The Only Solution Is Compromise

By ROY KEENE

from the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard 13. February 1996

In a recent Register-Guard opinion essay, Sierra Club spokesmen criticized Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., for taking an "ambiguous position" on the logging of previously offered old growth timber sales. Not too long ago, as many conservationists recall, it was the Sierra Club (and nine other environmental groups) that signed away old growth sales -- such as the Watchdog in the Umpqua national Forest -- as a so-called "short-term volumen offering" to the timber industry.

In the realm of what Charlie Ogle of the Sierra Club describes as "the politics of compromise," DeFazio is perhaps only conforming to a standard that Ogle's cohorts have already set.

Apparently the continued extraction of the old trees out of our heritage forest is justifiable to some as long as it secures political access or fattens federal timber harvests. The reality, according to scientists and foresters who intimately know our forests, is that we could enjoy a prudent harvest of potentially renewable trees from federal forests without extracting any more trees over 150 years old!

Environmental groups had an earlier chance to support this realistic leave-the-old-trees scenario, but gravitated instead toward a no-cut position, perhaps to assuage their guilt over giving away old growth at the request of the Clinton administration.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, the forest industry, empowered by a Republican Congress to take quick advantage, seems blind to the longer-term advantage of setting a stewardship standard and willing to trade public approval and credibility for another habitat-destroying fix of the public's old trees. Consequently, they ahve engineered the addition of a distinct piece of pork to an otherwise more moderate salvage rider, intended originally to expedite salvage sales in eastside forests.

Five years of legal harassment from equally short-sighted environmental groups has kept federal foresters from building timely eastside salvage and forest health models while being able to capitalize on dead (but sound) trees and strong chip markets. Now, when salvage sales come on line, there will be greater temptations to cut healthy trees to justify the economics.

The counterproductive efforts of the big (but not too savvy) environmental groups have precipitated this easily predicted salvage rider, bastardized into another timber grab instead of the respectful maintenance of fragile eastside forest ecosystems.

Even so, this rehtorically enshrined salvage rider that DeFazio's critics decry is neither the end of our grand forests nor a surety for future timber jobs. It is simply part of the spoils in a forest tug-of-war where the winner takes all -- whatever legal fees or timber sales courts or Congress awards them.

Although this ongoing contest feeds a few egos and fattens a few pockets, it is not a democratically or biologically equitable way to maintain our forests. If some environmental groups could forgo their ill-conceived forest management position and some mills could be weaned off easy profits from the public's premium logs, all of us could realize the simultaneous benefits from a whole and healthy forest and an efficient and diverse wood products industry.

The timber industry should prepare for the next counterswing if it uses its present freedom from appeal to exploit federal forests under the guise of "salvage" or "forest health." Although industry constantly touts renewable resources and sustainable forestry, it has yet to collectively create and show good examples of legacy-maintaining stewardship in America's heritage forest.

The Northwest Forest Plan, offering some prudent guidance in this direction, can only be set back by an initial volley of ugly old growth clearcuts as the "first fruits" of President Clinton's compromise. It is no wonder that further compromise is, then, a difficult choice for those with a vision of public forests higher than private log decks.

If "we the people" ever manage to wrestle our congressional representatives away from the clutches of special interests, we could undoubtedly arrive at a reasonable compromise over the allocation of our forest resources. The Constitution and the other great manifestoes of democracy were created by respectful compromise.

Far from being immoral, compromise is the basis for a moral human culture. Mutual consent over how and for whom our forests are to be managed should not, therefore, be confused with simply making concessions. Neither should the efforts of a forestry-smart populist champion such as DeFazio toward a pragmatic compromise be confused with simply caving in to special interest.

I and other foresters have conducted ground reviews of some of the contested sales released by the salvage rider, and we are convinced that they could be easily and economically mitigated. Major environmental interest groups, rather than attempting to feed feloow conservationists more pie-in-the-sky, should go to work with Congressman DeFazio and progressive industry to reduce damage to the critical forest stands and habitats affected by these court-released timber sales.

It's a done deal. We should work intelligently together to make it as easy on the forest as we can.

Forester Roy Keene submitted this statement on behalf of the Eugene-based Public Forestry Foundation.