11 



To me, it is just like the same thing on capital punishment, 

 where all of these appeals we have, where these nonmeritorious 

 claims in medicine that put us in a situation where we pay for de- 

 fensive medicine on every John Henry around. And Medicare and 

 Blue Cross and Aetna and all those providers are going broke and 

 want more money. And you ask them why, and the very first an- 

 swer they give is nonmeritorious claims. 



Mr. Unger. Well, I know that Congress did struggle with this 

 question when they enacted the law under which our project ap- 

 peals are carried out now, and a very broad definition of a person 

 with a right to appeal was adopted. It said that it could be a person 

 who was involved in the public comment process through submis- 

 sion of written or oral comments or otherwise notifying the Forest 

 Service of their interest in the proposed action, and that they are 

 all entitled to file an appeal. There were no more restrictions 

 adopted because of this difficulty in making this definition. 



Mr. Hansen. My time is about up, but I just want to hit you on 

 another one, and I apologize for you having to be in the chair. But 

 last night we found ourselves in a situation where Mr. Kennedy of 

 Massachusetts put on an amendment to the Interior Appropria- 

 tions bill which would limit the amount of roads that could be built 

 by the Forest Service. 



And we got into the age-old ad nauseam discussion whether it is 

 below cost timber sales and those of us who argue the other side 

 with our facts and figures, providing all the things of who uses the 

 roads and it went on and on and on. 



You know, I have a distinct impression — maybe this is unfair, 

 but I have a distinct impression that the Clinton Administration is 

 trying to stop road building in the American forest. 



Mr. Unger. I don't see that reflected in the appropriations re- 

 quests that the President has sent forward to the Congress, which 

 have included funding for timber roads and for our recreation roads 

 and our other roads. 



Mr. Hansen. I have no argument with the idea that the request 

 was somewhat reasonable. How come the Forest Service is closing 

 so many roads? I was amazed. What was it? 23,000 miles of roads 

 have closed? 



Mr. Unger. We are trying in a judicious way to in some cases 

 temporarily, in other cases permanently, close roads where they 

 will not be needed for some period of time or will not be needed 

 for the original purposes for which they were built, to avoid main- 

 tenance costs, to avoid impacts on other resources. But we are try- 

 ing to do this carefully and with involvement of the public in mak- 

 ing those decisions. 



Mr. Hansen. I think that is a reasonable answer and an answer 

 I would expect from a man of your stature, who I consider a very 

 reasonable and respectable man. 



On the other side of the coin, one of the biggest problems we 

 have as Members of Congress is we go into our local districts — and 

 I am in Logan, Utah, for example — the Utah State University in 

 the Walnut Room, and half the professors up there say, "When I 

 go up toward Bear Lake, why is it the blankety-blank-blank Forest 

 Service has closed this particular road that has been open for the 

 last — since I was a little boy?" 



