Strengthen Intent of U.S. Roadless Initiative

ACTION ALERT

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WORLDWIDE FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS

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Forest Networking a Project of Forests.org

http://forests.org/ -- Forest Conservation Archives

http://forests.org/web/ -- Discuss Forest Conservation

11/14/99

OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY

The Clinton administration proposal to protect remaining roadless

wildlands is still being developed. The ecological impact of the

announcement will be determined by the details. It must cover ALL

National Forests, and it must include protections that stop logging,

mining and other exploitation. Below is an action alert stressing the

importance of including the Tongass National Forest, and materials

from the Forest Service regarding their scoping analysis. They

request feedback on the scoping analysis, the alternatives, and

whether the Tongass should be included. Please take the time to

remain engaged with this important process, to make sure the hype is

matched by maximum biological impact.

g.b.

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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:

ITEM #1

Title: Alaska's Tongass National Forest urgently needs your help!

Source: Alaska Rainforest Campaign, Corrie Bosman,

cbosman@akrain.org

Date: November 11, 1999

Alaska's Tongass National Forest urgently needs your help! The Clinton

Administration may decide to exclude the Tongass -- our largest

national forest -- from his recently-announced proposal that would

protect the remaining roadless wildlands of all other national

forests.

The Tongass is the heart of the world's largest remaining expanse of

coastal temperate rainforest. Today, even with new management in

place, most Tongass logging will still take place in unroaded, old-

growth rainforest, and efforts to increase cut levels are underway.

The proposal to protect these roadless wildlands is a great idea -- as

long as it does two things: One, it must cover ALL National Forests,

INCLUDING the Tongass, and two, the protections must stop logging,

mining and other exploitation. A watered down version of the proposal

would only stop new roads. Helicopter logging and other damaging

activities that don't require roads could be permitted.

President Clinton's proposal to protect roadless areas leaves the fate

of the Tongass open for now. Whether he decides to include the Tongass

depends on the amount of public support expressed during the official

Forest Service comment period now underway. Send an official comment

saying that you want the Forest Service to stop logging and other

harmful development in ALL national forest wildlands -INCLUDING the

Tongass.

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Comments can be submitted to: USDA Forest Service-CAET, Attn: Roadless

Areas NOI, PO Box 221090, Salt Lake City, UT 84122 or mail to

:roadless/wo_caet-slc@fs.fed.us Fax: 801-517-1021

or send your comments directly from www.akrain.org

SAMPLE LETTER

SCOPING COMMENTS

Attention: Roadless Areas Notice of Intent

I urge you to consider the following points in formulating your policy

to protect America's pristine roadless wildlands on national forests:

Both the new moratorium and the final policy to protect unroaded

wildlands must apply to ALL National Forests, INCLUDING Alaska's

Tongass and Chugach National Forests. The Tongass National Forest is

the heart of the last great expanse of old-growth rainforest in the

United States. It was exempted from your 18-month road moratorium,

leaving two million acres of pristine roadless wildlands open to

logging and other development.

Both the new moratorium and the final policy must permanently protect

roadless wildlands -- especially the Tongass -- from logging, mining

and other exploitation.

There is no scientific basis to exclude roadless areas of the Tongass

National Forest from the proposed protections. Excluding the Tongass

would severely compromise the scientific legitimacy of any national

policy on the protection of roadless areas in our national forest

system.

ITEM #2

Title: Roadless meetings scheduled

Source: Tom Haswell (wthaswell@proaxis.com) via WALL list server

Date: November 11, 1999

Public meetings on the roadless EIS notice of intent (scoping notice)

are on the following web page:

http://www.eswr.com/fs11109b.txt

The EIS notice of intent is at the following page:

http://www.eswr.com/fs10199.txt

The notice requests feedback on the scoping analysis, the alternatives

proposed, and whether the Tongass should be included. Comments are

due by December 20. In the spring the draft EIS will be issued with

further public meetings and comment opportunity. The abstracted

portion below gives the alternatives.

