596 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



resulted in more or less incompetent 

 management and proved costly to the 

 state. 



Despite this, efforts to secure changes 

 from present systems, which are effec- 

 tive, to others which have proved to be 

 ineffective, are being made in some 

 states at the present time. 



The men who favor such changes 

 would do well to read the following 

 extract from a letter written by Mr. 

 E. T. Allen, a Director of the American 

 Forestry Association, to a member of 

 the Oregon House Committee on the 

 proposed consolidation of the State 

 Forestry Board with other boards in 

 that State. 



After stating that the present board 

 is unsalaried, that its work does not 

 overlap any other State work, and that 

 its work is most important owing to 

 the great value of Oregon's forest 

 resources, Mr. Allen goes on to tell of 

 its duties. He says: 



"The purpose and duties are most 

 specific and real, as the minutes of past 

 meetings will show. The board has 

 not only to obtain competent non- 

 political officers to protect life and 

 property, but to deal with live, practical 

 and difficult problems where error or 

 neglect would be very costly to the 

 State. The protective work must be 

 with full understanding of, and in 

 harmonious cooperation with, that of 

 private owners and the Government. 

 The laws must be administered with 

 justice alike to struggling settler and 

 wealthy timber-owner. To a very large 

 extent, therefore, the board's work is 

 technical, requiring special competence 

 in the beginning and improving directly 

 with attention and experience. This 

 forest State particularly needs the 

 building up of such a board. No inex- 

 perienced ex-officio service will suffice. 



"There is no political significance 

 under the statutory composition of the 

 board. Its membership cannot become 

 a political reward; its own composition 

 precludes the use of its authority to 

 build a political machine or spend State 

 funds to pay political debts. It is the 

 one board in the State absolutely free 

 from political possibilities. 



"So it seems to meet every count. 

 Now let us consider the danger of 



change the same danger that has 

 wrecked the forest work of many other 

 states. 



"There are practically only three other 

 methods: (a) a Governor's straight 

 appointive board; (b) an ex-officio 

 board of selected State officials; (c) a 

 combination of existing boards having 

 some theoretical relationship. The first 

 is necessarily political, or capable of 

 being made so, and is satisfactory to no 

 one but the "ins." Even to them it 

 may prove embarrassing. Such boards 

 have never done good work long, 

 especially when involving a large paid 

 force. The ex-officio board of State 

 officials is practically useless or worse. 

 Being busy and without interest or 

 technical knowledge, its members give 

 the State Forester no real help. If they 

 do anything, it is to exert political 

 pressure without even understanding its 

 influence. 



"The third method, that of combining 

 all the State's relations to natural 

 resources under one board, has more 

 plausibility than the other two but has 

 always failed in practice for certain 

 unavoidable reasons. First of these is 

 the impossibility of getting competence 

 in any one line as a board, however 

 competent each member is in his own 

 specialty. The very proficiency which 

 has led to appointment of a fish member, 

 or a mining member, or a forestry 

 member, means he has specialized too 

 much on that to understand the other 

 things. So whatever the topic before the 

 board, it is acted on by a majority that 

 does not understand that topic. There 

 cannot be a competent majority on 

 any, if the board is fairly chosen. If it 

 is not so chosen and there is a fish, 

 forestry, or other majority, then ob- 

 viously the minority subjects always 

 suffer. This is an inherent weakness 

 in a mixed topic board of technical 

 nature. It is doubly dangerous if the 

 funds are also made general. Finally, 

 the combined board of this kind always 

 manages, if it makes a mistake in any 

 subject, to bring down public disap- 

 proval on all. For example, if you 

 combine forestry with fish and game 

 work and the latter makes enemies, 

 the latter will fight the forestry appro- 

 priations, too, in order to punish the 



