conflict resolution

Collaboration Can’t Fix What Ails Public Forest Management

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Thanks to Matthew Koehler for sending this..

Collaboration Can’t Fix What Ails Public Forest Management

By Steve Kelly, Friends of the Wild Swan

For decades, forest activists have performed vital oversight, monitoring and enforcement of environmental laws and regulations. Caused by the rapid rise of neoliberalism, beginning in earnest during the Reagan administration, Congress and administrative agencies largely avoided policy responsibilities associated with our environmental laws. Politicians and agency bureaucrats have been screaming bloody murder about grassroots environmentalists and “gridlock” ever since. The simple fact remains, the primary cause of “gridlock” is the government’s systematic refusal to follow environmental laws and regulations.

The steady rise of neoliberalism in the Clinton years led to the now commonplace sharp political rhetoric, which directs its attacks toward the legitimacy of local grassroots forest activism. Add to this a proliferation of market-based, professional “problem solvers” touting “win-win” solutions and jobs, and one can see the game is rigged in favor of those with a vested financial interest in subsidized commodity extraction. This approach is typically dismissive of science and the law and grassroots activism.

Stakeholder partnerships prefer to engage in consensus and collaboration processes which favor a narrow, economics-based view of forest ecosystems. When challenged, collaborative stakeholders say one thing, and do the opposite, which usually leads to more old growth logging, and bulldozing new roads to access the remaining pockets of big, old trees.

One recent example of collaboration gone wild is the Southwestern Crown of the Continent Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program, which was authorized in 2009 under the Omnibus Land Management Act. The stated purpose of this collaborative program is to encourage the collaborative, science-based ecosystem restoration of priority forest landscapes.

In practice, normal environmental assessment procedures, required by the National Environmental Procedures Act (NEPA), are being undermined by making decisions that may affect thousands of acres of public forest before conducting proper analysis of forseeable environmental impacts, especially cumulative impacts. Full funding has already been allocated by Congress and the Obama administration to a program that lacks a programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). NEPA just becomes a speed bump at the end.

Once a project has been selected a work plan and business plan must be developed within 180 days. These plans describe how projects will be implemented, treatment costs, infrastructure needed, projected supply of woody biomass and timber and the local economic benefits.

The work plan is then submitted to the Regional Forester for approval. Project
implementation may begin once the requesting unit has been notified that the work plan
has been approved.

All of this indicates that any NEPA will be front-loaded.

Here is a copy of the Friends of the Wild Swan Newsletter
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I read this piece, but I don’t understand it. I know some things about NEPA but perhaps not as much as I should about CFLRP, so perhaps readers could enlighten me.

What does Mr. Kelly want a programmatic EIS on? A specific project?

NEPA doesn’t say that agencies can’t work with the public in developing proposals to be analyzed, in fact one of the ideas in NEPA is fostering public involvement. Doesn’t it make sense to develop a proposal before you analyze it? How else could it work? Would it be better for agencies to develop proposals without the public? Maybe I’m missing something here…

And I wonder about this quote:

Stakeholder partnerships prefer to engage in consensus and collaboration processes which favor a narrow, economics-based view of forest ecosystems. When challenged, collaborative stakeholders say one thing, and do the opposite, which usually leads to more old growth logging, and bulldozing new roads to access the remaining pockets of big, old trees.

It is a pretty broad brush statement about “stakeholder partnerships.” I think that some of the collaborators around the country might question whether their view is “narrow, and economics-based”. They might see themselves as seeing the big picture of sustaining the land and people, and working respectfully with each other to understand different views and find the best solutions. They might see others as “lawsuit-happy ideologues.” 😉

Sharon

Putting Lawsuits Before Results: Missoulian Editorial on Colt Summit

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Thanks to Terry Seyden for this find (so glad you’re back!).

Putting lawsuits before results: Environmental groups suing over timber sale need to collaborate
Missoulian editorial | Posted: Sunday, October 2, 2011 8:00 am

http://missoulian.com/news/opinion/editorial/article_f76db5d8-eb93-11e0-af9c-001cc4c002e0.html

