Oregon: Forest protection plans in the age of Obama
Those who known me of late notice how I keep talking about an Obama
forest. What’s an Obama forest you ask? Well we don’t really know… I
trust it won’t be as bad as a Bush forest or a Clinton forest! And
truth is until we know how much Obama reverses Bush forest policies,
we don’t really know what an Obama forest is. So here’s some people
who say what they want an Obama forest to look like. –Deane
Conservation groups that spent the past eight years battling the Bush
administration over logging, wildlife and global warming are hoping
for major changes from the Obama administration and a more strongly
Democratic Congress. Their green wish list includes more wilderness
designations, legislation to stop old growth forest logging, ramping
up protection of species on the brink of extinction, cutting back on
government predator control, and adopting a comprehensive plan to
address climate change. “The challenge for the conservation community
is to rise to the occasion,” said Steve Pedery, spokesman for Oregon
Wild, a frequent plaintiff in lawsuits challenging Bush administration
policies. “This is a fairly historic moment on conservation policy. It
is not only the end of the Bush administration, but the greenest
Congress and president in 40 years.
“Folks could spend the next four
or eight years unraveling the things the Bush administration did in
the order they did them, or they could try to move the country ahead
on environmental policy and find areas of consensus.” Andy Kerr, a
conservation consultant, said it should be relatively easy for Obama
to undo much of what Bush did on the environment, because it was done
administratively, by changing rules and regulations, not
legislatively. Prime targets for administrative action are Bush
administration polices that made it easier to log, mine and drill for
oil in undeveloped sections of national forests known as roadless
areas, easing Endangered Species Act requirements for federal
agencies, and running up a backlog of candidates for threatened or
endangered species designation. “It would be prudent to assume there
will be a Palin administration someday,” Kerr added, referring to
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a conservative who was the Republican vice
presidential nominee. “That’s why we need to act with Congress to
permanentl y protect the forests.” Recognizing widespread public
support for thinning of crowded young stands susceptible to fire while
protecting centuries-old forests that are the foundation of spotted
owl and salmon habitat, Oregon Democrats Sen. Ron Wyden and U.S. Rep.
Peter DeFazio are both working on old growth forest protection
legislation. “The devil will be in the details,” Pedery said. “The
nature of any legislative effort is it’s a delicate balance.” Oregon
Wild also has its eye on new wilderness designations that would
prohibit logging in some prime salmon habitat. Besides the Mount Hood
wilderness bill languishing in Congress, it would like to see creation
of a Kelsey-Whisky wilderness along the wild section of the Rogue
River, and a Devils Staircase wilderness in the Coast Range north of
the Umpqua River. Big Wildlife and the Center for Biological Diversity
are hoping that some of the 251 candidates for Endangered Species Act
protection – including the Oregon spotted frog – will get the
protections they have been waiting for, and for cutbacks in the
numbers of wolves, coyotes, cougars and other predators killed in the
name of livestock protection. Dominick DellaSala, director of the
National Center for Conservation Science & Policy, said he is hoping
for a clear signal from the Obama administration that key appointments
and policy decisions will be based on science. “That has been lacking
the last eight years,” DellaSala said. “Obama has made some great
choices,” particularly Oregon State University marine biologist Jane
Lubchenco as head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory director
Steven Chu to be Energy secretary. On global warming, DellaSala and
others are calling for a national summit on climate change, which
would address reducing greenhouse gas emissions and protecting old
growth forests as a way of drawing carbon out of the atm osphere.
Though not part of a conservation group, Bob Dopelt, director of the
Climate Leadership Initiative at the University of Oregon, said making
progress on climate change will be difficult, because even the
national environmental groups most interested in the issue have yet to
come together on what steps to take.
http://www.kval.com/news/local/37183489.html
— Posted to http://forestpolicyresearch.com via gmail to posterous and
also to forestpolicyresearch@yahoogroups.com