213 



Oregon Forests at Risk From the Rescissions LogKine Rider 

 July 17, 1996 



Proponents of the rider used the threat of "forest health" to justify 

 suspending environmental laws and terminating citizens rights. But a closer look 

 reveals that mucli of the logging in Oregon is occurring in healthy Ancient 

 Forests that are not susceptible to destructive bums or other "forest health" 

 threats. Because of the nder, many sales under the 1990 Section 318 rider that 

 were hzdted for envirorunental concerns have now been released to logging. In 

 addition, sales under the Northwest Forest Plan (Option 9) no longer nave to 

 comply with the Plan's requirements, because citizen appeals and court 

 challenges are rendered meaningless by P.L. 104-19. 



The salvage portion of the rider is also damaging the Eastside and 

 Southern forests of Oregon. Fire is a natutral part of the ecology of the forests 

 of the Eastside and in the Siskiyou. Salvage sales cause the same environmental 

 damage as regular timber sales and do nothing to reduce the risk of fires. In 

 addition, there are many cases where the "salvage" sales contain sigT\ific«mt 

 healthy green trees that have been renamed "safvage" so that envirorunental 

 controls and dtizen appeals v^dll not apply. 



Monitoring efforts by concerned citizens have revealed that the Forest 

 Service and ELM are not complying with President Clinton's directive to adhere 

 to our nation's environmental laws. We urge the President to take immediate 

 action to cancel the following list of abusive sales pending under the rider in 

 Oregon. 



PENDING OREGON SALES TO CANCEL 



Bureau o f Land Man agement - Roseburg District 



Contact: Francis Eatherington - Umpqua Watersheds, Inc., 541/673-7649 



1. Pond View: The National Forest Resources Council used the logging rider 



to successfully sue for release of tliis sade. P.L. 104-19 

 reqioires that tlie units be sold at the original bid price of $353 

 per thousand board feet, but comparable units sold in 1995 

 tor an average of around S600/mbf. The loss to taxpayers 

 was thus over $1 million on this sale alone. 



2. Olalla Wildcat: Two out of seven units in this South Douglas Resource Area 



have already been cut. Ten mUes of new and renovated 

 roads will be built over streams and over steep unstable 

 mountain sides with a "high probability of failure." As an 

 added threat to the area, a rock quarry is slated to be built in 

 an intermittent stream as part of this sale. Olalla Wildcat is 

 in a marbled murrelet habitat, and was released for purchase 

 after federal district court Judge Michael Hogan ruled on 



