Where were they 20 years ago???

By Ralph Saperstein, NWTimberBlog

The Oregonian published an Editorial “Taking an ax to rural Oregon”.  In the piece the authors admonish President Obama’s Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, who during a recent trip touting President Obama’s Jobs Plan, predicted an end to county timber payments.

 

“Listening to Vilsack, it's not clear that he or anyone else leading the Obama administration fully understands the challenges of keeping county governments and schools operating in places where the U.S. Forest Service owns more than half the land and about the only economic activity it generates is whatever is spent putting out the wildfires that flare every summer.”

 

No kidding.  Since President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore came to Oregon to hold a timber summit in 1994, the federal government has failed to address the reality of rural Oregon’s dependence on the scientifically sound management of our federal forestland.

 

Instead, President Clinton’s Northwest Forest Plan has failed to maintain the economic and social viability of the rural communities in the Pacific Northwest.  Lately, elected officials urge continuing county timber payments. 

 

They decry the “broken promises” of discontinuing the county timber expenditures, or welfare payments, for all Western Counties that have lost the economic activity federal forestlands once provided.

 

This scream of “broken promises” misses the most important point.  The federal government, through the Departments of Agriculture and Interior promised rural communities that they would provide a Sustained Yield of raw materials for the independent timber industry.

 

Through the sale of timber, the federal forests would generate county revenue for schools and roads, and family-wage jobs for foresters, loggers, truckers, tree planters and thousands of mill workers.  That ‘community stability’ is the real broken promise of every Administration since the timber crisis began in the 1990’s.

 

Worse, while rural communities have been thrown under the bus, the forests continue to lose Northern Spotted Owl and other fish and wildlife habitat as a result of burning from uncharacteristic wildfires that result from the exclusion of scientifically sound forest management.

Taking an ax to rural Oregon

Published: Wednesday, September 28, 2011, 4:15 PM     Updated: Wednesday, September 28, 2011, 4:18 PM

By The Oregonian Editorial Board  

 

It's just as well that Portland was Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack's only Oregon stop on his tour this week promoting President Obama's jobs act. No audience in rural Oregon would have appreciated Vilsack's bleak view of the future of federal payments to counties.

Vilsack predicted that the expiring program that provides a lifeline to timber counties in Oregon and 40 other states will not survive the congressional supercommittee and its charge of making at least $1.5 trillion in spending cuts. If he's right -- and we hope he's not -- the payments arriving in Oregon in the coming days will be the last.

 

Brian Feulner/The Oregonian

 

If those payments are not renewed, and nothing is done to promptly provide the counties with more revenues from public forests, Oregon will have a rural catastrophe on its hands. Federal payments pay for essential services across timber country; without them, some county governments are likely headed for default.

Listening to Vilsack, it's not clear that he or anyone else leading the Obama administration fully understands the challenges of keeping county governments and schools operating in places where the U.S. Forest Service owns more than half the land and about the only economic activity it generates is whatever is spent putting out the wildfires that flare every summer.

Yes, there's a federal budget crisis. But the argument for support of communities surrounded by public forestlands has not changed in more than a century. One way or the other, through timber receipts, direct payments or another source -- the government is obliged to share the costs of schools, roads and other public services in places where federal ownership of land cuts deeply into local tax bases.

The Agriculture secretary repeated a lot of the same tried-and-failed economic ideas of the past 20 years -- that yet another forest rule will get things moving, that recreation is the answer for rural counties, that there's more money and investment coming, just you wait, from energy and other activities.

Well, new forest rules have come and gone, all to no particular effect. And while some communities -- Bend, Sisters, even Joseph -- have made themselves over into tourist towns, recreation hasn't proved an economic panacea. It hasn't helped, either, that the feds have cut spending on recreation.

Look, no one likes county payments, which are more or less welfare checks to over 700 counties. All these places would prefer jobs and sharing logging revenue and other strong economic activity from neighboring federal forests. Before Congress and the Obama administration leave county payments on the cutting-room floor, they have an obligation to deliver real alternatives.