Nearly everyone – environmental groups, timber companies, private landowners and public lands agencies – would agree that land management decisions are best made outside the courtroom. Years of bitter legal disputes have demonstrated that the vast majority of problems are best solved out of court, so forest lands can be managed in a more timely, efficient, and less costly manner.
This has been especially apparent in Montana, where a relatively new collaborative approach is increasingly gaining traction – and being watched carefully by others hoping to copy its success.
By bringing to one table all those with a vested interest in forest land management, collaboration has significantly cut down on the number of lawsuits concerning the Lolo National Forest, supervisor Debbie Austin told the Missoulian editorial board last week. What’s more, she said, it results in better management decisions.
But not everyone is on board. Certain environmental groups remain stuck on the old way of getting their way. Apparently, they continue to favor lawsuits over a seat at the table.
Earlier this month, several environmental groups filed suit against the Forest Service over a timber sale near Seeley Lake. The Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Friends of the Wild Swan, Montana Ecosystem Defense Council and Native Ecosystems Council say the Colt Summit Forest Restoration and Fuels Reduction Project should have included a full environmental impact statement, and that the statement’s results should be compared to the provisions in the National Forest Management and National Environmental Policy acts. They also argue that the project ignores the potential impact on wildlife.
The groups involved in the project’s planning, of course, beg to differ. The Wilderness Society, for one, believes the environmental analysis performed on the project is sufficient – and certainly more expeditious than a cumbersome environmental impact statement. That is especially important given the risk of wildfire to the Seeley Lake community, said Megan Birzell, a Northern Rockies forest associate for the Wilderness Society.
The project now being challenged in court would both remove roads and thin forests on more than 4,300 acres of land over five years. The specifics of the project are the direct result of much hard work, debate and problem-solving by a group of people with diverse but intersecting interests – and a test, of sorts, for the Montana Forest Restoration Committee, to see whether collaboration can trump litigation.
It ought to. Lawsuits have an important role to play in protecting public resources from bad decisions. But they should be methods of last resort, used only after all other options have been exhausted.
Unfortunately, some environmental groups may be so used to slapping lawsuits on new projects that they are missing an opportunity to solve potential problems before they become actual problems. They are rejecting an open invitation to resolve their concerns during the planning process, instead of after the fact.
Regardless of whether they win or lose in court, that’s clearly not the best way to go about protecting Montana’s public lands.

EDITORIAL BOARD: Publisher Stacey Mueller, Editor Sherry Devlin, Opinion Editor Tyler Christensen, Sales and Marketing Director Jim McGowan

Multi-Objective Forest Service Projects: Does It All Get Done?

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Lisa K. Anderson; Sandy Post' A Link Belt 3900 tears its way up an old gravel logging road. At the entrance contractors will build a berm.

Matthew Koehler raised this interesting point in our previous discussion, which was a bit off the main topic, but I think worthy of its own discussion. He said:

Also, please note that many of the “Land management activities in this decision” will not be accomplished at any point in the near future due to a lack of funding. Of course, all the logging will be completed, but most of the true restoration work (decommissioning of roads, culverts, etc) will only be completed as funding becomes available, which in our experience here in the N. Rockies might take a decade, if the work ever is completed at all. The public and the media would be wise to recognize the difference between simply signing a Decision Notice vs. actual completion of the work. Unfortunately, despite repeated requests to look into this matter, the media (and the Forest Service) continues to give the public the impression that all this work gets completed within a reasonable amount of time. That’s totally not true. In fact, I bet if someone did a comprehensive look at all the Stewardship Projects in USFS Region 1 over the last decade they’d be shocked at the amount of promised, yet unfinished, restoration work.

Knowing FS people, I know that their intention is to do the all the work in the project.

So I’ll start a series of questions of everyone.
1) Do you have an observation in your area, that the “other work” doesn’t get done?
2) If so, please ask the FS why not, and report their answer.
3) If you don’t agree with their answer or have other insights to share, please do.

Toddi Steelman on Science and Politics

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At a recent TED lecture at North Carolina State University, Professor Toddi Steeman talked about three science myths: “Science Determines Policy,” “Science is Objective,” and “More Science Leads to Consensus.” Steelman titled the talk, “My Jihad Against Scientific Fundamentalism.” Beginning about 7:50 into the presentation Steelman talks about so-called “Climategate,” as one of two case studies where misplaced emphasis on science frustrates policy development and problem solving. Here is a “snip,” [hastily transcribed from audio, beginning at 12:57]:

More, better, new science cannot provide objective answers to value-based questions. Science is actually pretty good at helping us understand problems, but is really not so good at helping us understand solutions to those problems. … Politics is the realm where we shape and share our collective values as a society. And politics requires different forms of knowledge, including local knowledge and public preferences. …

Knowledge like “public preferences” and “local knowledge” are often dismissed outright when we talk about environmental issues because they are seen as flawed in some fundamental way. They are seen as biased or not objective or not neutral. In that type of framing science is actually seen to be a more perfect form of knowledge … seen as … less biased or more objective or more neutral. … And under that type of framing [science] is a preferred or privileged form of knowledge in environmental decision-making. … The question is, Should it be that way?

