The climate religion fades in spasms of anger and twitches of boredom.
By BRET STEPHENS
How do religions die? Generally they don't, which probably explains why there's so little literature on the subject. Zoroastrianism, for instance, lost many of its sacred texts when Alexander sacked Persepolis in 330 B.C., and most Zoroastrians converted to Islam over 1,000 years ago. Yet today old Zoroaster still counts as many as 210,000 followers, including 11,000 in the U.S. Christopher Hitchens might say you can't kill what wasn't there to begin with.
Still, Zeus and Apollo are no longer with us, and neither are Odin and Thor. Among the secular gods, Marx is mostly dead and Freud is totally so. Something did away with them, and it's worth asking what.
Consider the case of global warming, another system of doomsaying prophecy and faith in things unseen.
As with religion, it is presided over by a caste of spectacularly unattractive people pretending to an obscure form of knowledge that promises to make the seas retreat and the winds abate. As with religion, it comes with an elaborate list of virtues, vices and indulgences. As with religion, its claims are often non-falsifiable, hence the convenience of the term "climate change" when thermometers don't oblige the expected trend lines. As with religion, it is harsh toward skeptics, heretics and other "deniers." And as with religion, it is susceptible to the earthly temptations of money, power, politics, arrogance and deceit.
This week, the conclave of global warming's cardinals are meeting in Durban, South Africa, for their 17th conference in as many years. The idea is to come up with a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, which is set to expire next year, and to require rich countries to pony up $100 billion a year to help poor countries cope with the alleged effects of climate change. This is said to be essential because in 2017 global warming becomes "catastrophic and irreversible," according to a recent report by the International Energy Agency.
Yet a funny thing happened on the way to the climate apocalypse. Namely, the financial apocalypse.
The U.S., Russia, Japan, Canada and the EU have all but confirmed they won't be signing on to a new Kyoto. The Chinese and Indians won't make a move unless the West does. The notion that rich (or formerly rich) countries are going to ship $100 billion every year to the Micronesias of the world is risible, especially after they've spent it all on Greece.
Cap and trade is a dead letter in the U.S. Even Europe is having second thoughts about carbon-reduction targets that are decimating the continent's heavy industries and cost an estimated $67 billion a year. "Green" technologies have all proved expensive, environmentally hazardous and wildly unpopular duds.
All this has been enough to put the Durban political agenda on hold for the time being. But religions don't die, and often thrive, when put to the political sidelines. A religion, when not physically extinguished, only dies when it loses faith in itself.
That's where the Climategate emails come in. First released on the eve of the Copenhagen climate summit two years ago and recently updated by a fresh batch, the "hide the decline" emails were an endless source of fun and lurid fascination for those of us who had never been convinced by the global-warming thesis in the first place.
But the real reason they mattered is that they introduced a note of caution into an enterprise whose motivating appeal resided in its increasingly frantic forecasts of catastrophe. Papers were withdrawn; source material re-examined. The Himalayan glaciers, it turned out, weren't going to melt in 30 years. Nobody can say for sure how high the seas are likely to rise—if much at all. Greenland isn't turning green. Florida isn't going anywhere.
The reply global warming alarmists have made to these dislosures is that they did nothing to change the underlying science, and only improved it in particulars. So what to make of the U.N.'s latest supposedly authoritative report on extreme weather events, which is tinged with admissions of doubt and uncertainty? Oddly, the report has left climate activists stuttering with rage at what they call its "watered down" predictions. If nothing else, they understand that any belief system, particularly ones as young as global warming, cannot easily survive more than a few ounces of self-doubt.
Meanwhile, the world marches on. On Sunday, 2,232 days will have elapsed since a category 3 hurricane made landfall in the U.S., the longest period in more than a century that the U.S. has been spared a devastating storm. Great religions are wise enough to avoid marking down the exact date when the world comes to an end. Not so for the foolish religions. Expect Mayan cosmology to take a hit to its reputation when the world doesn't end on Dec. 21, 2012. Expect likewise when global warming turns out to be neither catastrophic nor irreversible come 2017.
And there is this: Religions are sustained in the long run by the consolations of their teachings and the charisma of their leaders. With global warming, we have a religion whose leaders are prone to spasms of anger and whose followers are beginning to twitch with boredom. Perhaps that's another way religions die.
Write to bstephens@wsj.com
Copyright 2011 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Forests, fishing and now wind!
It just never ends…
After living through the exploitation of the spotted owl as a surrogate for stopping scientifically sound management of first Federal, and then private and state-owned forest lands, I should not be surprised that 20 years later, anti-everything activists would rule the day.
Recently three wind energy projects in the Pacific Northwest were cancelled due to the developers’ frustration with wildlife officials’ demands to protect species, not to mention the millions of dollars wasted on preliminary wind farm activities. Southwest Washington Wind Energy
In Southwest Washington, four public utilities cancelled a 32-turbine wind farm on state-owned forestland due to requirements to shut the windmills down during daylight hours for six months to protect the marbled murrelet, a seabird listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
Environmental concerns also led developers to cancel two wind farms on private land in the Steens Mt. area of Southeastern Oregon. Steens Mountain
Environmental activists used the marbled murrelet and the spotted owl to shut down forest management on Federal forest lands in the 1990s. A large spoonful of sugar is definitely needed to buy into the plight of the murrelet and the need to stop forest management or windmills.
See, the marbled murrelet is a seabird. That means the birds spend most of their life at sea. They only come ashore to nest and reproduce. However, the murrelet doesn’t just come to the beach, these birds fly 60-70 miles inland looking for a suitable nest site.
That means murrelets fly over roads, industrial development and metropolitan areas up and down the I-5 corridor. Renewable (so-called clean) energy developers have to accept the theory that although, murrelets fly over all sorts of human progress, they will shrivel up and go extinct if they have to fly over a windmill in the daytime. We won’t even mention the hundreds of thousands of marbled murrelets in Canada and SE Alaska…
Sunday, November 20, 2011
"Restoring the West"
From: Bob Zybach
https://forestry.usu.edu/files/uploads/RTW2011Media/ZybachRTW10-19-11.mp4
For those of you with interests more specific to biomass utilization
and related forest management issues, there were a number of great
presentations that are also presented on this website:
http://forestry.usu.edu/htm/video/conferences/rtw-2011/
https://forestry.usu.edu/files/uploads/RTW2011Media/ZybachRTW10-19-11.mp4
For those of you with interests more specific to biomass utilization
and related forest management issues, there were a number of great
presentations that are also presented on this website:
http://forestry.usu.edu/htm/video/conferences/rtw-2011/
The squeeze around our neck of the woods
If a governor cuts down 20 years of forest mismanagement and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound -- or more importantly, a difference?
We'll see. Gov. John Kitzhaber recently delivered a powerful but little noticed speech to the Oregon Board of Forestry in which he argued that current policies across the sweep of federal, state and privately owned forests that cover over 30 million acres of Oregon conspire to hurt rural communities, the economy, fish and wildlife and the forests themselves.
Harvest numbers prove his point: The federal government owns and manages nearly 60 percent of Oregon forest lands, but these lands produce only about 12 percent of the annual timber harvest. Oregon's relatively tiny state forests, at 3 percent of forest lands, produce nearly as much timber.
Meanwhile, Oregon's private and industrial forests, which total 19 percent of Oregon forest lands, produce 75 percent of the harvest. Here's the kicker: Nearly a billion dollars' worth of private logs are not going to feed the Oregon sawmills struggling to survive; they're being exported to China. "This amounts to nothing more than exporting our natural capital and our jobs," Kitzhaber said. "We are at risk of becoming a timber colony for Asia."
Kitzhaber describes current policies as "de facto forest zoning" that harms forests and puts pressure in the wrong places. Timber exports force sawmills to seek more logs from public forests. The failure of federal management shifts more demand onto state forests. But adjusting the timber harvest on 3 percent of Oregon forest lands solves little.
But Oregon can demonstrate a way forward. Kitzhaber urged the forestry board to "break the mold of conflict and polarization" by adopting truly sustainable policies for state forests. He urged the board to adopt a land allocation system that explicitly protects high-value conservation and recreation areas while also delineating areas for commercial logging.
