GOP Assails Clinton Forest Plan
12/13/99
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Title: GOP Assails Clinton Forest Plan
Source: The Associated Press
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: December 13, 1999
Byline: John Hughes
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Forest Service should scrap its 2-month-old
process for protecting 50 million acres of federal forests and begin
again, two GOP senators said in a letter released Monday.
The process ``is replete with what we believe are fatal flaws,''
Sens. Bob Smith of New Hampshire and Frank Murkowski of Alaska told
Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck. ``To remedy these fatal flaws, the
entire ... process must be started over.
Forest Service officials have held more than 150 meetings in national
forests and in cities since they began a yearlong process Oct. 19 to
write rules that permanently protect the 50 million roadless acres,
which have not been developed or logged.
The senators' letter cited specific complaints about the hearing
process:
-Agency officials have not said how many acres are being set aside in
each national forest.
-The public had only two days' notice of a meeting in Juneau,
Alaska, had to draw names from a hat to speak in Portland, Ore., and
were told they could not comment verbally at the Mark Twain National
Forest in Missouri.
-Meeting formats seem to favor plan supporters in urban areas over
rural opponents, which ``casts a very disturbing pall over the
process.''
Smith chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee,
Murkowski the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
Chris Wood, a senior policy advisor to Dombeck, said the agency is
examining the seven-page letter and will respond in detail later.
But he said the agency was required by law only to gather written
comments, not to hold hearings.
``It's safe to say the outreach we have made is unprecedented,'' Wood
said.
Details of the plan, such as acreage amounts in individual forests,
are not yet set because the comment-gathering process is still under
way, he said.
Environmentalists have praised the directive, announced Oct. 13 by
President Clinton, as one of the century's most ambitious
conservation efforts. Republicans have criticized Clinton for
bypassing Congress and accused him of blocking access to many of the
nation's 192 million acres of public forests.