The Trump administration and the U.S. Forest Service (FS), Department of Agriculture, support legislation and rules that silence citizens, reduce environmental review, and expand logging in our National Forests. The Sierra Club needs your help to stop this.
1. Stop the “Fix Our Forests Act”. This bill is deceptive and is really the “Log our Forests Act”. This terrible logging bill has passed the U.S. House of Representatives and is in the U.S. Senate. In the Senate, the bill is S.B. 1462.
Go to the websites of Texas U.S. Senators John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, find their “contact me” webpage, and in your own words tell them this bill will:
a. Cut out public participation and environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and Endangered Species Act (ESA). It uses “emergencies” to do this which ignore public input/will. It increases road milage and access to our forests which will increase wildfires because humans cause 80-90% of all wildfires.
b. Allow huge categorical exclusions on 10,000-acre logging projects (That’s 15 square miles!) with no environmental and public comment/review. This will result in logging old growth forests and large, old, trees.
c. Fibs that commercial logging and grazing protect communities from wildfires. Science says fireproofing homes (home hardening), protection 100 feet around homes (defensible space), and emergency planning prevent wildfire damage. These proven alternatives to logging, aren’t funded by S.B. 1462.
Tell Cornyn and Cruz that you support public comment/review of proposed logging projects, complete environmental review of these projects, and funding wildfire reduction alternatives of home hardening, defensible space, and emergency planning.
2. Write the FS about Proposed Changes to Project Objection Rules. For many years the FS has had rules for objections (project-level pre-decisional administrative review process) to proposed logging and other projects in the National Forests.
The FS proposes to change these rules so the timetable for making an objection is reduced from 45 days to 10 or 20 days (22%-44% reduction) and limits objection pages from the public to 15-30 from the current “no page limit” requirements.
A lot of research, in the field surveys, and written explanations are needed for an objection of a proposed FS logging project. These FS proposed limits ensure that objections won’t occur or will be written less comprehensively.
These objection submittal time and page limits reduce public participation further than already approved recent FS rules which weaken forest environmental protection. Contact the FS either:
a. Electronically, using the RIN 0596-AD69 identification number for this proposal, at the Federal eRulemaking Portal: https://www.regulations.gov.
b. By mail, using the RIN 0596-AD69 identification number for this proposal: Director, Ecosystem Management Coordination, 201 14th Street SW, mailstop 1108, Washington, D.C. 20250-1124.
Tell the FS you want no changes to the current objection rules. The public deserves enough time to fully research and write an objection to a proposed FS logging or other project and the proposal doesn’t allow this.
If you have any questions, contact: Brandt Mannchen at 281-570-7212 or brandt_mannchen@comcast.net.