This is more or less the same philosophy that Sen. Ron Wyden, Rep. Peter DeFazio and other members of Oregon's congressional delegation have embraced and are pursuing for federal lands. Wyden's eastside forest compromise, which has idled for more than a year in Congress, would protect remaining old-growth forests while allowing more commercial logging in other areas. DeFazio's idea of carving out conservation and logging "trusts" on some westside forests is a variation of the same theme.
The word is that DeFazio and other Oregon members of Congress may be poised to roll out a serious plan to spur more activity in federal forest lands in Southwest Oregon. It would take a big push to move something through this Congress. Meanwhile, we keep hearing that the state wants to be a player in the federal forest debate. It can start by getting its own forests in order.
The Board of Forestry should get cracking on a land allocation system, and it shouldn't take forever -- the agency knows where salmon and spotted owl strongholds and other key conservation and recreation areas lie in its forests. The agency already is protecting many of these areas; formally setting them apart from commercial logging would give recognition to their stewardship. The board also should be unafraid to dig into the controversial issue of log exports, and explore ways to keep logs here by making them more valuable to Oregonians than to the Chinese.
Meanwhile, Kitzhaber, the entire congressional delegation and leaders of the timber industry and environmental groups must keep pressing for thoughtful, collaborative change in the management of federal forests. If Oregon is ever going to get the most out of its forests, the governor has to deliver a lot more than one great speech.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Have Occupiers Missed Their Log…er Boat?
My friend, Certified Forester Greg Miller, raised a good
point today: Where were the 99 per centers twenty years ago, when the federal
government and radical environmentalists were shutting down the sustainable forest
management of our federal forest lands and destroying the lives of rural, and
some urban, hard working citizens in the Pacific Northwest?
The war on the livelihood of hundreds of thousand’s of
timber workers continues today as environmentalists continue to use the courts
and the Obama Administration to frustrate both scientifically sound forest
management and generate economic activity for depressed rural communities while
nearly bankrupting local governments.
As federal County Payments come to an end, one hears squeals
of “Broken Promises” from elected officials who think that the U. S. Treasury
should continue to provide welfare payments to counties to ease the pain of
shutting down the timber industry.
With the country deep in debt, this is unlikely to happen.
The Occupiers and 99 %’rs were nowhere to be found when the
ultimate federal promises were broken.
After World War II the federal government encouraged the timber industry
to build mills and provide family wage jobs throughout Oregon, Washington, and
Northern California.
In fact, the promise of a sustained yield of timber was a
distinctly non-capitalistic notion that one would think the current protesters
would embrace. Instead, we’ve
tossed hundreds of thousands of jobs aside and watched rural communities struggle
to stay intact as crime, hunger, and domestic problems explode.
Let’s call for the protesters to take up the struggle of the
99%’rs in the rural Pacific Northwest.
This would not only help citizens, but can also apply some much needed
management to our critically ailing federal forests.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Forest biomass as a fuel source and solution for maintaining forest health
Letter to Oregon Board of Forestry from the Committee for Family Forestlands
The Committee for Family Forestlands (CFF) urges the Board of Forestry and State Forester to continue working with the Governor, the Oregon Forest Resources Institute, Oregon’s Forest Biomass Working Group, and the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to explore the potential for expanding the forest-based energy production industry. The EPA is presently engaged in a 3-year review of the proposed “Tailoring Rule”, the rule which would determine the acceptable limits of CO2 emissions from biomass-fueled energy generation facilities. The parameters outlined in the final Rule will effectively determine whether large-scale forest biomass-based energy production is permissible and economically viable. The current review period provides an important window of opportunity for the State of Oregon to concurrently examine the pros and cons of using forest biomass as an energy source, and to provide important and convincing input to the federal government and the EPA. The CFF believes it is crucially important that the EPA’s review of the issues related to forest biomass includes a holistic consideration of forest ecology and forest economics as well as potential impacts on air quality.
The Committee for Family Forestlands is a statutory committee appointed by the Board of Forestry to provide advice and recommendations regarding family forests and includes family forestland owners from different areas of the state, environmental organization and forest industry representatives, a citizen-at-large and ex-officio members representing the Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF), Extension Service, Oregon Forest Resources Institute, the Oregon Small Woodlot Association and logging or forestry consulting interests.
The Committee for Family Forestlands (CFF) urges the Board of Forestry and State Forester to continue working with the Governor, the Oregon Forest Resources Institute, Oregon’s Forest Biomass Working Group, and the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to explore the potential for expanding the forest-based energy production industry. The EPA is presently engaged in a 3-year review of the proposed “Tailoring Rule”, the rule which would determine the acceptable limits of CO2 emissions from biomass-fueled energy generation facilities. The parameters outlined in the final Rule will effectively determine whether large-scale forest biomass-based energy production is permissible and economically viable. The current review period provides an important window of opportunity for the State of Oregon to concurrently examine the pros and cons of using forest biomass as an energy source, and to provide important and convincing input to the federal government and the EPA. The CFF believes it is crucially important that the EPA’s review of the issues related to forest biomass includes a holistic consideration of forest ecology and forest economics as well as potential impacts on air quality.
The CFF suggests that a forest biomass-based energy production industry should:
1. Be guided by the goal of achieving and maintaining forest health.
2. Recognize that without a reliable market paying reasonable prices for raw materials, restoration thinnings that remove only the smallest diameter classes may not be fiscally realistic. Until such markets are available, forest operators will be financially unable to undertake small-diameter forest restoration thinnings unless these projects are publicly subsidized or unless larger-diameter, more profitable timber can be simultaneously harvested from the site to defray the cost of removing the less profitable biomass.
3. Establish a sustainable, even flow biomass harvest rate so that infrastructure and labor pools can be appropriately matched to the ecological capacity of the forests.
4. Be consistent with established best forest management practices as outlined in related state and federal laws and regulations.
5. Encourage cross-boundary collaboration to achieve landscape-level forest restoration goals.
6. Be visionary, and adaptively responsive to emergent scientific knowledge and social expectations.
A forest biomass energy industry offers an important means of improving forest health and sustainability while simultaneously helping to stabilize the nation’s renewable energy sector. This is particularly true in fire-adapted western forest ecosystems. An estimated 12.2 million acres of forests in Oregon have been identified as overstocked and in need of thinning or prescribed burning to restore their vigor and reduce their susceptibility to aggressive wildfires. In many instances these forests are so heavily overstocked that they cannot be safely treated with prescribed fire until the excess biomass has been removed through mechanical thinning. In many other cases, particularly in the wildland-urban interface where many family forests are located, prescribed fire is not a realistic treatment option due to problems related to unfiltered smoke pollution and the risk of escaped fire. In such locations, thinning is the only realistic restoration option.
Forest thinning treatments, however, are typically expensive. The excess biomass is frequently too small in diameter to be sold for conventional wood products such as dimension lumber, and its quantity vastly exceeds the demand in established markets such as the particleboard industry that can utilize small-diameter material. Consequently, there is presently no market for the excess forest biomass that needs to be removed through restoration thinnings. Most restoration projects must therefore be subsidized with tax dollars on public forests, or a combination of personal funds and public cost-share programs on private forests. Small-forest owners find it particularly difficult to accomplish forest restoration, because their smaller-scale projects often cannot generate sufficient profit to attract forest operators who depend upon conventional forest products markets. Particularly in the current economic climate, wherein adequate public and private funding for forest health improvement products is less and less available, the absence of a reliable commercial market for excess forest biomass means that most of these forests will be doomed to a continuing state of decay. Forest restoration biomass would be, however, eminently marketable as a renewable fuel source that could substantially reduce US dependence upon fossil fuel supplies. The thoughtful development of a forest biomass energy industry would, therefore, help Oregon and America meet two of its most pressing environmental goals: forest sustainability and energy sustainability.
There are many who caution that enabling a new forest energy production industry may lead to overharvesting rather than sustainable harvesting within our forests, and also that the ecological impacts of removing small diameter biomass are not yet fully understood. We agree that there is need for caution. Scientific understanding of the implications of biomass extraction is indeed incomplete. There is, however, solid scientific understanding of the ecological, social, and financial risks associated with leaving forests overstocked and in declining health, and of the validity of thinning as a technique for restoring and maintaining forest vigor. We therefore concur with the Oregon Forest Resources Institute’s conclusion that “Biomass utilization for energy should be considered a tool for improving the health of our forests. To ensure a sustainable, appropriate level of development, the needs for forest restoration should determine the scale of the forest biomass energy industry” (OFRI Report on Biomass Energy and Biofuels from Oregon’s Forests, Page 1-v.)
