Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health

July 25, 2000

Opening Remarks for The Honorable Helen Chenoweth-Hage

Today we will discuss how the Forest Service's timber program is changing, and whether this change is serving the interests of the public.

When Congress created the National Forest System in the Organic Act of 1897, we clearly identified two key functions for these forests: water protection and timber production. Subsequent legislation relating to National Forests has added other multiple uses, but has never removed timber production as one legitimate use of National Forests.

Today, a small but very vocal and litigious group of land preservation activists are attempting to eliminate timber production from all federal lands. These zero-cut advocates have been very successful in driving the Forest Service timber program from a 12 billion board foot level that was sustained over 30 years, to a level under 3 billion board feet today. The Forest Service themselves say that they now see timber harvest as an essential tool for achieving other resource ends such as wildlife habitat restoration and hazardous fuel reduction, but they are quiet on the issue of whether timber sales for their own sake are a legitimate use of federal forests.

As a result of the reduction in harvest on federal lands, timber imports and timber harvest on privately owned lands is increasing. By not contributing significantly to meeting American demand for wood, the Forest Service - which controls 50% of the Nation's softwood forest supply - is simply exporting the demand to foreign countries which often lack the legislation and infrastructure which exists in the United States to protect forest sustainability.

This shift in philosophy - away from timber harvest as a legitimate use of the forest towards timber harvest as a means to an end - appears to be at variance with the intent of Congress as expressed in the laws of the land. The issue is not simply one of 'living within the limits of the land' as Chief Dombeck likes to state. Clearly we can produce more than 3 billion board feet of timber without adversely impacting the limits of the land.

The real issue is whether or not the Administration is willing to actively manage federal lands for the public good, or whether they will continue to defer to a small but powerful group of environmental preservation advocates currently driving such Administration policies as the roadless initiative and the revised planning regulations.

The hearing today is intended to give the Forest Service a chance to clarify what they see as the future of timber sales on the National Forests, and to have some enlightened discussion of their views with respect to the law and with respect to the needs and expectations of society. The format we will be using today will be different from our typical hearing in that it will be more of a group discussion, as opposed to a series of questions and answers. We have only one panel today for which we have multiple rounds of topics for discussion among the panel members as well as between the panelists and the Members of the Subcommittee. I look forward to a lively and engaging discussion.

I would like to close with a quote from John Muir, the founder of the Sierra Club, who in 1895 said:

"The forests must be, and will be, not only preserved but used, and the experience of all civilized countries that have faced and solved the question shows that the forest, like perennial fountains, may be made to yield a sure harvest of timber while at the same time all their far-reaching beneficent uses may be maintained unimpaired."
If John Muir could find it in his heart to accept the legitimacy of timber harvest as one of the many 'beneficent uses' of the forest, surely the Forest Service can do no less.

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