OCR Text |
Show pertain to air and water quality aspects. At their request, separate sessions were held with a representative of the Rocky Mountain Center on Environment from Denver, Colorado, and National and State officers of Trout Unlimited. Numerous other meetings and discussions have been held by public and civic groups where the Bonneville Unit was the subject topic. All written or in- person requests for information were answered by either the Regional or Project offices. On May 31, 1972, Reclamation consummated a contract with the Center for Health and Environmental Studies at the Brigham Young University under which the Center would research and summarize available information on the status of flora and fauna in the Bonneville Unit area, These reports were completed during the latter part of July 1972 but were not available for consideration when the draft statement was prepared. These inventories have been used in preparation of the final statement and should help serve as base- line data for future studies. As part of their comments, the Forest Service submitted copies of two reports they had prepared in connection with the Central Utah Project. One was entitled " Stream Habitat Studies on the Uinta- Ashley National Forests"* 0 . which presented results of a 7- year biological study of fishery habitat conditions of streams draining the south slope of the Uinta Mountains. The published data for the Bonneville Unit streams were collected in 1962- 1964. The second report represented an interdisciplinary study of the impact of proposed Bonneville Unit features on existing natural conditions on Rock Creek and North Fork of the Duchesne River. 72 Reclamation was a cooperating agency in this latter study. These reports had widespread distribution through the Forest Service and copies are available for public inspection at Reclamation's Regional and Project offices. During October 1972 an archeological survey was conducted oy the Department of Anthropology at the University of Utah of the area to be inundated by the enlarged Strawberry Reservoir. 138 £ j0 archeological sites were discovered. A contract has been negotiated with the University through the National Park Service for additional surveys during 1973 of the proposed heavy use areas around Strawberry as well as the Currant Creek and Upper Stillwater Reservoir sites. The official review period for the statement began on August 14, 1972, and continued through October 5, 1972. Extensions were granted to requesting agencies until October 16. This represented a full 60- day review period from the time the Statement was first distributed. Final comments were not received from the Environmental Protection Agency, Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife, and National Park Service until December 1972. Official review comments received through January 5, 1973, a period of almost 5 months, have been considered in the preparation of the Final Statement. 632 |