There are promising ideas. Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., is promoting a plan to separate productive forests formerly owned by the O&C Railroad into two trusts, one that would protect old growth, the other that would be available for active commercial harvest. Others have proposed creating a new payment formula based on factors such as the counties with greatest need and rewarding counties for actions that bolster forest goals, such as reducing development near fire-prone areas.

Oregon's timber counties are surely open to change. But all these reforms seem distant, and the last county payment checks soon will be in the mail. It's wrong to cut the counties off before anything is done to increase revenue from forests, especially now, when rural communities are fighting for their very existence.

Legacy of logging roads brings change to Oregon forests, and so do the courts

Published: Monday, September 26, 2011, 4:43 PM     Updated: Tuesday, September 27, 2011, 6:06 AM

By Eric Mortenson, The Oregonian

View full size Benjamin Brink/The OregonianThe Tillamook State Forest is taking out 2.15 miles of old logging road along the Miami River.

 

GARIBALDI -- Miami Forest Road is what Oregon foresters call a "legacy" road, meaning it is left over from the days when people built a slap-dash network of dirt logging roads without much thought to salmon habitat.

This forest road, put in to salvage timber after wildfires in 1945, follows the Miami River, one of five streams that empty into Tillamook Bay. The river is a babbling trickle in summer, but come winter it swells with the rain cascading down the slopes and flowing under, over or through Miami Forest Road.

That runoff puts the old road, and hundreds like it, very much in the news. Last summer, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals equated stormwater runoff from logging roads with industrial pollution. Sediment can smother salmon eggs, and the court ruled road runoff is pollution that requires a discharge permit under the federal Clean Water Act.

The ruling stunned state and federal forest managers. A law firm representing timber companies said the court turned its understanding of the Clean Water Act "upside down." Private forestland owners worry their roads will be subject to more regulation as well. Oregon's political leaders want the ruling overturned. With thousands of miles of logging roads potentially requiring pollution discharge permits, a bitter tussle in the courts and in Congress seems certain.

But beyond the legal fight, the forest floor is changing.

From 1997 to 2009, public and private forests closed or decommissioned 2,572 miles of logging roads, according to the Oregon Forest Resources Institute, an educational organization established by the Legislature.

The Mount Hood National Forest alone is reviewing about 3,389 miles of "legacy" logging roads -- most of them built from the 1940s to the 1980s when timber production was seen as the forests' primary function, U.S. Forest Service spokesman Rick Acosta said. So far, the forest service has decided to take out 746 miles of road.

The closures will result in a "right-sized road system" that's capable of meeting the multiple mandates of the modern forest: Clean water, wildlife habitat and recreation in addition to wood products, Acosta said.

Elsewhere, state forests installed 63,055 cross drains on logging roads from 1995 through 2008 to route runoff away from streams.

On Miami Forest Road this summer, the Tillamook State Forest is decommissioning 2.15 miles of road. The $200,000 project includes plowing the surface, removing two bridges and digging out multiple metal culverts. Excavators created humped terrain to slow down and catch stormwater, and placed dozens of 60-foot logs and ponderous root wads in the river to form pools, filter gravel and improve salmon habitat.

The old logging road has paid the price of the Miami River's fitful nature, said Kate Skinner, assistant district forester. Segments had to be reinforced with riprap where the river took a bite in the past, and slides are a hazard. Taking out the section of it made sense, Skinner said, especially because other roads provide access to areas likely to be logged in the future.

Hunters, hikers and anglers can continue using the area, but they'll have to park and walk in, Skinner said.

The work is largely paid for by an Oregon State Lottery grant obtained by Denise Lofman, executive director of the Tillamook Bay Watershed Council. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service provided $26,000 for habitat work downstream.

 

Logging Road Decommissioned Tillamook State Forest and local watershed council team up to decommission an old logging road that runs along the Miami River. Watch video

Lofman said juvenile coho salmon, which spend winter in the river before migrating to the ocean, will be the chief beneficiaries when the work ends this month.

"It's allowing the river to do what it wants," she said.

A winding road

The appeals court decision sprang from a lawsuit involving two other roads in the Tillamook State Forest. Environmentalists measured runoff entering the South Fork of the Trask River and the Little South Fork of the Kilchis River.

