Agency Names New Forester For The Region
Hal Salwasser, the regional forester for Montana and North Idaho, is being moved to California, to be replaced by the regional forester from Utah, Dale Bosworth.
Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck announced those changes and several others Wednesday, with the transfers generally well received by environmentalists and the industry alike.
Timber industry officials had no immediate criticism and an aide to Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, an ally of the industry, said all the appointments appeared to be legitimate professional promotions.
Michael Francis, national forests director for the Wilderness Society, said it was a sign Dombeck was making good on his pledge to place more emphasis on recreation and wildlife protection over logging of national forests.
“It sends a signal. In order to institute change, you’ve got to rock the boat in a bureaucracy,” Francis said.
The changes came in assignments in the Southeast, Colorado and the Northern Rocky Mountains as well as deputy chiefs in Washington, D.C.
Among the seven changes:
Salwasser, Region 1 forester for Montana, North Idaho and the Dakotas, will head the agency’s Pacific Southwest Research Station in Berkeley, Calif.
Bosworth, Region 4 forester for Utah, Nevada, western Wyoming and southern Idaho will replace Salwasser in the Region 1 job based in Missoula.
Elizabeth Estill, Region 2 forester for Colorado, eastern Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas, will become regional forester for the 13-state Southern Region 8 based in Atlanta stretching from Texas to Virginia.
Lyle Laverty, the agency’s current national director of recreation, will replace Estill in the Region 2 job based in Denver.
xxxx If cuts work, mergers won’t happen Associated Press MISSOULA National forests in the U.S. Forest Service Northern Region won’t face consolidation if alternative costcutting and money-raising measures are effective by 1999, Regional Forester Hal Salwasser said Tuesday. Consolidation and office closings have been moved to the “back edge of the table,” he said. “The bottom line in all of these proposals is that we’re going to do everything we can to not have office consolidations.” Employee cuts of 400 to 600 from the region’s work force of 3,600 also will be a last resort, he said. Salwasser and agency officials announced last winter that the Missoula-based region and its national forests in Montana, northern Idaho and the Dakotas faced a $20 million budget shortfall by 1999. While consolidation of some offices would save some money, it would be too disruptive, Salwasser said. The political and community damage that would be incurred was too much, he said. The possibility of consolidating some offices generated significant opposition from communities and from agency employees, he said. Still, if the Forest Service cannot fix its budget woes in the next year and a half, the agency will be forced to consider office cutbacks, he said.