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estry. There are four years in the undergraduate degree, and then 

 most foresters have graduate degrees, master's, or Ph.D.'s. There 

 are substantial silvicultural research going on. 



In my district, the Bent Creek Station — southeastern station — 

 has been there since the 1920's so we are approaching 80 or more 

 years that they have had to see and experiment with forestry prac- 

 tices, working with the extension service. North CaroHna State 

 University, Clemson, and other universities around the Southeast. 



An3rtime that we are doing something, we should use the best 

 science and the best knowledge we have. It doesn't mean that we 

 won't improve that in years to come, but it is the best we have. 



What the appeals process has done, more than any other area, 

 certainly in highways or other areas, it allows someone who will 

 admittedly tell you, and if they don't tell you outright after you 

 have talked with them a few minutes, you are certain that they 

 know nothing about the subject at all, to file an appeal, stop a proc- 

 ess, to challenge that professional in the middle of his work and 

 put an enormous cost on the public with what amounts to frivolous 

 appeals. 



Now, this is not saying the public should not be involved in for- 

 mation of public policy. When we put together the forest plan, we 

 have enormous amount of public involvements, hearings and 

 rehearings and chances to come in and comment, and all of the 

 things where the public can be involved. 



But if we allow the public after we assign the policy is going to 

 be carried out this way to come in and micromanage the profes- 

 sional decisions that have to be made to carry out that policy, it 

 is the same thing as saying the public ought to be figuring the en- 

 gineering weights on the bridge. 



If we want to change policy, we have the public input at the be- 

 ginning. When we put together the forest plans, we have the oppor- 

 tunity to do it through our elected representatives, both State and 

 Federal, depending on the level of forestry that is involved, and it 

 is an ample time to do it. We do not need numerous frivolous ap- 

 peals, and that is why I made the recommendations I made. 



The Federal Court system, having nothing to do with silviculture 

 in this area, has come up with rules where they make frivolous ap- 

 peal expensive. It is Rule 11. In the Federal Court system, for in- 

 stance, it requires you to pay — if you bring a frivolous appeal, then 

 Rule 11 may be applied, and you have to pay the cost of both sides 

 in that appeal. And that has made a lot of difference in the court 

 system about frivolous civil appeals being brought. 



Mr. POMBO. And I think that one thing that Mr. Vento said is 

 probably accurate, and that is that you can't force down an agenda 

 that doesn't fit the science because there is a reaction to that. 



And I think that in our forests today, I know especially in the 

 West, we are seeing the reaction to an agenda which was forced 

 down from Congress that may have locked up an excessive amount 

 of public lands to multiuse and disallowed them from being used 

 for timber cutting. 



And with the forest fires that we are seeing in the West right 

 now, most foresters in the West will tell you that we have this very 

 severe problem, that we do need to take care of that. The science 

 that was ignored when these decisions were being made may have 



