Selling Out the Forests

The Bush administration’s assault on environmental protection reaches an appalling new high -- or low -- with the U.S. Forest Service’s proposal to essentially gut 20-year-old management planning rules for deciding the most appropriate uses of the nation’s 192 million acres of national forest.

The proposal, to become effective in 90 days, will “better harmonize the environmental, social and economic benefits” of the forests, the Forest Service said in a press release.

That’s bureaucratic gibberish for eroding safeguards under the National Environmental Policy Act that protect fish and wildlife. This will be done by reducing the public’s participation in the planning process and its ability to appeal bad decisions to the courts.

The Forest Service even has the gall to claim that the new rule will emphasize modern scientific knowledge, but environmental scientists say it actually will reduce the role of scientists in the planning process.

The plan offers more “flexibility” to forest managers, the Forest Service says. That means forest managers can designate areas for future logging without studying the impact on wildlife, watersheds and public recreation throughout the forest. The loggers, who consider the present system slow and cumbersome, support the change.

The Forest Service says there’s no need to do an environmental study during the forestwide planning process. The study can be done when individual projects, such as a timber sale, are undertaken. But that change sidesteps the major purpose of the National Forest Management Act of 1976, which directs the Forest Service to develop a management plan for each of the 175 forests and grasslands.

The plans are the means of determining the most appropriate uses of various parts of the forests over a 15-year period and studying the relative impact of those uses on the rest of the forest. In California, population pressures have brought about a greater recognition of the need for recreational uses of the forests, including hiking, backpacking, hunting, fishing and backcountry skiing, and for reduced logging.

The current rules require the Forest Service to conduct a formal environmental impact study whenever the management plans are revised or significantly amended. The planners must consider alternatives. Through a hearing and comment process, the public has a chance to balance one against the other and offer support or opposition.

The new rule allows forest managers to exempt forest plans from such environmental studies. There would be only one choice, that of the forest manager. No longer would the plans have to give first priority to protection of the forest environment or maintain legal protection for wildlife.

The Forest Service says it’s not changing national goals for protecting the forests. If that’s so, there’s no point in junking the present rules. They are complex, but they work.