Forest Service Should Reject Logging Plan for Tongass National Forest

I have recently sent a letter along with over 70 of my colleagues in the House calling on the Forest Service to reject the recently released draft land management plan for the Tongass National Forest in Alaska.  The plan continues the inefficient and unprofitable timber sales program in Tongass that has been a perennial money-loser for decades, forcing U.S. taxpayers to waste $1 billion since 1982 on the logging of this ancient rainforest.  Not only is this program extremely harmful to the environment and ecosystem of the Tongass National Forest, but it is also a colossal waste of your money. 

I have included my letter to the Forest Service below.

The level of logging targeted by the Forest Service in their “proposed action” alternative for 2007 is exactly the same as the target level in the 1997 plan and more than five times what southeast Alaska’s independent sawmills have logged annually over the past 15 years.  The Forest Service’s inaccurate projections have forced taxpayers to pay for an inefficient, unprofitable timber program and the unnecessary construction of expensive new logging roads. According to an independent analysis of Forest Service data, the agency has lost an average of $40 million annually for 25 years.

The Tongass National Forest is the only forest in the Untied States where commercial logging is allowed in roadless areas. With the draft plan’s bias toward logging, the Forest Service is clinging to a financially-failed policy that holds the Tongass roadless areas in trust for the timber industry rather than the American people.  I will continue to oppose logging in Tongass and will fight so that your taxpayer dollars are being used intelligently and responsibly. 

Dear Chief Kimbell:

            We are writing to express our concern about the proposed action for the January 2007 Draft Land and Resource Management Plan for the Tongass National Forest. Under the revised plan, the timber sale program would continue to require annual federal subsidies of $40 50 million.

            Since 1982, the Forest Service has lost nearly a billion dollars subsidizing timber sales on the Tongass.  During this time, timber employment has significantly decreased due to declining demand for Tongass timber products, however; program costs remains high.  As a result, fewer than 300 jobs are now attributable to the Tongass timber sale program.  The cost to federal taxpayers is over $150,000 per job per year. 

            The high cost of the Tongass timber sale program is based on past economic conditions in southeast Alaska. The new Forest Service plan fails to address these changes.  The agency continues to plan timber sales at volumes far exceeding the demand. 

            Most timber sales continue to be planned in remote areas requiring expensive road construction, and resulting in significant adverse effects on wildlife, tourism, subsistence, and recreation.  The Tongass National Forest contains the largest remaining tracts of old-growth temperate rainforest in the world, including many roadless watersheds with native species such as bald eagles, brown bears, wolves, black-tail deer and salmon.  Given that almost four percent of the Tongass is made up of the large old growth that is vital to fish and wildlife, this habitat is a valued treasure.  Already, more than half this rare and valuable old-growth in the Tongass has been clear cut.

            The Tongass forest planning process now underway presents an opportunity for change.  However; the proposed action does not make any substantial changes to the current plan.  The annual allowable timber sale quantity would remain at 267 million board-feet; the total volume logged on the Tongass in the last six years combined.  Like the existing plan, the proposed action leaves 2.4 million acres of roadless areas open to road construction, with most of the timber coming from these costly-to-access sections.  The new plan should reduce costs to the federal taxpayers by decreasing the planned timber sale volume and eliminating new logging roads.  Continuing without change is not sustainable and is a disservice to the American people and the residents of southeast Alaska.

            We strongly encourage the USDA to reject the proposed action for the Tongass plan and adopt a balanced solution which meets the true needs of Southeast Alaska's communities and economy.

            Thank you for your attention to this matter.  We look forward to your response.

Sincerely,

Robert E. Andrews
Member of Congress 

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