The Nation - News from Jan. 17, 1989

Businesses and residents have filed $1.1 million in damage claims against the federal government from fires that raged through Yellowstone National Park and surrounding forests last summer, forest officials say. U.S. Forest Service officials are processing the more than two dozen claims, which will be passed on to the U.S. General Counsel’s Office, said Arlene Bateman, who is handling claims filed through the Forest Service’s Region II office in Missoula, Mont. Government attorneys will review each claim to determine whether negligence or nature caused the damage, Bateman said. The Forest Service’s policy to allow fires started by nature to burn unless they threatened lives, property or historic sites generated enormous controversy that has still not been resolved.