Products Council about 5 years 

 ago, and served as its first 

 chairman (Hosner, personal 

 communication). School deans or 

 directors are ex officio members of 

 boards of directors of State 

 forestry associations in Florida, 

 Louisiana, and Mississippi. During 

 hard times in the past, the 

 Mississippi State School of Forest 

 Resources has provided staff and 

 other support to help keep the 

 Mississippi Forestry Association in 

 operation (Foil, personal 

 communication). 



Service to the Public 



Southern universities have made 

 and continue to make important 

 contributions to public policy. 

 They are qualified for this role by 

 virtue of their being pools of 

 scientific and technological 

 expertise and relatively unbiased, 

 reasoned judgment based on such 

 expertise. Two examples will 

 suffice to illustrate the university 

 contribution to public policy. 



was already underway in 

 Arkansas, Florida, Oklahoma, 

 Tennessee, and elsewhere on 

 forest management practices/ 

 systems and water relationships. 

 As a result, the university forestry- 

 program units were able to supply 

 data-backed evidence as to the 

 nature, intensity, and duration of 

 effects of forest management and 

 harvesting practices and least-cost 

 modifications for mitigation. 



The availability of such evidence 

 made it possible for one State's 

 department of environmental 

 regulation to agree to put 

 compliance with guidelines on a 

 voluntary basis (Mace, personal 

 communication). In another State, 

 such evidence — provided by the 

 university to key leaders 

 individually and at public hearings 

 held throughout the State — was 

 instrumental in preventing adoption 

 of State legislation to restrict 

 harvesting and other forest 

 practices (Blackmon, personal 

 communication). 



Environmental protection came to 

 the forefront as a public concern in 

 the 1970's. A major dimension at 

 the State level was the 

 development and implementation 

 of "Best Management Practices" 

 to minimize nonpoint-source water 

 pollution from forestry operations 

 as required under section 208 of 

 the Federal Water Pollution 

 Control Act of 1972. 



As discussed earlier, specific 

 university research was initiated or 



Legislation authorizing assessment 

 of forest and agricultural land on 

 the basis of present use rather than 

 "highest and best use" was 

 adopted in a number of Southern 

 States in recent years. University 

 forestry faculty and administrators 

 provided technical input in the 

 drafting stage of these so-called 

 Greenbelt Laws. But they played 

 an even larger role in developing 

 and maintaining systems for 

 classification and valuation of 

 forest land according to net 



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