The Smokey Wire : National Forest News and Views
Community Sourced, Shared and Supported
These national Restoration Principles, released about ten years ago, were the result of a 4-year bridge building effort between conservation groups and restoration practitioners to develop agreement on a common sense, scientifically-based framework for restoring our nation’s forests. I believe over 100 + conservation groups from around the country signed onto these Principles.
Citizens’ Call for Ecological Forest Restoration: Forest Restoration Principles and Criteria
From EcoWatch:
On March 20, a federal court in Oregon formally struck down a Bush-era plan that abandoned scientific protections for federal public lands in western Oregon and would have opened up those lands to outdated boom-and-bust logging. The plan, called the Western Oregon Plan Revision (known as WOPR and pronounced “whopper”) would have dramatically increased logging on about 2.6 million acres of federal public forests in Oregon managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).
The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by Earthjustice and Western Environmental Law Center on behalf of nine conservation and commercial fishing organizations.
“This ruling is the final nail in WOPR’s coffin,” said Kristen Boyles, an attorney with Earthjustice. “These public forests protect our climate, provide us with clean water, and sustain world class salmon runs and recreational opportunities that contribute to Oregon’s diverse economy. Now they will no longer be haunted by an outdated, unbalanced plan,” she said.
A federal court ruling yesterday one again enjoined the Forest Service regulations that exempted Categorical Exclusion (CE) decisions from notice, comment and appeal. According to one of the attorney’s who worked the case, “This certainly means any new CE’d decisions must be subject to notice, comment and appeal – beyond that, and how this will affect (or be affected by) any new regulations regarding the HFRA-like rider, is TBD.”
UPDATE: Just to be clear, here is the Summary Judgment Decision on Merits of Plaintiffs’ Claim. Also, the same Court issued this Summary Judgment Decision on Jurisdictional Issues.
The following article is from the website of the Greater Southeast Alaska Conservation Community (GSACC), a regional organization based in Sitka, Alaska. The Board of Directors of the organization includes an impressive and diverse group of longtime Southeast Alaska residents, including: commercial fishermen, a PhD biologist, former Forest Service foresters, hydrologist and a regional economist, a city councilor for the City of Kupreanof, the former Deputy Director of the Alaska Department of Fish & Game’s Habitat Division, and even a former mechanical engineer for Alaska Pulp Corporation. You can read about GSACC’s Founding Principles here. – mk
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Since 2007, Alaska’s congressional delegation has been pushing legislation for a special land deal for one Alaska Native corporation, Sealaska. The 1971 Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) authorized the corporation to select acreage for timber development from the Tongass National Forest. Congress and Sealaska resolved the selection areas during the 1970s. But now, Sealaska and Alaska’s delegation want to rescind this agreement by allowing the corporation to select areas for timber development outside of the original “boxes” designated in the prior settlement. The proposed deal, S.730, has met resistance from affected communities who have worked with regional outfitters and guides and commercial fishermen to prevent passage of the current version of the bill.
A critical problem is that Sealaska and ANCSA village corporations have already logged the high quality forest within the prior land selection “boxes” under Alaska’s state forest regulations. Those regulations are notoriously lax for private landowners and present unacceptable risks to critical wildlife and fish habitats. Legislation to allow Sealaska to make its remaining land selections outside the box will simply spread destructive logging practices to other high value forest habitats. A further problem is that behind closed doors several environmental organizations – apparently at the behest of the foundations that fund them – have been trying to cut a deal with Sealaska and the Alaska delegation to “improve” the bill. These negotiations rely on the faulty premise that Sealaska can offset significant environmental impacts in one area by including some small Wilderness (or similar) land designations in areas that for the most part are not at risk from further development because of existing laws and regulations or economic limitations.
GSACC rejects that approach as tainted by the failed process for land management changes that have significant consequences for the region and therefore cannot accept the premise of the bill.
