Collaboration in Tester’s bill has predictable outcome
By George Wuerthner, 6-17-10
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| Senator Tester's legislation would mandate even more logging on the already heavily logged Kootenai National Forest. | |
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Collaboration vs Negotiation 6-16-2010
Polite conservationists leave no mark upon the Earth except scars that could have been prevented had they stood their ground.
David Brower
There is a real difference between negotiation and collaboration. In negotication one tries to get the best deal for one’s position or goal. In collaboration, those participating generally adopt the least controversial and least disruptive policies. In collboration all points of views are considered to be equally valid. But that is not the case in conservation. The goal of the timber industry to expand profits is not necessarily in the public interest, and/or have the same value as fighting to prevent the extinction of a grizzly or loss of a wild roadless land to development. When dealing with public resources, collaboration almost always means private industry gets to keep or increase access to public resources. And that is exactly what we have seen as the outcome of the collaborative process that has led to Senator Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation bill.
Collaboration is not a level playing field. Membership in such cooperative committees always includes individuals with a direct financial conflict of interest and those who have already indicated that they are willing to compromise away public resources for a positive outcome. Such collaborative processes are corrupting, not only to those who have a direct financial stake in the outcome, but also any other members of the collaborative group. We can see this corruption in the “collaborative” process that created the legislation being promoted by Senator Tester. Well-meaning and dedicated environmental groups participated in this collaboration adopted a bill that has a direct financial benefit to private businesses interests, degrades public forests, and compromises/ and restricts public participation in the management of public forests.
I do not want to imply that those who supported this legislation are unethical or had malicious intent. Rather they are caught up in a process that had a predictable outcome.
The corrupting effect was even more apparent in the past few weeks when it was revealed that a discussion draft conference committee revision of Senator Jon Testers’ Forest Jobs and Recreation bill provided better protection for Montana’s forest lands.
The draft legislation eliminates many of the worse aspects of Senator Tester’s bill including a mandated logging of 10,000 acres a year. The draft proposal would provide greater protection to old growth and large trees, eliminated a shortened time frame for NEPA documentation, as well as things that are in direct conflict with the Wilderness Act like allowing ranchers to use motorized access in the proposed Snowcrest Wilderness and helicopter landings in the Highlands proposed wilderness. What pro- wilderness and public interest group would not support such changes?
Well, the answer is abundantly clear—not the MWA, TU or NWF. In newspaper articles across the state, these organizations said they wanted mandated logging of Montana’s forests, and they would not support a bill that did not include the timber giveaways and subsidies to the timber industry. Is this what one expects from organizations that profess to work in the public interest and for wildlands?
Hearing these organizations continued misguided support for logging and taxpayer subsidies for a few private corporations, I can’t help but think that they are suffering from the Stockholm syndrome. Like Patty Hearst, these environmental organizations have been captured by their former foes.
Such an outcome is not an uncommon result of “collaborative” efforts. A good example of this corruption of the public interest to benefit private industry is the Quincy Library Group in California. Here local environmental activists joined with timber industry to craft a plan that called for logging up to 60,000 acres of the Plumas National Forest annually in exchange for protection of some old growth trees and small roadless areas. Like the Tester legislation, the Quincy proposal was hailed as an example of how collaboration had achieved a resolution to a long-standing stalemate.
However, other environmentalists, including the Wilderness Society, Sierra Nevada Forest Protection Campaign, and Sierra Club among others did not support more logging on the Plumas NF and they railed against the Quincy Library Group proposal. Environmental members of the Quincy group soon joined the timber industry in denouncing the anti-corporate giveaway activists.
We don’t know whether Senator Tester’s bill will pass Congress, or whether the logging mandates will remain. One thing is certain, had the environmental organizations involved used negotiation rather than collaboration they might have received more support from many hard core wilderness supporters, and perhaps even some grudging respect from the timber industry as well without jeopardizing their ability to further wilderness protection in Montana. Because they have adopted the timber industry’s position and propaganda, these groups feel compelled to support Tester’s logging legislation or risk their credibility with the timber industry. I think, given the circumstances, these are legitimate concerns, however one of their own making.
What happens in collaborative efforts is that everyone has a stake in declaring victory—to make attending all those meetings worthwhile—so one is willing to accept the lowest common denominator. So they are reluctant to walk away from an agreement—and we see this with Tester’s legislation.
What these groups failed to understand is that one doesn’t have to give up one’s core values to negotiate with other interest groups. A good example of this is the Oregon Natural Desert Association (ONDA) who obtained protective legislation for Steens Mountain in eastern Oregon.
When the proposal to create a Steens Mountain National Monument in eastern Oregon was being negotiated by Oregon Natural Desert Association, there was a lot of discussion between ranchers, county commissioners, and ONDA. ONDA was working with Greg Walden, a conservative Republican Congressman who had no love for wilderness. How did they get wilderness with a Republican especially when ONDA has always opposed grazing on public lands?