Under that type of framing politics is really vilified. It is seen as a dirty, spin-filled, nasty practice full of compromise and collaboration in the absolute worst sense of those words. And because it is portrayed that way or framed that way it is easy to dismiss these other forms of knowledge….We are sort of left with having science to fill this gap. … But the question is, Should it be that way? …

Science can’t tell us what to do as individuals or as a collective society in the face of a changing climate. We have to make those hard decisions and engage in that debate collectively. And yet we continuously look to science to provide those answers for us. So the question again is, Why? Why do we do that? …

We continue to place these expectations on science—that science really cannot meet. And in doing so we really do an enormous disservice to science. …What we really need to do is to elevate the political dialogue in our society and to take the expectations on science down a little bit. …

We could continue to perpetuate the [three science myths above]. … And in doing so we do an enormous disservice to science … Or, the alternative vision is to acknowledge what those myths are and to embrace politics and the really constructive role it can potentially play for us. And in doing so what we could do is accept what science can do and what its strengths are, as well as what local knowledge can do for us, as well as what public preferences can do for us. And in leveraging all three of those knowledge types perhaps get better purchase on some of these contested claims in the environmental arena. Because the challenges we face in our environmental arena are so wide and so challenging we need all the help that we possibly can get.

From Forest Planning to Adaptive Governance

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“If planning is everything, maybe it’s nothing.” Aaron Wildavsky

[Author’s note: This is a lengthy (for a blog), partisan, historical view rant on the road from NFMA “forest planning” to “adaptive governance.”]

Let’s face it, the “forest land and resource management plan” is an anachronism—an artifact of a bygone era. That era was in its heyday when the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) reigned supreme after President Richard M. Nixon consolidated rule-making and other powers in the OMB via executive order in 1970. Economics-based, comprehensive rational planning was the rage. It is no surprise that The Renewable Resources Planning Act was passed in 1974, just after Nixon consolidated power under the banner of rationally planned and carefully audited governmental process. Twenty years later Henry Mintzberg penned The Rise and Fall of Strategic Planning (1994). Mintzerberg’s classic pretty much laid a tombstone atop rational planning exercises. Or at least it should have.

The Forest Planning Era
Following passage of the National Forest Management Act of 1976 as an amendment to the Renewable Resources Planning Act of 1974, it was thought that forest program management decisions could be adequately fit into a forest plan “decision container”—that somehow each forest could develop a forest-wide plan that would integrate programs now and into the future in a such a way as to allow disclosure of environmental consequences that might flow from said decisions. Project level National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) disclosure would disappear with proper forest planning and environmental disclosure at the forest level.

Allowance was made for FS administrative region plans, and for a national RPA Program plan. Given the upper two tiers, it was believed that decisions would be integrated vertically, and cumulative effects—according to NEPA standards—could be adequately disclosed.

It was a relatively innocent era, when viewed through the “green-eyeshaded accounting lenses” of OMB over-see-ers. The innocence collapsed relative soon in the forest arena as litigation proved that the three-level administratively-bounded review was not going to pass muster in the courts. Not only were projects not going to be shielded from NEPA review by a forest plan, there was increasing evidence that at least one level of planning/disclosure might be needed between project and forest.

An initial remedy to the seemingly endless process gridlock brought about by too many levels of planning was to eliminate regional plans. I referred to this then as the Texas two-step solution (forests/projects), since at that time the Forest Service’s National Planning Director was from Texas. But that was a solution looking for a problem, or better still a “non solution” not looking for anything but an easy way out. The problem between forest and project remained. Another problem was to be found elsewhere, framed larger than forest plans but not fitting into regional plan containers.

Spotted Owls, Roadless, and more
Much time and effort was now spent in the 1970s, 80s, 90s on above-forest policy making, brought about by actors and actions taken either against the Forest Service or from within the Forest Service responding to the Endangered Species Act of 1973. They were, “Spotted Owl Management Plans,” “The Roadless Rule,” “The Northwest Forest Plan,” and more. These decision containers were bounded as regions, not FS administrative regions but geographical regions more appropriately suited to the issues and the actors petitioning for problem resolution. Note that the policy-level decision making was largely about curtailing timbering and roading, but the Forest Service chose to name the efforts after the initiating issues, not the federal actions being considered.