In pressing for Supreme Court review, Gov. John Kitzhaber has said he supports work to improve logging roads and prevent harmful discharges to streams. He wants collaboration, "not management by lawsuit," he said in July news release.

Meanwhile, Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden introduced legislation that would exempt logging, thinning and other forest activities from pollution discharge permits.

But Portland attorney Christopher Winter, who worked on the case for Northwest Environmental Defense Center, said state and timber industry officials overstate the "chaos" the appeals court ruling will cause.

To date, no one has filed for a discharge permit. Winter said timber operators, loggers and haulers will be in "knowing violation of the Clean Water Act" if they don't follow the court's ruling and get permits.

The issue isn't going away anytime soon.

Deciding to decommission logging roads isn't as simple as it might seem, said Julia Jones, a Department of Geosciences professor at Oregon State University. She's studied the hydrology of logging road runoff.

"Are the roads going to be used again?" she asked. "Because the trees are going to keep growing. There will be a need to do firefighting and logging."

Problems can arise. Firefighters attempting to reach the Dollar Lake Fire on the northeast side of Mount Hood this month were temporarily stymied by two recently decommissioned logging roads.

Meanwhile, private timberland owners believe the court ruling will result in another layer of control and scrutiny, said Tom Nygren, who owns 80 acres of timber in the Chehalem Ridge area near Newberg and 85 acres near Drain, in Douglas County.

"We all require roads to manage our property," Nygren said. "We're concerned about overlaying a new system on top of that."

His Chehalem Ridge property was logged between 1904 and 1910, again during World War II and a third time in 2000. It has a dirt road rebuilt by Willamette Industries when it logged most recently. Nygren said he mows and maintains the road, and clears the culvert when necessary. His Douglas County property has old logging roads closed off by brush, and an access road maintained by Bonneville Power Administration.

Nygren said he doesn't use his road during the winter, when it's muddy. He hasn't seen road sediment flowing into the two small streams that cross his property. The most recent logging left a significant buffer of trees along the banks, and thick vegetation blocks soil movement, he said.

Additional regulation may encourage small woodland owners to develop their property instead of bothering with a permit system that could be costly and complicated, Nygren said.

"If there is a problem we ought to be looking at that, but it should be based on good science," he said.

--Eric Mortenson

Forestry dean to step down

From Corvallis Gazete Times
OSU News and Communications |
Posted: Saturday, September 24, 2011 9:00 am

Hal Salwasser, a professor and dean of the College of Forestry at Oregon State University for the past 12 years, announced Friday that he will step down as dean at the of the 2011-12 academic year in June.
A press release from OSU indicated that Salwasser will remain on the faculty even after he leaves as dean.

In the press release, OSU did not provide a reason for the change.

Salwasser also serves as the executive dean of the Division of Earth Systems Science and the director of the Oregon Forest Research lab.

OSU’s College of Forestry is considered one of the nation’s best.

The search for Salwasser’s successor soon will begin.

Until he leaves his post as as dean, Salwasser will hold the first newly created endowed chair to fund the position of dean, the Cheryl Ramberg-Ford and Allyn C. Ford Deanship of Forestry. (See right).
Under Salwasser’s tenure, the college has revamped degree programs to better meet employer needs, raised more than $39 million during the Campaign for OSU, created five faculty endowments, developed new distance education degree programs and grew enrollment by more than 50 percent. Demand for its forestry graduates is continuing to increase.

The traditional forest products industry has been under enormous pressure in recent years, with mills closing, ownership of forest lands changing and new products emerging. At OSU, programs in forest engineering and management have been joined by new research initiatives in climate, forest ecosystem protection and renewable material science.

“Going forward, there will be continuing changes in the forest industry, as companies strive to maintain markets and competitiveness,” Salwasser said. “The college will have to continually adapt its education, degree and research programs to meet these changing needs. And as state and federal funding for research continues under pressure, we’ll have to forge stronger partnerships with industry.”

Before joining OSU, Salwasser held many positions in the U.S. Forest Service, culminating as regional forester in the northern Rockies and research station director in California in the 1990s. An expert in wildland resource science, he published more than 80 professional papers during a long career, is a member of the board of directors of the World Forestry Center, and is a fellow of the Society of American Foresters.

