ACTION
ALERT
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WORLDWIDE
FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS
Clinton
Moves to Protect 40 Million Acres of Forest
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Forest
Networking a Project of forests.org
http://forests.org/ -- Forest Conservation Archives
http://forests.org/web/ -- Discuss Forest
Conservation
10/13/99
OVERVIEW
& COMMENTARY
Today
is the day President Clinton is set to announce a massive
forest
conservation initiative with major implications for future
American
forest health, biodiversity, and ecosystem functionality.
Despite
press coverage of the impending announcement, it has not yet
actually
been made. I appeal to you to email
and/or call the White
House
comment line today as you receive this message and request
that:
1) the Tongass National Forest, as the largest roadless area,
be
included in the announcement and not left to a later
determination;
and 2) that the Forest Protection Initiative include
strict
restrictions on permitted land uses in the protected roadless
areas. Please email President Clinton at
president@whitehouse.gov,
and/or
call the White House comment line at (202) 456-1111, and
request
politely that the policy announcement proceed with the above
clarifications.
Additionally,
you may want to note that objections by industry and
Western
politicians are based on narrow economic self-interests, and
fly in
the face of scientific knowledge regarding forest
sustainability. The U.S. can deal with the consequences of
protecting
forests while some remain in large, natural expanses; or
after
it all is logged. Either way, the
timber industry will
downsize--the
only question is whether there are large forests left
when it
does.
g.b.
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RELAYED
TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Clinton Moves to Protect 40 Million Acres
of Forest
Source: Associated Press
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for
permission to reprint
Date: October 12, 1999
WASHINGTON
(AP) -- Seeking to leave a lasting environmental legacy,
President
Clinton will designate as much as two-thirds of America's
remaining
road-free federal forests as permanently off-limits to
logging,
mining and other development.
The
plan, already under attack from Western Republican lawmakers, is
expected
to be crafted in a way to make it difficult for a future
president
to reverse, sources who have followed the issue said
Tuesday.
Clinton
was to travel to the George Washington National Forest in
Virginia
on Wednesday to announce the executive order, which will
direct
development of a regulation to protect as much as 40 million
acres
of government-owned forest, most of it in the Western states.
Currently
only about 18 percent of the 192 million acres of federal
forest
is protected as wilderness. About 60 million acres are without
roads,
or sign of commercial or -- in many cases -- even recreational
activity.
Clinton's directive was expected to cover isolated
forest
areas of 5,000 acres or more. White House press secretary Joe
Lockhart
declined to provide any details, saying "some of the larger
issues"
of the proposal were still being worked out. Other government
sources
said the general plan has been in place for weeks.
The
forest initiative is hoped by administration officials to provide
Clinton
a permanent environmental legacy, a yardstick upon which his
presidency's
conservation and environmental record will be measured.
Earlier
this year, Clinton proposed a $1 billion "land legacy"
initiative
to purchase open spaces, but that program has been largely
thwarted
by Republicans in Congress, who refused to fund it.
The
forest protection plan would require no congressional action,
relying
on regulations to be issued by the U.S. Forest Service after
a
detailed environmental review and public comments, said government
sources,
speaking on condition of not being further identified.
"It
would be one of the most significant land conservation actions by
the
United States government in its history," said Richard Hoppe, a
spokesman
for the Heritage Forests Campaign, a coalition of
conservation
groups that has waged a campaign to protect roadless
forest
areas.
"It's
certainly on par with creating the national park system or with
setting
aside the public lands in Alaska," he said.
But the
action brought a sharp rebuke, even before it was formally
announced,
from some Western Republican members of Congress and from
the
logging industry.
"The
president's trying to be Teddy Roosevelt," snapped Rep. Bob
Goodlatte,
R-Virginia, in whose district Clinton will make his
announcement.
He accused Clinton of playing to voters at the expense
of
preserving healthy forests.
Sen.
Larry Craig, R-Idaho, accused Clinton of "acting outside the
law"
and pressing "an agenda against public use" that is contrary to
Congress'
intended policy of multiple use of federal lands. "It's an
anti-environmental
policy," said Craig, arguing that forest health
will be
harmed without access.
Henson
Moore, president of the American Forest and Paper Association,
complained
that Clinton's action would arbitrarily create millions of
acres
of new wilderness areas by "walling off" forests from
commercial
or recreational uses.
"It's
very extremist," said Moore.
Specific
forest areas to be covered by the regulatory change could
not be
learned Tuesday. Areas earmarked for protection probably will
spread
from the southern Appalachians to the Chugach National Forest
in
Alaska. Most roadless national forests are in the West.
Conservation
groups have pressed for years to block future
construction
of roads in road-free forests, arguing the roads will
only
lead to logging, mining and other commercial development of the
pristine
forest areas.
"These
are the last uncorrupted enclaves of biological diversity,
watershed
protection, scenic splendor, recreational opportunity and
spiritual
solace we have left" in the federal forests, more than 40
foresters
and biologists wrote Clinton this year, urging him to act
to
protect roadless forest areas.
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TEXT ENDS###
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