138 



not studies, but have become hurdles or a gates the Forest Service must pass 

 through. National Forest Management Act reforms remain an unrealized 

 Congressional requirement. Critical deer habitat retention areas end up being 

 the timber that is left over after the pulp mills lay out their clearcuts. 



In the cloud- shrouded Tongass, nothing has changed: 30 years of 

 evolution of the science of forest management have yet to break through the 

 barrier of the 50-year contracts. The Forest Service apparently believes that 

 unless Congress takes action they are committed, and we are destined, to 

 trudge through the next 20 years of this public resource management tragedy. 

 Clearly, something must be done. Despite the best efforts of Congress, the 

 Courts, executive agencies, and the public to institute change, the business 

 of the Tongass is still done as if this were the 1950s. As APC itself stated 

 in its breach of contract claim, "one thing has remained unchanged, the 

 fifty-year contracts on the Tongass." 



First Chief of the Forest Service Gifford Pinchot's policy for 



dealing with corporations should be brought back to life. His words ring 



especially true in the case of these contracts: 



In the administration of the forest reserves it must 

 be clearly borne in mind that all land is to be 

 devoted to its most productive use for the permanent 

 good of the whole people and not for the temporary 

 benefit of individuals or companies. 



Almost 30 years after the passage of the Multiple-Use and Sustained Yield Act, 



S.346 promises at last to bring multiple-use to the far-flung reaches of the 



Tongass. 



HIGH-GRADING OF OLD GROWTH FOREST OF THE TONGASS. The industrial -scale timber 

 program imposed on the Tongass with the signing of the 50-year contracts is 



19 



