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Article from Oregon Public Broadcasting: “When It Comes To Wildfire, Politics Lag Behind Science.”

The public doesn’t want smoke, period, and is leery of fire in the woods.

“Political barriers might explain why some forest restoration projects complete the thinning but not the burning part of the plan. “

Note the “About This Story” section at the bottom of the page.

Why Does This Story Matter?

Politicians have the power to influence how the West manages wildfire by directing tax dollars toward suppression and forest restoration. This story focuses on where politicians stand relative to the science that says forest managers should be letting more wildfires burn and using more prescribed fire to reduce the likelihood of catastrophic wildfires in the future.

Discuss!

NEWS RELEASE

For Immediate Release
Contact: (202) 205-1005
Twitter: @forestservice

 State of Alaska, USDA Forest Service begin official work on Alaska Roadless Rule

JUNEAU, ALASKA, August 2 – The State of Alaska and the USDA Forest Service signed a memorandum of understanding this week to develop an Alaska state-specific roadless rule.

An Alaska state-specific roadless rule will determine which currently designated roadless areas would require a different management designation to further Alaska’s economic development or other needs, while still conserving roadless areas for generations to come.

The state-specific rule will amend the 2001 Roadless Rule, which prohibits road construction, road reconstruction, and timber harvesting on certain National Forest System lands across the country. Currently, in Alaska, 67 percent of National Forest System lands are inventoried roadless areas. An additional 26 percent are designated Wilderness, where road construction is also prohibited.

In establishing this new rule, the USDA Forest Service is responding to Alaska’s petition for a full exemption from the 2001 Roadless Rule. The petition was accepted by Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue in April 2018, with the decision to pursue a state-specific roadless rule. National Forest System lands in Alaska that are designated Wilderness would be unaffected by this rulemaking.

“We will continue to work with the people of Alaska, the state government, industry, tribes and Alaska native corporations to maintain the health and vibrancy of our National Forests,” said Secretary Perdue. “The national forests in Alaska should be working forests for all industries.”

The Forest Service and state will work closely together, as the Forest Service did with Colorado and Idaho to develop their state-specific roadless rules.  An important part of this process will be working with stakeholders from across the region to inform development of this state-specific rule.

“The State of Alaska is ready to begin this work. I am confident that state and federal officials will be responsive to input from local residents every step of the way and that together we will account for the diverse needs of people who live, work, and recreate in the forest,” Governor Bill Walker said of the project.

Secretary Perdue aims to sign a final Alaska Roadless Rule within the next 18 months. The preparation process will involve National Environmental Policy Act environmental review and disclosures, gathering public feedback, conducting public outreach, and consultation with Alaskan Tribes and Native Corporations.

A notice of intent to prepare an EIS for the rulemaking is scheduled to be published in the Federal Register later this summer.

For more information please contact Dru Fenster, Alaska Region Media Coordinator at 907-209-2094.

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From the Eugene Register-Guard: “Fire-prone area of Kalmiopsis ablaze again.”

“They are using some of the old lines from the Chetco as well as the Biscuit fire,” said Katy O’Hara, public information officer for the Klondike and Natchez fires.

The Klondike fire is burning within the boundaries of the 500,000-acre 2002 Biscuit Fire and on the edge of the Chetco Bar Fire, a 192,000-acre conflagration that rocked the region last year. The area was also the site of the 150,000-acre Silver Fire in 1987, which like the others was ignited by lightning.

In the years since the Biscuit Fire, light vegetation that is extremely flammable has sprouted, providing abundant fuel for the Klondike, which doubled in size last week.

FYI, from the US Forest Service, “Forest Health Monitoring: National Status, Trends, and Analysis 2017.”

This article, “5 years after massive fire near Yosemite, forest restoration may be in peril,” quotes Chad Hansen; John Buckley, executive director of the nonprofit Central Sierra Nevada Environmental Resource Center; some USFS staffers; and Malcomb North, a scientist at the Forest Service’s Pacific Southwest Research Station. I wish the article had included more info from North on the science!

“Its centerpiece is a federally funded community and watershed resilience program touted as a model for helping small town economies and wildlife habitats bounce back after wildfires throughout the western United States.

“But now, five years after the fire, there is growing concern that the grand partnership is crumbling due to delays, frustration and a tug-of-war between preservationists and logging advocates backed by the Trump administration.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in the Alliance for the Wild Rockies’ favor in its legal challenge to the East Reservoir logging project on the Kootenai National Forest in Northwest Montana.

“The Court found that the Forest Service violated its own rules for management of grizzly bear habitat“ Garrity stated. The rare and imperiled Cabinet-Yaak grizzly bear population of Northwest Montana has failed to recover to even half of its minimal goal of 100 bears after decades of management, which led to implementation of special management standards aimed to help recovery. However, the Court found that even though the agency adopted the recovery standards, it was not actually complying with them. “This grizzly bear population is less than 50 bears and in really dire straits – the Forest Service can’t just ignore that when it plans massive logging projects in grizzly bear habitat anymore,” said Mike Garrity, Executive Director for the Alliance for the Wild Rockies.