Copyright 2011 gazettetimes.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Read more: http://www.gazettetimes.com/news/local/article_36713dee-e681-11e0-890b-001cc4c002e0.html#ixzz1Z1aogala

Dollar Lake: Understanding the full costs of wildfire

Published: Saturday, September 24, 2011, 8:56 AM

By Bob Zybach

Two years ago, The Oregonian printed a column I wrote that summarized a paper written and published online by three coauthors and myself. The piece, titled "The Real Cost of Wildfires," reported our findings that large-scale wildfires in the US typically result in ten to 50 times more costs and damages than suppression costs:

That is, forest wildfires in the US have typically cost US citizens $50 billion to $100 billion – or more – annually for the past several years.

Rick Bowmer/The Associated Press/FileThe Dollar Lake fire.

 

If the Dollar Lake Fire had reached (or does reach) the BPA transmission lines or the Bull Run watershed, it will easily cause significantly more damage than just its suppression costs. Such damages can be readily understood by people in Texas, Arizona, San Diego, and Sisters, Oregon, that have had first hand experiences with property damage, polluted air, degraded soils, personal health problems, destroyed wildlife habitat and other problems caused by forest wildfires.

Ken Snell, the USFS regional director of fire, fuels, and aviation management was quoted by The Oregonian as saying "a large fire on the Bull Run will come in time." Snell is correct. Whether that time is ten days or ten years from now, it is a certainty. Annual growth in the forested watershed leads to a continuous increase in fuels that must either be managed by people or else consumed by flames. Those are the only options, and since fuel management was legally halted in the Bull Run more than 10 years ago, that leaves only fire to clean up the mess.

Two weeks ago, on Sept. 7, one of my co-authors, Mike Dubrasich, and I presented the same paper to the Oregon Board of Forestry in Lakeview. The Dollar Lake fire was part of the resulting discussion. Our point was that an economic analysis of potential wildfire losses is best made before these predictable events occur, so that affected communities, landowners, foresters and wildfire managers can make better-informed decisions when they do take place.

The focus of our paper is a one-page checklist of possible costs and damages associated with wildfires. Anyone can use this checklist to consider the harm that will be done when wildfire ultimately does affect BPA's power transmissions and Portland's water supplies.

One can hope the Dollar Lake fire will become a wake-up call to Portland residents who value fresh water, clean air, cheap electricity, native wildlife and forest recreational opportunities that are being degraded or put at risk by current forest and wildfire management policies. Our checklist provides a good first step in considering these values and the types of actions that can be taken to protect them for ourselves and for future generations.

Bob Zybach writes from Cottage Grove.

$5 Million Endowed Chair for Oregon State University College of Forestry

From OSU
CORVALLIS, Ore. – A $5 million commitment from the head of Roseburg Forest Products and his wife has created an endowment for the College of Forestry dean’s position at Oregon State University.
Named in honor of the donors, the Cheryl Ramberg and Allyn C. Ford Deanship of Forestry will be held by Hal Salwasser.

“For more than a century, the College of Forestry has been at the forefront of OSU’s efforts to produce research and graduates that enhance the state of Oregon,” said OSU President Ed Ray. “Today it is considered among the best forestry programs in the world, and it is a critical part of the university’s focus on sustainable earth ecosystems and economic growth.

“This visionary gift from Allyn and Cheryl Ford illustrates that in tough economic times smart people redouble efforts to preserve the path to excellence,” Ray said. “Their investment assures that the college will have outstanding leadership for the next century and beyond.”

A member of the college’s board of visitors, Allyn Ford became president and CEO of Roseburg Forest Products in 1997. The company was founded by his father, Ken Ford, in 1936 and is now one of the largest family-held wood products corporations in the United States, and among the nation’s largest timberland owners.

“At Roseburg Forest Products we have seen very clearly how important the College of Forestry is for the future of our industry,” Ford said. “Faculty research and innovation help us stay competitive in the global marketplace. It’s also essential that the college continue to provide the industry with graduates who understand these complex systems. We need leaders who can offer sustainable solutions that support the future health of our state and our world.”

