Well, the Bush administration finally made its move on the Roadless Rule -- the decision adopted at the end of the Clinton administration to protect the remaining unroaded areas on the national forests.

The administration's shameful proposal to abandon the rule, you see, effectively tries to turn back the clock not only on the Roadless Rule itself, but also on protections for pristine forests that existed for a decade or more before the Roadless Rule was finalized.

The reason the rule was hatched in the first place was that management of the national forests had led to unsightly clearcuts, unmaintained roads (an official maintenance backlog of more than $10 billion and counting), silted-in spawning beds for fish, and an increasingly restive public. Protests and lawsuits had slowed the juggernaut, but something more comprehensive needed to be done.

Maybe Congress could be persuaded to go after the Forest Service's road budget. Starting in the 'eighties, a campaign was mounted to let members of Congress know about the crisis on the nation's forests. Momentum built, and by 1996 it almost happened. The House voted by a margin of two votes to strip road funding from the agency's budget -- but Speaker Gingrich called for reconsideration, twisted arms, and enough Members switched their votes to change the outcome. The next year, an identical Senate vote ended in a tie. It was clear to everyone that within a very short time the purse strings would be tied.

That led Mike Dombeck, Chief of the Forest Service, to begin seeking a solution. The end result was the Roadless Rule. (It's a far more involved story, of course, about which I plan to write in great detail before too long.)

In any event, it appears that we are back to the budget-battle approach to forest conservation. As a precursor to its proposal to eviscerate the rule itself, the Forest Service exempted the Tongass National Forest in Alaska from roadless protections the day before Christmas Eve last year. In response, conservationists teamed up with taxpayer groups and succeeded in getting the House to pass an amendment to cut off money for new logging road construction in the Tongass this past June. That bill now heads to the Senate, where Alaska's Senator Ted Stevens rules the Appropriations Committee. It's a difficult way to do business, but the forest-protection lobby is determined and resourceful. Stay tuned.

Tom Turner, Senior Editor
yourturn@earthjustice.org