I do not like to forest plan. I do not like it, Stan the
man!
Would you, with a Forest hat, write and write on
habitat?
Or wax poetic what you see, for species viability?
I will not work on habitat, for potato bean or Indiana
bat!
I will not write them, don't you see? I don't like
viability!
- Phil Sammon, with apologies to Dr. Seuss, posted in
the New Century of Forest Planning humor section
***
Martin Nie has the rare distinction of being an expert for both
sides of the debate over Sen. Jon Tester's Forest Jobs and
Recreation Act.
The University of Montana School of Forestry professor has
raised questions about S. 1470's timber harvest mandates, while
praising Tester's courage for entering Montana wilderness politics.
He's also opened a blog, "A New Century of Forest Planning," that
is putting the bill in a much bigger context.
"We wanted to have a place to have some respectful dialogue and
serious discussion about forest management issues," Nie said. "The
Tester bill is one issue, but we have a lot of wonky categories.
Our motto is ‘To boldly go where we've gone three times before.'
"
For Nie and fellow blog administrator Sharon Friedman, the blog
is a way to keep current on how public lands are changing. S. 1470
could become a major driver in that change through what's called
"place-based initiative."
Tester's bill wraps together three local proposals for
designating wilderness, improving backcountry recreation and
cutting timber. The biggest involves most of the
Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest. The other two comprise parts
of the Lolo and Kootenai national forests.
It would mandate creation of 677,000 acres of wilderness,
336,000 acres of recreation areas, and the logging of at least
100,000 acres of timber over 10 years. It would also set up
stewardship contracts, where timber companies would perform
backcountry maintenance or improvements in return for the logs or
pulp they cut as part of that work.
The bill grew out of a coalition of environmentalists, timber
companies and snowmobilers. It's attracted opponents from all three
factions as well. Nie's testimony has figured prominently in
arguments from both sides.
"I see him (Nie) as someone in an academic setting who studies
these issues and draws his own conclusions," said Matthew Koehler
of the Wild West Institute, who's been a persistent critic of
Tester's bill. "He brought up a lot of great points when it comes
to these issues we need to be thinking about."
"I've been on panels with Martin and had some good discussions
with him," said John Gatchell of the Montana Wilderness
Association, one of the founding groups in Tester's coalition. "I
think of Martin as a thoughtful person."
***
What Nie and his fellow bloggers are thinking
about now is how place-based initiatives might remake forest
planning as we know it. One new thing Tester's bill does is take
something very local - wilderness designation - and link it to U.S.
Forest Service timber harvests, which are usually governed by
regional or national forest plans and rules.
The Forest Service recently started a public process of
rewriting its national planning rule, which guides how regional
forests do decades' worth of priorities and tasks. On March 30, Nie
was one of a panel of scientists who advised Forest Service
administrators on what to do.
"My statement was there's a bunch of stuff going on with all
these place-based agreements and bills, and the Forest Service
would be well-served to learn lessons from bottom up from all these
initiatives. When you look at agency statements on restoration and
climate change and resilience and roadless protection, that's where
these initiatives want to go, too."
A new reference table on the blog compares Tester's bill, a
similar bill from Oregon (S. 2895), the Northeast Washington
Forestry Coalition Blueprint, the Lakeview Stewardship Group
(Fremont-Winema National Forest), Clearwater Basin Collaborative,
Tongass Futures Roundtable, Four Forest Restoration Initiative
(Arizona), and the Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act.
It charts them all by the kinds of landscape-scale projects they
propose, how they deal with timber supply, what allowances they
make for roadless areas, how the National Environmental Policy Act
and other federal environmental protections affect them, what
biomass provisions they include, and a dozen other factors.
"We have a tendency to focus on the Tester bill here in
Montana," Nie said. "I hope the tables provide folks a big-picture
look at what's going on nationwide."
The tables don't grade or critique any proposal's effect on
those topics. But that could come next month, when the National
Forest Foundation and the Bolle Center for People and Forests
brings a two-day symposium to Missoula. Participants will learn
about place-based forest agreements from Alabama to Alaska, and the
problems or solutions they might bring.
"These bills are linked in significant ways," Nie said, "and
Tester's bill will be the first one out of the gate. It will send a
pretty strong message one way or the other with what that (Senate)
committee does with the legislation."
Reporter Rob Chaney can be reached at 523-5382 or at
rchaney@missoulian.com.