]. The Calgary, Alberta-based, Canadian owner of the rejected Keystone XL and rupture-prone Keystone tar sands pipelines in the Great Plains and the fiery Columbia Gas Transmission line in the northeast U.S., TC Energy (formerly TransCanada) proposes to increase the pump pressures of three compressor stations in Athol, Idaho, Starbuck, Washington, and Kent, Oregon, and push an additional 150 million cubic feet per day of unneeded, fracked gas volumes through the almost 1,400-mile-long GTN line from Eastport, Idaho, to Malin, Oregon, suspiciously the origin point of the defeated Pacific Connector gas pipeline to the also vanquished Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal planned for Coos Bay, Oregon [8, 9]. The bi-directional Williams Northwest gas line would carry over half (79 million cubic feet per day) of GTN Xpress methane from the GTN-Northwest juncture near the Columbia River at Stanfield, Oregon, to the Boise metropolitan area and southern Idaho. Cascade Natural Gas based in Kennewick, Washington, and Intermountain Gas headquartered in Boise signed precedent agreements for their utility companies to receive and distribute GTN Xpress gas. Not coincidentally, Intermountain has concurrently applied to the Idaho Public Utilities Commission for customer rate increases, contested by the city of Boise and Idaho Conservation League, likely to pass the costs of excess GTN methane on to Idaho consumers. After rubber stamping 423 of 425 pipeline applications as standard practice during the last two decades, FERC published a 79-page order issuing a certificate of public convenience and necessity for GTN Xpress, including statements from commissioners Clements and Danly both partially concurring and dissenting with the decision [10, 11]. This outcome ignored Northwest concerns about the lack of gas demand and the climate, health, and safety impacts of the expansion (addressed in an upcoming action alert), neglected proper tribal consultation, despite extensive comments to FERC from the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, and dismissed unprecedented community, tribal, and state and federal government resistance to this scheme clearly driven by industry profits from increasingly stranded fossil fuels assets. Columbia Riverkeeper and Rogue Climate, accepted intervenors in this quasi-judicial, FERC case deliberating whether GTN Xpress methane is both necessary and in the public interest, will challenge this reckless decision, by petitioning FERC before November 22, to withdraw its GTN Xpress order and/or hold a formal rehearing. Through their first of several filings, since the public comment period on the draft environmental impact statement (EIS) for GTN Xpress in summer 2022, all three West Coast attorneys general requested belated intervenor status after the February 2022 deadline. The Stop GTN Xpress coalition is encouraging the states of Washington, Oregon, and California, who urged FERC to reject this project, to also ask FERC for a rehearing. As the Northwest continues to hold FERC, TC Energy, and GTN accountable for exacerbated climate change and environmental injustices, FERC can grant, deny, or ignore these petitions within 30 days of their filing, and compressor station upgrades and construction could begin in January 2024. Besides thousands of Northwest citizens and a broad coalition of dozens of regional and nationwide, indigenous, environmental, health, and faith advocacy groups, numerous elected officials have voiced objections to GTN Xpress, including U.S. senators Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden of Oregon, Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray of Washington, and Dianne Feinstein and Alex Padilla of California, U.S. Congressional members Earl Blumenauer and Andrea Salinas of Oregon, Washington governor Jay Inslee, Oregon governor Tina Kotek, attorneys general Rob Bonta of California, Bob Ferguson of Washington, and Ellen Rosenblum of Oregon, and four Oregon and Washington state representatives. Inland Northwest GTN Xpress Weeks of Actions Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 5 Replies SPOKANE VIGIL OPPOSING GTN XPRESS FEATURED Posted on October 26, 2023 by WIRT 1 i 11 Votes Along with Inland Northwest GTN Xpress Weeks of Actions in Athol, Boise, Moscow, and Sandpoint, Idaho, and Kennewick and Spokane, Washington, on October 28 to November 10, Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) activists and allies encourage you to attend this GTN Xpress pipeline corridor community safety vigil on Sunday evening, November 5 [1, 2]. Forwarded message: Dear colleagues and friends, You are invited to a vigil to respond to the recent, disappointing news that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has green-lighted the GTN Xpress fracked gas pipeline expansion project. Here are the details, and attached is a flyer, which you are welcome to pass along to those who would be interested. Vigil for Community Safety Against Approved Pipeline Expansion of Gas Transmission Northwest Xpress Sunday, November 5, 2023, 4:30-5:30 pm* St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, 316 East 24th Avenue, Spokane *Please note that this will be an outdoor event on the day when clocks change from daylight savings to standard time. For more information, please see our website, the Seattle Times, and Columbia Riverkeeper [3-5]. The vigil is co-sponsored by these organizations: Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 1 Reply 2023 REMEMBER THE WATER KALISPEL POWWOW PADDLE FEATURED Posted on July 31, 2023 by WIRT 1 i 12 Votes On Monday, July 31, through Friday, August 4, Kalispel and regional tribal members and the River Warrior Society are holding the annual Remember the Water Kalispel Powwow canoe journey [1, 2]. The paddle usually voyages from Lake Pend Oreille and Qpqpe (Sandpoint), Idaho, to the Qlispe (Kalispel) Village in Cusick, Washington, during the week before the yearly Kalispel Powwow and around the time of the Festival at Sandpoint music concerts. In this cultural journey, families and friends are again paddling in traditional, dugout, wooden and sturgeon nose canoes, like their ancestors did for travel, fishing, and fun, over 50 miles through their home lands and waters among the tributaries, lake, and river of the Pend Oreille watershed. While oil and gas pipeline expansions and fossil fuels pipeline-on-rails infrastructure and transportation impose and risk further harms to indigenous people and places locally and across Turtle Island (North America), Native neighbors continue to revive, uphold, and practice their ancient cultures and sustainable ways, through admirable endeavors like this canoe journey and culminating powwow. Paddle organizers invite and encourage tribal allies and everyone to join in this joyful resurgence at various route locations, as they accommodate as many participants and observers as they can. The canoe journey tentatively begins on Monday, July 31, with setting up camp at Sam Owen Campground off Hope Peninsula Road near Hope, Idaho, before paddling to the Bear Paw petroglyphs and back. On Tuesday, August 1, participants plan to put in, paddle, and take out on the Pack River, and later stay at Sam Owen or the Best Western Edgewater Resort in Sandpoint. Like during previous years, and as depicted in linked photos and articles about prior journeys, Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) activists and area groups intend to welcome the paddlers at Sandpoint, during their arrival and/or departure on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, August 1 and 2 [2]. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, BNSF Bridges, Coal/Oil Trains/Ports, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 1 Reply URGENT JULY 26 & 27 GTN XPRESS PIPELINE ACTIONS FEATURED Posted on July 26, 2023 by WIRT 2 i 13 Votes WHAT THE FERC?! On Thursday, July 20, a Northwest coalition of groups working to stop the Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress pipeline expansion learned that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) listed GTN Xpress on its certificate agenda for its monthly meeting on Thursday, July 27. In an apparent, massive, rubberstamp attempt to rush approvals before FERC’s August non-meeting break, the federal agency will likely permit a slew of fossil fuels projects including the GTN Xpress application of TC Energy, owner of the rupturing Keystone and rejected Keystone XL tar sands pipelines. Along with thousands of Northwest citizens and dozens of organizations, the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission and West Coast governors, state attorneys general and legislators, and U.S. senators have opposed and organized against GTN Xpress for almost two years. GTN Xpress is essentially a fossil fuels invasion of southern Idaho, thankfully challenged by neighboring states and Sandpoint and Spokane fossil fuels sacrifice zones that would receive only 13 percent or none of additional GTN gas. More than half of the 150 million cubic feet per day of extra, unnecessary, fracked gas that TC Energy plans to push with