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A BETTER IDEA FOR OUR NATIONAL FORESTS
Paul W. Hansen, Executive Director
Izaak Walton League of America

President Clinton’s administrative order prohibiting new road construction in 58.5 million acres of roadless areas in the U.S. National Forests is being hailed by many in the environmental community as the "greatest conservation achievement" in the last 20 years, and condemned by many in the West and forest products industry as an illegal and capricious lock up of federal lands.

As both sides prepare for an all-out legal, administrative and legislative war over an effort to rescind this order, the Izaak Walton League of America would like to suggest a win-win solution that would be better for the environment, the forest products industry and our National Forests.

We believe that the roadless areas should remain roadless. Roadless areas are roadless for a reason: There is very little commercial timber in these areas and the expense of getting to it requires significant taxpayer subsidies. While these areas have very low value for timber, they have very high value for watershed protection, recreation and wildlife. This is why more than 2 million Americans wrote the Forest Service in favor of this proposal and why 83 percent of the nation’s hunters who use western forests also support this idea.

Just as this country acknowledges the logic in growing our food on the most productive and least environmentally sensitive lands, the League believes that a portion of the National Forests should be zoned for carefully regulated, sustainable timber production. Roughly 12 percent, or about 22 million acres, of the National Forests have the highest value for timber production. These areas already have roads and most were logged many years ago. Done right, timber can be harvested from these lands with better controls than timber now coming from private land or foreign sources.

Reliable growth and yield data, and science-based ecological evaluations, confirm that this portion of the National Forests alone could sustainably produce around 6 to 8 billion board feet of timber. That’s twice the amount being harvested on our National Forests today and somewhere on the order of 50 times more wood than could ever be harvested from the roadless areas – at much less cost to the environment and the taxpayer.

Congress has designated 36 million acres of National Forest as Wilderness, the highest level of federal land protection. Allowing 58 million acres to remain roadless will allow the one-half of the National Forests with the highest value for wildlife, watershed protection and recreation to be managed for primarily for these values – their highest and best use.

The remaining area of the National Forests – the areas not in roadless areas, Wilderness or timber production zones – should be managed to prevent fires, protect watersheds and restore the fire-dependent landscapes of the West. Much of this area is overly dense due to 95 years of fire suppression activities. Conservationists, wildlife managers and the forest products industry should get together and precisely define "stewardship harvest," and then promote the necessary thinning of these forests. By selling the wood only as a byproduct of the restoration activity, the incentive to over cut is eliminated.

Because stewardship harvests have been the source of much mischief in the past, this will be a difficult task. However, if the two sides would put as much energy into this effort as they would a jihad with one another, it could be done. In fact, stewardship harvest has been developed cooperatively between local communities, foresters and conservationists in several locations with great success. It will be essential to have careful definitions and outside assessments to monitor these projects.

This scenario could present an extraordinary opportunity to both protect the roadless areas from too many roads and the forest from too many fires. It could provide a consistent, sustainably produced supply of wood fiber to industry and the communities that depend on this industry. Perhaps most importantly, it would provide some end to the partisan bickering that has brought gridlock to National Forest management.