Forest Service Boss Pledges Strong Salvage Effort Failure To Pursue Program Isn’t Good Leadership, Jack Ward Thomas Says

The U.S. Forest Service broke its long silence Monday in the firestorm over salvage logging of dead and dying timber.

Agency Chief Jack Ward Thomas told a Minneapolis wildlife conference “we will pursue an active and aggressive salvage program.”

But Thomas stopped far short of specifying timber targets, such as a House mandate that would cut 6 billion board feet over the next two years.

Thomas also indicated salvage would be confined to thinning operations of understory fir trees and not old, healthy pine trees now open to harvesting under congressional proposals.

“I do not believe that failure to salvage, with appropriate care, some significant portions of the billions of board feet of dead and dying timber while there are willing workers without work, a demand for the wood, and increasing social stress in the timber regions is either good leadership or good management,” Thomas said.

A wildlife biologist, Thomas spoke to the 60th North American Wildlife and Natural Resources Conference.

Last year, 52,000 fires burned 2.2 million acres of federal, state and private land, Thomas told the group. Total firefighting costs in national forests alone exceeded $700 million. He said the costs in human life were even higher; 28 firefighters died.

Prolonged drought and a species change in national forests make them more vulnerable to catastrophic wildfires, scientists say.

Flammable firs now dominate fireresistant pines, most of which were cut down throughout this century for their value. Grazing, better firefighting techniques and elimination of fire as a silvicultural tool also have created unhealthy forests, Thomas said.

Low-intensity fires can remove dangerous woody debris from the ground and inferior trees that feed monster fires.

“As chief of the Forest Service, I can no longer abide the agency being mired in a quagmire of controversy and suffering a paralysis born out of a fear of this controversy…,” he said.

Thomas’ remarks were unwelcome news to environmentalists fighting to stop a “timber grab” they say is fueled by greed and the conservative lawmakers.

The timber industry pointed to Thomas’ speech as proof that chain saws, in some instances, are the medical prescription for sick forests.

But some industry leaders adopted an “I’ll-believe-it-when-I-see-it” attitude.

Call it “guarded optimism,” said Bob Dick, Washington manager of the Northwest Forestry Association.

Liz Sedler, a Sandpoint environmentalist, said her Forest Watch group has no objection to salvage logging as long as other resources are protected.

But she said the forest health crisis is an “overblown” guise to reopen national forests to wholesale clearcutting and road building.

Joe Fox, a Forest Service smokejumper and former forest insect scientist, is speaking out against salvage proposals because of the agency’s track record.

“It’s been hard to stay silent watching what the Forest Service does in mutilating the land. I just can’t be quiet anymore,” said Fox, who will visit Capitol Hill this week.

Timber spokesman Dick said logging has evolved over the years from a system based entirely on economics to one that now coexists with fish and wildlife.

“We have ways of harvesting today that leave a comparatively light footprint on the land,” he said.