A Forest Fire Flares Again : Logging/environmental conflict is being waged on several fronts

The long-smoldering timber wars between loggers and environmentalists in Northern California and parts of other western states have reignited. Stoked by congressional Republicans bent on eviscerating the Endangered Species Act and other environmental regulation, the new firestorm of anger and frustration imperils the future of irreplaceable old-growth forests and other wilderness tracts. Last week the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in a case that challenges the legality of the federal Endangered Species Act. Its decision could prove to be a key to the future of U.S. woodlands.

There is relatively little old-growth forest left in the United States--most of it has been chopped down--so these epic legal and political battles are being fought over the use of a fraction of the nation’s public and private forest land.

There are problems with the administration of the Endangered Species Act, to be sure. Nonetheless, if the protections for these dwindling forests and the dwindling species within them are dismantled or evaded, either by Congress or the court, logging conglomerates may reap a quick windfall but every American will be poorer in the long run.

The immediate cause of renewed hostilities was the decision, announced last month, by Pacific Lumber Co. to begin logging again in Northern California’s Headwaters Forest, the world’s largest remaining privately owned old-growth redwood grove. The 3,000-acre Headwaters tract, a small part of the company’s vast timber holdings, is subject to federal and state endangered species laws. In the 1980s, as companies such as Pacific Lumber dramatically increased the pace of their logging, environmentalists used those laws to preserve old-growth forests.

Many rare and endangered species are sheltered in the dense canopy created by these trees, some hundreds or even thousands of years old. Pacific Lumber officials said they acted, after having halted logging in Headwaters for five years, because “no serious proposal has emerged” for preserving the area. Do they mean that unless someone else devises a plan to save the trees the company feels free to cut them down?

The company announcement followed a federal judge’s ruling that Pacific Lumber logging operations would seriously imperil species such as the marbled murrelet, a sea bird protected under both state and federal endangered species acts. The decision was highly critical of the company’s scientific findings on animal and plant species within the forest and questioned the objectivity of the scientists it retained.

The company also announced plans to conduct salvage operations in the forest. An exemption in state forestry laws permits removal of up to 10% of the timber volume in dead, diseased or dying trees without the usual oversight. But while this practice sounds innocuous, it’s not. Downed and decaying trees are an integral part of the old-growth habitat; they provide homes and nutrients to other plant life and to animals. Moreover, the exemption permitting these operations defines salvage so broadly that even healthy trees could be cut. Now, facing another lawsuit over the legality of its plans, Pacific Lumber has suspended salvage operations pending a court hearing later this month.

But meanwhile Congress has come to the rescue of Pacific Lumber and logging companies across the West. Both houses have now passed bills that would extend a federal salvage exemption like California’s to all national forests. These measures are riders to the mammoth federal recision bill. Supporters justify the salvage exemption, which includes thinning green trees, as a way to prevent waste and forest fires. But in some instances, federal rules already permit quick action outside of legal constraints to prevent fires.

This disingenuous exemption, like Pacific Lumber’s salvage plans in the Headwaters Forest, is little more than an end run around appropriate existing protections. When the conference version of this legislation reaches his desk, President Clinton should regard it as a special-interest bill for private gain and veto it.