Craig Is All Bark On Canceled Timber Sales Senator Seeks Investigation On How Much It Costs Feds To Drop Contracts Because Of Environmental Laws
U.S. Sen. Larry Craig wants the General Accounting Office to investigate how much it costs the federal government to cancel timber sale contracts for environmental reasons.
Craig is concerned about cases where he believes the Forest Service has had to pay timber companies for sales canceled because of the Endangered Species Act or other environmental laws.
But Forest Service officials say environmental laws never have prompted any timber sale cancellations on the Idaho Panhandle National Forests or the Colville National Forest.
Nor has that scenario occurred anywhere in Region One of the Forest Service, which covers the Clearwater and Nez Perce forests in Idaho and all national forests in Montana.
“We have not canceled any sales in Region One as of today” said Dan Castillo, assistant director of forest and range management for Region One for the past seven years.
The Forest Service has canceled a few sales over road problems, but that was done with the agreement of the buyer, Castillo said.
Andy Anding, timber management officer for the Panhandle National Forests, gave a similar accounting. There have been two cases where timber sales were modified because of the Endangered Species Act in North Idaho, he said.
In one instance, the timber buyer agreed to give up about half of the timber. In the other, the Forest Service was able to find other trees in the sale area to make up for the timber that was withdrawn.
“When we run into one of these problems, we go to the purchaser and see if there’s a modification we can make,” Anding said.
The Panhandle Forests have never had to buy out a timber sale contract during Anding’s 12 years on the forest.
Craig, an Idaho Republican, wrote the GAO last week asking for the investigation, according to the Associated Press. He cited an internal Forest Service memo dated June 1, 1994, that said the agency might need an additional $200 million in that budget year to pay timber companies for eliminating contracts.
“We may be accruing several hundred million dollars in liability to the government with no real idea of how large the bill will be, when it will come due or who will pay for it, and an even vaguer understanding of who is responsible for deciding when and under what circumstances the assumption of this liability is justified,” Craig wrote.
Craig, chairman of the Senate subcommittee on forests and public land management, said he expects at least a preliminary analysis from the GAO by this summer.
Forest Service spokesman Alan Polk in Washington, D.C., said the agency would cooperate fully with an investigation.
, DataTimes