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The largest economic values that would be automatically foreclosed by the roadless designations involve future losses in recreational opportunity. If the Clinton actions stand, they will leave 56 percent of the total national forest lands set aside for primitive recreation, and 44 percent will be available for all the many other forms of more developed forms of recreation. Yet, activities associated with developed recreationsites are more popular with the American public and are also the most rapidly growing. Hikers, hunters, fishermen, snowmobilers, skiers, bird watchers, and many others, will all face new limits on the ability to expand their recreation opportunities.

A total of 7.6 million acres of land with oil and gas potential are found within designated roadless areas. According to a recent study commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy, a mean estimate of about 11 trillion cubic feet of natural gas may underlie the designated roadless areas and would largely be lost for exploration and production.

In summary, as I said, I am not arguing for any particular management in the future for any particular area of land in the national forests. Roadlessness may be appropriate in some places. But to seek to impose a single national land standard is the central error of the Clinton actions. These actions try to resolve such matters from Washington, DC. My concern is to maintain our future management options. Without any adequate justification, the Clinton roadless designations would preclude many important management actions that could offer large benefits to the American people. The Congress should act promptly to restore an element of common sense to national forest management.

Mr. OSE. Thank you Dr. Nelson.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Nelson follows:]

CEL

COMPETITIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE

RESCIND THE CLINTON 58.5 MILLION ACRE

ROADLESS DESIGNATIONS

Testimony of Robert H. Nelson

Hearing on "A Rush to Regulate - The Congressional Review Act and Recent Federal Regulations."

Subcommittee on Energy Policy, Natural Resources and Regulatory Affairs, Committee on Government Reform, U.S. House of Representatives

Washington, D.C.

March 27, 2001

1001 Connecticut Avenue, NW • Suite 1250 Washington, DC. 20036
Phone: (202) 331-1010 • Fax: (202) 331-0640 • E-mail: info@cei.org • Web site: http://www.cei.org

My name is Robert H. Nelson. I am a professor of environmental policy in the School of Public Affairs of the University of Maryland and senior fellow of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. From 1975 to 1993, I worked in the Office of Policy Analysis of the Office of the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, devoting much of my time there to policy issues relating to federal land management. I have published many articles and three books on the subject of federal land management, including most recently A Burning Issue: A Case for Abolishing the U. S. Forest Service (2000). As a longstanding critic of many aspects of federal land management, I find myself in the somewhat novel position today of defending the future prerogatives of professional land managers. That is a measure of the concern I have with respect to actions taken by President Bill Clinton in his last few weeks in office.

In one of those last acts in January 2001, former President Clinton set aside 58.5 million acres of new "roadless" areas on the national forests. This was adding to an existing 35 million acres of roadless areas in the national wilderness system that had previously been approved by Congress within the national forests. Combined, if the Clinton action stands, Congressionally approved and de facto wilderness areas will now equal 93 million acres, almost half of the total land in the national forest system (192 million acres).

This is a vast amount of land to set aside in such a restrictive land status that precludes most management - equal to 5 percent of the total land area of the United States. Idaho has a higher percentage of its area in national forests than any other state, 40 percent. Following the Clinton designations, 25 percent of the total area of Idaho would now be in a wilderness status.

I believe the Clinton designation of this 58.5 million acres was a reckless and misguided regulatory action, in a category with some other unfortunate actions of the final days of the Clinton administration. Congress should apply the provisions of the Congressional Review Act to rescind these roadless designations. If the Congress does not do so, the Bush administration should act on its own administratively to accomplish this result.

The Central Issue - Management or No Management

I should emphasize that the main policy issue posed by the recent Clinton designations is not one of whether there will or should be any roadless areas on the national forests. Indeed, well before the Clinton directive, local Forest Service planners had already identified 24 million acres for roadless management in local land use plans for national forests - 40 percent of the total areas subsequently designated by the Clinton actions. The same planners had also designated an additional 15 million acres for roadless management in areas that lie altogether outside the areas that Clinton designated.

Whatever happens, most of the land at issue will remain unroaded for many years to come. Over the next 20 years, and according to Forest Service projections, no more

than perhaps 5 to 10 percent of the areas designated by Clinton for a roadless status might actually become roaded, if the Clinton actions should now be rescinded.