Background
ANCSA allowed Sealaska to select several hundred thousand acres of land from the Tongass National Forest. During the 1970s, Sealaska made its selections for most of that entitlement and the federal government subsequently conveyed title to that land, which has now mostly been logged. According to the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Sealaska has the right to select between 68,000 and 79,000 acres. In 1976, Sealaska President John Borbridge filed specific land selections for this remaining acreage with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and Congress honored the request by approving the selections. Sealaska filed for these selections in June of 2008 but at the same time, asked BLM to suspend conveyance of the lands while it pursued legislation that would give it more valuable timberland “outside the box.”
This move is often referred to as a “land grab” by its many critics. It is GSACC’s view that Sealaska refrained from finalizing its 1976 land selections based on the possibility that a legislative deal such as S. 730 would enable the corporation to instead select more valuable lands outside the box so long as the bill included Wilderness designations or similar conservation area offsets. Such an exchange was desired by a powerful but less than fully representative portion of the environmental groups that have been active on Tongass issues.
Paradoxically, Sealaska claims both that the forest within the ANCSA selection boxes is habitat that is too valuable to clearcut, and that the timber still standing in the boxes is so poor in quality that cutting it is not economically justified. Alaska’s Citizens’ Advisory Commission of Federal Areas has studied the remaining lands in the boxes and found Sealaska did not provide adequate data to support its claims. The Commission concluded that there is more than enough suitable timber acreage left within the ANCSA boxes for Sealaska to finalize its remaining entitlements.
It instead appears that S.730 simply seeks to take the most valuable remaining timberlands out of public hands in a remarkably one-sided exchange. A recently published report by the Audubon Society analyzed the economic suitability of the timber remaining within the boxes and the habitat value of the “outside the box” forest lands allocated to Sealaska in the current bill. The report concluded that the bill targets a large proportion of the remaining “large tree” old-growth forest stands on the Tongass National Forest. This outcome of the bill – a practice known as “high-grading” – would be a continuation of this kind of destruction that began with the dawn of the region’s pulp mill era in the 1950s.
According to the Audubon report, if this legislation passes:
“This would constitute a substantial, permanent loss of a rare resource that is currently held in public trust and managed by the US Forest Service. The proposed legislation clearly contravenes the earlier intent of Congress to end high-grading and afford higher protection to these rare and valuable large-tree stands on the Tongass. If enacted, the Sealaska legislation would erode more than 30 years of effort by foresters, conservationists, biologists and other scientists to conserve these remaining rare stands, not only for their value to wildlife and human users in Alaska, but as a resource valued by citizens nationwide. “
The Sealaska legislation would also establish a precedent that could open a Pandora’s Box, setting a precedent for Native corporations across the state to also seek their own sweetheart deals from Congress, to create other exceptions to ANCSA provisions. The current legislation also includes brand new categories of lands that ANCSA never contemplated, such as Native futures sites. Land selections made under these new, craftily constructed legislative designations would be dispersed throughout the Tongass, often in ecologically-rich areas that are also valued for tourism, fisheries, already-established patterns of use, and in some cases potential for energy production. The concept of these “futures sites” has generated widespread resistance to the bill, with opponents from the full range of the political spectrum. Additionally, the bill would authorize Sealaska to privatize portions of the Admiralty and Misty Fjords National Monuments that Congress set aside for the public in the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA).
Collaborators
One of GSACC’s primary objections to the process used to develop this bill is that closed door negotiations have occurred under the auspices of the Tongass Futures Roundtable (TFR). The TFR began as a Forest Service project but has since devolved into a private discussion group (still including the Forest Service) that seeks to rezone the Tongass National Forest through legislation such as the current Sealaska bill. Several TFR environmental groups have been negotiating with Sealaska – in meetings closed and unannounced to the press and the public – for concessions that would earn their support for the bill. To the extent their sought concessions have become known, they are unsatisfactory to the affected communities and other environmental organizations. The negotiations have so far failed to produce a result. However, it is disappointing that self-appointed stakeholders from the TFR seem to have one public position that seems to oppose S.730 while working behind the scenes to achieve a compromise quid-pro-quo (Latin meaning this for that, commonly QPQ) Wilderness bill.