The CFF also recognizes that there is ongoing debate regarding how the burning of forest biomass as a fuel may affect air quality, particularly with regard to “greenhouse gas” emissions. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is by far the most troublesome of the “greenhouse gases”. Forests naturally absorb CO2 during their respiration process, and subsequently “sequester” or hold the carbon in the form of new wood growth. If the tree is harvested and the wood is used for building materials, the carbon remains safely stored until being gradually released as the wood eventually decays. Forests, therefore, are highly desirable carbon repositories. They are widely understood to be nature’s most effective tool at helping to combat this particular type of air pollution. If wood burns, however, all of its stored carbon is quickly released back into the atmosphere, thereby contributing to “greenhouse gas” pollution. Consequently, some contend that burning forest biomass as a fuel may actually add to energy-related air pollution, rather than substracting from it. This argument, however, overlooks the problem of wildfire, which releases not only massive amounts of CO2 but also many other toxic chemical and particulate pollutants in the form of unfiltered smoke.
Wildfires already run rampant through the West’s overstocked and unnaturally flammable forests each year. It is well understood that if forest overgrowth is not reduced to site-appropriate stocking levels, the incidence and intensity of wildfires can only increase. Wildfires produce levels of air pollution far exceeding any that would be produced from thoughtfully constructed wood-burning energy production facilities equipped with pollution control equipment. Furthermore, the high cost of controlling the wildfires deprives the state of funds that could be directed to other forest management practices that could directly improve forest health and sustainability. The Oregon Department of Forestry currently ranks wildfire control as its top priority and foremost expenditure.
Healthy, appropriately stocked forests provide optimal wildlife and fisheries habitat. They are invaluable as recreational sites. They are unparalleled sources of pure water. They produce the oxygen we breathe, the vistas we cherish, the wood products we use to build our homes, and the paper products we need for effective communication. With the development of a restoration-oriented biomass utilization industry, the CFF believes they can also provide a sustainable, renewable source of energy.
Oregon has long been a leader in innovative forest policy. The CFF urges the Oregon Board of Forestry and State Forester to continue this legacy by continuing to explore the potential benefits of a holistic forest biomass utilization policy.
Most sincerely,
The Oregon Committee for Family Forestlands
Craig Shinn, Chair
Susan Watkins, Vice-Chair
Friday, November 4, 2011
Kitzhaber wants Oregon forests to be model for region
Majority of state's timber being shipped overseas
From Salem Statesman Journal
Written by
By Jeff Barnard
Gov. John Kitzhaber on Thursday called on the state Board of Forestry to take a new approach to managing state forests that will make them a model for resolving regional conflicts that have pitted logging against fish and wildlife habitat in the Northwest for more than 30 years.
Speaking to the board at its regular meeting in Forest Grove, Kitzhaber said since national forests in Oregon cut logging 90 percent to protect old-growth forest habitat for salmon and northern spotted owls, the bulk of the timber now comes off private lands. Too many of those logs are being shipped to China rather than sustaining jobs in Oregon mills, he said.
"This amounts to nothing more than exporting our natural capital and our jobs," Kitzhaber said. "We are at risk of becoming a timber colony for Asia, while undermining our mill infrastructure and their surrounding communities."
The governor's speech comes as his office and Oregon's congressional delegation are struggling to save rural timber counties from going broke when a federal safety net expires at the end of this year. The Secure Rural Schools Act has made up for the big drop in federal revenue sharing based on logging.
In the past four years, West Coast log exports from private lands have gone from $42 million to $500 million, Kitzhaber said. Meanwhile, federal forests, which amount to 59 percent of Oregon's land mass, produce just 12 percent of the timber. State forests produce 10 percent of the timber from 3 percent of the land. And private forests produce 75 percent of the timber from 19 percent of the land.
Legislative efforts to increase logging have just eroded trust on all sides, he added.
To make Oregon a model for resolving these issues, Kitzhaber said the state will have to work closely with agencies managing federal and private forests.
He suggested the board adopt strict performance standards to measure the success of forest policies and re-examine the longstanding model that produces timber by cutting forests in a way to encourage structures similar to old growth, rather than for maximum timber yield.
Gov. John Kitzhaber on Thursday called on the state Board of Forestry to take a new approach to managing state forests that will make them a model for resolving regional conflicts that have pitted logging against fish and wildlife habitat in the Northwest for more than 30 years.
Speaking to the board at its regular meeting in Forest Grove, Kitzhaber said since national forests in Oregon cut logging 90 percent to protect old-growth forest habitat for salmon and northern spotted owls, the bulk of the timber now comes off private lands. Too many of those logs are being shipped to China rather than sustaining jobs in Oregon mills, he said.
"This amounts to nothing more than exporting our natural capital and our jobs," Kitzhaber said. "We are at risk of becoming a timber colony for Asia, while undermining our mill infrastructure and their surrounding communities."
The governor's speech comes as his office and Oregon's congressional delegation are struggling to save rural timber counties from going broke when a federal safety net expires at the end of this year. The Secure Rural Schools Act has made up for the big drop in federal revenue sharing based on logging.
In the past four years, West Coast log exports from private lands have gone from $42 million to $500 million, Kitzhaber said. Meanwhile, federal forests, which amount to 59 percent of Oregon's land mass, produce just 12 percent of the timber. State forests produce 10 percent of the timber from 3 percent of the land. And private forests produce 75 percent of the timber from 19 percent of the land.
Legislative efforts to increase logging have just eroded trust on all sides, he added.
To make Oregon a model for resolving these issues, Kitzhaber said the state will have to work closely with agencies managing federal and private forests.
He suggested the board adopt strict performance standards to measure the success of forest policies and re-examine the longstanding model that produces timber by cutting forests in a way to encourage structures similar to old growth, rather than for maximum timber yield.
He also encouraged the board to act more aggressively to protect fish and wildlife habitat, particularly along salmon streams and on hillsides vulnerable to landslides, which will create conservation jobs and give everyone a better idea about what to expect from state forests.
Kitzhaber told the board to take a new look at its business model, taking into account the economic problems faced by timber counties, where plummeting federal timber revenues have left them struggling to survive.
Oregon Board of Forestry Chairman John Blackwell said he liked the fact the governor was giving them permission to be more aggressive protecting fish and wildlife habitat.
Ray Wilkeson of the Oregon Forest Industries Council, a timber industry group, said he was encouraged by the governor's recognition that management on public forest lands, state and federal, is not working and needs changing.
Josh Laughlin of Cascadia Wildlands project, a conservation group, said the speech did not follow with the governor's recent vote to approve a 40 percent increase in clear-cut logging on the Elliott State Forest.
Kitzhaber told the board to take a new look at its business model, taking into account the economic problems faced by timber counties, where plummeting federal timber revenues have left them struggling to survive.
Oregon Board of Forestry Chairman John Blackwell said he liked the fact the governor was giving them permission to be more aggressive protecting fish and wildlife habitat.
Ray Wilkeson of the Oregon Forest Industries Council, a timber industry group, said he was encouraged by the governor's recognition that management on public forest lands, state and federal, is not working and needs changing.
Josh Laughlin of Cascadia Wildlands project, a conservation group, said the speech did not follow with the governor's recent vote to approve a 40 percent increase in clear-cut logging on the Elliott State Forest.
Gov. John Kitzhaber says forest policies must balance health of habitat and rural communities
FOREST GROVE -- Gov. John Kitzhaber called on the state Board of Forestry Thursday to step back from the "politically driven seesaw management" of the state's timberland and adopt a balanced approach that can be extended to the much larger federal forests as well.
Kitzhaber, in a rare appearance by a governor before the board, said current management practices put state, federal and private forests in isolated silos, when they should be viewed as an interconnected landscape.
"We are mired in ongoing conflict -- timber sale by timber sale, forest by forest -- rather than engaging in a holistic strategy" that balances environmental, economic and community values, the governor said.
The result is unhealthy forests and damaged rural communities, the governor said. The 18 million acres of federal forests, which make up nearly 60 percent of the forestland in Oregon, are choked with unmanaged stands of young fir and pine and produce only 12 percent of the annual timber harvest.
That puts harvest pressure on the relatively tiny state forests, which make up only 3 percent of the forestland base but produce 10 percent of the timber. Meanwhile, private forests make up 19 percent of the land base and produce 75 percent of the timber.
