New Rules Affect Salvage Logging Sales Surprise Memo Has Forest Officials Scrambling To Review Sales

More than 150 million board feet of timber sales in the Inland Northwest could be delayed, modified or stopped by new salvage logging rules.

That could bring bad news to the region’s sawmills, whose owners had been counting on salvage logging to boost log supplies.

Surprise orders from Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman Tuesday has local forest officials scrambling to figure out which sales are no longer allowed under the salvage law passed by Congress in 1995. His memorandum directs the Forest Service not to allow salvage logging in roadless areas unless there is great fire danger for urban areas. It also could tighten the rules for taking green trees under the salvage law.

The broad discretion contained in the salvage bill “has created an atmosphere where distrust is far too prevalent,” Glickman said. “The government has got to be careful and responsible in the use of this unprecedented power.”

Environmentalists, eager to stop the so-called “logging without law” measure, have tallied six salvage sales with 91.5 million board feet of timber in roadless areas in northeastern Washington, North Idaho and western Montana that could be affected by Glickman’s order. There are another 63.5 million board feet of green timber sales in the region that were blocked before the 1995 logging bill passed by Congress, are being reoffered under the salvage law, and could be stopped by the new rules, they say.

Glickman’s ruling came just as U.S. Sen. Dirk Kempthorne, R-Idaho, and other members of the Idaho and Washington delegations asked President Clinton to meet with mill workers to talk about how federal timber policy affects their livelihood. But it’s not clear how much Glickman’s orders limit regional salvage sales. Local Forest Service officials were caught cold with the memorandum and aren’t sure how the rules will apply.

“Some of our sales could be affected - we really won’t know until next week,” said Kerry Arneson of the Panhandle National Forest.

The Panhandle figures it will have to wrestle with questions about two sales covering 15 million board feet. That doesn’t include the controversial Barney Rubble’s Cabin salvage sale, said Carl Gidlund, spokesman for the Panhandle Forests.

That sale is hotly contested by local environmentalists, who say it was successfully appealed before the 1995 salvage law. “It has the same name. Our interpretation is it’s a new sale, in different areas,” Gidlund said.

Some 63 million board feet of sales on the Clearwater National Forest could be affected, as well as millions more on the Colville, Kootenai, and Nez Perce forests.

U.S. Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, quickly criticized the new rules and accused the Clinton administration of interpreting the law so narrowly that virtually no salvage timber sales will qualify. Craig will demand a full accounting from the Forest Service as “to which salvage timber sales are scuttled under the directive and why.”

The move bodes ill for forest health, Craig said.

But a Forest Service press release says forest health isn’t just about commercial timber, but includes water quality, soil conditions, species diversity, wildlife habitat and other things.

Environmentalists are skeptical of the entire exercise. Larry McLaud of the Idaho Conservation League said he doubted Glickman’s rules “will have any teeth.”

, DataTimes