Forest Planning Proves Resilient, if not useful
The forest planning paradigm still captured much attention, but the three-level planning process swirling around the forest plan—projects/mid-scale/forest—was felt by forest planners and the Forest Service generally to be too cumbersome. Something else needed to be done. While the rest of the world was waking up to complex systems, wicked problems, and adaptive management, as was part of the Forest Service via the Northwest Forest Plan, the Forest Service via the NFMA rule was still stuck in the wonderful, if overly complex and somewhat bizarre world of capital P “Planning.” And the Forest Service was always trying to force-fit things into forest-level and project-level decision containers. But times were changing by 1990 and at least for a time, the Forest Service seemed to be ready to catch up to the rest of the world.

Adaptive Governance: Emergence in the Clinton Era
Adaptive management seems to be evolving in name to Adaptive Governance, following a path laid down early on by Kai Lee in Compass and Gyroscope: Integrating Science and Politics for the Environment (1993). For a time the Forest Service seemed inclined to follow. [Note: Today, the “adaptive governance” path seems already well-discussed, if not well traveled. That is if my “adaptive governance” Google search is an indication. But my Wikipedia search didn’t give me much. Recognizing that the only viable adaptive management for dealing with public lands management has to deal with both Kai Lee’s Adaptive management compass and his civic-engagement gyroscope. I’ll go ahead and use the term “adaptive governance” hereafter.]

In what we might call Clinton era management, Chief Michael Dombeck sought to bring about a Leopoldian awakening (see, e.g. here, here) to Forest Service thinking. That “awakening,” as per Leopold’s earlier thinking, was about adaptive governance. But the largely Republican-dominated Forest Service resisted. Chief Dombeck was never accepted by Forest Service managers since he was from the BLM and appointed by an environmentally left-leaning Clinton administration. Things didn’t get better under Chief Jack Ward Thomas, himself a huge fan of Leopold. The road from Pinchot to Leopold was not going to be an easy one. Adaptive governance thinking was soon on the chopping block along with pretty much all else from “new forestry” to “new perspectives,” etc. following the election of George W. Bush as a new Administration came to Washington.

Adaptive Governance: Bush/Cheney Backlash
The Bush/Cheney public lands legacy can be viewed as a legacy of war—war on the environment and war on anything the previous Clinton Administration had built under the rubric of “ecosystem management” (See generally Bob Keiter’s Breaking Faith with Nature: The Bush Administration and Public Land Policy). Under Mark Rey as Undersecretary of Agriculture, the Forest Service moved into its “Healthy Forests Initiative,” followed soon thereafter by the “Healthy Forest Restoration Act of 2003.” As Bob Keiter notes, the names could be viewed as cynical, as part of a well-orchestrated backlash against Clinton era reforms. To Keiter:

By using the Healthy Forests Initiative to expand the scope of NEPA categorical exclusions and to alter the ESA consultation process, the Forest Service has further enhanced its authority and reduced the potential for judicial review of its decisions, which is also what the [Aquatic Conservation Strategy] and species inventory revisions to the Northwest Forest Plan would have done. Congress has abetted this de-legalization effort by including NEPA provisions in the HFRA and the Energy Policy Act that either eliminate or reduce environmental analysis requirements for timber thinning and energy exploration projects.279 Add to this the Bush administration’s approach to its ESA responsibilities—which include an overt hostility to new listings, a rush to delist species, and contemplated revisions to the section 7 consultation process and critical habitat designation and critical habitat designation criteria—and the land management agencies could well be relieved from meaningful regulatory oversight. Related efforts to eliminate administrative appeal opportunities are plainly designed to further insulate management decisions from review. The net effect is to minimize opportunities to enforce environmental standards and procedures, and thus shield criteria—and the land management agencies could well be relieved from meaningful regulatory oversight. Related efforts to eliminate administrative appeal opportunities are plainly designed to further insulate management decisions from review. The net effect is to minimize opportunities to enforce environmental standards and procedures, and thus shield the agencies from any meaningful accountability. It is a return to an era when discretion reigned supreme. [Footnote in original]

All good things come to an end. So do all bad things. The Bush/Cheney regime and its war on the environment ended in January 2009, although effects (and federal judges) linger. [Personal aside: My friend from the early “planning days,” Dale Bosworth served as Forest Service Chief early in the Bush/Cheney Administration. I believe Dale did what he could to curb the worst of the what might have been done to the Forest Service during that era, but didn’t take my advice the be take a firm stand and be the first Chief since Gifford Pinchot to be fired for standing up against the powers that be. Had I been in his shoes I might not have taken that advice either. Who knows? But it wasn’t in Dale’s nature to work that way. I don’t find fault with Bosworth’s leadership/management during that era.]