Much of the private timber, however, is exported overseas. West Coast log exporters are on pace to ship $900 million worth of logs this year, compared to $42 million four years ago, the governor said.
Kitzhaber said excessive log exports undermine Oregon's mill infrastructure, hurt communities and put more harvest pressure on the public forests.
"This amounts to nothing more than exporting our natural capital and our jobs," he said. "We are at risk of becoming a timber colony for Asia."
Kitzhaber challenged the board to make several management changes. Among them, he said the board should establish conservation zones in state forests, and likewise define the amount and location of land that will be used for timber production.
He said the state should move away from "structure based" management and should not let harvest revenue targets drive forest management. Timber harvest revenue from state forests supports counties and school districts.
A "land allocation" management approach with both timber production and conservation emphasis would provide stability and certainty for everyone concerned, he said.
To manage Oregon's forests as a joined landscape, the board will increasingly have to work closely with federal and private forest managers, Kitzhaber said. The governor said increased management -- thinning and other logging -- is required to restore the health of federal forests.
Groups at both ends of the state's long-running forest arguments found things to like among the governor's ideas.
The Sierra Club, Wild Salmon Center and Association of Northwest Steelheaders issued a joint statement applauding the idea of establishing conservation areas.
Ray Wilkeson, president of the Oregon Forest Industries Council, said Kitzhaber's ideas are worth a try both on state and federal land.
"If anybody can do it, it would be him," Wilkeson said of Kitzhaber.
In other business Thursday, the board voted 4-2 to approve a management plan for the Elliott State Forest near Coos Bay.
Under the plan, the Elliott's annual timber harvest will increase to 40 million board feet, compared to 25 million board feet under a plan implemented in 1995. The new plan increases the targeted annual harvest to 1,100 acres with up to 850 acres to be clear-cut. The previous plan logged 1,000 acres annually, half by clear-cutting. The new plan will produce annual net revenue of up to $13 million, compared to about $8 million currently.
Board members John Blackwell, Cal Mukumoto, Jennifer Phillippi and Gary Springer voted in favor of the plan. Peter Hayes and Sybil Ackerman opposed it
More than 90 percent of the 93,000-acre Elliott consists of Common School Fund lands under jurisdiction of the State Land Board, made up of Kitzhaber, state Treasurer Ted Wheeler and Secretary of State Kate Brown. The land board unanimously approved the plan Oct. 11.
--Eric Mortenson
Kitzhaber, in a rare appearance by a governor before the board, said current management practices put state, federal and private forests in isolated silos, when they should be viewed as an interconnected landscape.
"We are mired in ongoing conflict -- timber sale by timber sale, forest by forest -- rather than engaging in a holistic strategy" that balances environmental, economic and community values, the governor said.
The result is unhealthy forests and damaged rural communities, the governor said. The 18 million acres of federal forests, which make up nearly 60 percent of the forestland in Oregon, are choked with unmanaged stands of young fir and pine and produce only 12 percent of the annual timber harvest.
That puts harvest pressure on the relatively tiny state forests, which make up only 3 percent of the forestland base but produce 10 percent of the timber. Meanwhile, private forests make up 19 percent of the land base and produce 75 percent of the timber.
Much of the private timber, however, is exported overseas. West Coast log exporters are on pace to ship $900 million worth of logs this year, compared to $42 million four years ago, the governor said.
Kitzhaber said excessive log exports undermine Oregon's mill infrastructure, hurt communities and put more harvest pressure on the public forests.
"This amounts to nothing more than exporting our natural capital and our jobs," he said. "We are at risk of becoming a timber colony for Asia."
Kitzhaber challenged the board to make several management changes. Among them, he said the board should establish conservation zones in state forests, and likewise define the amount and location of land that will be used for timber production.
He said the state should move away from "structure based" management and should not let harvest revenue targets drive forest management. Timber harvest revenue from state forests supports counties and school districts.
A "land allocation" management approach with both timber production and conservation emphasis would provide stability and certainty for everyone concerned, he said.
To manage Oregon's forests as a joined landscape, the board will increasingly have to work closely with federal and private forest managers, Kitzhaber said. The governor said increased management -- thinning and other logging -- is required to restore the health of federal forests.
Groups at both ends of the state's long-running forest arguments found things to like among the governor's ideas.
The Sierra Club, Wild Salmon Center and Association of Northwest Steelheaders issued a joint statement applauding the idea of establishing conservation areas.
Ray Wilkeson, president of the Oregon Forest Industries Council, said Kitzhaber's ideas are worth a try both on state and federal land.
"If anybody can do it, it would be him," Wilkeson said of Kitzhaber.
In other business Thursday, the board voted 4-2 to approve a management plan for the Elliott State Forest near Coos Bay.
Under the plan, the Elliott's annual timber harvest will increase to 40 million board feet, compared to 25 million board feet under a plan implemented in 1995. The new plan increases the targeted annual harvest to 1,100 acres with up to 850 acres to be clear-cut. The previous plan logged 1,000 acres annually, half by clear-cutting. The new plan will produce annual net revenue of up to $13 million, compared to about $8 million currently.
Board members John Blackwell, Cal Mukumoto, Jennifer Phillippi and Gary Springer voted in favor of the plan. Peter Hayes and Sybil Ackerman opposed it
More than 90 percent of the 93,000-acre Elliott consists of Common School Fund lands under jurisdiction of the State Land Board, made up of Kitzhaber, state Treasurer Ted Wheeler and Secretary of State Kate Brown. The land board unanimously approved the plan Oct. 11.
--Eric Mortenson
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Governor Kitzhaber testimony before the Board of Forestry
November 3, 2011 Forest Grove Oregon
I. Introduction
Thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today. It comes at an important time. While there is chaos in our nation – Oregon remains an island of sanity; a place where we can still bring our problems and differences to a common table and seek win/win solutions.
In the past legislative session – and confronted with a larger per capita budget deficit than either California or Washington – we balanced our budget with civility and integrity; without tearing our state apart like Wisconsin; or shutting it down like Minnesota.
I would like to apply that same spirit to the management of our forest lands, which remain embroiled in controversy. The vast federal forests of Eastern Oregon continue to need environmentally sound active management to restore their health at a landscape scale. In SW Oregon, the conflict over how the O&C forest lands should be managed has reached a new chapter. All the while, many rural counties and communities across our state face a relentless slide into fiscal insolvency and social disintegration. And earlier today, you engaged in rulemaking on the management of the Elliott state forest – an issue that has also fostered deep and ongoing controversy.
So while I am here to speak to the Board of Forestry about Oregon’s state forest lands, my overall concern, my hope and my vision, centers on Oregon’s forested landscape as a whole; and on creating a path forward that can unify the often competing interests that have divided us in the past.
As you know, I have had a long involvement in forest policy in Oregon, dating back to the two rewrites of the Oregon Forest Practices Act in 1987 and 1991 when I was President of the State Senate; the Eastside Forest Health Project and the Blue Mountain Demonstration Project; the development and implementation of the Oregon Plan for Salmon and Watersheds; and carrying through to the initial development of the management plan for the Tillamook and Clatsop State Forests during my service as Governor from 1995-2003.
Over the years I have witnessed legislative attempts to establish timber primacy on our state forests; as well as ballot measures which attempted to set aside half the landscape for preservation purposes. Both approaches reflect the politically-driven see-saw management of these lands which has colored our past; and both approaches erode trust and diminish our capacity to put in place the kind of sustainable forest policy which can help inform the management debate across Oregon’s larger forest landscape.
Given this history it is understandable that your recently revised management plan for the Tillamook and Clatsop State Forests of northwest Oregon is not without controversy, with many on all sides expressing a familiar set of concerns. The environmental community is concerned that the increased harvest level is not sustainable and will jeopardize conservation values; the wood products industry is concerned that any reduction in harvest – particularly given the timber supply problem being exacerbated by raw log exports -- will jeopardize the viability of our local mill infrastructure and the jobs associated with it; and counties are concerned that any reduction in the harvest level will further erode the already strained financial integrity of local government.
These are variations of the same concerns we are hearing surrounding the Elliott state forest; the current and future management of our O&C lands; and of the much larger federal forest landscape managed by the U.S. Forest Service. It is an old litany. And all of these concerns have merit – certainly when viewed in isolation – but perhaps less so when viewed through a larger lens.