The real issue is whether there will be adequate flexibility in the future with respect to management actions extending over about half of the total area of the national forest system. There are a host of reasons why active management may be desirable or even necessary on these lands. The Clinton roadless designations simply sweep aside any such possibilities by the imposition of a single national mandate precluding most management.

Procedural Failings

Prior to the Clinton designations, the Forest Service had been engaged for many years in the development of land use plans for the national forests in these areas. Local citizens had in good faith put in countless hours in learning about, discussing, and debating the land management options for the nearby national forest lands. For a third of the national forest system, these efforts were undermined by the roadless mandates. It amounted to a betrayal of the trust of these citizens on the part of the Forest Service.

The Forest Service recognized the violation of its own longstanding forest planning commitments, as indicated in the agency's Final Environmental Impact (FEIS) for the roadless designations, released in November 2000. As the Forest Service FEIS stated, the agency had long sought to promote "a collaborative approach between agencies, partners and the [local] public" but, as many people would now inevitably perceive, "the Roadless Rule contradicts the [past] emphasis placed on collaboration" (FEIS, p. 3-369) and instead reflects a strategy of "maximizing national prohibitions" (FEIS, p. 3-238) on the use of national forest lands. As a result, the Clinton actions were likely to "undermine local communities' trust in the [Forest Service] public involvement process over the short term," although it could be hoped that "this trust may be regained over the long term" (FEIS, p. 3-369).

The Clinton actions also swept aside the longstanding role of the U.S. Congress in determining the establishment of new wilderness areas on the federal lands. Since the Wilderness Act of 1964, Congress has specifically approved each new permanent wilderness area. This has often involved long debate and careful legislative consideration of each new area proposed for inclusion in the national wilderness system. In January 2001, in one action, the Clinton administration bypassed this process to increase the total acreage of effective wilderness areas on the national forest system by 160 percent. Although the Clinton roadless areas will not officially be wilderness areas, the combination of the regulatory management restrictions formally established by the Clinton actions, and the informal restrictions that are sure to be recognized in day-to-day management by Forest Service field employees on the ground, would make them for all practical purposes new wilderness areas. Over time, the roadless areas would be likely to become indistinguishable in management from the lands in the national wilderness

system - as was in fact probably the expectation and strategy of the Clinton decision makers.

Most management options will automatically be precluded over the 58.5 million acres of roadless areas. I do not propose to suggest that any one type of management is appropriate for such a vast area involving so many local circumstances. What may be helpful for the Congress is to consider some of the many important management actions that would now be ruled out without any further consideration, and the possible reasons why such actions may actually be needed in the future for many of the areas that would now be designated for a permanent roadless status.

The importance of maintaining future management options comes clear to any careful reviewer of the Forest Service's own Final Environmental Impact Statement for the roadless area policy. As well as any outsider could, the information and data documented at length by the Forest Service professionals themselves demonstrate clearly the folly of a single national policy that would preclude the great majority of forms of affirmative management over such a large part of the national forests.

Forest Fire and the Forest Environment

Despite the public image of protecting "nature" little touched by prior human impact, according to Forest Service figures, about 50 percent of the newly designated roadless areas in the lower 48 states actually consist of declining forests in a moderate to advanced state of ill health and ecological deterioration (FEIS, p. 3-83). The principal reason for their dire condition is a previous century of the Forest Service following an active policy of suppression of forest fire.

In ponderosa pine and other types of western forests, frequent low intensity fires historically removed the underbrush and other invasive tree species. Suppressing forest fires for decades disrupted this natural process, however, leaving many forests now with as many as 300 to 500 small and fire prone trees per acre, where 50 or so much larger trees might have been the historic norm.

During the 1990s, various national expert groups, including the National Commission on Wildfire Disasters in 1994 and the General Accounting Office in 1998 and 1999, warned that the west faced a high risk of catastrophic forest fires, if strong management actions were not taken to reduce the levels of "excess fuels" on western forests - and including prominently the national forests. Although the Clinton administration ignored these warnings and did little or nothing in response, prompted by the catastrophic fires of the summer of 2000, the administration was finally pushed to take action. By the fall of 2000, the Forest Service had established priority areas for forest treatments to reduce excess fuels and fire hazards on 89 million acres of national forest land.

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