Adaptive Governance: Obama’s ‘Audacity of Hope’
Unfortunately for Leopoldian dreamers, incoming President Barrack Obama’s audacious plans have not yet been focused on matters environmental, other than green energy. Nor will they likely anytime soon, even if Obama or anyone in his Administration were prone to do so—which itself is in question. Obama is too distracted with two wars, emergent unrest in the Mideast and Middle America following Tea Party elections in statehouses and the US Congress. Not to mention continued after-shocks from the near-disaster of the financial meltdown that arrived coincidentally (or not) right as Obama was entering the White House.

Obama cut his political teeth on community organizing, and that is in a sense Kai Lee’s gyroscope to accompany his adaptive management compass. So we can at least hope for endorsement from Obama if planning is replaced with adaptive governance. Whether or not it will be a good thing depends largely on whether or not untoward devolution happens—or is perceived to likely happen—under adaptive governance schemes. Time will tell. But I get ahead of our story. The Forest Service hasn’t yet embraced adaptive governance, although I hear they are flirting with it. Instead they are still wedded to capital P “Planning.” As Andy Stahl noted, the recent Draft NFMA “planning rule” (pdf) (as the Forest Service likes to call it), stages up a rational planning exercise. The difference is that this time it is driven by ecological rationality instead of the earlier economic rationality from the OMB era.

Adaptive Governance: Absent in the NFMA Draft Planning Rule
I suspect it was because the Bush/Cheney era NFMA rule was thrown away by the courts, but for whatever reason the Obama Administration chose to rewrite the “NFMA rule.” There has been a flurry of commentary on this blog and elsewhere about the rule and associated planning. But does anyone really care about this type planning anymore? What decisions are really contained by a forest-level plan? Despite the language of the draft rule, I find no “ecological resilience” decisions, neither “ecological or social sustainability” decisions, nor any “species viability” decisions, nor … that can be contained in a forest-level plan. All such considerations will well-up at scales different from forest boundaries.

As I’ve argued before, these are wicked problems. Wicked problems are not amenable to rational planning resolutions. Part of the “wicked problem” problem is that they are shape-shifters, they vary in problem identification and resolution across both time and space. They just won’t stand still, and will not be force-fit into predetermined “decision containers.”

In addressing wicked problems, I believe that scale-dependent futuring, and/or puzzle solving, is in order alongside scale-dependent assessments and monitoring. We ought to add in scale-dependent standard setting. They all fit under a header “puzzle solving.” Where scale-dependent is really the stuff of framing decisions/actions according to a “Garbage Can Model” wherein issues, actors, and arenas self-organize across the landscape into various and sundry decision containers. We all need to think hard about wicked problems and, e.g. Cohen, March, and Olsen’s garbage can decision model. Here’s a pdf of CMO’s 1972 article: “A Garbage Can Theory of Organizational Choice.”

See too Pritchard and Sanderson’s chapter in Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems (2002), “The Dynamics of Political Discourse in Seeking Sustainability.” After setting stage for adaptive governance, complete with “wicked problem identification” and “garbage can” resolution mechanisms, Pritchard and Sanderson conclude:

[Testing hypotheses and applying lessons learned] to the thorny puzzles of environmental management and governance are [noble] goals. The greatest promise lies in addressing political issues directly, rather than in avoiding or submerging them. The fondest hope might be that individuals, communities, and formal organizations engage the spirit of adaptation and experimentation, by allowing a set of contingent ideas to shape “the gamble” of democratic resource management, and citizen experts to report on the results. Of course, for such a profoundly disorganized and multiscale approach to thrive, government, market, and citizen must share a common vision—that all must address these puzzles in order that they might be engaged and worked on—not solved forever; that “expertise,” popular voice, and power are separable, and none holds the dice [from a “floating crap game” model of politics] for more than a pass.

A Few Questions Linger
Is an ecologically framed rational planning rule what we need to resolve controversy?
Or is it time to embrace adaptive management, even adaptive governance in an attempt to tame wicked problems? Yes, I know that the preamble to the Draft NFMA rule claims that forest planning will be driven by adaptive management. But, really? Read the rule and explain to me how the draft rule stages for more than rational planning.

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Related:
The Forest Service as a Learning Challenged Organization, Iverson, 1999
US Forest Service Deeply Flawed Planning Culture, Iverson, 2004

Forest Wars: From Multiple Use to Sustained Conflict

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When we sometimes tire of our “word wars” here, we need to remember that they are just one manifestation of broader holy wars being waged in and around our public lands.

Long Road to War

Utilitarian ideology has been a mainstay in forest policy development since the early 1900s when Gifford Pinchot and Bernhard Fernow introduced forestry into American government. Samuel Hays’ Conservation and the Gospel of Efficiency, alongside David Clary’s Timber and the Forest Service both build on self-righteousness to the point of religious fervor among many who chose to work on the land, notably foresters and engineers, and their evangelists (pundits, professors, etc). Similar books could be written — likely have been — talking about the religious-like fervor of the environmental community. [See, e.g. Environmentalism as Religion, Wall Street Journal, 4/22/2010.]