First, ONDA remained very up front that their goal was to end grazing--and they were not afraid to tell the ranchers, the Congressman, or anyone else that if they had an opportunity to eliminate grazing, they would go for it. Indeed, one of the things they negotiated successfully in the Steen Mountain legislation was the first legislated cow-free wilderness. Since they were clear in expressing that their chief goal was to protect wilderness and eliminate grazing, no one, including the local ranchers had any misgivings about their motives.
The ranchers went into the negotiations with their eyes wide open. They knew where ONDA stood on matters. They did not think ONDA lied or deceived them when they continue to lobby to remove cows from public lands, not only on Steens, but also throughout Eastern Oregon.
However, ONDA’s goal of livestock removal didn’t keep them from working with the ranchers either. By negotiation ranchers got some things they wanted too. They were able to consolidate their private lands by land exchanges with the BLM. Some received permit buyouts, and left the business altogether, but with a golden parachute. With these negotiations, the ranchers had some control over where wilderness designations occurred.
ONDA never let the fact that they were negotiating with the ranchers keep them from continuing to file law suits to thwart grazing, While the ranchers involved understood this because ONDA was very clear from the beginning that they were always opposed to grazing on public lands.
Furthermore, by keeping pressure up on ranching interests through appeals, law suits and other measures, ONDA created an environment where ranchers felt it was in their best interests to negotiate. This is a lesson that MWA, TU, and NWF appear to misunderstand. Without the legal appeals and law suits from groups like the Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Center for Biodiversity, and others, the timber industry would have no interest in collaborating at all.
So for the purposes of Steens Mountain legislation, both parties worked to get legislation that was mutually beneficial. However, negotiation did not mean ONDA had to become a ranching industry advocate.
ONDA never diluted their message. They continued to educate the public about the damage done by livestock grazing to the public lands and wildlife. They never compromised their message to appease the ranchers they were working with to garner legislation. You won’t hear ONDA suggesting that a economically marginal industry like ranching is critical to the economies of rural Oregon like MWA, TU, and NWF misinformed claims about the economic role of a dying timber industry in Montana. You won’t hear ONDA parroting the livestock industry propaganda that grazing will reduce fires or improve the health of rangelands like the MWA, TU and NWF have asserted that logging will do for forests in Montana.
In the case of the Steens Mountain legislation, ONDA and the ranchers were being practical. ONDA worked with the ranchers because it furthered their goal of getting a cow free wilderness as well as other things like wild and scenic river designation, a mineral withdrawal and other conservation benefits.
Since the Steens legislation, ONDA has negotiated with ranchers in the eastern Republican House District for two more cow-free BLM wilderness areas. In fact, they have yet another bill introduced into Congress this session that will establish two more new wildernesses. They have done this without compromising their position on livestock grazing on public lands.
Had the MWA, NWF, and TU clearly stated from the beginning that their goal was to garner the best outcome for Montana’s public forests (as opposed to the best outcome for private industry) they would not now have to feel like they were betraying their partners if they openly supported this draft bill and/or any other legislation that may come out of the legislative process that eliminated the mandated logging quota and other subsidies to the timber industry.
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Comments
When I lived in Montana, over 20 years ago, I was active in MWA. Because of this disgusting, ill-advised, and totally unprincipled sellout, this total compromise of the organization's core principles, if I was still involved with MWA, I would have no choice but to bail out of the organization. It's sold its soul.
R.I.P., MWA
How strange... how queer... how utterly mindboggling, to see a set of purportedly serious environmental organizations arguing with what one can only hope is simulated passion, for impossibly outsized timber harvests; to see them all hanging tough for abrogating established Forest Service policy and protective environmental laws; to have them doing baldfaced cheerleading to get out the cut to profit a tiny handful of economically and socially insignificant, non-competitive mills.
Oh, what a tangled web we weave...
I completely agree with your assessment of the dynamics and pitfalls of collaboration. I would take issue, though, with the free ride you give ONDA regarding the Steens. They should indeed be given credit for not having dissembled on their anti-grazing stance. But the Steens deal was the springboard for many of the quid pro quo land deals that have been proposed or completed elsewhere in the past 10 years, and because of the lopsided land exchanges that formed the quid, the continuing, willful devaluing of public lands by environmental groups can be traced to that legislation.
Restoration is the key but, preservationists do not want that. I think it is time to listen to the scientists, instead of the eco-diletantes. In my 20+ years of experience, I've spent most of it salvaging bug trees and wildfires, and have seen the intensive, accelerated damages caused by catastrophic wildfires. The impacts go far beyond what you may have considered. Alas, Obama's Katrina plows onward, through our public forests and private lands, as well.
ONDA also had the big bad elephant of Bruce Babbitt and the Antiquities Act sitting at the table.
Never mind that the subsituted grazing and the buyouts of rights were an outright "giveaway" to ONDA. They could never have raised the funds to buy off the ranchers themselves, so they blackmailed Walden, Congress and the US taxpayer to do it.
But unless you believe that virtually any logging on public land is something all conservationists should oppose, regardless of the results on the ground, then George's conclusions will lead us in the wrong direction.
The strategy that George describes as negotiating, seems to depend on conservationists pushing an agenda promoting wilderness while opposing even modest logging. The flaw in this approach seems pretty obvious - it may appeal to a minority of conservationists, but there is extremely limited public support for this agenda. The likelihood that this approach is going to achieve positive results on the ground is very low.
