Campaigns

The Northwest Forest Plan

In Brief: Since 1994, the Northwest Forest Plan has protected 24 million acres of public land from relentless clearcut logging practices. The Bush administration worked to systematically weaken this management framework but failed because their approach skirted the law.

Assault on Northwest Forests

Northern Spotted Owl

Photo: NPS

The Bush administration launched a systematic effort to weaken the legal framework that conserves what is left of the magnificent old growth forests that once dominated the Northwest. Since 1994 the Northwest Forest Plan has governed the management of 24 million acres of public land in Washington, Oregon, and northern California. The Plan was a revolutionary change from the relentless clearcut logging that had long dominated the landscape. It shifted the focus away from pure timber production toward a more scientifically based ecosystem approach allowing some logging while protecting important wildlife habitat. The Bush administration worked hard for eight years to weaken the Plan through a combination of low profile regulatory changes and secretive litigation settlements with the timber industry. Earthjustice successfully challenged virtually every move by the administration and succeeded in upholding the legal protections embodied in the Plan.

  Learn more about the origins of the Northwest Forest Plan

Components of the Northwest Forest Plans

The Northwest Forest Plan has multiple elements.

1. It created forest reserves where destructive activities such as logging and roadbuilding are limited
2. It included an Aquatic Conservation Strategy (ACS) for salmon and other species that live in rivers and streams
3. It implemented a Survey and Manage program to protect lesser-known old-growth species that often depend on forestland outside the Plan's designated reserves

  Learn more about the components of the Northwest Forest Plan

Dismantling the Plan's Environmental Protections

In late 2002, Earthjustice exposed the timber industry's goal of tripling logging in Northwest. To succeed, the industry demanded that the Bush administration remove existing protections for salmon, clean water, and old-growth forests. The timber industry groups outlined five needs:

1. Weaken the Aquatic Conservation Strategy
2. Weaken northern spotted owl Endangered Species Act protections
3. Weaken marbled murrelet Endangered Species Act protections
4. Eliminate the Survey and Manage program
5. Weaken ecosystem and species protections on 2.2 million acres of Bureau of Land Management land

  Learn more about the timber industry's plans to dismantle the Northwest Forest Plan

Bush Administration Accedes to Industry Demands

The Bush administration fully acceded to the industry's wish list.

• In March 2004, the administration completed an overhaul the Aquatic Conservation Strategy that sought to fundamentally alter its protections.
• In January 2003, the administration settled friendly industry lawsuits involving spotted owls and marbled murrelets, pledging to review their current status.
• In March 2002, the administration settled an industry lawsuit involving the Survey and Manage program that proposes reverting to optional protections.
• In August 2003, the administration settled a 1994 industry suit in order to re-interpret environmental protections for Bureau of Land Management forests in western Oregon.

  Learn more about the administration's effort to undermine forest protections

Courts Rebuff Bush Administration

Earthjustice challenged almost every one of the Bush efforts to tear down and weaken the Northwest Forest Plan. We successfully challenged the elimination of protections for rivers and salmon and restored the Aquatic Conservation Strategy to the Northwest Forest Plan. Our participation in a lawsuit brought by the timber industry has kept the marbled murrelet protected as a threatened species. We have challenged the scientifically flawed owl recovery plan and the 2008 reductions in owl critical habitat; and we have challenged the Bureau of Land Management's Western Oregon Plan Revision -- the wholesale management change that opens up over 2.5 million acres of federal public forest in Oregon to regressive clearcut logging. Good outcomes in these cases will protect the forests, the rivers, the fish, the wildlife, and the communities that get their clean drinking water from the these areas.

Check our website for updates related to this assault on our ancient forests.