A native of southern Oregon and secretary for the Ramberg Glass Company board in Roseburg, Cheryl Ramberg-Ford is a University of Oregon Foundation trustee and former president of the UO Alumni Association. She serves on the boards of the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art and Wildlife Safari and is a member of the Tree of Hope Committee for Mercy Medical Center in Roseburg, Ore. Allyn Ford serves on the Oregon State Board of Higher Education, is a director of the Doernbecher Hospital Foundation and the World Forestry Center, and chairs the board of Umpqua Bank.

“This is a family that is profoundly committed to the state of Oregon and to higher education,” said Mike Goodwin, president and CEO of the OSU Foundation. “We are deeply grateful for the Fords’ support as OSU advances to the next level as a major international research university.”

The Ford family has a long history with Oregon State University.

Allyn’s sister, Carmen Ford Phillips, is an OSU alumna who has been actively engaged with her alma mater for many years. A gift from Allyn’s and Carmen’s late mother made possible the construction of the Hallie Ford Center for Healthy Children and Families – named in her honor – which celebrated its grand opening on Sept. 8. Allyn and Cheryl Ford are both highly involved with the Ford Family Foundation, which helps to fund OSU programs and outreach in the College of Public Health and Human Sciences. At any one time the foundation also provides scholarship support for more than 500 students in Oregon post-secondary schools.

“The Ford family and Roseburg Forest Products are deeply rooted in rural Oregon and they have had a tremendous impact on rural communities,” said OSU Provost and Executive Vice President Sabah Randhawa. “This deanship gift extends that legacy in a powerful way. Supporting College of Forestry leadership is a long-term investment not only in sustainable forests but in sustainable rural communities.”

Building on his predecessors’ legacy, Salwasser has led OSU’s nationally ranked College of Forestry for 12 years. The college has been ranked the number one forest resources research program in North America and the number one forest ecology program. It encompasses three departments, about 1,000 undergraduate and graduate students, and 14,000 acres of college forests.

Salwasser is also executive dean of OSU’s Division of Earth Systems Science, which includes the colleges of forestry, agricultural sciences, and oceanic and atmospheric sciences. Prior to his arrival at OSU in 2000, Salwasser held numerous positions with the U.S. Forest Service. He holds a doctorate in wildland resource science from the University of California, Berkeley.

In honoring Salwasser as the inaugural holder of the endowed deanship, university officials also announced today that Salwasser will step down from the position at the end of the 2011-12 academic year.

“OSU has one of the finest forestry educational and research programs in the nation, a program that Oregon needs to build both a healthy economy and a healthy natural resource base,” Randhawa said.

“No one has understood these multiple demands better than Dr. Salwasser,” he said. “We’re grateful for his work, his leadership in the College of Forestry to align academic programs with needs of industry and society, and his efforts to increase collaboration across colleges in his role as executive dean of the Division of Earth Systems Science. The new endowment is a fitting capstone to his achievements and will ensure that we are able to recruit a leader of similar caliber to help write the next chapter of the college’s distinguished history.”

The gift is part of The Campaign for OSU, the university’s first comprehensive fundraising effort. Guided by OSU’s strategic plan, the campaign seeks $850 million to provide opportunities for students, strengthen the Oregon economy and conduct research that changes the world. Approximately $743 million has been committed to date, including more than $74 million toward a $97 million goal for endowed positions and other faculty support. Since 2004, campaign donors have doubled the number of endowed faculty positions at OSU.

The Fords’ gift leveraged the OSU Provost’s Faculty Match Program, an initiative designed to encourage donor investments in endowed faculty positions. Over five years the match on the Fords’ gift will provide an additional $450,000 for College of Forestry programs.

This is the third endowed deanship of OSU's 12 colleges, following established endowments in the colleges of business and veterinary medicine.

Study of logging's impact on Oregon streams shows no water temperature increase on state forest lands, slight increase on private timber

By Eric Mortenson, The Oregonian 

Published: Wednesday, September 21, 2011, 2:49 PM     Updated: Wednesday, September 21, 2011, 3:22 PM

View full size 

The Oregonian/fileCattle grazing on Forest Service land tromp through Camp Creek, a John Day drainage stream full of steelhead trout. 

 

An on-going study of Oregon Coast Range streams before and after logging shows no average water temperature increase on state forest lands but a 1.3 degree increase on private land, according to an Oregon State University researcher.