The logic behind the approach George defines as collaboration, is that when conservationists can find allies whose goals overlap our own, we can form powerful coalitions and get things accomplished that would be impossible otherwise. Of course the outcome is not desirable if it requires we violate our own core goals. So for anyone who considers it a core conservation goal to always oppose the goals of the timber industry, then the Tester bill is a sellout, as some people believe.
For conservationists who relish the prospect of protecting 670,000 acres of wilderness, and who do not categorically oppose modest logging projects on public lands, collaboration is not necessarily a bad thing. This is especially true if, as in the Tester bill, the forest projects will result in lower road densities, stream restoration projects and other resource benefits.
For more information, see “Conservationists Support the Forest Jobs and Recreation Act” on the MWA webpage. See especially a “Comparison of Passing FJRA with Keeping the Status Quo”. This is an eye opening chart, highly recommended for anyone interested in a clear factual analysis, and tired of wading through generalities about why the bill is good or bad.
I am a long time conservationist who is proud to serve on the MWA Council. It is clear to me that if protecting wilderness is an important goal, then we are on the right track.
The so-called environmental groups (MWA, TU, etc.) that have bought into this recipe for disaster and degradation have no business referring to themselves as Conservationists or Wilderness advocates.
Yes, Tester's Bill is flawed, perhaps fatally so but, the costs of inaction far outweigh the costs of forest restoration to more natural and resilient ecosystems. Tester has correctly seen this situation to be a disaster and was compelled to act for his constituents and his forests. We cannot expect Tester to be a forest expert but, we also cannot trust the not-so-hidden agenda of people who villainize restoration forestry. Tester's Bill won't pass unless it meets the Democratic partylines. Even eastern Republicans won't vote for it, as they don't want to be tagged as in favor of "wilderness logging". Even if it does pass, with the potential for logging (but not mandated), lawsuits will probably be successful to stop any project, while new wilderness areas are implemented.
The preservationists simply do not want restoration. They want untouchable wilderness with no traces of human impacts. At ANY cost! Collaboration marginalizes their positions and the courts, as ignorant of science as they are, will be the last, best hopes for preservationists to assure damaging firestorms, massive GHG emissions and environmental damage that dwarfs the Gulf oil disaster. 17 million acres of dead forests amounts to 26.5 thousand square miles, to put things in perspective. All of it ready to burn to bare mineral soil, baked into a hydrophobic and infertile soil that cannot support historical levels of old growth forest anymore. Not to mention all of the still-green forests that burn, or are exposed to radically-elevated bark beetles blowing in from impacted areas.
I guess, what we need, is a HUGE tragedy of lost towns and dead people to get the changes we need in restoring forests and their ecosystems. That seemed to work when "Healthy Forests" was passed in 2003. Congress kinda has to act, in those situations. (Remember, too, that Democrats rewrote important sections of HFRA, and voted for it too!... 19 Senate Dems crossed partylines to vote for it.)
Fact is, the ENR Committee's draft would protect 670,000 acres in Montana as Wilderness. Let's be honest about that fact. So perhaps you should have said above, "For conservationists who relish the prospect of protecting 670,000 acres of wilderness, the ENR Committee's draft is a great step in the right direction because the Committee's draft doesn't undermine Wilderness by allowing military helicopters to land in Wilderness or ranchers to ride their ATV's in Wilderness, as Senator Tester's draft allows."
By any objective measure, when it comes to Wilderness, the ENR Committee draft is better. Not only for Wilderness in Montana, but for helping to maintain the integrity of our America's entire Wilderness system.
And let's be honest here about the logging mandates in Tester's bill Doug. Remember, the ENR Committee's draft dropped the controversial mandated logging provisions – which the Forest Service called unachievable, unsustainable and not reasonable – Senator Tester's new draft, unfortunately, re-inserts the logging mandates.
The issue is not, as you claimed about those "who do not categorically oppose modest logging projects on public land." The issue is that Senator Tester's bill would, for the first time ever, mandate logging on a national forest. You folks can claim it's no big deal, but honestly many of you don't work on timber sale issues and besides, you think that these folks below might have some legal and policy expertise?
Harris Sherman, Under Secretary of Natural Resources and Environment, in official testimony before the US Senate's Energy and Natural Resources Committee:
"The levels of mechanical treatment that are called for in S1470 are likely unachievable and perhaps unsustainable...If the Committee decides to go forward with a bill, we would urge you to first, alter or remove the highly specific timber supply requirements, which in our view are not reasonable or achievable."
The Wilderness Society, an official supporter of the FJRA, had this to say specifically regarding the logging mandates in their official testimony submitted to the US Senate's Energy and Natural Resources
Committee:
"We oppose Congressionally mandated treatment levels in the bill because they, a) neglect the root causes of the problems this bill is intended to address, b) set an adverse national precedent, c) create unreasonably high expectations, d) fail to provide the agency the resources it needs to do its job, and e) most important, we do not believe this approach will work on the ground."
