Decades of evading laws led to timber woes

It is easy to understand, given his dual roles as Douglas County commissioner and president of the Association of O&C Counties, the great concern Doug Robertson has regarding the dismal state of the O&C timber program and the resultant massive impact on county funding levels. In his Oct. 12 guest viewpoint, he attributes our problems to a “tangled web of environmental laws [which have] become an impenetrable barrier to reasonable, balanced management of our federal forest lands.”

But the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act haven’t caused our problem. Rather, we are in our fiscal bind because of efforts by political appointees heading the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Department of Interior over the past three decades to evade and circumvent both the letter and intent of these laws.

Historically, the BLM re­calculated the allowable timber cut level for the O&C lands every decade. The 1980 calculation was the first done under the mandate of NEPA and the ESA. In addition, it was the first done under the realization that old growth timber was fast disappearing in Western Oregon.

Field-level personnel on a BLM pilot district developed a prototype allowable cut plan that met the mandates of NEPA and the ESA and recognized the importance of maintaining the old growth ecosystem. The prototype plan also would have prevented the spotted owl from becoming listed as an endangered species.

The allowable annual cut level for the O&C lands during the 1970s was 1.2 billion board feet. If the principles incorporated in the new prototype plan were applied to all O&C districts, the total cut would have been reduced by about 15 percent to 20 percent.

We took the prototype plan to Washington, D.C., to explain it to the leadership of the BLM and Department of the Interior and gain permission to implement it. The political appointees, try as they might, could find no fault with the plan’s logic or rationale, so they simply issued two verbal directives which I can still recall verbatim:

“This administration will not lower timber production. This administration will raise timber production,” and “The spotted owl will not be listed as endangered while this administration is in office.”

In other words, science, logic, reality and law be damned — we are going to raise the timber cut on the O&C lands.

As might be expected, this orientation prompted numerous lawsuits. The courts invariably found for the plaintiffs and stated time and again that the letter and intent of NEPA and the ESA were not being adequately complied with.

Timber production on the O&C lands drifted downward continually. Finally, in 2008, the BLM issued its long-awaited plan called the Western Oregon Plan Revision. It came in three volumes and weighed almost 10 pounds. Unfortunately, in its haste to justify an increase in timber production, it overlooked a few minor details — namely, compliance with NEPA and the ESA. The WOPR remained in effect for about a year and was revoked by the secretary of interior because it was deemed to be “legally indefensible.”

Which brings us to the present, with legislative proposals aimed at fixing the O&C problem developing in both the House and Senate.

New legislation seems to me to be an overreach. All that is really needed is to remove political expediency from the process and require the BLM to finally, after three decades, complete an O&C management plan in full compliance with NEPA and the ESA.

The timber output from the O&C lands would be significantly lower than in earlier years, but the new program would essentially be immune from new litigation and the timber output would be consistent and predictable.

The BLM intends to begin a new planning process in 2014. Because of the unique relationship between counties and the BLM inherent in the O&C program, I suggest that the Association of O&C Counties formally consider becoming a joint lead agency with the BLM for the preparation of the new environmental impact statement. NEPA regulations specifically recognize the appropriateness of this type of partnership and recommend this type of cooperation.

Rather than sit outside the BLM planning process in an adversarial role or attempting to foster a complex and uncertain legislative solution, I suggest active participation with the BLM in preparing a new O&C plan that meets all legal requirements might be the best way to restore a predictable and continuing flow of O&C timber receipts back to the counties.

We’ve tried to evade existing laws for 30 years now, and look where that has gotten us. Let’s try something new and do it the right way for a change.

Ron Sadler of North Bend was formerly the chief of forestry planning for the Bureau of Land Management covering all operations in Oregon and Washington.