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Forest Service Is Expected to Further Reduce Logging in Sierra

Nature: The long-awaited management plan is part of an effort to halt region's ecological decline.

By BETTINA BOXALL

January 12, 2001

The U.S. Forest Service is expected to announce today a long-awaited decision that would substantially increase protections for the Sierra Nevada's oldest trees and most vulnerable wildlife.

The management blueprint for 11.5 million acres of national forest land in the Sierra, which will shape countless specific policies, is the latest in a series of sweeping environmental decisions by the Clinton administration in its final days in office.

It reflects an effort, proponents say, not only to boost conservation efforts, but to reverse an ecological decline in a mountain range that occupies a central place in America's wilderness lore.

Sources close to the process said the document will severely restrict tree-cutting on about 4 million acres in which old growth is found, confine the most intensive timbering to land near developed areas and strengthen stream protections.

In much of the Sierra, logging would drop below current levels, which already are dramatically lower than 1980s' peaks.

Forest Service officials declined to describe details until the blueprint is released. But environmentalists, timber interests and recreation enthusiasts who have been keenly watching the formulation of the new policy reacted to it Thursday as word filtered out.

Conservationists--who have long criticized the Forest Service as too willing to accommodate the interests of mining and logging companies--were generally pleased, saying the agency was finally heeding the ecological needs of the majestic Sierra range.

The plan "represents a major step forward," said Craig Thomas of the Sierra Nevada Forest Protection Campaign. "It begins the process of protecting and restoring the Sierra Nevada's ecosystems, which have been degraded by decades of logging and road building."

Critics grumbled that the Forest Service was ramming the document through in the final days of the Clinton administration. And the logging industry argued that by limiting timbering so extensively, the guidelines would promote wildfires that would devastate the landscape.

"What is being recommended makes absolutely no sense," said Chris Nance of the California Forestry Assn., which represents the state's timber companies. "There are too many trees in the woods," he said. "Harvesting needs to be a part of the forest health solution and for political reasons the Clinton administration refused to acknowledge that."

A spokesman for U.S. Rep. Wally Herger (R-Chico) said his boss was "extremely concerned" about what he was hearing about the Sierra plan and questioned its timing.

The policy is the product of a tortured process that began in the early 1990s with complaints that the Forest Service was not adequately protecting the habitat of the California spotted owl. As a result, interim curbs were imposed on lumbering on federal land.

In 1996, a management proposal for the Sierra national forests was pulled just before release because it conflicted with the conclusions of a congressionally authorized study of the region. In 1997 the Clinton administration rejected another draft plan, saying it permitted excessive logging.

The latest blueprint has been in the works since June 1998. It was delayed a number of times as the Forest Service continued to revise it, analyzing the plan's impact on wildlife and ecosystems.

"This decision is not being rushed by any means. If anything it's overdue," said Forest Service spokesman Matt Mathes.

Opponents have 90 days to appeal the decision. Like other recent moves by the Clinton administration to expand wild-land protections, the new Sierra policy is sure to get intense scrutiny under the more environmentally conservative Bush administration.

But it will not be easy to undo a plan that went through a long administrative review and numerous hearings and was the subject of tens of thousands of public comments. The decision, which amends national forest management plans in the Sierra Nevada, is accompanied by an environmental impact statement.

"The incoming administration can't just set it aside and invalidate it," said Jay Watson of the Wilderness Society. He added that if members of Congress attempt to undercut the plan, environmentalists "are ready to rumble."

"If anything, I think the balance in Congress has shifted further toward conservation," he said.

The decision will reshape management of land in 11 national forests that cover 40% of the Sierra Nevada range and draw more than 30 million people a year.

Underpinning the policy is not just the Forest Service's increasing emphasis on conservation over timber cutting, but a 1996 study that outlined a number of threats to the Sierra region.

Logging, recreation, water use and population growth have taken their toll on the range. The number of large, old trees has plunged since settlement. Streams have been diverted and dammed. Many types of wildlife have declined.

Environmentalists have petitioned the federal government to add four Sierra species to the threatened or endangered list: the chocolate colored California spotted owl, the Pacific fisher, the mountain yellow-legged frog and the Yosemite toad.

"You have a long legacy of tearing up that landscape and fragmenting it and failing to provide for a whole raft of species," said Barbara Boyle, senior regional representative of the Sierra Club.

Underscoring the shift in Forest Service philosophy, the Sierra document says that timbering will be carried out primarily to reduce the risk of fire, rather than for the sake of lumbering.

In much of the federal woodland, the blueprint reduces the size of tree that can be cut--a step intended to promote old growth ecosystems favored by the owl and some other species. Buffer zones limiting logging around streams also will be increased.

Cutting smaller trees will reduce the fire threat, Mathes said, responding to the timber industry criticism. "Scientists and veteran firefighters alike tell us smaller-diameter trees burn much more readily than larger-diameter trees."

And more intense cutting and thinning will be allowed to reduce the fire hazard on land near development scattered through the national forests.

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