BY REX BOWMAN
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

Aug 14, 2006


ROANOKE -- Environmentalists are vowing to continue their fight against logging in the Jefferson National Forest in Virginia despite new U.S. Forest Service rules they say will increase timber cuts.

Various environmental groups had filed appeals two years ago to stop proposed land-management plans for five Southern national forests, including the Jefferson, arguing that the Forest Service ignored conservationists' analysis that the plans would allow logging to destroy wildlife habitat and choke pristine streams.

Last month, the Forest Service chief upheld the plans, which establish guidelines for managing about 2.7 million acres of national forestland in the South for the next 10 to 15 years.

Having lost the war over the management plans, the Charlottesville-based Southern Environmental Law Center responded last week by saying it will still battle to shut down particular logging jobs.

"We will continue to file legal challenges to stop the worst projects on these public lands, which citizens increasingly value for recreation and environmental values than for timber," law center staff attorney Sarah Francisco said. "We're not going to let them log our roadless areas or our old-growth forests. We're not going to let them muddy our clean mountain streams or build roads through remote wildlife habitat. And we're not going to let them scrape away the forested views along our trails."

The forests covered under the management plans are the Jefferson, the Cherokee National Forest in Tennessee, the Sumter National Forest in South Carolina, the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest in Georgia and the National Forests in Alabama. The Jefferson stretches over 732,000 acres in western and Southwest Virginia.

JoBeth Brown, a Forest Service spokeswoman in Roanoke, said the new management plan will reduce the amount of logging allowed in the Jefferson. Under the old plan, she said, loggers were allowed to cut 27 million board feet per year; under the new plan the maximum is 21 million board feet. The old plan allowed logging on 302,000 acres, she said, while the new plan permits logging on 258,000 acres. Brown added that logging actually occurs on only 0.5 percent of Jefferson land annually.

But the Wilderness Society, Sierra Club and the Southern Appalachian Forest Coalition, all represented by the law center, contend the 21 million board feet allowed is too high because loggers have typically cut about 11 million board feet from the forest in past years.

"The plans allow roughly double the level of logging compared to recent harvest levels, which means more roadbuilding, loss of prime wildlife habitat, threats to water quality and ruined recreation experiences," according to a written statement from the law center.

Contact staff writer Rex Bowman at rbowman@timesdispatch.com or (540) 344-3612.

Source: Richmond Times-Dispatch online article