There has recently been a national trend toward QPQ Wilderness bills developed by self-appointed “stakeholders” that have financial interests in the outcome of their so-called “consensus-based” collaborations. The above closed door negotiations, in which all participants were TFR members, is an unfortunate example of this trend. At their core, the thrust of these exercises is to privatize public lands, undermine existing environmental laws and regulations, and devolve the public process of public lands management in exchange for often small Wilderness designations or other so-called “conservation gains.” Nationwide, many environmental organizations, including GSACC, recognize that the QPQ approach is antithetical to the watchdog role that environmental organizations must fulfill, and we strongly oppose the QPQ, collaborative mindset.
That said, we recognize the need to work cooperatively with all sectors of society to arrive at outcomes that work well but protect the environment and ecosystem integrity. However, GSACC believes the cozy relationships that are inherent to QPQ assemblages like the TFR and the negotiations over the Sealaska bill, and the foundation-influenced strategies that have driven some environmental organizations into such efforts, are counter to achieving the greatest public good.
In our judgment, the best course is for the Sealaska bill to be withdrawn by Alaska’s senators, and for the selections that Sealaska filed with BLM in 2008, for the corporation’s remaining entitlement, to be conveyed without further delay by the government or Sealaska.
Thank you to reader David Beebe for passing along this new report from Alaska Audubon titled, “High‐grading on the Tongass National Forest: Implications of Pending Land Selections on Forest Diversity.” The entire Audubon report is available here. I’ve pasted the report summary below, although that’s also available in PDF form here, with the citations included. – mk
UPDATED: Paul Olson from Sitka, Alaska (who has been a commercial fisherman in southeast Alaska since the 1970s and is the board president of a new regional organization called the Greater Southeast Alaska Conservation Community) provided some excellent context in the comments section that deserves to be highlighted here:
“This legislation is also relevant to the issues you discuss in the ‘collaboration’ blog since the current version of the bill is largely the result of negotiations between a subdivision of a Forest Service initiated ‘collaborative’ group, the Tongass Futures Roundtable. That secretive subdivision is known as the “Devil’s Club” and has been primarily responsible for persistent but to date unsuccessful efforts to rezone public lands on the Tongass National Forest for the primary benefit of private timberland owners. That collaborative group has all the characteristics of a typical collaborative stewardship group – it meets during the day when the working public cannot attend its deliberations; most of the NGO stakeholders had funding funneled to them as a result of high level Forest Service efforts; the participating environmental group representatives are for the most part inexperienced imports from distant lands or otherwise “soft” on certain types of resource development….”
Read Paul Olson’s entire comment here.
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Coastal temperate rainforests of the world occur in only ten areas, are extremely rare, and account for less than 3% of all forest cover on earth. Alaska’s Tongass National Forest contains a large portion of the world’s last remaining old‐growth rainforest. Regarded widely as the “crown jewel” of the national forest system, the Tongass is home to the bulk of America’s remaining old‐growth forest.
Over the last century, the Alaska timber industry has focused logging on the largest and most valuable old‐growth trees of the Tongass. This controversial practice is referred to as “high‐grading” and has already eliminated half or more of the very large‐tree stands on the Tongass. The very biggest trees, the ancient giants greater than 10 feet in diameter that can grow for many centuries, have largely been cut and eliminated from the forest.
Today, the remaining stands of very large‐tree old growth are extremely rare and account for only 0.5 percent (82,000 acres) of the 16.8 million‐acre Tongass. Known as volume class 7, these remnant stands are not only visually impressive but also provide important habitat for five species of Pacific salmon, Steelhead, brown bear, black bear, wolves, Sitka black‐tailed deer, river otter, marten, flying squirrel, Bald Eagle, Marbled Murrelet, Northern Goshawk and other wildlife.