The truth of the matter is that for a decade many of the fifty plus conservation organizations that are a part of our Last Best Place Wildlands Campaign has been working the Forest Service, communities, elected officials and workers on bona-fide restoration or fuel reduction projects. You folks have totally not been honest about that fact.
So too, you all have been less than honest about the amount of positive work moving forward on national forests in Montana. The Forest Service in our region finished last year with more timber volume under contract than at any point in the past decade. According to the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest supervisor, they too sold more timber last year (over 30 million board feet) than at any point in a decade. Quite literally tens of thousands of acres of fuel reduction and logging work is already approved by the Forest Service (or will be shortly). The same is true of watershed and road restoration projects. Literally there is a backlog of nearly $100 million worth of work in MT and N. ID. Maybe Congress should have been properly funding this watershed and road restoration work as groups like ours have advocated for for nearly 15 years now.
Obviously, with the huge economic crisis we're in – a crisis based on over-consumption and over-development – demand for lumber is still about 50% what it was a few years ago and lumber prices are still near historic lows. So there's not really a whole bunch of demand for timber right now. So do we really need politicians stepping in and mandating logging? What's next? Gulf Coast politicians stepping in to mandate deep water drilling in the Gulf? Or Appalachian politicians mandating mountain top removal coal mining in that region?
Based on the ENR Committee's draft, it seems pretty clear that the Committee and Chairman Bingaman will not allow this bill out of Committee if it includes logging mandates. So it seems as if right now Wilderness designation for 660,000 acres of Montana's wildlands is being held captive by the timber industry and Senator Tester's insistence on the U.S. Congress mandating logging, which would be an unprecedented and unwise step.
Besides, let's be honest also about the fact that the ENR Committee's draft would also establish a "National Forest Jobs and Restoration Initiative" that would "preserve and create local jobs in rural communities...to sustain the local logging and restoration infrastructure and community capacity...to promote cooperation and collaboration...to restore or improve the ecological function of priority watersheds...to carry out collaborative projects to restore watersheds and reduce the risk of wildfires to communities." Much of this work would be carried out through stewardship contracting.
I can understand why supporters of the FJRA are resistant to the ENR Committee changes, but when it comes to preserving Wilderness and America's public lands legacy, as well as getting some good watershed restoration and fuel reduction work accomplished, you folks just can't deny that the ENR Committee's draft, while not perfect, is a much better framework to work from. Plus, it might actually pass. Hopefully you folks come to this realization soon. Thanks.
What about when the markets were good, and REAL foresters were warning that millions of acres of even-aged LP were reaching decadence and would be especially vulnerable to bug kill? Would have been a heck of an opportunity to crank out some fine wood products and set up the the next forest on the proper trajectory.
But nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo....
No one is proposing to manage each and every acre, especially in the steep canyons and riparians zones. No one is proposing to install more than a few new roads. No one is proposing to clearcut high elevation dead lodgepoles on a landscape basis. Fuel breaks, thinning and restoration becomes prohibited activities, and free-range wildfires are preferred, even on private lands, if the preservationists get their way. We'll see if the new Planning Rules will have any impact on this ongoing environmental disaster.
One more question.... Would you be in favor of exempting non-mandated logging from court battles, in favor of mandated consensus building? Ole George doesn't, and neither do the eco-groups.
Regarding the South, so they are against cutting pine trees in plantations on the old cotton fields?!?!? Trees grow awfully fast down there and carbon sequestration through forest products can go a long way towards mitigating climate change. I measured one individual that was 29 years old, 90 feet tall and has put on 3 inches of diameter in the last 10 years. THAT is significant growth and sequestration!!! Gotta look at the BIG picture, folks!
Senator Testers bill sets dangerous precedent for the nation by mandating unsustainable logging, by-passing environmental protection laws, and allowing motorized use in Wilderness.
The ENR committee draft reverses these untenable agreements in Senator Tester's bill. It is a step in the right direction and will go a long ways in garnering the support of disillusioned Wilderness advocates. To hear Senator Jon Tester say it's "Dead on Arrival" is disheartening at best. I also find it disconcerting that the title of this bill, "Forest Jobs and Recreation Act" clearly leaves out any mention of Wilderness.
Regardless of how this bill was hatched, it now important to get the best bill possible without diluting the values of Wilderness. Senator Tester needs to hear from Wilderness advocates that the ENR draft changes has merit and giving it due consideration is what Montana expects from her Senator.
MWA has failed this test, badly.
in fact, measuring an organization by its stated mission to protect wild lands it has exhibited at least cowardice and possibly outright treachery.
not one net acre of wilderness has ever been saved by compromise and collaboration. more is always lost than is saved by such craven and shortcut methods.
but i guess you made your choice and as bob dylan wrote....
you gotta serve somebody....
http://4and20blackbirds.wordpress.com/2010/06/19/chuck-e-cheese-or-the-earth/
Add to that the fact that Tester, as a Democrat, now has the baggage of voting for unpopular Obama initiatives. Democrats are expected to take a beating this fall due to voter unhappiness, and Tester is lucky he doesn't have to run this year. But he has to get right with Montana voters for 2012, and the process of doing that will include convincing them he hasn't been too liberal and that he's done all he could to create jobs. Thus, he has no choice but to stick with a logging mandate -- come hell or high water.
i hope you also realize that all those hearty backslaps the timber industry is giving MWA will also disappear the instant MWA pushes all their chips into the kitty on this losing hand.
they will be lucky to raise enough for cab fare for the ride home while conrad burn's buddies who dreamed up this scheme all laugh at their naiveté.