The study involves 33 sites in the Coast Range. Water temperature was monitored for two years before harvest and for five years after logging. All of the monitored streams are fish-bearing; stream temperature is critical to cold-water fish such as trout and salmon.

Jeremy Groom, an OSU research associate and lead author of the report, said the study does not address whether the temperature increase on private land is significant. The state Department of Environmental Quality says logging and other forest management work should not increase stream temperatures by more than 0.5 degrees.

Research from previous decades, when loggers sometimes cut trees and burned slash to the edge of streams, showed water temperature increases ranging from 3 to 21 degrees.

Groom said the current results will be presented to the Oregon Board of Forestry in November. The board oversees application of the Oregon Forest Practices Act, which governs such things as buffers zones that must be left adjacent to streams when logging occurs.

State forest managers typically leave larger buffers than required by the forest practices act, and leave more standing timber than required, according to an OSU summary of the research.

While many private landowners follow similar practices, the study involved only those meeting the minimum requirements under the forest practices act. The research was intended to find out if those regulations are working.

"A big question is whether the temperature changes warrant any sort of rule changes," Groom said. "I supply (the board) with this information, but whether or not that's an important amount of temperature increase is not in my job description. I'm very curious to see what happens."

None of the studied sites is on federal national forest or Bureau of Land Management timber.

The research is a collaboration of OSU, the Oregon Department of Forestry, private industry and other state and federal agencies.

--Eric Mortenson

BLM is among state's greatest investments

Salem Statesman Journal

 

9:00 PM, Sep. 18, 2011  |  

Written by

Edward Shepard

Classic parables like the ancient tale of the blind men describing an elephant illustrate how perspectives on a single thing can diverge widely.

The mission of the Bureau of Land Management spans so many areas that different people could tell you completely different things about us depending on where they live, work or play. In this challenging economy, it's smart to be aware of how our tax dollars are being invested. As a taxpayer, I want to know what we get in return for that revenue.

The BLM has the privilege of managing some of the nation's unique treasures. We manage more than 15.7 million acres of public land in Oregon and approximately 436,000 acres in Washington, together with some 23.4 million acres of federal subsurface minerals. Each year, the BLM puts about $100 million into rural Oregon economies and another $12 million into Washington. Revenues that we return to the states and counties come from the fees we collect for recreation use, grazing and mineral leases, timber sales, energy royalties and right-of-way rentals.

The BLM's annual operating budget of $272 million in Oregon and Washington generates almost five times as much in economic benefit. That's a nice return on your investment! In 2010, the overall economic effort of our programs in the Pacific Northwest was almost $1.3 billion.

Our direct financial contributions to Oregon and Washington don't fully capture the economic activity of the individuals and companies we contract with to provide goods and services. When we award contracts for habitat restoration, road renovation, fuels reduction, energy retrofitting or myriad other projects, it multiplies the impact of those dollars to commodity suppliers and through local workers.

Next, consider the 2,000 BLM employees who live and work near you. They protect and preserve public lands, educate our kids about natural resources, guide people through the laws and policies on public lands, enhance and develop the recreation opportunities you enjoy and much more. But you also find them serving as first responders for fire or emergency medical situations, coaching youth sports, volunteering on civic groups of every variety and helping wherever the need might arise in your hometown.

No matter what perspective you come from, the numbers make one thing perfectly clear: Investing in the BLM is a gain, not a drain, on the region we love. Our people and programs provide a positive economic return on the diverse portfolio that comprises your public lands.

Edward Shepard of Portland is the state director of the Oregon/Washington Bureau of Land Management. He can be reached at (503) 808-6026.

Congressman questions response to Mount Hood fire

The Oregonian

Sept. 14, 2011, 9:10 p.m. PDT

Associated Press

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Federal fire responders say unreliable weather forecasts, a dearth of resources, tough terrain and multiple blazes elsewhere are to blame for the timing of a response to an Oregon wildfire that has burned on more than 6,000 acres on the north side of Mount Hood and has posed a potential threat to the watershed from which nearly 1 million Portland residents get their water.

