The 2019 Forest Service NEPA Changes: An Assault on Citizen Rights and Government Accountability. Take Action!
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The Forest Service's new proposed rule for how it implements its projects and Long Range Management Plans is the the latest in a long series of rollbacks against citizen rights and oversight. We have until August 26 to make public comment, engage elected officials and the media, and empower citizens to speak out on their hard-earned right to have a voice in the future of their 188 million acres of National Forest lands. Here's how to get involved.
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The Proposed RuleThe text of the Forest Service's Rule and their rationale for bringing an end to most public involvement and oversight.
Citizens Making a Difference
Find out how "everyday people" have done much to protect our forests over the years. |
Rally for Our Rights at the Forest Service's Southern Region Headquarters!Citizen grassroots advocacy of National Forests has a rich history that is the essence of democracy in action. Learn about citizen science and on the ground work provides important oversight of the public trust, and how citizen rights have steadily eroded in recent years.
Why This Matters
Citizen grassroots advocacy of National Forests has a rich history that is the essence of democracy in action. Learn about citizen science and on the ground work provides important oversight of the public trust, and how citizen rights have steadily eroded in recent years |
Get Talking Below is a short summery of the rule and some possible talking points. It is important that public comments be unique. The Forest Service is getting away with classifying petition signatures and postcards as a single comment. It is now trying to get away with using software to detect similarities between letters so they can be also lumped in as a single comment. While our talking points are certainly important, explore this site some to help personalize what you have to say. The "Why This Matters" page has a lot of great information and personal stories. Click on the link below to get your voice heard.
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Summary of the Rule and Some Talking Points
Public Involvement rights on our National Forests have been eroding for some time. However, the new changes in proposed by the Forest Service are radical and will end most of the public voice. Here is a summary of what's about to happen. Thanks to the Southern Environmental Law Center for providing much of this analysis.
The Forest Service proposal would cut the public out of:
The logging loophole created by this proposal is so big that every single timber sale in the Southern Appalachians would fit through it—meaning no more public input or science-based analysis. To give a sense of scale, 4,200 acres of harvest would cover, in a single decision:
Furthermore, many forest districts in the Eastern United States are highly fragmented and lack the large parcels that are typical of the West, to the degree that the acreage of this scale covers the size of any single contiguous parcel of land found on a number of districts, such as the Holly Springs or Tombigbee.
This also has the potential to have a huge effect on both the economic health of our National Forest system. For decades, the Forest Service had acknowledged billions of dollars of backlog in its enormous road system. The Roads Rule of 2000 was designed to reduce road volumes, which would reduce budgetary problems and the ecological effects of poorly maintained roads. The agency seems now to be reversing course on their policy of needing to reduce road volumes and now imply that they need more. The RR was meant to reform its thousands of miles of road backlog, reduce the obvious harmful effects of road volumes, and reduce the sheer budget crisis that came from being unable to maintain such a large system. In the interests of saving taxpayer dollars alone, this needs to be addressed. Economics of National Forest management is an underrated issue.
Not only would these decisions be made without public input; they would also be made without environmental review and without considering whether there are less harmful ways to meet the same needs.
The Forest Service proposal would cut the public out of:
- Commercially logging up to 4,200 acres (6.6 square miles!) at a time;
- Building up to 5 new miles of roads at a time;
- Adding illegally created roads and trails to the official roads and trails systems;
- Closing roads used by the public to access hunting areas, streams for fishing, and trails;
- Bulldozing new pipeline or utility rights of way up to 20 acres (e.g., 4 miles at 40’ across)
The logging loophole created by this proposal is so big that every single timber sale in the Southern Appalachians would fit through it—meaning no more public input or science-based analysis. To give a sense of scale, 4,200 acres of harvest would cover, in a single decision:
- 5 years’ worth of commercial logging at current levels on the Nantahala-Pisgah National Forest;
- Almost 3 years’ worth of commercial logging at current levels on the Chattahoochee National Forest;
- Over 2 years’ worth of commercial logging on the George Washington National Forest, even at maximum production levels;
Furthermore, many forest districts in the Eastern United States are highly fragmented and lack the large parcels that are typical of the West, to the degree that the acreage of this scale covers the size of any single contiguous parcel of land found on a number of districts, such as the Holly Springs or Tombigbee.
This also has the potential to have a huge effect on both the economic health of our National Forest system. For decades, the Forest Service had acknowledged billions of dollars of backlog in its enormous road system. The Roads Rule of 2000 was designed to reduce road volumes, which would reduce budgetary problems and the ecological effects of poorly maintained roads. The agency seems now to be reversing course on their policy of needing to reduce road volumes and now imply that they need more. The RR was meant to reform its thousands of miles of road backlog, reduce the obvious harmful effects of road volumes, and reduce the sheer budget crisis that came from being unable to maintain such a large system. In the interests of saving taxpayer dollars alone, this needs to be addressed. Economics of National Forest management is an underrated issue.
Not only would these decisions be made without public input; they would also be made without environmental review and without considering whether there are less harmful ways to meet the same needs.
The Three R's: Resilience, Restoration, Regeneration- A quick guide to Agency Newspeak by TN Heartwood
Since the passage of the Healty Forests Restoration Act of 2003, the Forest Service has shifted its rationale for its timber program away from pure dollars to a kind of ecological justification. Increasingly, agency projects, plans, and its governing policies are couched in the "Three R's": "resilience", "restoration", and "regeneration". These terms have done much to mollify a public that increasingly were opposing the ecological and economic losses happening to National Forests. Let's take a look at how these terms are being misused to "greenwash" bad forest policies in ways that are causing long-term damage to our National Forests.... |
Digging Deeper: What the Forest Service Is Arguing
The Southern Environmental Law Center has an excellent analysis of the long-term implications of this new rule, withh some discomforting facts and had figures, particularly in how it will affect the Southern Region... |