Unfiltered Commentary

Forest Service’s Public Appeals Process Works for Everyone

By Jeff Juel, Unfiltered 7-09-07

This is about appeals, a controversial process that is often misrepresented as nothing but a delay tactic used by “environmental extremists.” But really, this is more about how everyone gains when the public is allowed to participate in, and stays involved with, the management of our national forests.

Administrative appeals are part of the dialogue between national forest managers and the public, adopted by Congress as a last opportunity to reach consensus about how an area ought to be managed, before a government agency implements a project.

I can’t think of a more instructive case about appeals than the Frenchtown Face project, just west of Missoula. It was proposed by the Lolo National Forest and highly promoted as restoration. And for good reasons-the forested watersheds near Frenchtown were mightily abused, partly from intense logging many years ago when the land was owned by the Anaconda Copper Mining Company.

But other factors led to the lost integrity of the ecosystem, so the list of things the Forest Service proposed to restore included a mine site, roadways that bleed sediment into the streams, and native vegetation under press from noxious weeds. The Forest Service also wanted to restore more natural fire regimes by logging and prescribed burning, which troubled our group since unsustainable logging had caused so much previous damage. Yet until the final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) was published along with the decision, the agency hadn’t fully told the public about what we came to see as the highest restoration priority-the soils.

The previous logging, along with livestock grazing, excessive roads, and all-terrain vehicle use, had compacted so much soil in the Frenchtown Face area that vegetation growth, including trees, was stunted. Compaction also makes the soil vulnerable to noxious weed invasion and erosion. Each of these factors reduces the long-term productivity of the forest.

Peter Lacy wrote in 2001, “Because soils are essential building blocks at the core of nearly every ecosystem on earth, and because soils are critical to the health of so many other natural resources-including, at the broadest level, water, air, and vegetation-they should be protected at a level at least as significant as other natural resources.” Back in 1938 the U.S. Department of Agriculture wrote in its Yearbook: “The social lesson of soil waste is that no man has the right to destroy soilŠ The soil requires a duty of man which we have been slow to recognize.” Ironically, to this day the Forest Service-a branch of the Department of Agriculture-still struggles to adequately assess soil conditions in proposed project areas.

The Frenchtown Face EIS did include plans to restore soils, however to us the plans were not well-grounded in science. But by then the final decision had been made, so the only avenue left for bringing better science to the table was to appeal.

This kind of appeal involves asking a higher level official within the Forest Service to undertake a formal review of the appeal issues. To make a long story short, after we appealed the Lolo Forest Supervisor’s decision, the Forest Service’s Regional Office reversed it, agreeing with us that the soils analysis was inadequate.

Our successful appeal triggered the agency to initiate a scientific study of the soils in Frenchtown Face, one that involved wider perspectives on soils and soil restoration than were contained in the original EIS. What the soil experts mostly recommended was to leave more large pieces of wood on the ground in areas where soils were compacted. This would increase soil moisture and biological activity, allowing natural soil recovery over time.

But putting the wood on the ground would most easily be accomplished-both financially and logistically-by logging operations. For us, it was a leap of faith to accept more logging as a way to restore what unsustainable logging had damaged. All too often these days the position taken by the timber industry and many foresters is that logging vast areas is needed to make forests resemble those which would have developed if fire had not been suppressed, and instead allowed to play its natural, vital role in the ecosystem. To us, this is a topic that needs more public and scientific debate given the uncertainties of how unnatural our forests really are, and what the real causes might be. But for Frenchtown Face, where we believe the highest restoration priority is the soil, we’re willing to forgo those debates for now. And so, we won’t appeal this much-improved project.

At this point, it must be mentioned that this whole dialogue about soil restoration within the appeal process for the Frenchtown Face project had been facilitated by another demonized aspect of environmental activism-litigation. It was our recent successful lawsuit against the Lolo National Forest that led to requirements that scientific soil surveys be completed in areas prior to logging, which then led to the discovery of the soil compaction in Frenchtown Face.

Much has been said recently about the need for environmentalists to broaden their tactics. But make no mistake-the appeals process and litigation are both vital tools that empower the public and agency specialists, and lead to better, more scientifically sound decisions and public policies that serve everyone.

Jeff Juel is Ecosystem Defense Director at WildWest Institute in Missoula.

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