Collaboration has failed in QLG, due to litigation. SPI has decided to close their mill because the Forest Service cannot get its restoration act together. QLG is NOT restoration! It is collaboration for collaboration's sake, ignoring the science but uniting stakeholders. Complaining about the past does nothing for the future of our forests. I'm all about fixing mistakes made in both the very recent past, as well as the distant past.
Where is the management of this forum?? Clearly this person is focused on insulting me, and others, with little to offer on-topic. Hatred is an ugly thing, "Bear". Lies aren't conducive to understanding or collaboration. You are abusing this forum for your own witch hunt, despite what it says under "Comment Policy". YOU had been warned and YOU are being reported!!
I think people who live and breathe this stuff begin to believe it is the most important issue out there, and forget that, for most people, it is pretty far down on their list of priorities, even though they might say it is important to them. Most people, when they get in the voting booth, are casting ballots for people they think are going to be good for their economic security.
And that, again, is why Tester isn't going to abandon the logging mandate in his bill.
He knows that, if he caves on that issue, it will look like he is putting liberal principles ahead of jobs. And that will kill him at the polls. He'd be a goner in 2012.
if conrad burns tried to push this through now everyone would recognize it for what it is- pure chicanery and political double-dealing purely for the sake of looking good.
jobs creation is a mirage and would require massive subsidies which given the current political climate toward the deficit would never be funded.
this stupid bill is a land mine set by conrad burns which jon has planted his foot firmly on. either way he moves now it blows up.
I think your conspiracy theories about Conrad Burns are rather amusing. I don't see how Burns could be pulling so many strings and controlling Tester's destiny. He couldn't even control his own destiny.
I don't know that jobs have to be "massively" subsidized. Particularly if the cost of litigation/appeals don't have to be factored in.
But regardless of who you think is behind the bill or what you think it is about, I believe Tester will continue to push for a middle course, and he won't back down on a logging mandate. Again, if he's got to prove anything to the electorate in 2012, he's got to prove he's working hard to create jobs. He's also going to have to prove he's not too liberal. I could be wrong, but I just think it is a fantasy to believe he'd drop the logging mandate and go full bore on wilderness. That would win him stronger backing from those who are already going to vote for him, but it would lose independents he needs to win reelection. He'd be a one-term senator.
also, bear earlier mentioned some woman who grew up in Eureka who was supposedly "upset with how those real foresters raped and logged her homeland." And bear jabbed at someone who "grew up in a motorhead campground..fool."
I'm very familiar with that area and have a lot of friends and family living there. The woman bear mentions, if she is real, is the exception, not the rule. The vast majority of people there don't believe the land has been "raped." That's a ridiculous statement, particularly if it refers to the landscape today. If someone said that out in public they'd be scorned. Many of the people there have worked in the timber industry (of course by now they've lost their jobs due to the economy and the lawsuits that have stopped timber sales. The last working saw mill shut down just last year.)
One can go out and hike or drive around in the woods and see that it isn't "raped." Forty or fifty years ago there was a lot of clear cutting, but that practice has ended, and today evidence of logging isn't always easy to find. It is a whole different world today. The folks who work today in the woods take great pride in leaving a light footprint on the land.
and she's not happy and does'nt live in her homeland anymore becuase of the destruction.
No evidence of logging in that area..please keep drinking that kool aid son.
Gee you refer to people who workd in the timber industry, real unbiased sources.
Fact is she grew up watching griz fish in the river while she waited for the school bus.
Now the griz and slamon, old growth and wilderness are all gone.
Now the timber industry is gone, all thanks to their greed and unsustainable, tax-payer subsidized logging.
The truth hurts to be frank....frank.
when you reduce once wild, diverse country into endless logging lands it affects the people's psyche as well.
No wonder all the kids do in Eurka is drink and no wonder the parents allow an sometimes promote it.
Real great community and existence they've built around their logging lands...frank.
This woman now lives in rural central Idaho becuase she wants to be somewhere that has'nt been decimated by the timber industry like the Eureka area.
She worked on the Griz DNA project in the Flathead.
She actually lived and worked in the wilds.
Someone with her backgroud can see that griz used to wander from glacier to the cabinets, but now thanks to the massive logging projects there's not a chance in hell.
It makes me sick the way you try to make it appear as through that area is so green now and forest friendly.
50 years ago blah blah.
Collaboration is taking its toll as well on the Tongass National Forest. The Tongass Futures Roundtable collaborative process followed verbatim the blueprint of the QLG and the Great Bear. After four years of green groups sitting at the Roundtable it's hard to tell who is really green any longer with the self-appointed members, (many of whom are public officials) and their strict rules on proceeding disclosure (no first hand press accounts, no recording and lots of closed doors - public officials?!) and dissent, and plenty of greenbacks from foundations to grease the collaborative skids.