For many years, what later emerged as forest wars were never more than disagreements between mainstream forestry practitioners and malcontents like John Muir, Aldo Leopold and Bob Marshall. Such “disagreements” were deep-seated ideological splits, but contrarians of that era didn’t have the political/legal muscle to make for war. Later, however, the very same disagreements intensified into ideological war with the dawn of the environmental movement.

Environmentalists gained traction in forest debates, appeals, litigation, etc. after people began to wake up to environmental concerns in the late 1960s. The first of a series of Wilderness Acts became law in 1964. The Endangered Species Preservation Act of 1966 predated and set a stage for the Endangered Species Act of 1973. Earth Day began in 1970. In 1969 the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) became law. In 1976 The National Forest Management Act (NFMA) and the Federal Lands Policy Management Act added to the mix. The environmental battles gained legal footing. But it is not clear that the legal footing was ever recognized, or at least accepted by the US Forest Service. At least if actions speak louder than words, we must question whether the Forest Service and its USDA overlords ever accepted these legislative mandates.

Disdain for legislative mandates runs deep, but there is an alternative path — a road not taken. Sally Fairfax set a stage for continued disgust for NEPA among forest practitioners with her 1978 Science article titled A Disaster in the Environmental Movement. Countrast Fairfax’s view with that from Jim Kennedy’s NEPA note: Legislative Confrontation of Groupthink.

Environmental Wars

Beginning in the 1970s, environmentalists waged war on timbering, grazing, road building, mining and oil & gas development, developed recreation, and more. Warriors on the “enviro” side typically vilify corporations, else government “lackeys” for the corporations. Warriors on the practitioner side vilify the enviros. In war there is little room for thoughtful discussion or dialogue. The rift between the two camps will likely remain very deep for a long time.

It is not clear that the Forest Service ever gave much heed to the “legislative confrontation of groupthink” ideas in NEPA. It seems that the Forest Service has been evading/avoiding NEPA responsibilities from the get-go. They continued “go-go timbering” up to the point of shutdown following the Monongahela and Bitterroot controversies. After things were sort-of opened up again via NFMA, the Forest Service wanted “once and for all NEPA”, i.e. the forest plan would be a catch-all NEPA container, allowing all projects to flow without any further NEPA review. When that didn’t work, the Forest Service played various shell-games pointing either upward (e.g. forest plans, regional plans) for NEPA compliance, else downward toward projects depending on what was being challenged. Finally, during the Bush/Cheney period, they sought to “categorically exclude” as much as possible from NEPA review.

In 1999 I wrote up a little thing titled Use of the National Forests. I noted four distinct periods of Forest Service history: Conservation and “Wise Use” — 1900-1950, Multiple Use — 1950-1970, Sustained Conflict — 1970-2000, and Collaborative Stewardship — 2000+. Although we might quibble over the dates as well as the categories, I now realize that I was over-optimistic as to the dawn of the Collaborative Stewardship era. At minimum there was a dramatic backlash — not necessarly against collabortion but clearly against environmetalism — commencing with Bush/Cheney Administration and their ABC (“anything but Clinton”) campaigns. The Bush/Cheney war on the environment was a reenactment of an earlier war waged by the Ronald Reagan Administration.

Bob Keiter (Univ. of Utah Law School) chronicled the emergence of both ecological awareness and collaborative stewardship in Keeping Faith with Nature. Keiter later chronicled the Bush/Cheney reactionary footnote in a 2007 article, Breaking Faith with Nature. Taken together, the two trace certain aspects of emergent gospels that were part of the ideological wars. The former traces what I’ll call the “ecosystem awareness” movement in the Clinton era of government, and the second the Healthy Forests Initiative and the Healthy Forests Restoration Act reactions during the Bush/Cheney era.

An era of “collaborative stewardship” may yet be emerging, albeit slowly and as already seen, with pushbacks. Enviros are still quite leery of “collaborations” and high-sounding agency rhetoric. They are warriors, after all. So the wars are not yet over, and may not be for a very long time. Timbering continues, albeit a a much lower volume than in the go-go days, and reframed as “ecological restoration” or “forest restoration”. New forest evangelists appear on the stage. Now we have both Wally Covington and Jerry Franklin preaching the gospel of forest restoration. I’ll leave it for further discussion as to how the two brands compare, and as to who buys into one, the other, both, or neither.

