Seeing the Forest Service for the Trees
11/10/97
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Headline: Seeing the Forest Service for the Trees
Source: The Washington Post
Date: 11/10/97
Copyright 1997 The Washington Post Company
The Post's Oct. 26 editorial "Hacking Down the
Forest" inaccurately represents congressional
action on U.S. Forest Service programs. The
recently passed Interior appropriations bill
directs the Forest Service to continue the
timber purchaser road credit program without
change. The authorization of funding for the
program is the same as it was in the past few
years and is far below the $100 million to $200
million that was allowed throughout the 1970s
and 1980s.
The road program is not expanded. Funding
provided in the bill for timber roads is the
exact amount requested by the administration
and is down 20 percent from fiscal year 1997.
In fact, the Interior bill provides that more
miles of roads would be obliterated than would
be constructed.
Under the road credit program, roads designed
by the Forest Service must be built to exacting
environmental standards under agency
supervision by timber purchasers who receive
credit for this work as part of their timber
contracts. Eliminating this program would have
no effect on the number of roads needed to
manage the national forest lands that make up 8
percent of America's land base.
The Post has accepted the opinion that the
national forests continue to be destroyed by
logging. In fact, Forest Service timber harvest
is only a fraction of forest growth and is
considerably less than the amount of timber
that dies each year. The Interior bill provides
for a nationwide Forest Service timber harvest
of 3.8 billion board feet. Again, this is the
amount requested by the administration. This
compares with harvest levels of 10 billion to
12 billion board feet in previous decades.
Of the 144 million acres of forested area, 49
million acres are potentially available for
timber activities. The Forest Service has a
forest-health problem that includes at least 39
million acres of overstocked forest stands that
are highly susceptible to catastrophic
wildfire. It is critical that some form of
harvest be available for lands such as these to
ensure enhanced forest health and to reduce the
potential for wildfires.
The Interior bill is a strong, pro-environment
bill. For instance, within the Forest Service
budget, Congress has increased funds
substantially above the levels requested by the
administration for recreation, wildlife and
fish habitat, watershed improvements, range and
forest vegetation improvements, scientific
research and hazardous fuels treatments. The
bill directs the Forest Service to use 10
percent of its receipts to repair eroding roads
and trails, thereby providing about $30 million
per year for environmental improvements. The
bill also doubles the amount that can be spent
to decommission roads no longer needed.
We in Congress look forward to working with the
administration and others to enhance management
of the nation's public forest lands. Inaccurate
editorials do not further the cause of
achieving a balanced policy that benefits the
American taxpayers and protects these special
public lands that are so important to the
nation's recreation and natural resource needs.
RALPH REGULA
Washington
The writer, a Republican representative from
Ohio, is chairman of the House appropriations
subcommittee on interior and related agencies.