The end result of these fours years is an onerous, precedent setting bill introduced by Senator Murkowski to privatize thousands of acres of the Tongass under the guise of correcting native inequities. Few are fooled at the corporate giveaway. Small affected communities and residents (bipartisan) have cried foul loud and clear not only to the formerly green organizations but to the Senator who continues to forge ahead and offer only minor concessions most of which are only rumored at this point. After six weeks of trying to negotiate a better bill the executive director of the number one, formerly grassroots conservation group on the Tongass just declared an impasse in an opinion piece in the Juneau Empire. Now they are saddled with a monster, partly of their own creation because they figured they would get a better deal by entering in to the quid-pro-quo, roundtable negotiations - with entities that had NO shared values.
Meanwhile the down-in-the-trenches SE Alaska conservationists continue the good fight... and hope the scars that Mr. Brower referred to above can be avoided. I think we all know we are in it for the long, long haul.
keep singing la la la la la and i am sure it will turn out alright for you.
I've seen timber sales where average cut-tree diameters have gone from 40+ inches dbh in the late 80's, all the way down to 14 inches dbh, on projects I have worked on in the last 10 years. That includes the elimination of high-grading and clearcutting, enhancement of species diversity, improvement of wildlife habitat and fire safety. That, surely, doesn't sound, or look like, "destruction" to me. In fact, much of the public LIKES the look of forests "thinned from the bottom", and they tell us so. I'll hunt down some pictures "commercial logging" to share, and you can see for yourselves and comment.
So help me understand here... if THEY cut, restore, harvest (pick one) 100, 000 of timber, vegetation, trees (again, pick one), who will pay for it? Below cost harvest on the BHDL costs the taxpayer..... WHOOPS... no mention of this in the bill or allocation of any funds for proposed "treatment/restoration".
And now, take a giant leap forward past the 10 years this project is expected to last and ask yourself... WHAT NEXT? How will it be sustainable by anyone's measurement? All those poor forest workers out of a job, how sad to see the mills going under. Hmmm, right back where we started.
I live in a (superinsulated)log house and burn wood for heat (about one cord a year). I can also read an EIS/EA and research the laws and make an intelligent comment about the proposal based on the law. And I also join/give money to "groups" who are willing to go to court see that laws that protect the natural world are enforced. There are lots of people out there like me... we just need to keep at it.
After all, it is the American Way... we the people.
Janet the point of the article was that "collaboration" is not what's occuring nor does it work why would you expect it to work here?
If that isn't happening where you live, be sure to get involved and publicly request such benefits. I am totally in favor of making the Forest Service "walk the talk".
Also Fotoware this is an article Tester's FJRA not thinning on public lands. I understand there's a connection between the two, but you strive to find connections to thinning,firestorms, beetles and control of all fire in EVERY single article on new west.
It grows very tiresome for this old Baerh to read.
"Ending commercial logging would remove a stressor that threatens the ability of National Forests to survive climate change"
The Sierra Club firmly believes that ALL "commercial logging" (remember, a 9-10" dbh tree, or greater, is of "commercial size") is destructive and should be banned. And just how many other eco-groups blindly follow the Sierra Club's lead?!?!
I'm sorry that Foto has to be the primary voice of reason when it comes to fiscal forestry. Yet I'm not sorry. I think he's merely practicing his sound bites for when he has a chance to present his view to a saner audience, and his responses to the arguments made by the dark side.
By the way, Janet, there's no real cost to harvest. Take away the litigation and the paperwork and the ridiculous bureaucratic process and preparing good timber harvests is cheap. Then the only question is if the wood coming off is sufficient to pay for the machinery, wages and fuel as well as any needed restocking.
If not, then the question becomes, is a loser harvest actually the least cost option because it objectively reduces the intensity and negative consequences of a fire in the project area?
The fact of the matter is that logging a forest in a deliberate manner with the desired outcome being "good fire" -- is patty cake. I'm not bothered at all by good fires, of moderate intensity, set in the shoulder seasons, or even burning in fire season. There's no better way to park things out.
But heaven forbid that anyone gather useful products on a societal scale, or make a decent, non-itinerant living. Oh, ho, no.
Additionally, please remember that the New West staff can't possibly monitor every one of our comment threads for such abuse. Our sincere thanks to the great majority of you who share your very thoughtful and civil contributions, and who politely notify us when this forum is abused.
Regards,
Brian Fish
Webmaster, NewWest.Net
it's not a good thing if skinner thinks your the voice of the reason.
Interesting to note that the Sierra Club (which you demonize) was the only major enironmental group to stand against Tester's FJRA which you claim you don't support. It appears as though on this issue the two of you agree, you would'nt know it from your off topic comments on every article and you tadle tale behavior.
I believe you take their quote out of context and attempt to make it sound as thought they litigate ALL thinnig projects, or demand extreemly small diameter when in support.
But hey that's for the readers to decide.
You brought the removal of your postings on yourself, even after my warning and the very visible comment policy. Ya might want to quit while you are behind, or argue with facts, tact and skills.