Congress has long‐recognized the problem of high‐grading and took specific action to eliminate this practice of logging “a disproportionate amount of old growth timber” on the Tongass as part of the Tongass Timber Reform Act enacted in 1990. Some twenty years later, however, the Sealaska Corporation is seeking legislation (S 730/HR 1408) that threatens a return to high‐grading of the largest and most profitable trees. If enacted, the legislation would eliminate a substantial portion of the last remaining very large‐tree old growth forest on the Tongass.
S 730/HR 1408 would re‐open the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) of 1971 to give the Sealaska Corporation the unprecedented ability to select and obtain highly valuable public lands in the Tongass containing extremely disproportionate quantities of very large‐tree old‐growth timber. The legislation would permit a 12‐fold increase in the Sealaska Corporation’s logging of very large‐tree old growth. The legislation would also authorize Sealaska Corporation to obtain some the most popular public lands in the Tongass in hundreds of smaller parcels scattered throughout the forest that are currently open to the public for fishing, hunting, and recreation.
Signed into law in 1971, ANCSA is the largest land claims settlement in U.S. history, andwas enacted with strong bi‐partisan support to resolve all aboriginal land claims in Alaska. Under existing ANCSA law, Sealaska Corporation has already made its final land selections within the Tongass. S 730/HR 1408 would give Sealaska Corporation approximately 65,000 acres in new public lands for logging and development outside of areas where the corporation’s existing selections have been made.
To evaluate the impact S 730/HR 1408, Audubon Alaska mapped each of the proposed new timber selections using a US Forest Service forest cover database.
Key report findings include:
• Following decades of controversial logging involving “high grading” (i.e., logging that targets the largest and most valuable old‐growth trees) the remaining stands of very large‐tree old‐growth (class 7) are extremely rare. These stands account for only 0.5 percent or ~ 82,000 acres of the 16.8 million‐acre Tongass National Forest.
• S. 730/HR 1408 would enable Sealaska Corporation to clearcut vastly greater amounts of highly valuable very large‐tree old growth than under current law. Public lands that would be transferred to Sealaska Corporation contain up to 12 times more acres of very large‐tree old growth than occurs on the lands the corporation has already selected under current ANCSA law.
• The public lands that would be obtained by Sealaska Corporation include a significant portion of the last remaining very large‐tree old growth in the Tongass. These highest‐volume large‐tree stands account for only 1.6 percent of productive old growth on the Tongass as a whole but make up 24‐27 percent of the lands Sealaska Corporation seeks under S 730/HR1408.
• Under S 730/HR 1408 Sealaska Corporation could clearcut up to 17 percent of the last remaining very large‐tree old growth (class 7) on the Tongass.
• Public lands that Sealaska Corporation would obtain under S 730/HR 1408 are far more valuable than the corporation’s existing land selections and include approximately $50 million worth of taxpayer‐funded infrastructure and other investments (e.g., roads, trails, bridges, transfer sites, fish habitat restoration projects).
S 730/HR 1408 would result in the permanent loss of a substantial portion of the remaining very large‐tree old growth on the Tongass National Forest. This loss would be additive to the logging of any other large‐tree old growth resulting from U.S. Forest Service timber sales, with long‐term impacts on forest diversity and associated wildlife habitat.
The February 2012 edition of Fire Science Digest from the Joint Fire Science Program included this very interesting article titled, “Bark Beetles and Fire: Two Forces of Nature Transforming Western Forests.” Here’s the intro to the article [emphasis added]:
Bark beetles are chewing a wide swath through forests across North America. Over the past few years, infestations have become epidemic in lodgepole and spruce-fir forests of the Intermountain West. The resulting extensive acreages of dead trees are alarming the public and raising concern about risk of severe fire. Researchers supported by the Joint Fire Science Program (JFSP) are examining the complicated relationship between bark beetles and wildfire, the two most influential natural disturbance agents in these forests. Are the beetles setting the stage for larger, more severe wildfires? And are fires bringing on beetle epidemics? Contrary to popular opinion, the answer to both questions seems to be “no.”
