State Imposes New Logging Standards Rules Designed To Prevent Erosion, Dirty Streams
Loggers have to leave better trees, stay farther from streams and keep equipment off steep slopes under new, tougher logging rules on state and private land.
The new standards, the most sweeping changes to the state’s logging laws since they first were passed in the mid-1970s, came into play July 1. The changes grew out of studies in 1992 and 1993 that considered whether the Idaho Forest Practices Act was keeping water clean, soil intact and the air breathable.
The new regulations were adopted after contentious public hearings.
“The small loggers say it’s too much regulation,” said Jim Colla, a logging inspector with the Idaho Department of Lands. “The environmentalists say it’s not enough.”
“What we find is that when the rules are correctly applied, they are effective at protecting the water quality and ensuring you can have continued (timber) growth into the future,” Colla said. “When they’re not, we get dirt in the creek.”
Idaho’s 15 inspectors look at about half of the 6,000 logging jobs each year that occur everywhere but Forest Service land. But that’s quite a bit of coverage, Colla said.
“We know who the bad guys are and we have experienced people,” he said. Most folks aren’t shy about calling and complaining.
Thus, “there isn’t anybody in the state that looks at more bad logging jobs than me,” Colla said. However, some people confuse appearance and bad logging.
“We don’t regulate ugly, we don’t regulate aesthetics,” he cautioned.
More than 60 percent of the non-Forest Service logging jobs occur on industrial and private timber land in the five counties of North Idaho. These harvests far outstrip what’s done on Forest Service land.
Last year, for example, there were 87 million board feet logged from the Idaho Panhandle National Forests. More than four times as much - 445.3 million board feet of timber - was taken from industrial land owned by everyone from Plum Creek Timber Co. and Potlatch to private land owned by farmers and people with vacation hideaways.
The majority of logging jobs are done well, Colla said. Of the 6,000 jobs done last year on private and industrial lands last year, 620 generated unsatisfactory grades. A mere 32 ended up with the logger being issued a violation.
Most often the problem is related to loggers not installing adequate road drainage, leading to erosion.
Part of the reason the number of problems are so low, Colla said, is a change in the law a year ago that allows more drastic action with habitual violators. Repeat offenders now are required to post a bond for each logging job, which ranges from $5,000 to $15,000.
They also can be blocked from starting new logging jobs until problem jobs are fixed.
Overall, it works well and Colla isn’t eager to heed the calls for more rules, more regulations and more plans, he said. “When that happens, we end up sitting in the office, instead of being out on the ground, working with the land owner,” Colla said.
, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: New regulations As of July 1, the state of Idaho has implemented the most sweeping changes in the rules for logging on state and private land since the Idaho Forest Practices Act was implemented in 1976. The new regulations say: Skidding equipment such as tractors and bulldozers cannot be used on slopes steeper than 45 percent when those slopes are close to a stream. Logging skidders, bulldozers and roads no longer are allowed within 30 feet of a non-fish-bearing stream. The old limit was 5 feet. Logging still is allowed, but trees smaller than 8 inches in diameter have to be left to shade the streams. Trees have to be moved by a cable system, horses or similar method. Reforestation requirements have been tightened so that trees with dead tops or broken tops, those scarred by logging and other trees in poor condition no longer count as trees left as “seed trees.” People who log land but don’t replant it because they say they are converting it to other uses - such as a subdivision - have to convert the land within three years or replant trees. Prescribed burning is regarded as a forest practice, meaning only the state can regulate it and city and county governments cannot regulate it. But mandatory burning permits were rejected, so compliance with air quality rules is essentially voluntary, state officials said.