Residents have criticized the response as too slow and businesses said the Labor Day trade suffered as a result, U.S. Rep. Greg Walden said in a letter to National Forest Supervisor Chris Worth asking for an explanation.

"Local residents who live nearby the fire have relayed to me that the United States Forest Service could have launched a much faster response to this fire during its early stages but instead chose to let the fire, then only a handful of acres, burn," Walden wrote in the letter, sent Tuesday.

The Dollar Lake fire was found Aug. 27 after a barrage of lightning strikes. According to dispatch records provided by the Mount Hood National Forest, the blaze was first spotted at about 9 a.m. by an assistant fire-management officer.

Firefighters were unable to locate the base of the blaze, and conditions were too windy for them to jump from an airplane to extinguish it.

By 5 p.m., crews had managed to drop one load of water onto the fire from a helicopter, but the impending darkness created by the shadow of the mountain forced them to turn the helicopter back.
The darkness also forced firefighters who hiked for more than six hours through difficult terrain to turn back before they reached the 2-acre fire.

The blaze has drawn closer to the Bull Run watershed, which supplies about 900,000 people in Portland and its suburbs with drinking water. The fire began about 16 miles from the water supply and is now about 6 miles away.

"On that first day, due to the rough terrain — and you know it's very steep and rough — we tried to get an accurate pinpoint of the location," Mount Hood National Forest spokesman Rick Acosta said. "Our aim when we have a fire in the wilderness, when we have a small fire that was competing with much bigger fires at the time, is to keep it away from development."

Acosta said there were 16 other fires burning on Mount Hood on Aug. 27. A total of nine major wildfires were burning throughout the Pacific Northwest, and another two major fires were found in the region by the morning of Aug. 27. Another large fire broke out the next day.

Acosta acknowledged the helicopter was requested earlier than 5 p.m. but said it wasn't available because of the other fires.

The forecast on the morning of Aug. 27 was for cooler conditions and high humidity, Acosta said, which help tamp down wildfires. But by Aug. 28, the forecast was revised: Warm and dry weather would continue, and the fire would continue to spread.

Walden noted in his letter that tourism in the area suffered because of the wildfire and resulting smoke. The Labor Day crowds stayed away, Walden wrote, on one of the busiest weekends of the year.
Walden has asked for a timeline and decisions made during the early stages of the fire.

Acosta said the U.S. Forest Service will examine the response to the fire, and said the release of dispatch records was an effort by service to be transparent with the public.

"We as the fire managers and the ones closest to the situation on the ground will take a look at situation and review it," Acosta said. "We're trying to be as transparent as possible."

Acosta said he's drafting a response to Walden's letter.

The response to the fire has so far cost $9 million. Cooler weather this week has allowed fire crews to make progress toward insuring it won't jeopardize the water supply or nearby power lines.

Walden spokesman Andrew Whelan said Walden had heard from both residents and businesses, and said they deserve an explanation.

"If they're talking about a shortage of resources," Whelan said, "is it more than $9 million?"
___
Nigel Duara can be reached at www.twitter.com/nigelduara

Timber sale seen as step for pilot project

September 17, 2011

By Paul Fattig

Mail Tribune

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has made its first timber sale in a forest restoration pilot project under way in the Applegate Valley.

The 1.5-million-board-foot Pilot Joe sale was sold for $230,606 to Boise Cascade Wood Products on Thursday, one of three qualified bidders at the auction. There were no administrative protests to the sale which covers about 250 acres.

Work can begin on the project as soon as the contract documents are signed, John Gerritsma, manager of the BLM's Ashland Resource Area. The contract is for two years instead of the normal three years, he said.

"This one we wanted to get on the ground as rapidly as possible so we can learn from it and adapt for the next pilot project," he said. "We've already started on the planning process for the next pilot project."

Pilot Joe is the first sale for the project since it was proposed last year by forest ecology professors Norm Johnson at Oregon State University and Jerry Franklin at the University of Washington. The goal is to preserve the largest trees and improve forest health, including northern spotted owl habitat, while producing wood for mills and reducing wildfire danger.

The local project in the middle Applegate Valley is one of three such projects in Oregon that could change the way timber is managed on federal forestland nationally. The other pilot projects under way are on BLM land in the Myrtle Creek drainage in Douglas County and on tribal land in Coos County. Franklin and Johnson also are heading up those projects.

