[yew]

The US Forest Service has to do what the Bush Administration tells it to. The USFS is a federal agency, in the Executive Branch of the federal government and the President controls them. Any USFS personnel who does not follow the Administration's order can be disciplined or fired. However, these public lands can't be sold unless Congress OKs it. I'd like to see the USFS hold on to these lands because they may act as the framework for future land purchases. At the very least, they should hold onto these lands for land swaps. I do support land swaps. The character of these lands really varies. Some would be very valuable for timber and residential development. Some may be too steep for anything. But in general, it's safe to say that these lands will be developed to some degree if privatized. There's definitely a slippery slope potential here. Once this round of land sales occurs, rural communities will still need more money indefinitely. Then again, someone will propose to sell more federal land. Again, they'll put up "the hard, difficult choices argument" until there's is no more land to sell. I suspect that's one of the goals underlying the proposal. Certain people in the Bush Administration are libertarians philosophically opposed to collective ownership and want to see public things transferred to private ownership. The Cato Institute (I call it the "market might makes right" argument) really supports this proposal. Also, as contitutionalists, conservatives in DC don't think the federal government ought to fund state and local government responsibilities like education, EMS and roads. For them, this accomplishes atleast 2 goals: First, it gets more land away from the federal gov't. Second, it reduces the improper financial relationship between the federal gov't and states and counties. I researched a few parcels in areas that I'm familiar with (central Oregon and western Washington) that the USFS claims are disposable and inefficient to manage. Some parcels identified for disposal are neither small, nor isolated, nor not-contiguous to other USFS lands. I'll make my comments on those parcels to the USFS for the 30 day comment period which ends about the end of March. One solution to this problem is commercial logging on national forests which would bring in money to pay for rural schools, roads and other public services. It would not have to be clearcutting. It would not have to be in roadless areas. Rural forest communities need good industrial-style jobs. Americans are super-consumers of wood products; most of that wood and paper is imported now. Commercial thinning of second growth and mature, natural non-old growth forest would provide a lot of jobs and wood. I'd be OK even with a few small, scattered clearcuts. Black-tailed deer and other game populations are in decline in Westside timberlands because browse is being shaded out as old clearcuts from pre-1990 fill in and grow up (forest succession). Autumn deer hunting is almost an industry in some areas and it's suffering as time passes. There's pretty much no commercial logging on either the Gifford Pinchot and Mt Baker-Snoqualmie national forests right now. There's a little more commercial logging on the Willamette and Mt Hood national forests down in Oregon but still not much. The defacto zero-cut policy in place is having some undesirable side effects. I think most county commissioners, school districts, public administrators in rural forest counties don't want to see these public lands sold but would like to see a little logging. They don't want ugly clearcuts to scare off the tourists.

[Dante]

Remember folks, like it or not, it is the United States Department of AGRICULTURE Forest Service. They administer and oversee (tree) farms - not wilderness. Seriously, I'm with whomever suggested leaving it alone if it's too expensive to "manage". Just don't manage it then. Leave it wild or turn it over to the Park Service.

[yew]

The US Forest Service may be in the USDA but that doesn't mean they only "administer and oversee (tree) farms - not wilderness". The Bureau of Land Management is in the Dept of Interior (same as the National Park Service) and many would say the BLM has a more aggressive natural resource extraction program than the USFS. The USFS is still in the USDA because Gifford Pinchot fought to keep it there since forestry was a form of agriculture and the initial purpose of the national forests was timber and watershed protection. But much has changed since the early 1900s. That the USFS is still in the USDA is a historical relict. The USFS does indeed administer and oversea some lands as wilderness, just not every acre. Each national forest has a management plan which zones out which areas will have different management focuses. One area may be zoned for timber production and wildlife species that like brush and young forests while another area may be zoned for old-growth, and roadless primitive recreation and other areas with shades in between. The USFS has a Wilderness Management program, has trained Wilderness Rangers and other Wilderness Management staff. The USFS is even a large part in the Arthur Carhart National Wilderness Training Center at http://carhart.wilderness.net/ On these lands "too expensive to manage", I totally agree. If that's the case, they ought to leave them alone and let them act as open space and wildlife habitat.

[wildernessed]

One of the areas to be sold is a section of land up number 2 Canyon Rd. in Wenatchee, of course it's for the developement of houses which are already working there way into the mountains. The soil isn't really suitable for building and there is a significant fire hazard to building in that area (I think twenty some homes were burned down in that area a few years back), but developers and builders don't care it's the quick buck, it serves not the forest or publics interest.

[yew]

http://www.jacksonholestartrib.com/articles/2006/03/17/news/regional/770a70b932de226e8725713400045710.txt says the sale of national forest land is proceeding as of March 17th http://www.fseee.org/ has links to other articles.

[Sore Feet]

Interactive Map of the proposed lands to be sold