Since Sharon highlighted Michael Donnelly’s Pre-Public Interest Environmental Law Conference article at Couterpunch here, I figured we might as well also highlight Donnelly’s Post-Public Interest Environmental Law Conference article at Couterpunch. So here it is, “Lessons Learned at the 30th Environmental Law Conference: Of Advocates and Activists.”
As you’ll see, Donnelly’s provides a link to this blog in his article (as he did in his pre-piece too), which I believe is one of the reasons why this blog has seen a steady up-tick in traffic over recent days. Counterpunch has a huge readership and personally, I think it’s a good thing that some of those readers – who may not be that versed in national forest policy issues – are having a look at what we’re discussing over here. These national forest lands do belong equally to all Americans after all and NEPA ensures that any American who wants to participate in the management of these lands has a meaningful opportunity to do so.
A few years ago I received a phone call from from a researcher conducting a study about grassroots environmental organizations’ attitudes and behaviors toward ‘collaboration’ in national forest management.
Caitlin Burke, Ph.D., with the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources at North Carolina State University wanted to know about the factors that affect state and local environmental groups’ participation in collaboration, and how that affects representation, diversity, and inclusion in collaborative processes.
Burke set out by collecting data from eleven western states (Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming), conducting a survey of 101 environmental groups that addressed forest-related issues and operated in the study area. The survey gathered information about the organizations and their attitudes and behaviors toward collaboration, to test relationships between organizational characteristics and strategy choice.
Next, Burke did case study research of four organizations operating in US Forest Service Regions 4 and 6. Fourteen interviews were conducted and various archival documents were analyzed to examine in greater detail the correlations between organizational characteristics and the choice of collaboration or confrontation.
Burke’s full research (all 268 pages of it) is available here. A more accessible summary of the research findings can be found here. In Burke’s own words, below are some snipped paragraphs from that summary based on her extensive research:
“The results show that large, more professionalized organizations and those with multiple values use a collaborating strategy; small, less professionalized organizations and those with a single environmental value use a confronting strategy. In other words, collaboration is not representative of all environmental groups – smaller groups and more ideological groups are not involved. This research serves as a caution to those who would use, or advocate the use of, collaboration – its use must be carefully considered and its process carefully designed to ensure the most balanced representation possible.”
“If smaller, more ideological environmental groups are not involved in collaborative decision-making, then collaboration is not representative of all affected interests and collaborative decisions do not reflect the concerns of all stakeholders.”
“Given the rocky history between environmental groups and the US Forest Service, it will be hard for the Forest Service to build relationships and trust as it initiates or participates in collaboration. Moreover, given that collaboration does not ensure representation by all interests, it will be hard for the agency to create representative and participatory processes. Finally, given non-collaborators’ reliance on law and regulations to participate in decision-making, the agency will continue to meet resistance to efforts perceived as undermining the statutory framework for environmental protection”
It goes without saying that Burke’s new research certainly provides some additional – and well researched – food for thought on the topic of ‘collaboration’ and how it’s impacting everything from national forest management, politics and public policy, to the relationships between various environmental organizations. Without a doubt, Burke’s research and findings should be required reading for those currently engaged in collaboration and those interested in the future of national forest management.
Yesterday, Truthout ran this very thought-provoking piece from Jonathan Latham. While not directly related to National Forest planning issues, the article delves into many issues concerning the relationship between some of the world’s largest corporations and some of the world’s largest conservation organizations, a topic that has also been debated on this blog from time to time. According to the article, Jonathan R. Latham, PhD, is co-founder and executive director of the Bioscience Resource Project, which is the publisher of Independent Science News (independentsciencenews.org). He has published scientific papers in disciplines as diverse as plant ecology, virology, and genetics.
