Despite a previous veto, President Clinton has signed
a compromise bill that calls for accelerated logging on national
forests. The president justified the action to angry
environmentalists by claiming that his administration now has
Republican backing to implement salvage logging that is “consistent
with the spirit and intent of our forest plans and all existing
environmental laws.” The original rider mandated that 6 billion
board-feet of dead, diseased or fire-susceptible timber be cut
within two years; the new rider shortens the time-frame to 15
months and does not mandate a specific harvest level, although the
Forest Service estimates potential salvage volume to be as much as
four billion board feet. As in the original rider, emergency
logging will be exempt from lawsuits or administrative appeals on
environmental grounds. “We’re relieved and ready to get some wood
moving and put people back to work,” says Chris West, vice
president of the Northwest Forestry Association. Environmentalists
call Clinton’s signature an “evil betrayal” that subverts the law.
Jennifer Ferenstein of the Alliance for the Wild Rockies says,
“Clinton and the Congress want to remove the right of the public to
have a say in how our forests are managed.”
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Rick Keister
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Salvage logging reborn.
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