"There are a lot of people who are very attracted to the idea of making Washington even wilder than it is" by reintroducing grizzlies, said Elizabeth Lunney, the association's executive director. "There are other people who are frankly afraid," both of bear attacks and trail closures. Biologists estimate that the Washington Cascades host no more than 15 grizzlies. The last sighting confirmed by biologists was in 1996, although hikers and hunters make unconfirmed reports every year.
Canadian biologists think a handful of grizzlies roam the Cascades north of the border, where there's enough room for nearly 300 bears. The goal of the province's grizzly recovery plan is half that many by 2050.
The B.C. proposal would help a healthy bear population expand its range. Although the number is disputed, wildlife officials say the province is home to about 13,000 grizzlies -- one-quarter of the bears on the continent. Limited hunting is allowed in some areas, although it is highly controversial.
The situation is far different in the continental United States, where the best estimate of the grizzly population is somewhere between 800 and 1,200, down from an estimated 50,000 at the time of European settlement. The bears are reduced to about 2percent of their traditional range, which once covered most areas west of the Mississippi River.
In 1967, U.S. Interior Secretary Stuart Udall included grizzlies on a list of species that faced extinction. That was six years before Congress passed the Endangered Species Act and eight years before grizzlies were protected under the act.
About the same time, researchers Frank and John Craighead warned that the bears could go extinct in the Lower 48 if steps were not taken to protect them.
Famous for their research of Yellowstone bears, the Craighead brothers suggested transplanting some from the park to other suitable areas. The idea also was championed by the head of the International Association of Game, Fish and Conservation Commissions, Harold Woodwerd.
"He (Woodwerd) specifically mentioned the Selway-Bitterroot wilderness," The Associated Press reported in 1970.
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game studied the possibility of releasing six Yellowstone bears to an area northwest of Priest Lake. A committee shelved the proposal in 1970 amid rumors that 100 bears with a history of human conflicts were coming to the Panhandle.
Relocation plans simmered until the early 1990s, when the Wildlife Service used four young female bears from Canada to augment a weak population in Montana's Cabinet Mountains. One died a year later.
Chris Servheen, grizzly recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, believes the three surviving transplants stayed in the backcountry, since there's no evidence to the contrary. Biologists hope to trap some Cabinet grizzlies or get fur samples for DNA tests to help determine whether that's true.
Those four grizzlies were the only ones ever relocated to bolster or re-establish a U.S. population. For now, agencies plan no new releases, even in the Cabinets, Servheen said.
The Wildlife Service in 1994 announced plans to release grizzlies into the Cascades, but later acknowledged it had no money for the work. Some ranchers, hikers and business leaders opposed the plan, and the Washington Legislature in 1995 voted nearly unanimously to oppose it.
"A number of residents in British Columbia also were in opposition -- their cattlemen and a lot of their farming community," Schulz said.
Meanwhile, a plan to reintroduce bears to the Bitterroots seemed to be gaining momentum. A coalition of environmentalists and industry groups gave its support in 1995, as long as the Bitterroot bears were considered experimental and overseen by a 13-member citizens committee.
But people who came to hearings in rural communities largely opposed the idea. One Montana group called itself Citizens Against Grizzlies. Then-Rep. Helen Chenoweth, R-Idaho, compared bear reintroduction to "restoring sharks at the beach."
The Wildlife Service, under Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, released a "final" plan last year for putting 25 bears into the Bitterroots over a period of five years. Norton, who replaced Babbitt, announced in June that the Bush Administration would not carry out the relocation.
Norton's pronouncement generated 30,000 letters during a comment period that ended Aug. 22. Those letters are still being read, Servheen said, and Norton's decision is not yet official.
Servheen said grizzlies are far more widely accepted now than when he started his work 20 years ago. But challenges to the bears' legal status show diverse opinions about the protection they deserve.
During the 1990s, timber groups asked that bears along the U.S.-Canadian border be deleted from the Endangered Species List, arguing that they are really non-endangered Canadian bears. Environmental groups asked that grizzlies be listed as "endangered."
The bears remain officially "threatened." But that may change in the Yellowstone region of Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, where agencies are working on plans to remove grizzlies from the Endangered Species List.
Researchers think 400 to 600 grizzlies live in and around Yellowstone. Their population grows by 3 percent to 4 percent a year, numbers that government biologists consider healthy.
The states, which will take custody of the bears surrounding Yellowstone if they're removed from the Endangered Species List, hope to have management plans written by spring, said Glenn Erickson, wildlife manager for the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. That's just the first step in a process that could take years.
State management eventually could include limited hunting, if biologists decide there are enough bears.
David Gaillard of the Predator Conservation Alliance in Bozeman, Mont., said conservationists are pleased with the progress of Yellowstone bears. But they worry the grizzlies and their habitat wouldn't get enough protection as wards of the states.
Land development and loss of critical foods like whitebark pine seeds are among his concerns.
"The problems facing grizzly bears appear to only be getting worse and not better," Gaillard said. "It's going to take a long-term effort to keep them healthy and robust."
•Dan Hansen can be reached at (509) 459-3938 or by e-mail at danh@spokesman.com.