three upgraded compressors through the 60-year-plus GTN pipeline would threaten the health and safety of north Idaho and eastern Washington pipeline corridor residents, for delivery to southern Idaho. GTN and Intermountain Gas of Boise, who requested gas customer price hikes last winter, intend to essentially take over and reverse westward Williams Northwest pipeline flows, to bolster their profits at the 30-year expense of utility ratepayers increasingly favoring alternative energy. WIRT is exploring the GTN Xpress record for information about probably missing Williams agreements and to produce second WIRT comments before July 27, welcoming other, also issue-underrepresented, Idaho and inland Northwest groups and residents to send your remarks to FERC. Despite postponed railroad double-track construction impeding public transportation and requiring citizen monitoring at the Sandpoint Amtrak station, we will next coordinate regional protests in Athol (site of one of three compressor expansions), Sandpoint, Spokane, Moscow, and Boise, denouncing GTN’s proposal and FERC’s predictable decision, while supporting FERC re-hearing petitions filed by coalition partners and hopefully Northwest states, before the August 26 challenge deadline. We appreciate your interest in GTN Xpress resistance and your input toward comments and demonstrations that demand FERC justice from the ongoing dangers and compounded risks of GTN Xpress expansion, leaks, and resulting climate disasters. ANOTHER TC ENERGY PIPELINE RUPTURE On July 25, the TC Energy-owned Columbia Gas Transmission pipeline catastrophically failed, causing a large explosion and fire and temporarily closing Interstate 81 in rural Shenandoah County, Virginia, approximately 80 miles west of Washington, D.C. [1, 2]. Thankfully, the incident neither injured nor killed anyone, and its causes and impacts remain unknown. But like the December 2022 rupture and 600,000-gallon spill from TC Energy’s Keystone tar sands pipeline into a Kansas stream only weeks after FERC release of the GTN Xpress final environmental impact statement (EIS), the Virginia disaster demonstrates the terrible safety record of TC Energy and timely illustrates the major risks posed by TC Energy’s GTN Xpress, less than 48 hours before FERC could approve this expansion scheme [3]. The proposal would increase flammable, climate-wrecking, methane gas flows through a six-decade-old pipeline among fire-prone rural lands and urban residential areas in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon. As multiple wildfires burn and blanket the Northwest with smoke, a pipeline accident like the one that just occurred in Shenandoah County could devastate nearby communities. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 2 Replies STOP OIL TRAINS 2023 FEATURED Posted on July 3, 2023 by WIRT 3 i 14 Votes July 7-9 annual actions remember the Lac-Mégantic, Mosier, & Custer disasters Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) and allied activists invite everyone to participate in tenth annual, Stop Oil Trains direct actions and a training workshop in north Idaho on Friday, July 7, through Sunday, July 9. Five events commemorate the 47 lives lost and downtowns devastated by oil train derailments, spills, explosions, and fires in the lakeside village of Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, on July 6, 2013, the Columbia River Gorge town of Mosier, Oregon, on June 3, 2016, and the northwestern hamlet of Custer, Washington, on December 22, 2020. These demonstrations also support pipeline-on-rails resistance across the Northwest and in trackside and pipeline corridor communities and environments threatened and polluted by dangerous oil and gas infrastructure and transportation. Spotlight Message Projection Friday & Saturday, July 7 & 8, 10 pm, Downtown Sandpoint As the sun sets, WIRT and allied organizers will provide brief, light projection displays of social and climate justice messages on buildings in downtown Sandpoint, Idaho. Meet after 10 pm on Friday and Saturday, July 7 and 8, wherever you see this light show, for discussions among activists and curious passersby, about Northwest oil train and terminal and gas pipeline expansion issues. Resistance Outreach Saturday, July 8, 9 am to 1 pm, near Farmin Park, Sandpoint Gather with volunteer activists between 9 am and 1 pm on Saturday, July 8, at the WIRT outreach table at the corner of Fourth and Oak Streets near Farmin Park, during the Farmers Market at Sandpoint, Idaho. We plan to talk with residents and visitors of the one-mile-wide, north Idaho “bomb train blast zone,” offer updates on Northwest oil and coal trains and infrastructure and Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) Railway’s doubled tracks and three new communication towers and second railroad bridges, and provide #No2ndBridge and other petitions, letters, flyers, and brochures [1-5]. Oil Trains Protest Saturday, July 8, 2 pm, Farmin to City Beach Parks, Sandpoint At 2 pm on Saturday, July 8, bring your family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, protest signs, and creative spirit, to show community opposition to dangerous crude oil conduits to refineries and export facilities: Oil trains and railroad infrastructure, like the present and proposed, BNSF rail bridges in and near Sandpoint. Starting from the Farmin Park clock, we will walk with banners and signs objecting to the Northwest pipeline-on-rails and its expansion, through downtown Sandpoint to City Beach Park. At these public march origin and destination places, we will share reflections and stories about the isolated vulnerability of rural, rail corridor communities to oil and hazardous materials derailment catastrophes and industry invasions of local environments and economies. Train Watch Workshop Sunday, July 9, 5 pm, Gardenia Center, Sandpoint For the annual training sessions on regional oil and tar sands trainspotting, David Perk of PNW Oil Train Watch will present methods for trackside observing, documenting, and reporting Northwest fossil fuels train traffic with photos, videos, and social media. He will discuss rail routes from the plains to the coast, train descriptors, refinery and receiving facilities, rail system operations, stopovers, and transit times, and train watch motivations and resources. Please RSVP to WIRT at wild.idaho.rising.tide2@gmail.com, for required registration to join this teleconferenced conversation with David generously sharing images, skills, and insights, beginning at 5 pm on Sunday, July 9, via Zoom and at the Gardenia Center, 400 Church Street in Sandpoint, Idaho. WIRT needs more train monitors along the tracks of the north Idaho, fossil fuels frontline, to document all westbound, unit trains of cars hauling Powder River Basin coal, Bakken crude oil, and Canadian tar sands. Issue Background Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, BNSF Bridges, Coal/Oil Trains/Ports | 3 Replies WIRT COMMENTS ON BNSF COMMUNICATION TOWERS FEATURED Posted on June 22, 2023 by WIRT 3 i 15 Votes WIRT Comments on BNSF Communication Towers 6-18-23 SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in BNSF Bridges, Coal/Oil Trains/Ports | 3 Replies SPOKANE COMMUNITY GTN XPRESS TEACH-IN FEATURED Posted on April 10, 2023 by WIRT 1 i 16 Votes On Wednesday evening, April 12, in Spokane, Washington, faith, spiritual, health, and environmental advocates will lead a community gathering, teach-in, and procession in opposition to the proposed Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress fracked gas pipeline expansion [1]. The 62-year-old GTN pipeline runs under the Spokane River and through Liberty Lake, Spokane Valley, and other parts of Spokane County [2, 3]. Canadian company TC Energy, owner of the leaking Keystone and rejected Keystone XL tar sands pipelines, and its subsidiary GTN threaten to pump up to 150 million cubic feet of additional methane gas per day through the GTN pipeline that crosses north Idaho, eastern Washington, and central Oregon. While communities throughout the Northwest shift away from coal, oil, and “natural” gas, fossil fuel companies like TC Energy have adopted a new tactic: bolstering the capacity of aging pipelines. A broad, regional, Stop GTN Xpress coalition, the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, U.S. Senators Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden of Oregon, Washington Governor Jay Inslee, three West Coast state attorneys general, and other concerned Northwesterners are resisting this gas pipeline and compressor station expansion. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) could vote for or against granting project approval as early as April 20. The GTN Xpress pipeline expansion further risks exposing local, Spokane area, and north Idaho communities to both the dangers and damages of ruptured pipeline explosions, fires, and pollution and the increased carbon and greenhouse gas emissions that are causing more severe storms, droughts, wildfires, and floods [4-6]. The gathering and teach-in at 6:30 pm Pacific time on April 12, at Salem Lutheran Church, 1428 West Broadway Avenue in Spokane, will feature comments from members of Earth Ministry/Washington Interfaith Power and Light (WAIPL), Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility (WPSR), and Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), among other organizations [7-9]. They will offer opportunities to learn about GTN Xpress and its potential impacts on public and environmental health and safety. After an interactive presentation with speakers, event organizers invite participants to join a procession with signs and banners, walking together several blocks to the banks of the Spokane River, where faith leaders will share a brief group prayer and photograph the demonstration. To access further information and attend, please contact coordinating groups and visit their websites and RSVP through the event description link [10]. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 1 Reply TWELFTH ANNUAL CELEBRATION OF WILD IDAHO RISING TIDE FEATURED Posted on April 2, 2023 by WIRT 2 i 17 Votes Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) is celebrating its March 31 anniversary and twelfth year as a regional, climate activists collective confronting the root causes and perpetrators of air pollution, water degradation, and resulting climate change, through direct actions and locally organized solutions, in solidarity with frontline communities and grassroots networks of fossil fuels resistance [1-5]. We welcome everyone of all ages to enjoy this decade-plus milestone at two Twelfth Annual Celebrations of WIRT, held as benefit concerts and potluck gatherings in Sandpoint and Moscow, Idaho, with provided pizza, requested snacks and beverages, and a background slide show of WIRT and allied activism. WIRT invites and extends our hearty thanks to the remarkable core activists, board members, friends, and allies who have coordinated and shared the successes of ongoing citizen challenges of the corporate and government sources of climate chaos. Please join WIRT activists on two early spring evenings, for convergences full of musical performances, spirited conversations, invigorating camaraderie, wholesome food and drink, and other creative works offered by north Idaho and regional residents. At each of these free, lively, public events, we encourage and eagerly anticipate organizers, musicians, and businesses sharing their admired talents and participating as volunteers and/or sponsors. These yearly festivities not only strive to raise awareness and funds supporting relentless WIRT activism, but also seek to attract and involve cross-cultural, youth, and community member diversity in the climate justice movement in Idaho and the Northwest. Thursday, April 6, 7 pm: Monarch Mountain Band Gardenia Center, 400 Church Street, Sandpoint As a high-energy bluegrass, newgrass, and folk rock trio, the Monarch Mountain Band has been performing at numerous local and regional venues, halls, festivals, fairs, and clubs for close to 30 years [6]. Their high-stepping, toe-tapping, progressive repertoire includes bluegrass standards along with covers of the Rolling Stones, Beatles, Band, Byrds, Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan, and many more. Offering great entertainment for entire families and friends, the Monarch Mountain Band thrills music enthusiasts of all genres, who appreciate the excellent techniques and pure sounds played by this group of musicians. Saturday, April 8, 7 pm: Fiddlin’ Big Al & Guests The Attic, 314 East Second Street (rear, second story), Moscow KRFP Radio Free Moscow DJ and board member and core WIRT activist Fiddlin’ Big Al Chidester performs ragtime, honky-tonk piano, fiddle, and guitar, singing old-time, country blues and original, socio-political satire songs [7]. Al started the practice of playing traditional, phase-shifted, electric viola, adding to his multi-instrumental, experimental, Americana repertoire offered on mandolin, banjo, dobro, and lap steel guitar. He writes humorous, topical songs about peace, freedom, and political hypocrisy, some recorded on his 2004 album Where Were You the Night New Orleans Drowned? and Other Songs for Our Time. Besides performing at Northwest barter fairs and hosting a long-running jam session at the Moscow Moose Lodge, Fiddlin’ Big Al broadcasts several weekly, KRFP, music shows, giving airplay to an eclectic mix of genre-bending music, recorded performances from regional venues, and occasional, live, studio sessions. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, Annual Celebrations, Wild Idaho Rising Tide | 2 Replies GTN XPRESS PIPELINE PROTESTS MEETINGS & WINTER UPDATES FEATURED Posted on March 2, 2023 by WIRT 2 i 18 Votes Protests Planning Meetings While TC Energy desperately seeks to offload its stranded Canadian gas assets on the Northwest with the GTN Xpress expansion project proposed for the Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) pipeline, and pits elected Idaho politicians against their western Democrat neighbors, dozens of nonprofit organizations are coordinating authentic, public opposition to GTN Xpress. These community groups, including Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), assert that the project is inconsistent with regional efforts to transition away from reliance on polluting, planet-warming fossil fuels. Resistance to GTN Xpress continues to grow, as thousands of Northwest residents work together to demand that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) deny this risky plan and responsibly uphold regionally legislated goals for diminishing use of climate-changing, fracked gas. With a final FERC decision on the project expected as early as March 16 (postponed from the commission’s third Thursday, monthly meeting on February 16), we again invite you and your friends, family, and colleagues to join us in active rejection of this unnecessary fossil fuels invasion of the Northwest, as TC Energy and its subsidiary GTN scheme to increase the volume and pressure in their 62-year-old pipeline, just like TC Energy did in the decade-old Keystone tar sands pipeline, before it burst in Kansas on December 7, 2022. In preparation for a possible March 16, FERC decision, WIRT and allies in three cities are holding in-person planning meetings to organize the next pipeline protests with eager activists across the inland Northwest. We hope that you will participate in these gatherings and encourage your trusted comrades to attend. * Saturday, March 4, at 3 pm at The Attic, up the back stairs of 314 East Second Street in Moscow, Idaho * Sunday, March 5, at 1 pm at the Community Building, 35 West Main Street in Spokane, Washington * Monday, March 6, at 7 pm at the Gardenia Center, 400 Church Street in Sandpoint, Idaho For further information, please see and share the linked coalition videos about GTN Xpress resistance and the February 13 People’s Hearing, send your written comments sharing your concerns about GTN Xpress (Docket CP22-2-000) to FERC soon, peruse the enclosed and linked information promised with the People’s Hearing announcement and covering four months of campaign activity from mid-November 2022 until mid-February 2023, contact WIRT with your questions and suggestions, and expect further updates about upcoming, responsively scheduled protests and other urgent actions. WIRT and partner groups appreciate your work and input on this crucial issue that requires even more public participation, especially in the environmental and political sacrifice zones of Idaho. Stop GTN Xpress, January 30, 2023 Rogue Climate People’s Hearing to Stop GTN Xpress, February 14, 2023 350PDX How to File a Comment, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission FERC Online: Web Applications, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Pipeline Impacts & Winter Updates Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 2 Replies PEOPLE’S HEARING ON GTN XPRESS FEATURED Posted on February 9, 2023 by WIRT Reply i 19 Votes Starting at 5 pm Pacific time and 6 pm Mountain time on Monday evening, February 13, a Northwest coalition of nonprofit organizations, including 350 Deschutes, 350 PDX, Columbia Riverkeeper, Rogue Climate, Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility, and Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), will host a People’s Hearing on Canadian company TC Energy’s proposal to expand fracked “natural” gas exported through the aging Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) pipeline and compressor stations that span north Idaho, eastern Washington, and central Oregon. This hybrid town hall, convened online and in-person at the Gardenia Center (400 Church Street in Sandpoint, Idaho) and at the Rogue Climate office (205 North Phoenix Road, Suite G, Phoenix, Oregon), offers participants opportunities to learn about the potential impacts of the GTN Xpress expansion project and to provide testimony recorded and sent to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for the project docket. Among concerned, regional community members and environmental and climate advocates sharing their insights and stories, the People’s Hearing on GTN Xpress will feature these key speakers: * U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon * Audrey Leonard, staff attorney of Columbia Riverkeeper * Peter McCartney, climate campaigner of Wilderness Committee * Dr. Annemarie Dooley, physician and board member of Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility * Naghmana Sherazi, activist and board member of Earth Ministry/Washington Interfaith Power and Light Please RSVP and register to join this virtual conference at bit.ly/peopleshearing_gtn and/or gather at the Gardenia Center or Rogue Climate office and contact WIRT for further information [1]. Timely input from citizens and local elected officials to FERC before its possible decision on this project on Thursday, March 16, is crucial to halting the GTN Xpress fossil fuels onslaught [2]. Along with commenting and/or testifying to FERC, help support this resistance by amplifying a new video recently launched by the grassroots coalition, through social media posts email messages, and other methods [3]. Also reach out to any of the partner groups, if your organization is interested in joining the fight to #StopGTNXpress. Within the next few days, WIRT will add to this post and send further descriptions of pipeline expansion impacts and issue updates, to assist involvement in this campaign. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | Leave a reply OPPOSE COLLABORATIVE DEFORESTATION AROUND LAKE PEND OREILLE! FEATURED Posted on January 16, 2023 by WIRT 2 i 20 Votes The U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service (USFS) and compromised, north Idaho Big Greens involved in the Panhandle Forest “Collaborative” have agreed to massive deforestation of steep mountains on the remote, wilder, east side of Lake Pend Oreille, promoted as “restoration” projects to reduce wildfires and insect and disease outbreaks [1, 2]. Over the next few years, the Sandpoint Ranger District of the Idaho Panhandle National Forests (IPNF) and timber companies plan to excessively build roads and log over 175,000 acres of Lake Pend Oreille slopes, which would degrade water and air quality, wildlife habitat, protected areas, and recreational opportunities. A complex of three contiguous logging projects, the 57,000-acre Buckskin Saddle, 43,000-acre Chloride Gold, and 43,500-acre Honey Badger, extends 45 miles from the Clark Fork River on the north, throughout eastern lake forests, and south to the Hayden Lake area. Government proposals and decisions on these unnecessary forays into carbon-sequestering forests overlap temporally, while the middle Chloride Gold project also overlaps spatially with the area of the Kaniksu Winter Recreation environmental assessment (EA). These USFS overlaps are called “stacking National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) documents,” an illegal rush and overburden of public scrutiny. Located to the south of federal agency-finalized Buckskin Saddle project destruction, currently stalled by Johnson Creek bridge replacement near the Clark Fork River delta between September 2022 and May 2023, and potential litigation by grassroots groups, the Chloride Gold (CG) project proposes to conduct “vegetation management,” “hazardous fuels reduction,” and other activities to “manage invasive plants, roads, trails, recreation, wildlife habitat, and improve fish passage under roads … [and] overall landscape resiliency to disturbances” [2-6]. Pre-scoping ideas suggested that the USFS planned to push approximately 23.8 miles of new, “temporary” road construction and over 12 square miles of forest “regeneration” cuts in the area, which would remove the vast majority of trees in over 17,000 acres (26.6 square miles), through logging, road building, and controlled burning, even in inventoried roadless areas (IRAs). According to the December 1, 2022, Chloride Gold scoping notice signed by Sandpoint District ranger Jessie Berner, over 22,500 acres would undergo “vegetation treatments” including large clearcuts and prescribed burns. The scoping letter requests public review and comments by Monday, January 16, 2023, for USFS consideration in drafting only an environmental assessment (EA), not the full environmental impact statement (EIS) required and necessary for the CG onslaught. On September 27, 2022, in preparation for a public presentation and field trip refuting this logging project, provided by regional, climate activist collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) in spring or summer 2023, Northern Rockies wildlands and wildlife activist and GIS researcher Paul Sieracki and two WIRT board members visited the Chloride Gold logging project area [7]. With precise maps in hand while exploring CG forests, these citizen monitors found a highly impacted landscape, crossed by a spaghetti network of roads and all-terrain vehicle (ATV) and motorcycle trails, devastated by huge logged areas, and immersed in road dust and subsequent lake haze. They documented and publicly offered their observations with photographs and descriptions, noting several situations in which further CG ravages could severely disturb flora, fauna, and roadless areas [7]. For the Wednesday, January 11, 2023, Climate Justice Forum, weekly radio program produced by WIRT and recorded and posted on the WIRT website, Paul graciously expounded on his knowledge of the probable damages of the lakeside Chloride Gold scheme [8]. WIRT shares a summary of these insights in the following sections intended to further inform and assist public input resisting this CG cause of regional climate chaos. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, Climate Change | 2 Replies STOP UINTA BASIN RAILWAY SOLIDARITY ACTION FEATURED Posted on December 7, 2022 by WIRT 2 i 21 Votes Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) and climate activists throughout the West are organizing solidarity protests of oil trains and infrastructure, for a day of action against the Uinta Basin Railway (UBR), supporting campaigns against the Utah oil-by-rail scheme and in north Idaho, denouncing completion of BNSF Railway’s second, almost mile-long, rail bridge across the state’s largest, deepest lake: mountainous Lake Pend Oreille. Utah and Colorado comrades are calling for community-led actions on Saturday, December 10, 2022, to show that concerned citizens object to the devastating UBR project, and to pressure federal lawmakers, state representatives, and local governments to prevent building of the Uinta Basin Railway. They ask everyone to explore the #StopUintaBasinRailway action toolkit with information about the UBR and action coordination, sign a letter to Agriculture Department Secretary Tom Vilsack, demanding that he revoke the U.S. Forest Service permit for the railway, participate in actions happening in a dozen locations, register to join a remote phone bank on Tuesday, December 13, at 10 am Pacific time, and tell UBR opponents that you are interested in assisting this campaign [1-2]. To involve local communities across the United States in advocating against UBR permits and their potential disasters for climate and environmental justice, Colorado groups held a public, online, action training on November 10 [3]. Organizers with years of experience shared ideas about planning effective actions and helped participants learn about the UBR oil trains that would threaten lives and livelihoods along rail routes from Utah to Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana, and around the southern Northwest, Union Pacific Railroad (UP) line across southern Idaho and eastern Oregon to western Washington. Most of WIRT and allied resistance to behemoth oil and coal train shipments has successfully focused on dozens of BNSF Railway fossil fuels pipeline-on-rails routes from the Great Plains to the West Coast. We rarely demonstrate against Union Pacific, except while decrying its few weekly, Northwest, tar sands trains and myriad derailments, including the Mosier, Oregon, oil train spill and fire in June 2016. Based on our experiences of BNSF’s ongoing malfeasance, WIRT encouraged and sent extensive comments on the draft environmental impact statement (EIS) in 2021, opposing the Uinta Basin Railway, and talked about the issue during recent years on our weekly, Climate Justice Forum, radio program [4]. WIRT remains steadfast in our thorough monitoring, reporting, and protesting of daily, BNSF, Bakken crude oil trains across north Idaho, as we gratefully accept dedicated co-workers’ invitations to alert our regional neighbors to the impending dangers and direct action opportunities of Utah oil transport across the Northwest. Uinta Basin & BNSF Railways Protest As part of countless demonstrations against the fossil fuel causes of the climate crisis and their insidious pollution, risks, and impacts on north Idaho and Northwest rail line communities, we plan to protest both the proposed Uinta Basin Railway oil trains and tracks and the BNSF Railway expansion of its industrial infrastructure into Lake Pend Oreille and Sandpoint, with three second rail bridges and two miles of doubled main line. Please dress for warmth and dryness, bring your signs and