I think it was John Muir who said that all things in the natural world are connected, and I am merely following that lead. If Dave proposed clearcutting goshawk nesting habitat, I would certainly oppose that thought. I have yet to disagree with the few posting of his I have read. He appears to have seen a lot, which I can verify with my experience.
Regarding Tester's Bill, no one wants to address the litigation issues, resulting in a "bait and switch" situation (which I predicted from the outset!) AND, no one wants to trade wilderness for an exemption from litigation, as that brings those sneaky preservationist schemes out into the open.
Alas, it appears that it is the "low-down dirty compromisers" who are being demonized for not embracing the idea of wilderness in exchange for absolutely nothing. No wonder Tester says it is DOA, eh?!? Back to the drawing board!!
Yes, we CAN jump through lots of hoops and still be environmentally sound, as well as meeting the letter of the law BUT, litigation reform is needed, as well as forced collaboration. Do we really need Malloy to play that card again?!?! (Maybe we DO!!)
long whinded, but short of any substance or relevance.
LOL @ the fact that you always manage to respond in under an hour.
One word: TROLLAlas, it appears that it is the "low-down dirty compromisers" who are being demonized for not embracing the idea of wilderness in exchange for absolutely nothing. No wonder Tester says it is DOA, eh?!? Back to the drawing board!!"
"
Actually in this case it's the timber industry who are not compromising, they demand to log roadless areas and have mandated timber harvests.
The timber industry which you endlessly defend and support.
he's seen a lof logging roads all right and you've seen too much fire prop.
Soooo, the eco's are now denouncing collaboration in favor of steadfast scientific stubborness?? Once again George ignores the Precautionary Principle in favor of unnatural wildfires. Eco's always blame fire suppression for the catastrophic wildfires we're seeing, and I don't deny there is truth there. However, turning around and saying that catastrophic wildfires are "natural" is a basic contradiction in your position. Tester's Bill was a call for help to break the gridlock of forest destruction, while putting people to work doing restoration work. Sadly, it was flawed from the start, going against established laws. It is merely a symptom of a much bigger problem in our forests and courts.
Restoration is the key but, preservationists do not want that. I think it is time to listen to the scientists, instead of the eco-diletantes. In my 20+ years of experience, I've spent most of it salvaging bug trees and wildfires, and have seen the intensive, accelerated damages caused by catastrophic wildfires. The impacts go far beyond what you may have considered. Alas, Obama's Katrina plows onward, through our public forests and private lands, as well."
Sounds like you all for Tester's logging bill and are just dissapointed by those pesky environmental laws.
Don't post stiuff like this and expect to not be called for the pompous old windbag you are.
the "ecos" blame the catstrophic fire not only on suppression, but alos unsustainable logging and road building.
LMAO @ your "interpretation" of the Sierra Club's call for an end to commercial logging. After all even the wilderness act permits thinnig and other projects if there are seriuos threats of natural disaster.
Your just an egotistical old fire dork.
You also so very clearly display your lack of knowledge of the Wilderness Act and "thinning". We ALREADY have a natural disaster in progress, bud. And others can clearly see that I am NOT in favor of logging designated wilderness. It's illegal!
AND, just for the record, I am also against building new roads. Sorry that I don't fit your stereotype, yet again, bud!
AND, just for the record, here's the link to the Sierra Club's official comment:
http://contentanalysisgroup.com/data/18-258.pdf
I think it speaks for itself, eh?!?!
boast much?
I baulk at your assumptions that I don't understand the wilderness act or thinning. I've personally read the document several times and have participated and observed thinnig projects.
I also have worked and DO work in the wilderness
I have friends who have worked restoring the Antelope lake fire in the plumas. He was bitter towards certain groups who delayed thiningg projects.
Just because certain groups don't understand thinning does'nt give you the right to trash all env. groups, laws, and people on every sigle post on new west.
Give the Sierra Club some credit as i stated earier they were the ONLY major Env. group to stand up against Tester's Logging Bill.
Not even the local Montana Wilderness Association had any backbone on this deal. If you claim you don't want new roads you would have to at least credit the Sierra Club for blowing the whistle agaisnt Tester's road intrusions into roadless lands.
You don't have to like everything they do, but on this post and in this case the Sierra Club did the right thing. Whistle blowers are demonized left and right in this age of "deregualtion" that skinner begs for. The Obama admin. is proving to be one of the worst attackers of whistle blowrs in history.
The crux is that Sierra Club thinks they can keep up the delusion that an unmanaged forest is the only proper forest, no matter its actual condition physically and/or biologically. If the price of wilderness is to burn it flat, that's a price SC is perfectly happy to inflict on the rest of humanity. It's just what Sierra Club is, and does.
The question is, how long will what Sierra Club is, and does, be relevant?
Mr. Furshong stated:
"Wilderness philosophers from other states can postulate all they want about Montana politics - such chatter will never result in actual legislation to protect 500,000 acres of ground in the largest National Forest in the lower 48 states and create new jobs at Montana mills that have a record of stewardship best practices.
