The Northwest Forest Plan was adopted in April 1994 under the previous Administration as a way to settle the “timber wars” that had wracked the Northwest and Northern California for several years before. A fundamental part of that Plan was the “Aquatic Conservation Strategy (ACS),” which was intended to help protect and restore damaged salmon habitat on federal lands. ESA protections for damaged salmon runs on the west coast have come into being since the ACS was adopted, and the ACS has now become the federal government’s primary salmon restoration strategy on federal forestlands.
The Bush Administration's Northwest Forest Plan changes, although characterized by the Administration as mere technical changes to clarify language and “restore the original intent” of the Northwest Forest Plan, would eliminate current requirements under the ACS to protect or prevent damage to salmon habitat at any particular place in a watershed. By eliminating any requirement for site-specific protections, as well as any monitoring to ascertain cumulative effects of site specific timber operations, there would be no way of ascertaining whether the ACS was really working, nor of preventing further salmon habitat degradation. Since every watershed is made up of “particular places,” eliminating site-specific protection requirements gives a blank check for forest managers to destroy salmon habitat piecemeal, wherever they thought it expedient to boost timber sales.
The proposed changes to the ACS are specifically intended to overturn a decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in a case brought by commercial fishermen and others, PCFFA, et al. v. National Marine Fisheries Service, 265 F.3d 1028 (9th Cir. 2001). The Court of Appeals in that case blasted the U.S. Forest Service and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) for systematically ignoring site-specific impacts on salmon, and for rubber-stamping Biological Opinions (BiOps) approving timber operations which even agency biologists considered too risky for salmon.
The Bush Administration’s position now is that, instead of following the rules and doing it right, it will simply change the rules themselves, through these “clarifying amendments,” to eliminate all requirements for any site-specific analysis of impacts, in effect making salmon protections on federal lands optional instead of mandatory. Optional protections are rarely implemented.
The scoping notice is in the 25 November Federal Register (Vol. 67, No. 227, pp. 70575-70576), requesting public comments on its plan to prepare a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) on the new rule changes. It is available at: http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/7/257/2422/14mar20010800/edocket.access.gpo.gov/2002/02-29951.htm.
Written comments concerning the scope of the analysis must now be received in writing or by e-mail by 3 February 2003, and sent to: Comments, SEIS for Aquatic Conservation Strategy, P.O. Box 2965, Portland, OR 97208. Copies of the original Northwest Forest Plan Record of Decision (ROD) and Attachment A to the ROD as referred to in the notice are available on the Internet at: http://www.reo.gov/library/reports/newsandga.pdf. Comments can also be emailed to Joyce Casey, SEIS Communications Specialist, at: Jcasey01@fs.fed.us. There will be no public hearings and no other opportunity for public comment on the scoping process.
PCFFA has provided or joined in written comments on the proposed ACS changes, which are posted at the top of the PCFFA website at: www.pcffa.org. Feel free to use any part of our comments in preparing your own!
--- PCFFA/IFR Staff