NEWS ANALYSIS : The Bush Solution Has Its Problems : Environment: Loggers and conservationists are not appeased by Administration panel’s plan to save the owl and aid the timber industry.

Months ago, when the fate of the spotted owl first defined the battle lines between loggers and environmentalists, the drum rolls began: The Bush Administration would have to make a historic decision about the future of the Pacific Northwest and its dwindling ancient forests.

Would the “I want to be an environmentalist” President side with the scientists and act to save the owl by sharply reducing the harvest from publicly owned national forests in Northern California, Oregon and Washington? Or, would the free-market businessman President side with the timber industry and permit large-scale logging of the national forests in the name of a healthy economy and preserving jobs?

In the end, it seems that the politician in the President won out with a familiar move--an attempt to split the difference and call it a compromise.

But this fight resists the easy blurring of compromise.

And the Bush Administration, rather than reaching out and charting history, may find that it accomplished nothing more than setting down just another inconclusive step on a muddy trail of tears.

In literal terms, the Bush Administration tilted fairly sharply to the side of the loggers.

A Cabinet-level task force rejected the nearly universal opinion of scientists that logging national forests in the Pacific Northwest had to be reduced by a third to safeguard the owl from extinction. Speaking for the Administration, the task force said Friday that the owl habitat could be preserved and the overall reduction in harvest could be held to half that level.

The trouble is, setting aside the owl habitat, which generally represents the most remote areas of the forest, means that there are far fewer remaining areas on which timber cutting can occur. Some of them are scenic corridors near urban areas, such as Seattle. Some of them are in steep canyons, where cutting could cause erosion and harm to stream beds. The fate of other animal species could be involved. Few if any of the areas are without potential controversy.

So the Administration recommended that Congress provide loggers with a waiver, or “insulation,” from many environmental protection laws for the 1991 harvest. Otherwise, the Administration acknowledged, the proposal “will be a hollow promise.”

But was it realistic to ask Congress to enact such a waiver in the few remaining days of its session, which ends Oct. 20?

“It’s very difficult to take this proposal seriously,” said Victor M. Sher, Seattle attorney with the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund. “It adds nothing constructive to the debate in the Northwest.”

Because the industry did not get the go-ahead to cut as much or more than last year, it professed “no joy” at the Administration recommendation.

Just like environmental groups, timber companies want to settle this long fight as soon as possible. Some industry leaders are banking on the fact that Congress eventually will convene the government’s Endangered Species Committee, composed of high-ranking federal officials who have the power to determine that saving the owl from extinction is not as important as the economic consequences.

The industry all along has cast this as a matter of saving jobs for lumbermen and mill workers. Again, Friday, American Forest Resource Alliance said that the Administration had “jeopardized these families and communities.”

But environmentalists charged that this was a cruel smoke screen. If the industry wanted to save jobs, it would stop shipping one of every four raw, unmilled logs to Japan and the Far East, they said.

Meanwhile, the owl--and the larger question of the ancient forests--may be headed toward another showdown in the courts.

Andy Kerr, firebrand leader of the Oregon Natural Resources Council in Portland, said that he believes Congress will not complete action on the Administration proposal by Oct. 1, the beginning of the new fiscal year. At that time, the government will be without a plan to save the owl and “will be in violation of the endangered species act.

“And as long as the Administration insists on violating the law, it is the duty of environmentalists to seek to enforce it” through court action.

In California, some environmentalists think that the pro-logging slant of Friday’s decision will backfire and help the campaign for Proposition 130, the so-called “Forests Forever” ballot initiative. This measure would ban clear cutting and give environmentalists a voice on the State Board of Forestry.

“We will hope this galvanizes the people of California to go out in November and vote for the ‘Forests Forever’ initiative and do what is within their power to counteract this frontal assault on our ancient forest environment,” said Nathaniel Lawrence of the Natural Resources Defense Council in San Francisco.

Kevin Eckery, vice president of industry affairs for the Timber Assn. of California, figures that voters will instead show some sympathy for the once storied but now embattled logger.

“I think there is a sense of fairness on the part of the voters. They see all these events coming down on timber families, and I think they might be less inclined to make it even worse by passing something disastrous like Prop. 130.”

Times environmental writer Maura Dolan in Los Angeles contributed to this story.