A few days ago, the Montana Standard ran this editorial blasting the Alliance for Wild Rockies and Native Ecosystem Center for a lawsuit filed on the Fleecer timber sale on the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest. The editorial also claimed that the paper couldn’t think of any instance in recent years when WildWest Institute hadn’t sued to stop a logging project. Since the truth is that the WildWest Institute hasn’t filed a new timber sale lawsuit in Montana in over 5 years, the Montana Standard was forced to run this correction in today’s paper as well. – mk
Fleecer timber cut illegal, says group
By Michael Garrity, Alliance for Wild Rockies
http://mtstandard.com/news/opinion/editorial/fleecer-timber-cut-illegal-says-group/article_4028ae86-67db-11e1-b8ac-001871e3ce6c.html
One of the many reasons that Butte is a great place to live is the tremendous wild country surrounding the area. Within minutes of Butte there is world-class fishing on the Big Hole and Jefferson Rivers and some of the best elk hunting anywhere — including the Mount Fleecer area where the Fleecer timber sale is proposed.
The Montana Standard editorial on March 4 criticized the Alliance for the Wild Rockies for filing lawsuits to stop the Fleecer timber sale, the Colt Summit timber sale in the Seeley-Swan Valley, and for other timber sales we have stopped recently.
While claiming the Alliance is “abusing environmental laws,” what the editorial didn’t mention is that we win about 87 percent of those suits. Simply put, unless the Forest Service is found to be breaking the law, we don’t win.
One of the lawsuits we filed in the last several years was to stop the Price Powder timber sale in the Mount Fleecer area. This timber sale authorized 133 acres of clearcuts in prime elk habit and violated the Forest Plan standards for elk hiding cover that these large and iconic symbols of Montana require.
After we filed that suit, the Forest Service’s attorneys looked at our complaint, decided that we were right and pulled the timber sale.
It is common practice for the Forest Service to pull a timber sale before a judge can rule against them, because then they don’t have to pay our attorney’s fees and the thousands of dollars of expenses we incur are paid by us. When a judge rules in our favor, our attorneys get fees but we get nothing to cover our costs.
After the Forest Service pulled Price Powder, the agency went to work on a new timber sale in the same area named “Fleecer,” which is three times bigger than the Price-Powder timber sale and proposes 1,137 acres of clearcuts.
When the Alliance was informed of the new project, we toured the site with the forest supervisor and two district rangers, told them our concerns, and submitted detailed comments in writing.
The previous two forest supervisors worked with us on the Grasshopper, Anaconda Job Corps, Beaverhead-Deerlodge roadside salvage and the Georgetown Lake timber sales, for which they should be commended. But this time around, the agency decided to try and make giant, illegal clearcuts in prime elk habitat instead of following their own rules and laws.
Contrary to media representations, our country’s environmental laws aren’t that strict. They don’t prohibit logging on our National Forests, but do require that the Forest Service must ensure that there will be viable populations of native species after logging — and clearcuts simply do not make good wildlife habitat for elk, grizzly bears and other old-growth dependent species.
We are a nation of laws and that means federal agencies, just like citizens, must follow the law. As before, the Forest Service will either pull this proposal or, if it loses in court, blame environmentalists for once again stopping clearcutting of elk winter range.
The Standard claims it was surprised to find there are grizzly bears around Butte. But in 2010, the Standard reported that a grizzly bear was killed near Elk Park and in 2005 a hunter killed a grizzly bear within the Mount Haggin Wildlife Management Area which adjoins the Fleecer timber sale and is within the wildlife security analysis area for the project.
If grizzlies are to be recovered and removed from the Endangered Species protections, it means their habitat must be taken into account in Forest Service timber sales.
The Standard also pointed to the Colt Summit timber sale and chastised the Alliance for taking that project to court. But like the Fleecer sale, Colt Summit is another money-losing, taxpayer-subsidized logging proposal that will destroy habitat for elk, lynx and grizzly bears while costing taxpayers $1.5 million. Moreover, the Forest Service’s own records show that the agency made the decision Colt Summit would not impact the environment well before any analysis was done or public input received.
Instead of attacking citizens for participating in the management of our public lands and “abusing” environmental laws, the Standard should ask the Forest Service and its allies, like the Montana Wilderness Association, why the agency has such a hard time following the laws that ensure Butte continues to be surrounded by beautiful national forests full of native wildlife for generations yet to come.