“The East Reservoir Project is huge,” Garrity continued. “But consider that there are already over 22,000 acres of clearcuts within its boundaries. Add to that the 8,845 acres of proposed commercial logging in the East Reservoir project, of which 3,458 acres will be new clearcuts, and the additional impacts to this already heavily-logged area are simply unacceptable for wildlife, water quality, hunting, fishing, and other public recreation and use of this area.”

“In addition to the environmental impacts, the project was a huge money-loser which, by the Forest Service’s own estimate, would have cost taxpayers over $2.5 million to subsidize further degradation of an already-degraded landscape at a time when the federal deficit is exploding,” Garrity explained. “Much of that cost will be to rebuild and maintain an astounding 175 miles of logging roads, build nine miles of new permanent logging roads, add an additional 13 miles of illegal, user-created roads into the legal road system, and open nine miles of previously closed motorized trails. This would occur despite the fact that all the existing science shows more roads lead directly to more grizzly bear deaths and more sedimentation of the spawning streams for bull trout, which are already listed as ‘threatened’ under the Endangered Species Act.

“As most Montanans know, there is incredible pressure from industry lobbyists and politicians to ‘get out the cut’ on our National Forests. But the bottom line is that these National Forests are public lands that belong to all Americans, not just the 1percent or corporate interests. Our federal laws are often the only thing standing between the ‘cut-and-run’ practices we’ve see on private timber lands, and the intact ecosystems we can still find on our National Forests. That’s because federal laws require retention of functioning ecosystems and diverse wildlife and fisheries on our National Forests.

“Simply put, thanks to our federal laws, our National Forests are not commercial logging lots that exist to benefit a single, private industry. In this case, we had to go to court to make this point clear, and the rule of law prevailed,” Garrity concluded.

You can view the Order here.

Longtime readers of this blog will recall that this timber sale has been discussed and debated many times. Here’s a sampling of some previous posts.

Today, in Alliance for Wild Rockies v. Savage, the 9th Circuit ruled the Forest Service violated Kootenai national forest plan standards that regulate road densities to protect grizzly bears.

A Venn diagram would help explain the court’s reasoning, but since I don’t know how to draw one on-line, here’s a silly analogy.

Imagine a two-humped camel that has spent her long life carrying straws. Now old, weak and feeble, the vet advises, “No more straws should be put on your camel or she will collapse and die.” Chastened, the owner counts the straws — 1,000.

To simplify future straw management, the owner decides that from now on he will add and remove straws only from the camel’s small front hump, which carries 20 straws; the other 980 straws being on the large hump.

The owner dutifully keeps a running tally of the straws he adds and removes from the front hump. But, unbeknownst to him, his wife has been surreptitiously adding straws to the camel’s rear. In fact, some of the original 1,000 straws were probably hers, but no one knows for sure because the old straw records are missing.

The next day, the owner puts 6 new straws on his camel and, in an abundance of caution, removes 8, figuring that having only 18 straws on the small hump will provide a safety margin for his aging camel.

A day later, the camel dies. The vet is called. “Why did my camel die?” the owner asks mournfully. “I was careful to never have more than 20 straws on the front hump.”

“There were 1,452 straws on this camel!” exclaims the vet. “I told you your camel could tolerate no more than 1,000.”

“It was a smelly camel, anyway” his wife mutters, as she sweeps up the straws.

Our hearts and prayers go out to colleagues, students, friends and family of Dr. Maness.

It is with great sadness that we share the news that Thomas Maness, dean of the College of Forestry, passed away peacefully at home yesterday after battling an illness for the last two and a half years.

Thomas was a true visionary. One only needs to look at the Institute for Working Forest Landscapes and the TallWood Design Institute to understand Thomas’s dedication to improving the health of our lands, people, businesses, and ecosystems, and to do so through collaborative work. Through his vision, he helped propel our College into a globally recognized leader in forestry.

He was our friend, colleague, leader, and mentor.

Thomas’s inspiring words were always backed by meaningful action and high expectations. He recognized that for the College to prosper, we had to make hard decisions to achieve the excellence he confidently knew we were capable of – in our teaching, research and outreach. Thomas taught us we should not shy away from tough issues because that is where we are needed the most. (http://blogs.oregonstate.edu/issuesinforestry/)

If excellence is the goal of our College, our careers and our own lives, then complacency is the nemesis. Thomas drove us all to seek and achieve excellence and he provided the tools for us to do so. Since joining the College as Department Head of FERM in 2009, Thomas viewed our students as the best opportunity we have to make the world a better place. His commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion, recognition that we are housed on the traditional territory of the Calapooia people, and assertion that the College must be a driver for positive change in our professions and society is a baseline for our future as a community. Thomas also believed that with the best support and inspiring faculty mentors, anything was possible for our students upon leaving the College and OSU. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNQTM6CsVDg

Thomas committed to provide an inclusive, productive and engaging workplace. Many came to OSU because of his vision and specifically to work with Thomas. We learned more from him than we could ever ask of a mentor. Thomas was a once-in-a-generation personality.

Here’s a link to the note from OSU.
Here’s a post from the Capital Press that talks about his history pre-OSU.

This article from the Coos Bay World explains that the 5,400-acre Coquille Tribal Forest in Oregon is no longer “coupled” to BLM management practices — including Northwest Forest Plan restrictions on harvesting. Maybe the agencies ought to consult with the tribe as it considers revising the Northwest Forest Plan.