The two scientists, along with environmental activists and timber industry representatives, joined forces to convince Interior Secretary Ken Salazar last summer to launch the pilot projects. Basically, the principles call for preserving trees older than 150 years and avoiding entry into roadless areas. The projects will be consistent with the Northwest Forest Plan and the National Environmental Policy Act, according to the BLM.

In the Pilot Joe sale, all the trees slated for cutting are less than 50 years old, Gerritsma said, adding that most will be 16 inches and smaller in diameter at chest height.

All told, the initial work on Pilot Joe will include about 900 acres. Brush cutting and other vegetation management work will be conducted on the remaining 650 acres but no timber products will be produced from that work, Gerritsma said.

In August, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced its biological opinion on the Applegate pilot project, concluding it could harm a pair of owls at one site, but determining that overall it would be a long-term benefit to spotted owl habitat in the region. The Endangered Species Act requires federal agencies to consult with the service when their proposed actions could affect a species listed as threatened or endangered. The spotted owl is listed as threatened.

In addition to the Fish and Wildlife Service, the BLM also is working with the Southern Oregon Small Diameter Collaborative, Applegate Partnership and Watershed Council in designing and monitoring the project.

Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at pfattig@mailtribune.com.

West Coast log and lumber exports jump in 2011, fueled by China's building boom

Published: Friday, September 09, 2011, 7:03 PM     Updated: Friday, September 09, 2011, 7:13 PM

By Eric Mortenson, The Oregonian

 

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Associated Press

Logging exports are up, fueled by building in China

 

Driven by China's building boom, West Coast log and lumber exports jumped by 79 and 83 percent, respectively, in the first six months of 2011, according to U.S. Forest Service researchers.

 

Oregon log exports so far in 2011 are nearly double what they were in the first part of 2010, and similar to Washington, Northern California and Alaska, according to the Forest Service's Pacific Northwest Research Station in Portland.

 

Oregon exported nearly 46 million board feet of lumber in the first six months of 2011, compared to 12 million board feet in the first half of 2010. Washington ports ship far more lumber, nearly 369 million board feet in the first half of 2011.

 

China alone purchased 204 million board feet of U.S. lumber through June. It bought 141 million board feet in all of 2010, according to Random Lengths, a Eugene-based publication that tracks the wood products industry.

 

Some industry observers speculate that China primarily uses lower-grade West Coast lumber for such things as concrete forms and construction details that won't show.

 

"I don't know what they're building over there, but there's sure a demand for it," said Debra Warren, a Forest Service economist.

 

The reports represent a mixed bag of economic news.

 

Log exports are good for private landowners and make for busy ports, but a manufacturers' group says they can badly hurt Northwest lumber and plywood mills.

 

Foreign log buyers are willing to pay $650 per thousand board feet, while Northwest mills struggle to pay $500 to $550 per thousand board fee, said Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Council in Portland. That leaves mills more dependent on timber from public land.

 

By law, logs from U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management and Oregon Department of Forestry lands cannot be exported. But those agencies aren't providing enough timber to keep local mills operating consistently, Partin said.

 

"Domestic processors are caught in a real lurch right now," he said. "It's very important to keep domestic sawmills going right now. We've been asking the BLM and Forest Service to ramp up (timber harvest) programs and deliver more raw material, or we're going to see more downsizing."

 

Partin said timber owners should take a longer view instead of cashing in on the export market.

 

"These private timber owners have to go to bed with themselves every night and ask if they're doing the right thing or not," he said. "Log exports wax and wane. If we lose domestic (lumber) processors and exports drop off, private companies won't have anyone to sell to in the future."

 

Richard Haynes, a consulting natural resource economist in Beaverton, said log exports are a recurring controversy and will remain so.

 

By rule of thumb, a million board feet of timber generates about five logging jobs and five mill jobs, he said. Exporting raw logs adds a port job per million board feet, but the mill jobs are lost, he said.

 

He doesn't see an end to cyclical nature of logs and lumber.

 

"Not really," he said, "not as long as it's a market-based situation."

 

-- Eric Mortenson