Thursday, December 30, 2004
Bush's Christmas Gift to Timber and Logging Industries
Bush Administration Announces New Forest Regulations
New Rules are Expected to Favor Logging, Cut Standards for Wildlife Protection, Forest Management, Public Input
: "For the second year in a row, the Bush Administration has announced a harmful new forest policy on the eve of the Christmas holiday. Last December 23, the administration announced it was opening up pristine parts of the Tongass National Forest to new logging and development. Today, it is releasing what are expected to be damaging new regulatory changes to the rules that guide sound forest management.
The new rules for long-term forest planning will likely reduce protections for forest wildlife and eliminate requirements that forest plans comply with the National Environmental Policy Act. The final rules will change enforcement of the 1976 National Forest Management Act, and are expected to conform closely to a timber industry 'wish list' presented shortly after the presidential inauguration.
'We fully expect that the new forest rules will reflect the Bush administration's belief that logging companies should be the primary beneficiary of our National Forests,' said Carl Pope, Sierra Club Executive Director. 'Americans want to protect the places where they hike, hunt and fish, but when the Bush administration rewrote the rules, they wrote the public out of the equation.'
The new forest planning rules are likely to:
--eliminate analysis of forest plans under the National Environment Policy Act (NEPA), which requires federal government agencies to assess potential environmental impacts of their actions, and examine alternatives;
--scrap wildlife protections established under President Ronald Reagan;
--severely limit opportunities for public input into forest management decisions; and;
--scale back the role of independent scientists in forest management, in favor of administration scientists.
'Today's new rules could roll back 20 years of forest protections -- even many put in place by Ronald Reagan,' said Mike Anderson of The Wilderness Society. 'Taken together with the Administration's plan to curtail roadless protection for national forests, these changes will threaten many of our last-remaining roadless areas and old-growth forests.'"
Thanks again to the 51% of deluded voters--for giving us a Bush in exchange for all of the trees!
New Rules are Expected to Favor Logging, Cut Standards for Wildlife Protection, Forest Management, Public Input
: "For the second year in a row, the Bush Administration has announced a harmful new forest policy on the eve of the Christmas holiday. Last December 23, the administration announced it was opening up pristine parts of the Tongass National Forest to new logging and development. Today, it is releasing what are expected to be damaging new regulatory changes to the rules that guide sound forest management.
The new rules for long-term forest planning will likely reduce protections for forest wildlife and eliminate requirements that forest plans comply with the National Environmental Policy Act. The final rules will change enforcement of the 1976 National Forest Management Act, and are expected to conform closely to a timber industry 'wish list' presented shortly after the presidential inauguration.
'We fully expect that the new forest rules will reflect the Bush administration's belief that logging companies should be the primary beneficiary of our National Forests,' said Carl Pope, Sierra Club Executive Director. 'Americans want to protect the places where they hike, hunt and fish, but when the Bush administration rewrote the rules, they wrote the public out of the equation.'
The new forest planning rules are likely to:
--eliminate analysis of forest plans under the National Environment Policy Act (NEPA), which requires federal government agencies to assess potential environmental impacts of their actions, and examine alternatives;
--scrap wildlife protections established under President Ronald Reagan;
--severely limit opportunities for public input into forest management decisions; and;
--scale back the role of independent scientists in forest management, in favor of administration scientists.
'Today's new rules could roll back 20 years of forest protections -- even many put in place by Ronald Reagan,' said Mike Anderson of The Wilderness Society. 'Taken together with the Administration's plan to curtail roadless protection for national forests, these changes will threaten many of our last-remaining roadless areas and old-growth forests.'"
Thanks again to the 51% of deluded voters--for giving us a Bush in exchange for all of the trees!