II. Providing a Larger Context
The state forests that are managed by the Oregon’s Board of Forestry represent an opportunity to craft a model for public forest land management. I suggest to you that we have not yet perfected that model. It is a work in progress, and it is part of a much larger picture and should be viewed in that context.
Almost 60% of Oregon’s land base is in federal ownership, almost 18 million acres of which is forest land managed either by the U.S. Forest Service (14.7 million acres) or the Bureau of Land Management (3.2 million acres). This means that of the 30.5 million acres of forest landscape in Oregon, the federal government owns and manages 59% (17.9 million acres); and state owns and manages 3% (871,000 acres); and 38 percent is in private ownership (5.8 million acres in family forest land; and 5.7 million acres in private industrial forest land).
What happens on these federal lands, therefore, plays a significant role in overall public forest land management policy; which, in turn influences what happens on our state and private forest lands. I believe that one of the central flaws in our current effort to develop a rational and balanced policy for managing public forest land in Oregon is that we operate in silos, viewing state lands in isolation from activities on federal and private forest lands. This becomes obvious when we look at forest land ownership in Oregon and the relative contributions that these lands make to annual timber production.
Total Forest Land in Oregon = 30,499,733 acres
Ownership Percent Land Base Percent Timber Production
Federal 59% 12%
State 3% 10%
Private (Industrial + 19% 75%
Commercial non-industrial)
As you can see, the vast majority of annual timber production (75%) comes from private land. And while the fact that private industrial timber lands are producing most of the volume may not be surprising, when viewed in a larger landscape context – and given the current market forces – this is not necessarily a healthy situation; a point I will return to in a moment.
Furthermore, while at a level much less than private industrial lands, our state lands are producing a significant volume of timber when compared to federal lands. The 870,000 acres of state forest land is producing 10% of annual timber volume; while the 17,900,000 acres of federal forest land are producing only 12%.
These realities on private and state lands have caused some to look to federal public lands as the de facto conservation-base – they perceive these federal lands as the portion of the landscape that produces the habitat needs for fish and wildlife. This attitude towards federal lands increases pressure for harvest on both state and private lands, and it under-recognizes the unique habitat needs on state and private lands as well as the efforts that have been made -- and that could still be made -- by landowners and managers to address this. That is not healthy either.
My point is that our current private, federal and state management framework results in a de facto zoning of Oregon’s forest landscape that does not necessarily correlate with species needs, with forest health, or with economic and local community values. The consequence of this condition is the existence of three unsustainable and, in my view, undesirable symptoms:
But when you see production levels at 400 million board feet today across acreage 21 times larger than our state forest land base -- compared to nearly 5 billion board feet on that same landscape in 1989 -- I submit this is not desirable either. It ignores the legacy of a century of federal forest management policy characterized by active fire suppression, excessive livestock grazing, the removal of over story old growth pine and fir – compounded by an era of staunch resistance to active management by conservation groups.
The legacy of these management practices – particularly in Eastern Oregon –is forests overstocked with stands of younger fir and pine; the loss of older fire-resilient forest structure; a mammoth road system that has disconnected healthy hydrologic function and fragmented habitat; a significant reduction in watershed health; the destruction of habitat for sensitive species; a steep decline in employment for timber dependent communities; and a high risk of catastrophic fire.
Because of these conditions, I do not view calls for increased federal management—such as the April 2011 memo I received from groups including OFIC, AFRC, and a variety of other timber interests—as inconsistent with my conservation or broader social values. Indeed, I believe that reversing this legacy requires environmentally sound active management to restore the health of these federal forests.
Active management requires local mill infrastructure and a skilled contractor base; an operational market which rests upon a predictable and sustainable supply of wood and other products of restoration work; and adequate capacity for management within the federal agencies.
Today, through Congressional budget cuts, market downturns and dwindling supply, this local mill infrastructure and Forest Service management capacity has suffered greatly in the federal land dominated parts of Oregon – and, not coincidentally, so have the surrounding communities. Failure to reverse this trend will further jeopardize the health of these vast forest ecosystems; and increase pressure to ramp up the timber volume taken off our state and private lands.
This amounts to nothing more than exporting our natural capital and our jobs. We are at risk of becoming a timber colony for Asia; while undermining our mill infrastructure and their surrounding communities – and, at the same time, further increasing the pressure for harvest on public forest lands.
We don’t want to see the listing of another old-growth dependent species. This is Oregon. We can do better, and now is the time to take proactive measures that better allow us to show success stories around species recovery instead of the continued shackles of federal Endangered Species Act listings.
III. Moving Forward
The answer to meeting these challenges is not to expect that the private industrial sector is suddenly going to shift away from a timber production framework as its primary focus. Nor is it to expect that federal land logging will return to the levels of the 1980’s and early 90’s. That is not what I’m saying. Clearly there are different histories, legal frameworks and standards applicable to private versus state forest management; and state versus federal forest management.
What I am saying, however, is that the three symptoms I just described are just that – symptoms; symptoms of a larger underlying problem: the fact that the status quo in terms of our economic, community and conservation values does not represent a sustainable or, quite frankly, a defensible balance. We are mired in ongoing conflict: timber sale by timber sale; forest by forest – rather than engaging in a more holistic strategy that can move us toward a collaborative solution that balances our environmental, economic and community values in a sustainable manner.
To achieve this vision, new and innovative approaches are needed across many areas tied to public forest management. This includes diversification of product lines and business models, including ties to community-scale biomass energy. Examples of this can be found in John Day and the partnership between Malheur Lumber and the local hospital and airport; and in the integrated wood product campuses from Wallowa County.
Innovation also includes the expansion and diversification of revenue sources for counties, for the Department, and for the health of forest lands and affected communities. We need to examine responsible ways to increase revenue options, including community forests, carbon sequestration markets, and other market-based approaches that help avoid the conversion of forest lands to non-forest uses.
This also includes expansion of state-forest ownership – and I would like to applaud the Board and the Department’s work on the Gilchrist State Forest and your help in keeping a working forest active in a place that needs working forests. I am also interested in looking at innovative new loan programs, funding partnerships, the use of bonding authorities or the expansion of voter-backed funding in support of conservation-based working landscapes and rural economic development around forest management.
Innovation also includes considering the establishment of a signature research center (like ONAMI and BEST) dedicated to innovation in the use of wood – perhaps a partnership between the Forestry Department at OSU, the School of Architecture at U of O; and the proposed Sustainability Center in Portland.
Finally, we need to support pathways that lead to consensus in management, particularly on the federal landscape. Since my last term as governor-- and my work on the en libra principles -- the good work of collaboration has grown significantly across many Oregon regions and communities closely linked with federal forests. In many places, projects have not been appealed or litigated for years. This is a positive trend. Gaining collaborative agreement across diverse constituents on public forest management provides stability, and in a world of increasingly limited funding, the consensus these local forest collaboratives produce represents a sound place to invest. That said, the ecological, social, and economic needs we face today demand restoration work at a larger scale. I will continue to support forest collaboratives – but will also challenge them to advance project work at a pace and scale that is meaningful for forest and community health.
We have an opportunity to break the mold of conflict and polarization by how we choose to move forward on our state forests. I believe you join me in wanting Oregonians and the nation to look at Oregon as a model for public forest management. To do so, two things are required.
First, we must view our state forests not in isolation but rather in the context of the larger forest landscape of which they are a part. This means that in addition to the management policies set forth by the Board of Forestry for state lands; we must aggressively pursue the latitude to engage in environmentally sound active management to restore the health of our federal forest lands; through our Congressional delegation, through the US Forest Service via channels like our Federal Forest Advisory Committee, and through our network of community-based forest collaboratives.
It also means we must develop polices and strategies that will result in logs harvested off private lands being as valuable here in Oregon as they are in Asia. In short we need to be exporting value added products, not our natural capital and our jobs. Both of these efforts will be priorities for my administration.
Second, the management of our state forests must reflect the kind of sustainable forest policy which can help inform the management debate across Oregon’s larger forested landscape.
IV. Specific Charge to the Board of Forestry
My specific charge to you today is related to the development of exactly that kind of sustainable forest management policy. This notion of sustainability is why I have supported the application of the “Greatest Permanent Value” rule interpretation that recognizes and respects the wide variety of values that exist on State forest lands, and why I continue to support that approach. I applaud your work on review of that rule—working with your Public Advisory Committee—and support the Department’s recommendation that you affirm the rule in the near future.
