In a decision dismissing three lawsuits intended to compel more federal land logging in western Oregon, DC federal district court judge Richard Leon found that the timber industry failed to show that less logging means more wildfires (see page 7’s footnote). Judge Leon had ruled earlier in favor of the industry plaintiffs in one of four forum-shopping lawsuits filed by attorney Mark Rutzick. But, judges don’t like being reversed. When the DC circuit court did so in the earlier case, ruling that the timber industry failed to establish standing, Leon took that message to heart and said “ditto” for the other three lawsuits.
Judge Leon’s ruling likely ends a two-decades long legal skirmish by the timber industry to compel federal agencies to increase logging levels from Northwest Forest Plan lands. The campaign has been led by the Portland-based American Forest Resource Council. For 20 years AFRC chose primarily the courts as its strategy to increase logging. Today’s decision suggests that AFRC may change its focus from the courts to Congress, which would play to the strength of its newly-hired executive director, Travis Joseph, former natural resources staff to Oregon Rep. Peter DeFazio. Joseph, who is not an attorney, was DeFazio’s point person during House negotiations over proposed O&C forest legislation that continues to languish in Congress.
I don’t think AFRC ever sees a closed door, and I can still see a crack here. The D. C. Circuit opinion did not address fire. Both it and this case emphasized that the obvious cause of past economic harm to the timber industry was the recession, and there was no basis in the record for projecting future harm from restrictions on federal harvests. The district court refused to accept new declarations from plaintiffs that might have adequately responded to the circuit court’s demands for specificity.
With regard to wildfire as being caused by the agency action (and then causing economic harm to the timber industry), I’m not sure what “Vilsack” case is being cited in the footnote. The decision in FFRC v. Vilsack upheld the Forest Service planning rule, in part because of language in the rule that recognized fire risk and promoted its reduction (not because there is no causation as quoted in the footnote 7). In any case, it could still just be a failure by Rutzick’s recruits to say the “right” things in their declarations.
I do agree, Jon, and am kind of amused that industry would pursue such a “pie-in-the-sky” case. Chances are, their lawyer(s) cautioned them on taking that path but, industry wanted to make that leap. I’m pretty sure we haven’t seen the last of this issue, especially when checkerboarded land ownership still exists. I’m sure that industry would like to do some sort of massive land swap but, I doubt that the public will agree.
Note: AFRC Filed a New O&C lawsuit in DC. Their lastest newsletter says:
http://www.amforest.org/images/pdfs/AFRC_Newsletter_9-29-15.pdf