The corrected e-mail address for comments is on the FS web page (the

e-mail address in the Federal Register is inoperative) and in an

updated Federal Register notice:

http://www.eswr.com/fs11109a.txt

addresses: Send written comments to the USDA Forest Service-CAET,

Attention: Roadless Areas NOI

P.O. Box 221090

Salt Lake City, Utah 84122

All comments will be part of the public record.

Please take a couple of minutes to read the alternatives and draft a

short letter and mail it to the e-mail address given above. I have

attached my letter which you are welcome to edit.

Notices compliments of Forest Service in the News:

http://www.afseee.org/fsnews/whatsnew.html

Tom Haswell

541-757-7608

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Abstracted from the Federal Register Notice:

The notice requests feedback on the scoping analysis, the

alternatives, and whether the Tongass should be included.

The FS proposes a two part rule. Part one would immediately restrict

certain activities (e.g. road construction) in unroaded portions of

inventoried roadless areas previously identified in RARE II and

existing forest plan inventories. The possible alternatives to be

covered in the draft EIS may include the following ones relative to

part one:

1. Prohibiting new road construction and reconstruction projects in

the remaining unroaded portions of inventoried roadless areas.

2. Prohibiting new road construction and reconstruction projects and

commercial timber harvest in the remaining unroaded portions of

inventoried roadless areas.

3. Prohibiting the implementation of all activities, subject to valid

existing rights, that do not contribute to maintaining or enhancing

the ecological values of roadless areas in remaining unroaded portions

of inventoried roadless areas.

4. Making no change in current policy (No action alternative).

Part two establishes national direction for managing inventoried

roadless areas and whether and to what extent similar protections

should be extended to uninventoried roadless areas. This portion

would be implemented through the local forest plan and NEPA process.

This national direction may include these alternatives:

1. National procedures and criteria that address how land managers at

the forest plan level should manage activities, other than those

addressed in part one, in inventoried roadless areas.

2. National procedures and criteria that address how land managers at

the forest plan level should manage uninventoried roadless areas so as

to protect their unroaded characteristics and benefits.

Possible alternatives include these:

a. Protecting unroaded areas based on their ecological

characteristics b. Protecting existing unroaded National Forest

System lands that are at least 1000 acres in size and continuous to

unroaded areas of 5000 acres of more on all Federal lands

c. Protecting existing unroaded areas of at least 1000 acres.

3. No change in current policy (No action alternative).

Alternatives may consider exemptions under specific situations. The

Northwest Forest Plan was an exemption before (under the temporary

moratorium) but is not mentioned as an example here. The Tongass is

mentioned as a possible exemption because of the recent revision to

the forest management plan. Comments are requested as to whether the

Tongass should be covered under part one or only under part two.

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Letter sent:

Generally, this is a welcome step and is long overdue. Now that we

are doing it however, let's do it right and provide a legacy for

future generations that leaves them with choices and truly is the best

we can do:

For Part One, I strongly support the most restrictive alternative -

prohibiting all activities in all remaining inventoried roadless areas

that do not contribute to maintaining or improving the ecological

values in those areas. The ecological values MUST be defined,

however, as those conditions pre-settlement. Some people would see

"ecological value" in a clear cut, which I feel is totally

inappropriate for these areas!

Part two should be made more restrictive and prescriptive as follows:

1. The protections just mentioned above in this letter should be

extended to all unroaded areas greater than 1000 acres. This

restriction should not be subject to local manager discretion.

3. Local managers should be required to decommission roads built in

the 1980's and 1990's that fragmented RARE II roadless areas in order

to restore these areas to their unroaded condition.

The Tongass should be included under Part One and Part Two as any

other lands. The Northwest Forest Plan region should also be included

without exception; and without consideration of matrix lands and the

possible loss of timber harvest from those lands.

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