But we need not get hung up on GPV today -- or in the future; we need not fight about whether to narrow or expand the definition of the term because I believe we can achieve our economic, environmental and community values if we focus on a shared management vision that includes five key elements, some of which you are already working on. As you discuss your 2012 work plan this afternoon, I would like you to consider addressing these five elements in the coming year.
Element 1: Performance Measures
Performance measures define the collective targets for our management of public lands. They are the outcomes against which we measure management success. Begin to strengthen your existing suite of performance measures in a way that clarifies the expected outcomes from state forest -- not just revenues but the full range of values. In the coming year, take the time to refocus on these.
To illustrate the importance of this point, let me cite your recent Forest Management Plan revision around revenue from the Tillamook – which, in my view leads us to the wrong conversation and reinforces the old zero sum conflict that has characterized and constrained forest management policy in the past.
Revenue is certainly an important part of the state forest picture, and it is specifically important to forest counties as well as our forest industry. As I stated earlier, we need to increase the value of logs here, versus shipping them overseas. And we need to ensure county revenues. To be clear, I have no problem deriving revenue from our state forests, so long as the management plan is sound. And if some years produce more revenue than others because of market conditions, then that is a reason to look to diversification and other tools to stabilize revenues rather than a reason for large swings in harvest.
Unlike a stock market investment, however, we manage public forests for a balance of dividends beyond dollars. If hard revenue targets drive management, then this limits the management tools and prescription options available to foresters in attaining the variety of these values across the landscape. If we instead first define our targets around the amount and location of acres that will be our timber production base, what acres involve too much risk due to erosion or other reasons, and what acres are needed to advance conservation values or public recreation values, then a system will emerge on which we can project stable, predictable revenue outcomes in concert with other outcomes.
Element 2: Strategy
Based upon the increased clarity around performance measures, I encourage you to examine the tenets of structure-based management to consider if they; or other forest management strategies -- or some combination of strategies -- are best suited to deliver on these outcomes. There is still a need to address the issue of restoring diversity within the existing structural conditions across the state forest landscape, especially in the direction of layered and old-complex forest, which is extremely deficit in light of desired ranges. Specifically, I would like y0u to consider how a land allocation approach -- with both wood emphasis and conservation emphasis -- might help you better address your performance measures while providing a better degree of certainty for all interests. A determination of whether such an approach is superior to current management should rest on the best available science.
Remember, too, that the collaborative and inclusive approach to management that I am encouraging on federal lands should also guide your development of state forest plans.
Element 3: Conservation
Examine and then act upon the authority vested in the Board and Department to establish areas managed primarily for conservation on state forests. Consider ways of establishing and managing these areas that provide certainty and improved habitat and species recovery outcomes, restoration jobs, and other economic benefits such as recreation. These could be areas that protect against undesired risks (such as erosion on steep slopes), recognize special places with high value to the public or to species conservation, and -- while not in an industrial harvest rotation – these areas might still see active management to restore and enhance conservation values. Be careful to use a scientific basis for determining where and how large such a network of these areas should be so as to ensure landscape-level habitat value and hedge against impacts from disturbances.
I recognize that the Department already provides protection to certain sensitive areas under current management. Your challenge as a board is to provide a visible and durable conservation area commitment in a scientifically meaningful manner … doing so as an expression of the Board’s conservation values in action.
My request that you consider establishing clearly defined conservation areas could compliment the land allocation approach I just mentioned – and as such would require that we also clearly define timber production areas and grant these areas the same certainty granted to conservation areas.
Element 4: Adaptation
I have heard State Forester Decker refer to acting with humility, and recognizing that as land managers, we don’t have all the answers and the state of the science is always evolving. This is an important concept at the heart of adaptive management. In the year ahead, take a close look at your research, monitoring and adaptive management strategies to ensure you have sufficient data and information to inform and evolve your forest management approach into the future. This begins with a realistic identification of the resources and partnerships necessary to implement these strategies.
Element 5: Business Model
Finally, I encourage you to review your financial and business model for operating Oregon’s state forest system—within the context of your expected outcomes. For the long-term stability of Oregon counties and other beneficiaries of state forest management, we must find a way to diversify both the revenue portfolio of our counties and of our forest revenue streams as well. Your scheduled consideration of ecosystem services later today is an encouraging first step and I look forward to working with you and with our county partners over the months ahead to address this important issue.
Let me close this afternoon with a few final comments.
First, if we are to develop a landscape approach to the management of forestland in Oregon, the Board will increasingly have to work with both federal and private forest land managers. I will do whatever I can to facilitate that interaction.
Second, in terms of federal land management, I have intentionally focused today on what I see as a need to increase management activity. Even though you as a Board and I as governor do not directly manage these lands, we do have influence. In addition to the work of the Federal Forest Advisory Committee, with which you are familiar, I see one additional pathway in which you as a Board could have a positive effect: the work of forest collaboratives, where diverse voices are working through differences to find common ground for the good of the community and the good of the forest. The collaboratives provide a framework for my call for increased federal management. Currently the State of Oregon provides modest support for these collaboratives, and we need to do more. I’ve asked members of my team to consider ways to ensure reasonable technical and capacity support for collaboratives working to break the gridlock. We’ll need your help—and the assistance and support of the Department of Forestry—to make that work.
As you do this, and as you examine your business model, I ask you to work closely with me, with the Legislature, and with your partners and stakeholders to identify sufficient political and financial resources to deliver on the outcomes.
Third, I realize that work on the above elements will require significant work and lead you to a variety of decision points. But my belief is that by focusing on these key elements, you have within your reach the ability to shape a sustainable approach to managing forests that can be a model for how to simultaneously address environmental, economic and community values. An approach that is financially sustainable, politically sustainable, and environmentally sustainable, and that can inform future state forest management plans; as well as management on Oregon’s larger forested landscape.
Finally, let me thank you for your service to this Board, to our forests, to our state and to our common future.
[1] Wood Resource Quarterly, “Global Timber and Wood Products Market Update” (a news brief from Wood Resources International LLC) (August 2011). If the trends of the first seven months of 2011 continue, U.S. and Canadian softwood exports will more than double from last year.
I. Introduction
Thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today. It comes at an important time. While there is chaos in our nation – Oregon remains an island of sanity; a place where we can still bring our problems and differences to a common table and seek win/win solutions.
In the past legislative session – and confronted with a larger per capita budget deficit than either California or Washington – we balanced our budget with civility and integrity; without tearing our state apart like Wisconsin; or shutting it down like Minnesota.
I would like to apply that same spirit to the management of our forest lands, which remain embroiled in controversy. The vast federal forests of Eastern Oregon continue to need environmentally sound active management to restore their health at a landscape scale. In SW Oregon, the conflict over how the O&C forest lands should be managed has reached a new chapter. All the while, many rural counties and communities across our state face a relentless slide into fiscal insolvency and social disintegration. And earlier today, you engaged in rulemaking on the management of the Elliott state forest – an issue that has also fostered deep and ongoing controversy.
So while I am here to speak to the Board of Forestry about Oregon’s state forest lands, my overall concern, my hope and my vision, centers on Oregon’s forested landscape as a whole; and on creating a path forward that can unify the often competing interests that have divided us in the past.
As you know, I have had a long involvement in forest policy in Oregon, dating back to the two rewrites of the Oregon Forest Practices Act in 1987 and 1991 when I was President of the State Senate; the Eastside Forest Health Project and the Blue Mountain Demonstration Project; the development and implementation of the Oregon Plan for Salmon and Watersheds; and carrying through to the initial development of the management plan for the Tillamook and Clatsop State Forests during my service as Governor from 1995-2003.
Over the years I have witnessed legislative attempts to establish timber primacy on our state forests; as well as ballot measures which attempted to set aside half the landscape for preservation purposes. Both approaches reflect the politically-driven see-saw management of these lands which has colored our past; and both approaches erode trust and diminish our capacity to put in place the kind of sustainable forest policy which can help inform the management debate across Oregon’s larger forest landscape.