Other Wars

Even if wars between environmentalists and industrial and government practitioners were to ever end, these are just the tip of an iceberg of forest wars. We must add in the budget and staffing wars (hereafter budget wars) that have been ongoing in the Forest Service for a long time. Timber and Engineering reigned supreme in budget wars for many years, particularly after World War Two and the housing boom that fed rapid increases in timbering and associated road-building after WWII. Recreation, Wildlife, Soil and Water, even Fire, Personnel (later, “Human Resources”), Planning, Budget, Fiscal, State and Private Forestry, etc. were always struggling for funds. After go-go timbering days were a thing of the past — i.e. Environmentalists effectively shut down “go-go timbering”, Recreation and Fire gained an upper hand in budget wars. Somehow Engineering always seemed to keep its share of the money. [Note: Someday, maybe I’ll get these budget categories approximately right. For now, they are “good enough for government work”]

Finally — not trivially — Public Lands Wars have raged more of less continuously for many years. Remember the “Sagebrush Rebellion” and the so-called “County Supremacy Movement”? Now those have transformed into more of a “States’ Rights” movement. In all cases, part of the action has been an assault on federal lands.

I’ve probably missed some of the “wars” here. But if I’ve captured any of this even partially correctly, the landscapes, biophysical and political, have been transformed in the process. Some argue, as did Fairfax way back when, that the legal-administrative gridlock that has been a reality in federal lands management during the last 30-40 years, has done significant harm to the environment, and only resulted in wasted paper (EISs and dollars/time spent on forest planning, project planning, related NEPA work, appeals and litigation). Others like me argue that sometimes it is necessary to grapple with vexing social issues, even wicked problems in a very public way. Such “civic discovery” is a necessary part of a working democracy. Would that we could move from “war talk” to “fierce conversations“.

Related:
NEPA is Not the Problem, Forest Policy – Forest Practice, Oct 2007
The Blame Game

Voice in Democracy: When Anonymity Helps

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As we are seeing these days in the Middle East and Africa, even Wisconsin, democracy is never easy—whether to initiate or to keep. What we know is that we cannot maintain a democratic form of government without “voice.” After all, democracies are “temples of talk.” Yet, many times it proves too threatening to express opinions, or even to interject facts, into public discussions. Discussions sometimes threaten work, family, or community relations, yet without discussions, none of these institutions can long survive. In many situations, only the few dare voice opposition to either the status quo or to proposed change. But these days it is getting easier to be heard without some of the threat that has traditionally attached to voice. We are seeing an upwelling of “anonymity” as a form of voice.

I follow a bunch of blogs in the economics and finance arena. Believe me, there are a bunch of these. As you might guess, given recent financial shenanigans events, there are very active conversations in these blogs, and also in mainstream periodicals—that themselves now embed blogs. Some who comment and some who blog remain anonymous. Why? Because of perceived threats, sometimes very real threats. Anonymity allows a particular voice that would be disallowed if people were to “post” or comment under their real names.

Here are two examples. One noted financial blogger, The Epicurean Dealmaker, posts as TED (an acronym). TED is widely viewed as a sage in the arena of Wall Street financial deal-making. TED claims to be a mid- to higher-level employee of a Wall Street firm. He (or she? Not likely!) has been very critical of the culture wherein he makes a fine living. And his posts, and guarded/shielded interviews, have helped to unravel some of the mysteries of this arcane world. TED is unabashed. He even challenges people to find out who he is. He is so sure of himself that he believes that he will not be “outed.”

Then there is Maxine Udall (girl economist), who spent a few years blogging and attracted a following. Turns out that “Maxine” was not her real name. Unfortunately, the real author passed away suddenly a few weeks ago. She was “outed” after her untimely passing. Most everybody had previously thought Maxine was a savvy graduate student. Turns out that she was a professor. Had she been blogging under her real name, her voice would have been less edgy.

If you want to comment with anonymity, here’s what you can do. First create a fictitious name/email address, then begin commenting. Or, particularly if you want to carry conversation “off line” set up a real email, like TED did, with a “handle”, not your real name. If you feel you have more to say, start an anonymous blog—it is very easy.

We need more “voice” in the public lands arena. I don’t understand why there are not more blogs on matters we discuss here. Is it just timidity? Is it that there is so little passion among employees and public lands watchers? Really? Likely not. So what else is going on?

Nice Article on 4FRI

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We’ll probably all be interested in following as 4FRI unfolds.

This is the most detailed story I’ve seen..nice work, Pete Aleshire!

