U.S. FOREST SERVICE ECOSYSTEM 

 ASSESSMENT 



TUESDAY, MAY 21, 1996 



House of Representatives, Subcommittee on Na- 

 tional Parks, Forests and Lands, Committee on 

 Resources 



Washington, DC. 

 The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:05 a.m. in room 

 1324, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. James V. Hansen 

 [chairman of the subcommittee] presiding. 



STATEMENT OF THE HON. JAMES V. HANSEN, A U.S. REP- 

 RESENTATIVE FROM UTAH; CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

 NATIONAL PARKS, FORESTS AND LANDS 



Mr. Hansen. We will come to order. 



The Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Lands con- 

 venes today for an oversight hearing on several ecoregion-based as- 

 sessments currently being conducted by the Forest Service. This is 

 the Subcommittee's fifth oversight hearing on National Forest 

 Management issues. While other Federal and State agencies are 

 participating in the three assessments we will discuss today, our 

 current focus is on how these processes fit within the Forest Serv- 

 ice's decisionmaking process. 



The three large scale assessments that have been under way 

 since 1993 and 1994 cover California's Sierra Nevada Range, the 

 interior Columbia River Basin, and the Southern Appalachian 

 Mountains. Collectively, they encompass almost 207 million acres 

 of public and private land, more than the entire National Forest 

 System. The Interior Columbia Basin Project, the largest of the 

 three, encompasses 24 percent of all the acreage in the National 

 Forest System. 



I wonder, given the broad nature, and questionable usefulness, 

 of the nine regional guides that are in place, how the Forest Serv- 

 ice can now expect to issue one or even several decisions adopting 

 direction and amending the forest plans for the entire Columbia 

 River Basin. According to the Forest Service's testimony, this area 

 covers 74 different Forest Service and BLM land management 

 plans. It is difficult to envision how a decision this broad can be 

 useful to local managers and provide the flexibility each forest su- 

 pervisor needs to effectively manage a National Forest. 



By contrast, I understand the Forest Service does not intend to 

 issue one broad decision covering all the National Forests within 

 the Southern Appalachian assessment. This approach seems to 

 make more sense to me. 



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