Forest Committee News - February 2004

Most of you probably know that in December President Bush signed into law the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003 (HR 1904). Like the Orwellian newspeak rhetoric offered by his Clear Skies Initiative, which relaxes pollution standards for air quality, this legislation leaves homes and communities vulnerable to wild-fire, severely limits public participation, and does not protect old-growth forests or roadless wildlands. Be sure to thank Senator Maria Cantwell at your next opportunity for her vote against this devastating legislation.

The Bush administration has been actively waging war on our public lands on many fronts. The Forest Service responded to pressure from the administration to increase commercial logging by finalizing plans for two large commercial timber sales on the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest.

While the Sky Forks Thin and Forgotten Thin Plus sales have been in various stages of planning for many years, the Forest Service only recently issued Environmental Assessments (EAs) for them. PAS’ Forest Committee made several visits to the planning areas for these thins, wrote extensive comments, and ultimately joined with other groups—the Snohomish County group of the Sierra Club, Alpine Lakes Protection Society (ALPS), and the North Cascades Conservation Coalition—to appeal the sales.

We eventually reached a settlement agreement with the Forest Service on the Sky Forks Thin. We dropped our appeal since they agreed to remove the most egregious part of the proposal, which would have logged lands adjacent to a roadless area.

We have met with Forest Service officials regarding the Forgotten Thin Plus timber sale, and are waiting to hear from them regarding any possible concessions they might make on this sale. Located in the Falls Creek drainage near Darrington, this sale involves the reconstruction/new construction of 6.5 miles of road, with logging of 10.5 million board feet of timber. Keep in mind this exceeds the 7 million board feet annual Probable Sale Quantity (PSQ) for the entire Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. As part of this sale, the FS proposes to thin 26 acres of riparian reserve, the stream buffers that the agency is always telling the media are “off limits” to logging. The area contains some beautiful, large old trees, and provides excellent marbled murrelet and northern spotted owl habitat, as well as bald eagle roosting and feeding habitat.

We are very grateful to several special donors for their monetary assistance in hiring environmental attorney Susan Jane Brown to assist with our appeals.

If you would like to learn more or become involved in monitoring your local public forests, please call Kathy Johnson, 360.659.7252 or attend a Conservation Committee meeting on the third Tuesday of the month at 6:30 in the PAS office.