Counties Settle Fight Over Forest Plan ‘Cease-Fire’ Follows Pledge For More Local, State Control

A 3-year-old lawsuit against President Clinton’s landmark Northwest forest plan has been settled in exchange for a federal pledge to increase state and county involvement in revising the plan.

The lawsuit by 17 Western Oregon counties affects more than 2.4 million acres supervised by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

The acreage produced more than 1 billion board feet of timber annually during the 1980s but now produces less than 211 million board feet annually.

The Clinton forest plan required deep cuts in logging in an effort to end years of court battles and public policy gridlock over management of Pacific Northwest forests.

Released in 1994, the plan covered federal forests largely west of the Cascade Range, reducing timber harvests and increasing protection for the threatened spotted owl and other wildlife.

Western Oregon counties said logging levels on BLM lands were far too low small and went to court to try to force an increase.

“This is sort of a cease-fire rather than an end to hostilities for all time,” said Rocky McVay, executive director of the Association of O&C Counties.

Some conservationists feared the settlement could give counties an inside track on reshaping the BLM’s forest plan.

“These are national lands, and they are giving special emphasis to a special interest with a vested interest in extracting commodities,” said Bob Freimark of The Wilderness Society.

The counties had suffered legal setbacks in federal courts in Seattle and Washington, D.C., and also in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

While the counties withdraw from the court battle, the timber industry continues to press a lawsuit against the plan and has asked a Washington, D.C., appeals court to reopen the litigation, said Chris West of the Northwest Forestry Association.