You know what? Mr. Furshong's dismissive comment is striking when compared with the fact that just this week the Senate's Energy and Natural Resources Committee approved 26 bills establishing new Wilderness areas and dealing with other public lands issues. Those 26 bills were approved by the ENR Committee en bloc, by unanimous consent.
Reader's will recall that Senator Tester's FJRA is currently before this same Senate ENR Committee. Sometime in May, the ENR Committee sent Senator Tester a draft revision of this bill, which his office shared with the collaborators. Once the media questioned Senator Tester about the ENR's draft he proclaimed it "Dead on arrival."
So now, on June 20, the Senate ENR Committee approved 26 bills dealing with Wilderness and public lands issues
Something I'd encourage Wilderness supporters to consider is the very likely fact that if Senator Tester and the collaborators (Mr. Furshong, Mr. Ferrell and MWA included) would have accepted the ENR Committee's draft revisions when they were shared about a month ago, it too would have been approved by the Committee this week.
So despite Mr. Furshong's claim that "such chatter will never result in actual legislation" it sure seems to me that Montana Wilderness Association and the other collaborator's insistence on mandated logging and motors in Wilderness might have cost all of us the opportunity to designate over 660,000 acres as Wilderness and get some good restoration and fuel reduction work accomplished as proposed in the ENR Committee's draft.
Some details of the ENR Committee's draft:
* It would protect over 660,000 acres in Montana as Wilderness. However, it doesn't undermine Wilderness by allowing military helicopters to land in Wilderness or ranchers to ride their ATV's in Wilderness, as Senator Tester's draft allows.
* It drops the controversial and unprecedented mandated logging levels on the Beaverhead-Deerlodge and Kootenai National Forests. It adds language requiring that any project carried out under the bill must fully maintain old growth forests and retain large trees, while focus any hazardous fuel reduction efforts on small diameter trees.
* It would also establish a "National Forest Jobs and Restoration Initiative" that would "preserve and create local jobs in rural communities...to sustain the local logging and restoration infrastructure and community capacity...to promote cooperation and collaboration...to restore or improve the ecological function of priority watersheds...to carry out collaborative projects to restore watersheds and reduce the risk of wildfires to communities." Much of this work would be carried out through stewardship contracting.
I find it "interesting" that eco's state that so very little "old growth" still exists yet, they file lawsuits against all thinning projects "that cuts down old growth". How can there be sooooo little old growth when every thinning project includes it?!?!
And how come its OK to let "old growth" burn up?!?
My final recommendation is to let Tester's Bill die and do something truly collaborative and progressive, that includes real restoration forestry. The ENR version is fatally-flawed and one-sided. Gridlock LIVES!!!
Your last comment about how come it's OK for old growth to burn is a good one, and it demonstrate the poor understanding that many have about the ecological role of old growth trees.
The main value of old growth is not so much their value when alive, but when they die--thus if they are killed in a wildfire, they are still performing important ecological functions, indeed, it is after they die that they provide the bulk of their value.
Some has to do with its physical function. Large trees are more likely to be used by wildlife (such cavity nesting birds as an example) than smaller diameter trees. But it goes much further than that.
A large tree takes much longer to rot, thus is useful as habitat for much longer.
A large tree stores more carbon and other nutrients which are released slowly (and burning mostly takes off the small branches and needles with the bulk of the tree remaining as a snag).
A slow growing tree is more dense, hence rots slower.
Dead trees, even burned ones, still provide some shade, wind protection, and so forth that moderates the environment making it easier for trees to reestablish.
There are other values to old growth not found in managed forests, but those are a sample.
So if a fire should kill the trees, so long as they are not in a "post fire" logging operation and removed, they are performing their function.
Yes, the distant past style of salvage logging would leave only a dozen trees per cutting unit. Today's projects leave snags of several sizes for every acre in a cutting unit. Potential cutting units are also sacrificed to help cover the need for snags, as well. Salvage projects also put fine branches and needles on the ground to hold back catastrophic erosion, as well. You'd be amazed at how much soil is held back by a tiny stick. I have ample photographic evidence that salvage projects can be wildly beneficial and adds resiliency to partially-burned forests. Also beneficial is the removal of unmerchantable material that would add to the fuel loading of any future forest. Quite simply, such material doesn't rot before fire returns in many areas. It re-burns! Science says that trees soon lose their the rest of their carbon after death. I also have photographic evidence where living old growth was converted into pure CO2 in a period of 20 short years, leaving an eroding moonscape where brush barely even grows.
Also not factored into catastrophic wildfires is the sad loss of precious endangered species habitat. Spotted owls and goshawks depend on healthy forests for nesting habitat and cannot survive in today's burned forests. Both birds are listed solely on the fact that their nesting habitat was threatened and rare. The Biscuit Fire impacted a full third of Oregon spotted owl habitat, and the remaining habitat is further reduced by competition between those birds for the exact same established nest sites. Salmon and other fisheries are also heavily-impacted by such firestorms, with enhanced erosion and increased flooding due to hydrophobic soils.
I contend that letting wildfires burn goes directly against the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act. They also make people very sick and kill people!
So why are we allowing laws to be broken supporting catastrophic wildfires?!?!? So few benefits to wildfires and so many horrible catastrophic impacts.