T

he threat prompted timber interests and environmentalists together with forest researchers from Northern Arizona University to forge an agreement on the need to use a reinvented timber industry to thin some 2.4 million acres of forest. Instead of asking taxpayers to shell out $500 to $1,000 per acre for hand thinning, backers hope the timber mills can essentially cover the cost of the thinning by selling the small trees they harvest. That would require convincing the timber mills to invest millions in chipboard and particle board manufacturing operations plus a network of power plants that can burn the wood scraps.

A study by economists from NAU predicted that long-term contracts feeding wood steadily to a network of mills and power plants would generate about 1,000 jobs annually in the region and save the taxpayers the $1.2 billion cost of hand thinning such an expanse.

“If an effort of this scale is going to work anywhere, it’s going to work here,” said Ethan Aumack, Director of Restoration Programs for the Grand Canyon Trust.

“From the science to the social license to the wood utilization capacity, we have all the necessary pieces in place and now it’s time to move them in unison forward.”

And

The timber interests want 20- and 30-year contracts to guarantee a sufficient supply of wood to produce a profit. The conservationist groups want the Forest Service to accept what amounts to a ban on cutting the largest trees — generally those more than 16 inches in diameter.

The Ranchers and the Feds Should Be Friends

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The National Grasslands don’t often get the limelight in our Forest Service discussions. Sometimes I think the filter of the timber wars obscures a vision of our best mutual future. But listen to these words and see if you think they might be relevant to some of our other disputes. Especially the concept- there are no villains here, and a lot of common ground.

This is from an editorial here in the Bismarck Tribune entitled “Forest Service, ranchers need to reach common ground.

Divergent uses and demands upon the national grasslands periodically conflict, but the relationship between the ranchers who lease range and the Forest Service has become adversarial to the point it has crossed over the line of good sense. Huge amounts of time and energy are wasted on the verbal and political conflict. The running disputes between the grazing association and the Forest Service are an obstacle to thoughtful management of the grasslands.

It is not a conflict between a heroic ranching ethic and federal bureaucrats who don’t know one end of a cow from the other. Nor is it a dispute between noble naturalists and ill-educated cowboys more interested in a quick buck from the sales ring than they are in taking care of the grass. The two sides have a great deal in common. As in all things, the black and white issues are really gray, and it’s compounded by a third party – the public, the ultimate landlords.

The needs of the two – ranchers and Forest Service – are not mutually exclusive.

North Dakota’s experience with the Forest Service has been good. Its employees are skilled and dedicated. The ranchers in the Badlands are our fellow citizens. And we appreciate their difficult economic challenges and their role in forging the state’s identity.

It’s in the state’s best interests for ranchers and the Forest Service to develop a plausible working relationship based on mutual respect.

Who’s at the Table and Who Decides?

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Observing the stories in the press on our favorite topics over the past two weeks, I found a common set of questions that I hope can illuminate the controversies. ”Who’s at the Table and Who Decides?” There is another thread, in some of these stories, of the appropriate role of state and local governments.

In this post, we’ll examine the settlement of case against four forest plans (82 Rule) in southern California.

Here’s the link to the below quote. http://lakeconews.com/content/view/17531/931/
Here’s the link to another piece on the settlement on this blog.

SAN FRANCISCO – Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. has announced a settlement that requires the U.S. Forest Service to reconsider its plans regarding wilderness lands in four national forests, including the Los Padres, home of the endangered California condor. “With this settlement, the state of California will now play an active role along with the Forest Service in determining which areas of Southern California forests will be preserved as wilderness,” Brown said. The settlement resolves a lawsuit brought by Brown and various state agencies and environmental groups against the U.S. Forest Service for its plans to allow roads to be built through hundreds of thousands of acres of wild lands in the Los Padres, Angeles, Cleveland and San Bernardino national forests.

Who’s at the table? The plaintiffs (listed in the agreement) and the Forest Service and DOJ.
Who decides? The Department of Justice and the Forest Service and the plaintiffs, which in this case includes the State of California.

It appears to me that the State and groups that used the tactic of litigation moved the decisions in forest plans from being an open process, where the FS decides, to a not- open process where it is not so clear who decides. If land management allocations are ultimately to be made in the courts, because plans are so complex that it is difficult to do one perfectly- especially when people are paid to find flaws- perhaps it tells us that more conflict resolution, and not more analysis is what is needed. Again, I think it’s OK to use that as a tactic, but using that as a tactic has potential negative ramifications, from the perspective of openness and transparency, that need to be acknowledged.

It looks like the settlement imposes roadless-rule like requirements or, in other words, establishes a policy for federal lands in part of the State. We have had the discussion before on this blog about whether settlement agreements actually set policy. This seems to be an example of that.