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Forests:
Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act (Walden Salvage Logging)

Our Position: oppose
Bill Number: HR4200
Sponsor: Greg Walden (R-WA)
Legislative Session: 2006

Status

August 2006:  Hearings on this bill were held in the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Subcommittee on Forestry, Conservation, and Rural Revitalization.

May 17, 2006: This bill passed in the House.  It was then passed on to the Senate.

 February 2006: Representative Walden held a field hearing in his district town of Medford, Oregon on Friday, February 24th, and the House Resources Committee considered the legislation on March 15th.  However, the Committee did not finish debating and voting on amendments and was forced to adjourn without completing the markup or passing the bill out of committee.  No continuing date has been scheduled, but is expected by the end of March of the beginning of April.

Action Needed

Contact

Sean Cosgrove
Senior Washington Representative
National Forests and Endangered Species
sean.cosgrove@sierraclub.org
202-547-1141

Background

Proponents of this salvage logging plan claim that they need to expedite logging projects to prevent the wasting of valuable trees, which have been burned or blown down in a storm, and help these sensitive areas recover more quickly after a disturbance. However, scientific research does not support those claims. Logging a burned area is extremely damaging to a forest ecosystems because it compacts fragile soils, damages fish habitat and degrades water quality in streams by creating sediment run off, spreads invasive and noxious weeds, and removes live trees as well as dead and downed trees, which are essential to the ecological recovery of a disturbed area. The financial cost is also too high as taxpayers end up subsidizing timber sales that don't re-coup the amount that the Forest Service spent planning them.

Congress and the Forest Service should focus instead on protecting American’s homes and communities from fire and promoting real ecological restoration. Forest Service research clearly shows that the best way to protect homes and communities is responsible fuels reduction projects within the 500 meter Community Protection Zone. No community should be left at risk while the Bush administration and the Forest Service waste money and time on unnecessary salvage logging projects.