banners, voices and drums, friends and family, and joy and courage, and join WIRT and inland Northwest activists for the Stop Uinta Basin Railway Solidarity Action at 12 noon on Saturday, December 10, at the Serenity Lee trailhead near the East Superior Street and Highway 95 intersection and/or on the public, pedestrian, and bike path to Dog Beach Park in Sandpoint, Idaho. WIRT will provide on-site action advice and chants and pizza for appreciated participants after the gathering. Respond in advance with your questions and suggestions, share this event information and flyer among your associates and contacts, and see previous and upcoming, website- and facebook-posted, WIRT newsletters and alerts, for further updates on these issues. Uinta Basin Railway Opposition Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, BNSF Bridges, Coal/Oil Trains/Ports | 2 Replies NOVEMBER 17-18 GTN XPRESS ACTION, WIRT TALK, & FEIS RELEASE FEATURED Posted on November 17, 2022 by WIRT Reply i 22 Votes GTN Xpress & Idaho & Northwest Stakeholders Canadian energy company TC Energy (formerly TransCanada), owner of the notorious Keystone and Keystone XL tar sands pipelines and the Coastal GasLink line under contested construction through unceded, indigenous, Wet’suwet’en territories in British Columbia (B.C.), has applied to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to increase the “natural” gas pipeline volumes and pressures of three compressor stations along its Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) pipeline, with the GTN Xpress expansion project from B.C. through north Idaho, eastern Washington, and central Oregon. The 61-year-old, potentially explosive GTN pipeline passes under Wild Idaho Rising Tide’s (WIRT) fossil fuels pipeline-on-rails frontline community and waters around Sandpoint and Lake Pend Oreille, Idaho, through several rural sacrifice zones, and below the Spokane, Washington, metropolitan area. One of the GTN compressor stations planned for upgrades stands near dozens of unaware residences and a popular amusement park full of hundreds of visitors in Athol, Idaho [1]. TC Energy and partner fossil fuel corporations propose to increase the capacity for dangerous methane gas in the existing, 1,354-mile GTN pipeline by 150 million cubic feet per day, pushing more gas into the Northwest and locking communities into expensive fossil fuel energy for decades. If approved by FERC, the GTN Xpress expansion would cause continued fracking in tribal lands in Canada and threaten and harm the health and safety of rural, low-income communities living and working along the pipeline route. Prone to accidents like leaks, fires, and explosions, the aging infrastructure of pipelines and compressor stations risks exposing nearby residents to cancer-causing pollutants. Over the last few decades, Northwest citizens have defeated fossil fuels pipelines, processing plants, and export terminals, and organized to pass local and state climate laws, while experiencing record droughts, wildfires, storms, floods, and other climate change impacts. But sneakier pipeline expansions require different government processes and regulations than new pipeline construction, even though GTN Xpress would exacerbate the greenhouse gas emissions and accelerate the climate crisis contributing to these conditions. Supplying enough gas to serve 1.2 million households each day, GTN Xpress would contradict Oregon and Washington state policy commitments to reduce climate pollution and end dependence on climate-wrecking fossil fuels. During summer 2022, over 1,300 people petitioned FERC to deny TC Energy’s plans; Columbia River tribes voiced their resistance; a broad, emerging coalition of Northwest community groups commented against the project; and the attorneys general of California, Oregon, and Washington told FERC that they oppose GTN Xpress, because it clearly conflicts with state and federal climate goals. With FERC expected to release the scheme’s final environmental impact statement (EIS) on November 18, 2022, and to issue an ultimate decision in February 2023, Northwesterners need to hold FERC accountable, ask that the agency address valid climate, public health, and environmental concerns raised across the region, and demand that FERC reject the GTN Xpress project. Since April 2022, the WIRT climate activist collective has been informing, networking, and supporting impacted, indigenous, and grassroots groups and individuals and state, county, and city, elected and agency officials about GTN Xpress, along the north Idaho and eastern Washington GTN pipeline corridor and in southern Idaho, where Intermountain Gas customers would receive over half of the additional GTN Xpress methane gas from a Stanfield, Oregon, compressor station diversion. We have provided extensive comments to FERC on behalf of WIRT’s 3,200-plus contacts, and communicated and urged opposition to the GTN Xpress gas pipeline expansion via social media, email, website, and other online resources, and through WIRT’s weekly, eleven-years-broadcast, community radio program [2]. WIRT plans to continue to raise resistance to this Canadian stranded gas asset invasion of the Northwest, by encouraging citizen involvement in public processes and alternative methods of GTN Xpress rejection. Stop GTN Xpress Week of Actions Report Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | Leave a reply STOP GTN XPRESS WEEK OF ACTIONS FEATURED Posted on October 24, 2022 by WIRT 3 i 23 Votes Regional organizations and grassroots activists of 350 Spokane, Idaho Chapter Sierra Club, Palouse Extinction Rebellion, Rogue Climate, Veterans for Peace Spokane Chapter 35, and Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) request your participation and support of public protests of three corporations pushing the dangerous Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress pipeline expansion project. We are collectively co-hosting these actions in solidarity with sovereign Wet’suwet’en land defenders and water protectors opposing Coastal GasLink pipeline construction through their unceded, indigenous territories in British Columbia, Canada. Allied groups are planning peaceful, safe, and effective citizen pickets on nearby public walkways outside fossil fuel company offices during early November, to attract a broad range of involvement and responses from the public, issue coalition groups, and media. Several partner organizations are graciously offering travel funds and providing Stop GTN Xpress/Coastal GasLink logo designs, T-shirts, signs, banners, and other equipment. Volunteer activists are eager to engage you in resistance to both Northwest gas pipelines owned by TC Energy, notorious for its Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. Please share this event announcement and flyer and other campaign outreach materials via text, social media, email, and website, invite and bring your friends, family, and protest signs, create props and coordinate carpools and various logistics, and join us at one or all of these lively demonstrations! Tuesday, November 1, 4 pm PDT at TC Energy, 201 West North River Drive, Suite 505, Spokane, Washington: Meet on the north path along the Spokane River, across from Riverfront Park and between Washington and Division streets Wednesday, November 2, 4 pm PDT at Cascade Natural Gas, 8113 West Grandridge Boulevard, Kennewick, Washington: Gather on the south sidewalk along Grandridge Boulevard Friday, November 4, 4 pm MDT at Intermountain Gas, 555 South Cole Road, Boise, Idaho: Converge on the west Cole Road walkway near the Farmers Lateral Canal Resist plans by TC Energy (formerly TransCanada) and regional “natural” gas utilities to increase methane gas volumes by 150 million (and eventually, incrementally 250 million) cubic feet per day and upgrade the capacity of three compressor stations of the 1,354-mile GTN pipeline that crosses from British Columbia, through north Idaho, eastern Washington, and central Oregon, to California [1, 2]. The 61-year-old, potentially explosive, climate-wrecking gas pipeline is dangerously located under the Spokane, Washington, metropolitan area and below the Schweitzer ski resort parking lot and city of Sandpoint, Idaho. The Athol, Idaho, pump station proposed for expansion stands only two miles from the popular Silverwood Theme Park, full of hundreds of visitors on precarious rides during spring, summer, and fall days. GTN has applied to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for a certificate of public convenience and necessity to permit the GTN Xpress expansion project. But controversy has continued to grow during and since the too-brief comment period on FERC’s draft environmental impact statement (EIS) that closed on August 22, despite a timely letter from twenty mostly Oregon groups and Wild Idaho Rising Tide, requesting that FERC provide an additional 30 days for the public to review and evaluate the document [3]. As thousands of people across the Northwest rise to oppose GTN Xpress, FERC has received over 1,300 oppositional petition signatures and extensive, informative remarks from concerned citizens, environmental and climate groups, and tribal, state, and federal government officials, denouncing draft EIS deficiencies and the fracked gas pipeline expansion’s significant contributions to worsening climate change, while the Northwest transitions off fossil fuels toward more sustainable, renewable energy sources [2, 4, 5]. Attempting to foist stranded Canadian gas assets on the Northwest, likely aware of its gradually failing product prospects, TC Energy expects to quickly, stealthily secure GTN Xpress approval by FERC and other government regulatory agencies. It has strategically enlisted contracted, third-party, environmental reviewers with undisclosed conflicts of interests as consulting firms simultaneously working with TC Energy, and has expanded its other pipeline volumes, instead of building new infrastructure that attracts justified direct actions from frontline fossil fuels fighters [6, 7]. With anticipated release of a final EIS on November 18, postponed from October 14, and a pending conclusive FERC decision on GTN Xpress in February 2023, impacted residents and concerned communities must act swiftly to protect the inland Northwest from this proposal [8]. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 3 Replies SEVENTH PANHANDLE PADDLE FEATURED Posted on September 18, 2022 by WIRT 1 i 24 Votes Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) and allied activists, friends, and supporters heartily welcome your participation in the upcoming, Seventh Panhandle Paddle weekend of opportunities to discuss, train for, and stage resistance to the fossil fuels and railroad industry degraders of human rights, environmental health, and the global climate. Interior Northwest residents are coordinating and co-hosting annual activities in Sandpoint, Idaho, to unite in opposition to regional coal, oil, and tar sands trains, terminals, and derailments and Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) Railway’s almost complete track and bridge construction across downtown Sandpoint, Sand Creek, and Lake Pend Oreille. Amid the intensifying situations of north Idaho railroad expansion, federal and media criminalization of dissenters, and COVID-19 health and economic disasters during the last two-plus years, we are reaching out to you, our regional network comrades, to share direct action skills and invite you to join with rail line communities, to protest fossil-fueled climate change via these free events on Thursday through Sunday, September 22 to 25. We would appreciate your involvement in the talk, workshop, and paddle, your RSVP of your intentions for spots in kayaks, canoes, and carpools, and your assistance with distributing this event description and printing and posting the color, PDF version of the WIRT website-linked Seventh Panhandle Paddle Flyer. #No2ndBridge Talk 6 to 8 pm Thursday, September 22 Gardenia Center, Sandpoint At this informal discussion, participants can exchange issue information, expand knowledge, and brainstorm strategies and tactics for creatively engaging and catalyzing further community resistance and regulatory and legal recourse to BNSF’s Sandpoint Junction Connector project and railroad infrastructure, pollution, and risks in the Lake Pend Oreille area and beyond, which activists have denounced and challenged during each of the Panhandle Paddles [1-5]. Please bring ideas about campaign organizing and railroad monitoring and protesting, and gather at 6 pm on Thursday, September 22, at the Gardenia Center, 400 Church Street in Sandpoint. During and after the Thursday and Saturday meetings, we plan to broaden coalitions and camaraderie among activists, while continuing conversations and enjoying music outside nearby pubs. Direct Action Training 2 to 5 pm Saturday, September 24 Gardenia Center, Sandpoint Regional climate and environmental activists and water protectors will provide several, interactive, training workshops, through talks and videos sharing frontline skills, stories, and insights. Advocating grassroots, direct actions at the sites of environmental destruction, more than participation in expensive, ineffective, legal systems and other government processes, trainers will offer their expertise through three one-hour presentation and practice sessions on topics such as knowing your rights, strategizing and tactical thinking, affinity group dynamics, target selection and scouting, action design, roles, and documentation, media communications, police interactions, de-escalation, security, safety, and self-defense, and jail solidarity. The number, topics, and lengths of training sessions have varied over the years, chosen by and adapted to rural participants and supporting various ecological and social justice movements within current, U.S., political contexts. Prior speakers have given advice on road and railroad actions, digital security, pipeline blockades, grand jury resistance, know-your-rights, and the previously mentioned subjects. Organizers holding these trainings anticipate reciprocally learning and strengthening the volunteer activism gaining momentum in the Idaho Panhandle. We encourage everyone who plans to attend to RSVP in advance and request particular topics and further logistical information. Join WIRT and guests anytime between 2 and 5 pm on Saturday, September 24, at the Gardenia Center, 400 Church Street in Sandpoint. Panhandle Paddle 10 am to 12 pm Sunday, September 25 City and Dog Beach Parks, Sandpoint For a seventh year, WIRT and allied activists are bringing their boats, bodies, and bravery to two locations, for on- and off-shore protests of Northwest coal, oil, and tar sands trains, terminals, and derailments and north Idaho, railroad bridge and track expansion. To accommodate participants who are renting single or double kayaks, paddleboards, or other manual watercraft from Sandpoint businesses that open at 9 am, activists are meeting an hour later, at 10 am on Sunday, September 25. Near the south boat ramp at City Beach Park in Sandpoint, we will launch a flotilla on Lake Pend Oreille, departing after participants arrive by land and water, to voyage around present and proposed railroad bridge sites. By about 11 am on Sunday, another rally will converge after paddlers reach Dog Beach Park south of Sandpoint. Bring large, attractive banners and signs, visible to observers at great distances, and respond to WIRT with your boat rental intentions and mobility needs, so we can reserve and cover the costs of watercraft, and arrange transportation for folks who cannot walk to Dog Beach Park. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, BNSF Bridges, Events | 1 Reply STOP NORTH IDAHO’S KEYSTONE XL PIPELINE! FEATURED Posted on August 18, 2022 by WIRT 4 i 25 Votes GTN Xpress Gas Pipeline Expansion Residents of the Northwest and Turtle Island continent continue to experience the extreme, worsening heat, droughts, wildfires, storms, and floods caused by fossil-fueled climate change. But Canadian energy company TC Energy (formerly TransCanada), owner of the notoriously leaky Keystone tar sands pipeline, partially completed but unpermitted Keystone XL pipeline, and new Coastal GasLink line invading unceded indigenous lands in British Columbia (B.C.), expects the public not to notice its plans to stealthily expand its 1,353-mile-long Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) pipeline across north Idaho, eastern Washington, and central Oregon [1-5]. The GTN Xpress project would dangerously increase “natural” gas volumes by 150 million to 250 million cubic feet per day, in its 61-year-old pipeline system. GTN transports gas extracted via hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” from the prolific West Canadian Sedimentary Basin and Rocky Mountain fields of northeast British Columbia and Alberta. It connects with the Foothills and Nova Gas Transmission pipelines in Canada near Kingsgate, B.C., crosses the U.S. border at Eastport, Idaho, and terminates in Malin, Oregon, where it flows into the Tuscarora pipeline in northern California. In north Idaho, the climate-wrecking, potentially explosive GTN pipeline traverses the Moyie Valley, Bonners Ferry, and the Highway 95 corridor, close and parallel to railroad lines. GTN passes under a Schweitzer Mountain ski resort parking lot and West Pine Street in Sandpoint, and below the Pend Oreille River near Dover, downstream from Idaho’s largest, deepest lake. From Malin in southern Oregon, the controversial Pacific Connector pipeline would have carried feedstock gas out to the coastal Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal in Coos Bay. But a decade-plus of broad public opposition and regulatory hurdles overcame both boondoggles. Through a compression-only expansion of the GTN system, GTN Xpress would software-upgrade the capacity and pressure of the gas-fired turbine compressor at the Athol, Idaho, pump station 5, from 14,300 to 23,470 horsepower. Although the Athol station is located at 2244 East Seasons Road in Kootenai County, a dispatch center in Portland, Oregon, remotely controls it and 11 other compressor stations, numbered 3 through 14, which move gas along the U.S. part