[at-l] The Other MacKaye Vision

[Slyatpct at aol.com (Slyatpct@aol.com)]

In a message dated 7/22/2005 9:16:32 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
camojack@comcast.net writes:
> 
> 
> I'm fully aware of the clear-cutting that has occurred in the past, and not 
> just in Maine. I am glad that a more sensible approach to forestry, 
> sustainable harvesting AND old growth being left alone, has become the order of the 
> day.
> 

Get a grip friend, the HFI is nothing of the sort....



Debunking the "Healthy Forests Initiative"

The Healthy Forests Initiative (HFI) is President Bush?s response to the past 
year?s forest fires. The initiative is based on the false assumption that 
landscape-wide logging will decrease forest fires.

This premise is contradicted by the general scientific consensus, which has 
found that logging can increase fire risk. This disconnect between what the 
administration says and what science says about logging and fire reveals the 
administration?s true goal which is to use the forest fire issue to cut the public 
out of the public lands management decision making process and to give 
logging companies virtually free access to our National Forests. The HFI, if fully 
enacted, would:


Limit environmental analysis and limit public participation by (a) excluding 
environmental analysis for any site-specific project the Forest Service and 
BLM claim will reduce hazardous fuels, including post-fire salvage projects; and 
by (b) limiting public participation by allowing "hazardous fuels reduction 
projects" to be categorically excluded and suspends citizen's rights to appeal 
projects. 




Accelerate aggressive "thinning" across millions of acres of backcountry 
forests miles away from communities at risk to forest fires.




Uses 'Goods for services' as the Funding Mechanism by (a) allowing the Forest 
Service and Bureau of Land Management to give away trees to logging companies 
as payment for any management activity, including logging on public lands; 
and (b) creating a powerful new incentive to log large fire-resistant trees, old 
growth, and other commercially valuable forests. Here's what's hiding behind 
the smoke:
More detail on the Bush Administration's Healthy Forests Initiative (HFI)

Using the hype of the 2002 fire season, the Bush administration proposed a 
series of drastic administrative changes to the way our National Forests are 
managed. Combined, these proposals will give free reign to the timber industry 
across National Forests under the guise of "fuel reduction." The President's 
ill-named "Healthy Forests Initiative" will do little to protect communities and 
homes from forest fires, instead this sweeping initiative is concentrated on 
decreasing public involvement, reducing environmental protection and increasing 
access to our National Forests and other federal lands for timber companies.

Real public protection requires honest fuel reduction a quarter-mile around 
communities and involving the public and community leaders in long-term 
education and planning. Instead, the President's plan would promote logging of large, 
commercially valuable trees miles from at-risk communities. When the plan met 
with widespread public skepticism and Congress adjourned in late 2002 without 
passing Bush's legislation, the President decided to act by decree, pushing 
parts of his plan through administratively. The administration then began a 
series of new National Forest management proposals to limit the analysis of 
environmental impacts, repeal the ability of the public to appeal bad projects and 
increase the degradation of wild forests. Each proposal will increase harm to 
forest habitat and wildlife; together these proposals will turn scientific 
forest management back 40 years.