How do I submit a public comment on Fridley Foothills Hazardous Fuels Reduction?

Submit your comment through the agency's official portal at https://cara.fs2c.usda.gov/Public/CommentInput?Project=331238. This page includes talking points and a starter comment you can make your own.

When is the public comment deadline for Fridley Foothills Hazardous Fuels Reduction?

Comments are due by December 10, 2026. Comments received after the deadline may not be considered by the agency.

Do public comments actually change federal decisions?

Yes, when they are substantive. Agencies are legally required to read and respond to substantive comments before finalizing a rule, and specific personal comments about real places and real uses carry far more weight than identical form letters. Courts have overturned rules when agencies ignored substantive comments.

Review Fridley Foothills fuels project near Gardiner and Yellowstone districts

4 holes in the agency’s own analysis

Make these points, in your own words

Require the Forest Service to show how vegetation treatments in the Yellowstone and Gardiner Ranger Districts will actually reduce hazardous fuels, rather than just asserting it will improve forest resilience.
Insist the Forest Service fully analyze under NEPA the logging effects on the Fridley Foothills, including wildlife habitat, before approving any treatments.
The proposal's stated goals of insect and disease resilience and fuel reduction are broad, so I urge the agency to specify exactly which stands will be cut and why each one qualifies.
I oppose this project as proposed and ask the Forest Service to consider alternatives that limit logging in the Fridley Foothills and keep this public comment period open through 12/10/2026.

Say something only you can say. The law requires the agency to consider and respond to substantive comments, and specifics are what make a comment substantive.

Affects public lands

PLAN’s own label for this notice, read from the official notice ↗.

The Forest Service wants to treat forest in the Fridley Foothills, and the public has until 12/10/2026 to weigh in before details are set.

What’s at risk

The Forest Service proposes vegetation management treatments across the Yellowstone and Gardiner Ranger Districts, citing insect, disease, and hazardous fuel concerns. The notice does not say which treatments or how many acres, so the real impact on the forest is still unclear.

If this goes through

The Forest Service could carry out treatments on federally owned forest in the Fridley Foothills, and tree removal on the ground cannot be undone once done.

Our plain-English read of the official notice ↗. Check it against the agency’s own words below.

In the agency’s own words

The Forest Service proposes vegetation management treatments in the Yellowstone Ranger District and the Gardiner Ranger District to maintain and improve forest resilience to insects and disease and reduce hazardous fuel accumulations.

Forest Service project page ↗

The groups on this fight

4 groups predicted likely to care in Montana and South Dakota

Predicted likely to care is a guess from the group's sourced work in Montana and South Dakota, with no link to this decision. Give straight to them; nothing routes through us.

American Prairie
Predicted likely to care · a guess
American Prairie, Montana: Defending its own bison herd, formally protesting BLM's revocation of grazing permits on 63,000 public-land acres.
Badlands Natural History Association
Predicted likely to care · a guess
Works South Dakota: They work only in South Dakota.
Earthjustice
Predicted likely to care · a guess
Cabinet Mountains Wilderness, Montana: Counsel in the long-running litigation against the Rock Creek and Montanore mines proposed beneath the wilderness.
Wind Cave National Park Friends Group
Predicted likely to care · a guess
Works South Dakota: They work only in South Dakota.

Every group above is on STAND for Public Lands, with its court record, its filings and who backs it.

Who signs it

The notice names no signer PLAN could read. PLAN names a decision-maker only when the document names one.

The ground

This fight isn’t bound to a map place in PLAN’s record yet. The notice names Yellowstone Ranger District, Gardiner Ranger District, Fridley Foothills (MT, SD); none is a unit on the threatened lands map, so there’s no place page to open or watch.

The photograph on this page: Grizzly bear crossing sage flats, Greater Yellowstone. More Than Just Parks.

In court on this ground

This fight isn’t bound to a land unit in PLAN’s record yet, so there are no court cases to show for its ground.

Who holds the vote

PLAN’s record doesn’t tie a member of Congress to this fight yet. The scorecard grades the votes and bills that decide public lands; nothing joins a vote or a bill to this decision, so there’s no member to name here without guessing.

See how your members vote ↗

Calling your two senators and your representative is the Call door on this page.

Forest ServiceWe track this on the agency’s own system of record, where most on-the-ground decisions live.

Filed underLogging Wildfire Environmental review

Know an open comment period we are missing, or spotted a wrong deadline? .

Review Fridley Foothills fuels project near Gardiner and Yellowstone districts

4 holes in the agency’s own analysis

In the agency’s own words

4 groups predicted likely to care in Montana and South Dakota

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