Given this history it is understandable that your recently revised management plan for the Tillamook and Clatsop State Forests of northwest Oregon is not without controversy, with many on all sides expressing a familiar set of concerns. The environmental community is concerned that the increased harvest level is not sustainable and will jeopardize conservation values; the wood products industry is concerned that any reduction in harvest – particularly given the timber supply problem being exacerbated by raw log exports -- will jeopardize the viability of our local mill infrastructure and the jobs associated with it; and counties are concerned that any reduction in the harvest level will further erode the already strained financial integrity of local government.
These are variations of the same concerns we are hearing surrounding the Elliott state forest; the current and future management of our O&C lands; and of the much larger federal forest landscape managed by the U.S. Forest Service. It is an old litany. And all of these concerns have merit – certainly when viewed in isolation – but perhaps less so when viewed through a larger lens.
II. Providing a Larger Context
The state forests that are managed by the Oregon’s Board of Forestry represent an opportunity to craft a model for public forest land management. I suggest to you that we have not yet perfected that model. It is a work in progress, and it is part of a much larger picture and should be viewed in that context.
Almost 60% of Oregon’s land base is in federal ownership, almost 18 million acres of which is forest land managed either by the U.S. Forest Service (14.7 million acres) or the Bureau of Land Management (3.2 million acres). This means that of the 30.5 million acres of forest landscape in Oregon, the federal government owns and manages 59% (17.9 million acres); and state owns and manages 3% (871,000 acres); and 38 percent is in private ownership (5.8 million acres in family forest land; and 5.7 million acres in private industrial forest land).
What happens on these federal lands, therefore, plays a significant role in overall public forest land management policy; which, in turn influences what happens on our state and private forest lands. I believe that one of the central flaws in our current effort to develop a rational and balanced policy for managing public forest land in Oregon is that we operate in silos, viewing state lands in isolation from activities on federal and private forest lands. This becomes obvious when we look at forest land ownership in Oregon and the relative contributions that these lands make to annual timber production.
Total Forest Land in Oregon = 30,499,733 acres
Ownership Percent Land Base Percent Timber Production
Federal 59% 12%
State 3% 10%
Private (Industrial + 19% 75%
Commercial non-industrial)
As you can see, the vast majority of annual timber production (75%) comes from private land. And while the fact that private industrial timber lands are producing most of the volume may not be surprising, when viewed in a larger landscape context – and given the current market forces – this is not necessarily a healthy situation; a point I will return to in a moment.
Furthermore, while at a level much less than private industrial lands, our state lands are producing a significant volume of timber when compared to federal lands. The 870,000 acres of state forest land is producing 10% of annual timber volume; while the 17,900,000 acres of federal forest land are producing only 12%.
These realities on private and state lands have caused some to look to federal public lands as the de facto conservation-base – they perceive these federal lands as the portion of the landscape that produces the habitat needs for fish and wildlife. This attitude towards federal lands increases pressure for harvest on both state and private lands, and it under-recognizes the unique habitat needs on state and private lands as well as the efforts that have been made -- and that could still be made -- by landowners and managers to address this. That is not healthy either.
My point is that our current private, federal and state management framework results in a de facto zoning of Oregon’s forest landscape that does not necessarily correlate with species needs, with forest health, or with economic and local community values. The consequence of this condition is the existence of three unsustainable and, in my view, undesirable symptoms:
- If you are a rural community or a mill located in a landscape dominated by federal land, you are in real trouble -- if you are still in existence today. Federal lands are producing wood products at levels 90% lower than those in 1989. Let me be clear that I am not suggesting that we return to the unsustainable practices and logging levels of the 1980’s and early 90’s.
But when you see production levels at 400 million board feet today across acreage 21 times larger than our state forest land base -- compared to nearly 5 billion board feet on that same landscape in 1989 -- I submit this is not desirable either. It ignores the legacy of a century of federal forest management policy characterized by active fire suppression, excessive livestock grazing, the removal of over story old growth pine and fir – compounded by an era of staunch resistance to active management by conservation groups.
The legacy of these management practices – particularly in Eastern Oregon –is forests overstocked with stands of younger fir and pine; the loss of older fire-resilient forest structure; a mammoth road system that has disconnected healthy hydrologic function and fragmented habitat; a significant reduction in watershed health; the destruction of habitat for sensitive species; a steep decline in employment for timber dependent communities; and a high risk of catastrophic fire.
Because of these conditions, I do not view calls for increased federal management—such as the April 2011 memo I received from groups including OFIC, AFRC, and a variety of other timber interests—as inconsistent with my conservation or broader social values. Indeed, I believe that reversing this legacy requires environmentally sound active management to restore the health of these federal forests.
Active management requires local mill infrastructure and a skilled contractor base; an operational market which rests upon a predictable and sustainable supply of wood and other products of restoration work; and adequate capacity for management within the federal agencies.
Today, through Congressional budget cuts, market downturns and dwindling supply, this local mill infrastructure and Forest Service management capacity has suffered greatly in the federal land dominated parts of Oregon – and, not coincidentally, so have the surrounding communities. Failure to reverse this trend will further jeopardize the health of these vast forest ecosystems; and increase pressure to ramp up the timber volume taken off our state and private lands.
- If you are a mill, a mill worker, or a secondary market business living in a landscape dominated by private industrial land, you are likely seeing real trouble as well, because so many of the trees being cut on these lands today are being shipped across the Pacific Ocean as raw logs. Despite the continuing weakness of the U.S. housing market, lumber production both in the U.S. and Canada is higher in 2011 than in 2010.[1] Yet Oregon mills face an acute timber supply problem despite the fact that west coast log exporters are projected to send over $900 million dollars worth of logs overseas this year, compared to only $42 million just four years ago.
This amounts to nothing more than exporting our natural capital and our jobs. We are at risk of becoming a timber colony for Asia; while undermining our mill infrastructure and their surrounding communities – and, at the same time, further increasing the pressure for harvest on public forest lands.
- Finally, if you are a forest-dependent species that relies on old-growth habitat, then you are in trouble too. Old-forest habitat is in a deficit condition across Northwest Oregon and other places as well. We’ve seen the impacts of the spotted owl listing…which is a cautionary tale regarding species recovery, and potential future listings.
- The US Fish & Wildlife Service recently issued its Spotted Owl Recovery Plan, highlighting actions that are still needed to address habitat and population health for this species.
- In the National Marine Fisheries Service’s recent decision to keep coastal Coho salmon listed under the ESA, it highlighted limiting factors to recovery related to forest management;
- And, the US Fish & Wildlife Service just issued a “warranted but precluded” decision for the Red Tree Vole, creating a Northwest Oregon Distinct Population Segment for this species and making it a candidate for listing under the ESA.
We don’t want to see the listing of another old-growth dependent species. This is Oregon. We can do better, and now is the time to take proactive measures that better allow us to show success stories around species recovery instead of the continued shackles of federal Endangered Species Act listings.
III. Moving Forward
The answer to meeting these challenges is not to expect that the private industrial sector is suddenly going to shift away from a timber production framework as its primary focus. Nor is it to expect that federal land logging will return to the levels of the 1980’s and early 90’s. That is not what I’m saying. Clearly there are different histories, legal frameworks and standards applicable to private versus state forest management; and state versus federal forest management.
What I am saying, however, is that the three symptoms I just described are just that – symptoms; symptoms of a larger underlying problem: the fact that the status quo in terms of our economic, community and conservation values does not represent a sustainable or, quite frankly, a defensible balance. We are mired in ongoing conflict: timber sale by timber sale; forest by forest – rather than engaging in a more holistic strategy that can move us toward a collaborative solution that balances our environmental, economic and community values in a sustainable manner.
To achieve this vision, new and innovative approaches are needed across many areas tied to public forest management. This includes diversification of product lines and business models, including ties to community-scale biomass energy. Examples of this can be found in John Day and the partnership between Malheur Lumber and the local hospital and airport; and in the integrated wood product campuses from Wallowa County.
Innovation also includes the expansion and diversification of revenue sources for counties, for the Department, and for the health of forest lands and affected communities. We need to examine responsible ways to increase revenue options, including community forests, carbon sequestration markets, and other market-based approaches that help avoid the conversion of forest lands to non-forest uses.
This also includes expansion of state-forest ownership – and I would like to applaud the Board and the Department’s work on the Gilchrist State Forest and your help in keeping a working forest active in a place that needs working forests. I am also interested in looking at innovative new loan programs, funding partnerships, the use of bonding authorities or the expansion of voter-backed funding in support of conservation-based working landscapes and rural economic development around forest management.