of the pipeline. The facility stands just two miles west-northwest of the popular Silverwood Theme Park, full of hundreds of visitors on precarious rides during spring, summer, and fall days. Installing new equipment and improving an access road at two Washington and Oregon compressor stations and along the pipeline, the GTN Xpress project would push an additional 250,000 dekatherms of gas per day out to smaller, linked pipelines and markets in Washington, Oregon, and California. As one dekatherm provides enough gas for five average-sized (over-large) homes, new GTN Xpress infrastructure and gas volumes would force 1.2 million households to use fossil fuels for at least another 30 years. Excess Gas & Northwest Energy Transitions In its October 2021 application to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), seeking a certificate of public convenience and necessity for the GTN Xpress project, TC Energy claims that “increased market demand driven by residential, commercial, and industrial customers in the Pacific Northwest” justifies aged GTN pipeline expansion, and that “the benefits of GTN’s proposed project far outweigh its potential adverse impacts” [6]. These plans prompted FERC to prepare a draft, federal, environmental impact statement (EIS) currently undergoing public scrutiny and input [7-9]. Although TC Energy has urged FERC to approve the project with a final EIS by October 14, 2022, and to authorize it by the 90-day federal deadline of January 12, 2023, company and agency staff must first prove to the commission that Americans, not just Idahoans and Northwesterners, need this pipeline expansion, and that GTN Xpress would benefit public interests. As FERC called for draft EIS scoping comments on the project in February 2022, it also updated its policies guiding decisions on natural gas projects, allowing the agency to more thoroughly consider a proposal’s contributions to climate change and potential impacts on landowners and environmental justice [10]. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion | 4 Replies SUPPORT WIRT CROWDFUNDING FOR PRDC! FEATURED Posted on August 7, 2022 by WIRT Reply i 26 Votes Protect Palouse Prairie Wetlands from Highway Expansion For the fourth time in 20 years, the Paradise Ridge Defense Coalition (PRDC) is challenging the Idaho Transportation Department (ITD) and now also the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps), in an ongoing citizen attempt to force selection of the least environmentally disruptive, central C-3 route for proposed U.S. Highway 95 realignment south of Moscow, Idaho. PRDC filed a legal complaint in the U.S. District Court of Idaho on March 22, 2022, against the Thorn Creek Road to Moscow highway project. This ITD scheme plans to reroute and expand to four lanes a six-mile segment of Highway 95, along the easternmost E-2 alternative route highest on Paradise Ridge. The E-2 alignment would significantly impact some of the few remaining tracts of native Palouse Prairie and several critical wetlands. PRDC disputes ITD’s assessment that the E-2 route would not destroy essential wetlands larger than the half-acre threshold of the Clean Water Act. Smaller wetland sizes along E-2 would allow the project to proceed under a “nationwide” permit, with fewer restrictions and no further public input, while wetlands larger than a half-acre require the Corps to issue a more rigorous “individual” permit. If PRDC can prove that some wetlands along the E-2 route each surpass a half-acre in size, ITD may be forced to stop commenced construction, re-apply to the Corps for an individual permit, and defend its preferred E-2 alternative as the “least environmentally damaging, practicable alternative” (LEDPA), which it is not. After negotiations among opposing attorneys, the federal court let PRDC bring two wetlands scientists and a licensed surveyor into the E-2 right-of-way. These experts found more than a half-acre of wetlands near the southern end of the project. Subsequently, the ITD wetlands consultant sent back to the contested site confirmed the prior ITD determination. Now, the Corps intends to study the area and decide whether the assessments of ITD, PRDC, or neither are correct. On July 27, Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), a member organization of the PRDC coalition, launched a crowdfunding site for PRDC, to help cover the work of attorneys and experts that could cost up to $20,000, during this expensive phase of current litigation. To win this federal case and protect native Palouse Prairie on Paradise Ridge from Highway 95 expansion, PRDC and WIRT are relying on contributions from concerned citizens and the regional community. Please support these earnest efforts by generously donating soon toward the $4,000 target of this publicly transparent crowdfunding campaign on the GiveButter platform, or by mailing a check to PRDC. You can further assist WIRT and PRDC reaching this goal by posting this crowdfunding page and PRDC website and facebook page updates to social media, sharing issue information and articles with your friends and family, and encouraging participation in giving to PRDC. Thanks in advance for your gracious contributions! Protect Palouse Prairie Wetlands from Highway Expansion Paradise Ridge Defense Coalition website Paradise Ridge Defense Coalition facebook page P.O. Box 8804, Moscow, ID 83843 SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Alerts, Highway 95 Re-Route | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: JACK WILLINGHAM, JERRY BRIGGS, DAN ZEGART, & JANE KLEEB ON 2020 SATARTIA, MISSISSIPPI, CARBON PIPELINE RUPTURE, IMPACTS, AFTERMATH, & SAFETY CONCERNS 8-21-24 Posted on August 21, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 3 Votes The Wednesday, August 21, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features an Pipeline Fighters Hub webinar covering the February 2020 carbon pipeline rupture in the small, rural Mississippi town of Satartia. A panel of emergency responders Jack Willingham and Jerry Briggs, journalist Dan Zegart, and Jane Kleeb of Bold Alliance discuss their on-site experiences, community health impacts and lingering aftermath, and the critical safety concerns of carbon pipelines. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: IDAHO OIL & GAS RULES & NEW COLLABORATIVE, SPOKANE CLIMATE ORDINANCE, GTN XPRESS CONSTRUCTION & EMISSIONS, NEW JERSEY PIPELINE REJECTION, MANCHIN ENERGY BILL 8-14-24 Posted on August 14, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 4 Votes The Wednesday, August 14, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features news, music, and reflections on Idaho public hearings and proposed changes to state oil and gas development rules, a new north Idaho collaborative proposing federal legislation that “balances” public lands uses, a Spokane ordinance that would create a citizen board guiding climate and sustainability policies, Northwest GTN Xpress methane pipeline expansion information, compressor station construction, and greenhouse gas emissions, appeals court rejection of federal approval of a similar New Jersey gas infrastructure proposal, and a Senator Manchin, Congressional bill that supports dirty energy permitting. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: STEPHANIE ROE ON CLIMATE CHANGED HEAT, IDAHO OIL TRAINS & RAIL SAFETY AWARD, GTN XPRESS CONSTRUCTION & LEGAL ARGUMENTS, REJECTED NEW JERSEY PIPELINE APPROVAL 8-7-24 Posted on August 7, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 4 Votes The Wednesday, August 7, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features a conversation with Dr. Stephanie Roe, the World Wildlife Fund global climate and energy lead scientist explaining climate change-driven heat waves, key indicators of their impacts, and possible actions to reduce and adapt to extreme heat. We also share news, music, and reflections on recent north Idaho oil train traffic, an Idaho agency railway safety award for reduced train and vehicle collisions, started Washington compressor station construction and Northwest state and environmental group arguments against the GTN Xpress methane pipeline expansion, and an appeals court challenge and victory over similarly flawed federal approval of a New Jersey gas infrastructure proposal. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: GUY MCPHERSON ON CLIMATE & EXTINCTION, KALISPEL INDIGENOUS PADDLE, IDAHO RAIL EXPANSION & FIRE, OREGON ANTI-PIPELINE ACTIONS, WASHINGTON METHANE BALLOT MEASURE 7-31-24 Posted on July 31, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 5 Votes The Wednesday, July 31, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features a presentation by University of Arizona professor emeritus and climate-caused human extinction scientist Guy McPherson. We also share news, music, and reflections on a Kalispel and indigenous canoe journey in the Idaho and Washington, Pend Oreille watershed, a rail yard-adjacent, wildland fire and environmental impacts of doubled tracks and rail bridges near Sandpoint, Idaho, a protest, petition delivery, and ongoing resistance to the GTN Xpress methane pipeline expansion around Bend, Oregon, and a November 2024, Washington ballot measure seeking to prevent “natural” gas phase-out. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: GUY MCPHERSON ON HUMAN EXTINCTION, KALISPEL CANOE JOURNEY, FIRST NATIONS WORK PARTY & BC PIPELINE CONCERNS, 1/3 GTN XPRESS GAS START, 2 HOTTEST EVER DAYS 7-24-24 Posted on July 24, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 6 Votes The Wednesday, July 24, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features a presentation by University of Arizona professor emeritus and climate-caused human extinction scientist Guy McPherson. We also share news, music, and reflections on an upcoming Kalispel and indigenous canoe journey in Idaho and Washington, an August work party at a First Nation healing center in British Columbia, native concerns about police violence around Prince Rupert Gas Transmission pipeline construction in Canada, a request, approval, and start of one-third increased compressor capacity of the GTN Xpress methane pipeline expansion across the Northwest, and the two hottest days in recorded Earth history during the last week. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: BILL MCKIBBEN ON CLIMATE IN OREGON, SPOKANE OIL TRAINS TALK, ONE-THIRD GTN XPRESS PIPELINE APPROVAL, IDAHO COUNTY & STATE OIL & GAS RULES CHANGES & HEARINGS 7-17-24 Posted on July 17, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 7 Votes The Wednesday, July 17, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features climate activist, author, and 350 and Third Act co-founder Bill McKibben, speaking for a Locus Focus radio interview and at a recent gathering in Portland, Oregon. We also share news, music, and reflections on an upcoming talk about regional opposition to hazardous oil trains and railroad infrastructure, sudden, federal approval of one-third of Northwest GTN Xpress pipeline expansion methane gas, and Idaho county and state public hearings and proposed changes to oil and gas extraction rules. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply CLIMATE JUSTICE FORUM: JUSTIN MIKULKA, MARK BURROWS, & IDAHO ACTIONS ON OIL TRAINS, HEAT-CANCELLED NEW YORK AMTRAK, MELTING ALASKA ICE FIELD, BC INDIGENOUS CHIEF SENTENCING 7-10-24 Posted on July 10, 2024 by WIRT Reply i 8 Votes The Wednesday, July 10, 2024, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features freelance writer Justin Mikulka and Railroad Workers United representative Mark Burrows, discussing further railroad regulations and practices to protect community and crew safety from flammable oil and hazardous materials trains. We also share news, music, and reflections on upcoming north Idaho demonstrations opposing Northwest oil trains and infrastructure, a New York passenger train to Canada cancelled by heated rail concerns, the rapidly melting Juneau ice field in Alaska, and British Columbia court sentencing of a First Nation chief opposing gas pipeline construction through indigenous territory. Broadcast for twelve years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuels projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading → SHARE THIS: * Facebook * Twitter * Email * Print * Like Loading... Posted in Climate Justice Forum | Leave a reply POST NAVIGATION ← Older posts Older posts CONTRIBUTE TO WIRT Support Grassroots Resistance to Dirty Corporate Energy! Send your check, to assist our work, operational costs, supplies, and legal fees: Wild Idaho Rising Tide 301 N. First Avenue 209B Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 CONTACT WIRT wild.idaho.rising.tide @gmail.com 208-301-8039 WildIdahoRisingTide.org GET WIRT EMAIL UPDATES Enter your email address to receive notifications and newsletters by email. Email Address: Sign Up! YOUTUBE * Watch WIRT on YouTube TWITTER * Follow WIRT on Twitter FACEBOOK * Like WIRT on facebook WIRT FACEBOOK PAGE TOPICS * Actions (303) * Alerts (197) * Audio (26) * Photos (45) * Videos (38) * City of Moscow (11) * Events (643) * Annual Celebrations (11) * Climate Justice Forum (544) * Issues (406) * Alberta Tar Sands (19) * BNSF Bridges (49) * Climate Change (10) * Coal/Oil Trains/Ports (124) * Community Rights (8) * GTN Xpress Pipeline Expansion (14) * Hanford Nuclear Site (1) * Highway 95 Re-Route (72) * Idaho Fracking (107) * Megaloads (31) * Port of Lewiston (25) * Letters & Op-Eds (71) * News (279) * Anti-Tar Sands Megaloads Protests (54) * Bantrel/Conoco Evaporators (8) * FBI Contact (3) * Highway 395/Interstate 90 Megaloads (10) * Highway 95 Megaload Accident (3) * Mammoet 2014 Megaloads (27) * Moscow Megaload Collision (11) * Omega Morgan Megaloads (130) * Nez Perce Protests (15) * Oregon Resistance (50) * Protester & Monitor Arrests (34) * Newsletters (102) * Wild Idaho Rising Tide (38) HAPPENINGS September 2024 S M T W T F S 1234567 891011121314 15161718192021 22232425262728 2930 « Aug ARCHIVES * September 2024 (1) * August 2024 (4) * July 2024 (7) * June 2024 (4) * May 2024 (6) * April 2024 (5) * March 2024 (5) * February 2024 (4) * January 2024 (5) * December 2023 (5) * November 2023 (5) * October 2023 (6) * September 2023 (4) * August 2023 (5) * July 2023 (8) * June 2023 (5) * May 2023 (5) * April 2023 (6) * March 2023 (6) * February 2023 (5) * January 2023 (5) * December 2022 (5) * November 2022 (6) * October 2022 (5) * September 2022 (5) * August 2022 (8) * July 2022 (5) * June 2022 (6) * May 2022 (4) * April 2022 (5) * March 2022 (7) * February 2022 (6) * January 2022 (4) * December 2021 (4) * November 2021 (4) * October 2021 (5) * September 2021 (5) * August 2021 (5) * July 2021 (4) * June 2021 (6) * May 2021 (4) * April 2021 (4) * March 2021 (5) * February 2021 (6) * January 2021 (4) * December 2020 (5) * November 2020 (5) * October 2020 (6) * September 2020 (6) * August 2020 (6) * July 2020 (5) * June 2020 (6) * May 2020 (4) * April 2020 (5) * March 2020 (5) * February 2020 (7) * January 2020 (3) * December 2019 (3) * November 2019 (4) * October 2019 (5) * September 2019 (5) * August 2019 (4) * July 2019 (4) * June 2019 (3) * May 2019 (4) * April 2019 (3) * March 2019 (5) * February 2019 (1) * January 2019 (6) * December 2018 (4) * November 2018 (4) * October 2018 (5) * September 2018 (6) * August 2018 (4) * July 2018 (8) * June 2018 (6) * May 2018 (5) * April 2018 (7) * March 2018 (6) * February 2018 (6) * January 2018 (6) * December 2017 (3) * November 2017 (4) * October 2017 (5) * September 2017 (5) * August 2017 (8) * July 2017 (7) * June 2017 (7) * May 2017 (10) * April 2017 (8) * March 2017 (9) * February 2017 (4) * January 2017 (5) * December 2016 (7) * November 2016 (7) * October 2016 (10) * September 2016 (7) * August 2016 (11) * July 2016 (8) * June 2016 (7) * May 2016 (7) * April 2016 (9) * March 2016 (11) * February 2016 (6) * January 2016 (7) * December 2015 (4) * November 2015 (7) * October 2015 (5) * September 2015 (6) * August 2015 (7) * July 2015 (7) * June 2015 (9) * May 2015 (7) * April 2015 (7) * March 2015 (6) * February 2015 (6) * January 2015 (12) * December 2014 (12) * November 2014 (6) * October 2014 (11) * September 2014 (7) * August 2014 (15) * July 2014 (16) * June 2014 (12) * May 2014 (12) * April 2014 (7) * March 2014 (14) * February 2014 (15) * January 2014 (17) * December 2013 (30) * November 2013 (22) * October 2013 (24) * September 2013 (18) * August 2013 (21) * July 2013 (19) * June 2013 (24) * May 2013 (10) * April 2013 (12) * March 2013 (10) * February 2013 (18) * January 2013 (47) * December 2012 (30) * November 2012 (16) * October 2012 (29) * September 2012 (12) * August 2012 (29) * July 2012 (7) * June 2012 (16) * May 2012 (23) * April 2012 (25) * March 2012 (43) * February 2012 (33) * January 2012 (18) * December 2011 (40) * November 2011 (17) * October 2011 (9) * September 2011 (17) * August 2011 (17) * July 2011 (13) * June 2011 (11) * May 2011 (9) * April 2011 (9) * March 2011 (1) ALLIES * Advocates for the West * All Against the Haul * Blue Skies Campaign * Fighting Goliath * Friends of the Clearwater * Idaho Residents Against Gas Extraction * Indigenous Environmental Network * No North Idaho Transport Corridor! * Northern Rockies Earth First! * Northern Rockies Justice Center * Northern Rockies Rising Tide * Occupy Spokane * Palouse Environmental Sustainability Coalition * Palouse Group of the Sierra Club * Portland Rising Tide * Rising Tide North America * Tar Sands Action SITE ADMINISTRATION * Register * Log in * Entries feed * Comments feed * WordPress.com Wild Idaho Rising Tide confronts the root causes of climate change with and for you! Send your check, to assist our work, operational costs, supplies, and legal fees: Wild Idaho Rising Tide 301 N. First Avenue 209B, Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 Blog at WordPress.com. * Subscribe Subscribed * Wild Idaho Rising Tide Join 161 other subscribers Sign me up * Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now. * Privacy * * Wild Idaho Rising Tide * Customize * Subscribe Subscribed * Sign up * Log in * Report this content * View site in Reader * Manage subscriptions * Collapse this bar Loading Comments... Write a Comment... Email (Required) Name (Required) Website %d