Bureau of Land Management Blamed for Higher Wildfire Risk
9/11/96
*******************************
RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Group blames U.S. agency for higher wildfire risk
9/11/96
Organization: Copyright 1996 by Reuters
WASHINGTON (Reuter) - An environmental group Wednesday accused the U.S.
Bureau of Land Management (BLM) of poor logging practices and increasing
the risk of wildfires.
The BLM used emergency powers approved by Congress last year to cut healthy
trees, while leaving dead and diseased timber in place, a report by the
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) said.
The dead trees, which are more susceptible to fire, were left because they
were less economical to remove, the group of environmentally concerned
public workers said.
The BLM was acting under the so-called "salvage rider," legislation passed
by Congress last year that orders government agencies to boost logging of
salvage timber and suspends environmental laws that might prevent the
logging.
"Not only has BLM's salvage frenzy resulted in timber harvests well above
the sustainable levels..., but it has also boosted the risk from
devastating wildfires," PEER executive director Jeff DeBonis said.
While the salvage rider could not be said to have caused the wildfires that
have swept the Western United States this year, it had certainly
contributed, said DeBonis, a former timber sale planner for the U.S. Forest
Service.
The West has had its worst fire season in 30 years, with about 5.8 million
acres burning so far this year, compared with a five-year annual average of
2.1 million acres.
The PEER report said the some salvage cuts were made in such haste that
wood and underbrush were left onsite, increasing susceptibility to wildfire
even further.
The report also said that the 1996 salvage target for the five state area
of California, Idaho, Montana, Washington and Oregon is more than five
times the sustainable harvest ceilings for those states.
A BLM official declined to comment on the particulars of the report, but
said it would be taken into consideration.
"As with PEER's previous reports, which were highly critical of the bureau,
we don't agree with all of their characterizations. However, they have
raised serious issues and we will take a look at them," the official said.