Innovation also includes considering the establishment of a signature research center (like ONAMI and BEST) dedicated to innovation in the use of wood – perhaps a partnership between the Forestry Department at OSU, the School of Architecture at U of O; and the proposed Sustainability Center in Portland.
Finally, we need to support pathways that lead to consensus in management, particularly on the federal landscape. Since my last term as governor-- and my work on the en libra principles -- the good work of collaboration has grown significantly across many Oregon regions and communities closely linked with federal forests. In many places, projects have not been appealed or litigated for years. This is a positive trend. Gaining collaborative agreement across diverse constituents on public forest management provides stability, and in a world of increasingly limited funding, the consensus these local forest collaboratives produce represents a sound place to invest. That said, the ecological, social, and economic needs we face today demand restoration work at a larger scale. I will continue to support forest collaboratives – but will also challenge them to advance project work at a pace and scale that is meaningful for forest and community health.
We have an opportunity to break the mold of conflict and polarization by how we choose to move forward on our state forests. I believe you join me in wanting Oregonians and the nation to look at Oregon as a model for public forest management. To do so, two things are required.
First, we must view our state forests not in isolation but rather in the context of the larger forest landscape of which they are a part. This means that in addition to the management policies set forth by the Board of Forestry for state lands; we must aggressively pursue the latitude to engage in environmentally sound active management to restore the health of our federal forest lands; through our Congressional delegation, through the US Forest Service via channels like our Federal Forest Advisory Committee, and through our network of community-based forest collaboratives.
It also means we must develop polices and strategies that will result in logs harvested off private lands being as valuable here in Oregon as they are in Asia. In short we need to be exporting value added products, not our natural capital and our jobs. Both of these efforts will be priorities for my administration.
Second, the management of our state forests must reflect the kind of sustainable forest policy which can help inform the management debate across Oregon’s larger forested landscape.
IV. Specific Charge to the Board of Forestry
My specific charge to you today is related to the development of exactly that kind of sustainable forest management policy. This notion of sustainability is why I have supported the application of the “Greatest Permanent Value” rule interpretation that recognizes and respects the wide variety of values that exist on State forest lands, and why I continue to support that approach. I applaud your work on review of that rule—working with your Public Advisory Committee—and support the Department’s recommendation that you affirm the rule in the near future.
But we need not get hung up on GPV today -- or in the future; we need not fight about whether to narrow or expand the definition of the term because I believe we can achieve our economic, environmental and community values if we focus on a shared management vision that includes five key elements, some of which you are already working on. As you discuss your 2012 work plan this afternoon, I would like you to consider addressing these five elements in the coming year.
Element 1: Performance Measures
Performance measures define the collective targets for our management of public lands. They are the outcomes against which we measure management success. Begin to strengthen your existing suite of performance measures in a way that clarifies the expected outcomes from state forest -- not just revenues but the full range of values. In the coming year, take the time to refocus on these.
To illustrate the importance of this point, let me cite your recent Forest Management Plan revision around revenue from the Tillamook – which, in my view leads us to the wrong conversation and reinforces the old zero sum conflict that has characterized and constrained forest management policy in the past.
Revenue is certainly an important part of the state forest picture, and it is specifically important to forest counties as well as our forest industry. As I stated earlier, we need to increase the value of logs here, versus shipping them overseas. And we need to ensure county revenues. To be clear, I have no problem deriving revenue from our state forests, so long as the management plan is sound. And if some years produce more revenue than others because of market conditions, then that is a reason to look to diversification and other tools to stabilize revenues rather than a reason for large swings in harvest.
Unlike a stock market investment, however, we manage public forests for a balance of dividends beyond dollars. If hard revenue targets drive management, then this limits the management tools and prescription options available to foresters in attaining the variety of these values across the landscape. If we instead first define our targets around the amount and location of acres that will be our timber production base, what acres involve too much risk due to erosion or other reasons, and what acres are needed to advance conservation values or public recreation values, then a system will emerge on which we can project stable, predictable revenue outcomes in concert with other outcomes.
Element 2: Strategy
Based upon the increased clarity around performance measures, I encourage you to examine the tenets of structure-based management to consider if they; or other forest management strategies -- or some combination of strategies -- are best suited to deliver on these outcomes. There is still a need to address the issue of restoring diversity within the existing structural conditions across the state forest landscape, especially in the direction of layered and old-complex forest, which is extremely deficit in light of desired ranges. Specifically, I would like y0u to consider how a land allocation approach -- with both wood emphasis and conservation emphasis -- might help you better address your performance measures while providing a better degree of certainty for all interests. A determination of whether such an approach is superior to current management should rest on the best available science.
Remember, too, that the collaborative and inclusive approach to management that I am encouraging on federal lands should also guide your development of state forest plans.
Element 3: Conservation
Examine and then act upon the authority vested in the Board and Department to establish areas managed primarily for conservation on state forests. Consider ways of establishing and managing these areas that provide certainty and improved habitat and species recovery outcomes, restoration jobs, and other economic benefits such as recreation. These could be areas that protect against undesired risks (such as erosion on steep slopes), recognize special places with high value to the public or to species conservation, and -- while not in an industrial harvest rotation – these areas might still see active management to restore and enhance conservation values. Be careful to use a scientific basis for determining where and how large such a network of these areas should be so as to ensure landscape-level habitat value and hedge against impacts from disturbances.
I recognize that the Department already provides protection to certain sensitive areas under current management. Your challenge as a board is to provide a visible and durable conservation area commitment in a scientifically meaningful manner … doing so as an expression of the Board’s conservation values in action.
My request that you consider establishing clearly defined conservation areas could compliment the land allocation approach I just mentioned – and as such would require that we also clearly define timber production areas and grant these areas the same certainty granted to conservation areas.
Element 4: Adaptation
I have heard State Forester Decker refer to acting with humility, and recognizing that as land managers, we don’t have all the answers and the state of the science is always evolving. This is an important concept at the heart of adaptive management. In the year ahead, take a close look at your research, monitoring and adaptive management strategies to ensure you have sufficient data and information to inform and evolve your forest management approach into the future. This begins with a realistic identification of the resources and partnerships necessary to implement these strategies.
Element 5: Business Model
Finally, I encourage you to review your financial and business model for operating Oregon’s state forest system—within the context of your expected outcomes. For the long-term stability of Oregon counties and other beneficiaries of state forest management, we must find a way to diversify both the revenue portfolio of our counties and of our forest revenue streams as well. Your scheduled consideration of ecosystem services later today is an encouraging first step and I look forward to working with you and with our county partners over the months ahead to address this important issue.
Let me close this afternoon with a few final comments.
First, if we are to develop a landscape approach to the management of forestland in Oregon, the Board will increasingly have to work with both federal and private forest land managers. I will do whatever I can to facilitate that interaction.
Second, in terms of federal land management, I have intentionally focused today on what I see as a need to increase management activity. Even though you as a Board and I as governor do not directly manage these lands, we do have influence. In addition to the work of the Federal Forest Advisory Committee, with which you are familiar, I see one additional pathway in which you as a Board could have a positive effect: the work of forest collaboratives, where diverse voices are working through differences to find common ground for the good of the community and the good of the forest. The collaboratives provide a framework for my call for increased federal management. Currently the State of Oregon provides modest support for these collaboratives, and we need to do more. I’ve asked members of my team to consider ways to ensure reasonable technical and capacity support for collaboratives working to break the gridlock. We’ll need your help—and the assistance and support of the Department of Forestry—to make that work.
As you do this, and as you examine your business model, I ask you to work closely with me, with the Legislature, and with your partners and stakeholders to identify sufficient political and financial resources to deliver on the outcomes.
Third, I realize that work on the above elements will require significant work and lead you to a variety of decision points. But my belief is that by focusing on these key elements, you have within your reach the ability to shape a sustainable approach to managing forests that can be a model for how to simultaneously address environmental, economic and community values. An approach that is financially sustainable, politically sustainable, and environmentally sustainable, and that can inform future state forest management plans; as well as management on Oregon’s larger forested landscape.
Finally, let me thank you for your service to this Board, to our forests, to our state and to our common future.
[1] Wood Resource Quarterly, “Global Timber and Wood Products Market Update” (a news brief from Wood Resources International LLC) (August 2011). If the trends of the first seven months of 2011 continue, U.S. and Canadian softwood exports will more than double from last year.
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