Scandinavian model of sustainable, productive forestry could happen here

Published: Tuesday, March 27, 2012, 8:00 AM

 By By Ken Swanson

Environmentalists' hypersensitivity to modern productive forestry practices is a legacy of a bygone era of forest exploitation in the northwestern United States. Is this hypersensitivity understandable? Of course. Is it sensible in a more modern environment of highly regulated, sustainable harvesting and regeneration practices employed in other parts of the world that have been demonstrated to be successful and can easily be employed in Oregon? Probably not. 

Case in point: Sweden. Roughly the size of California, Sweden is 70 percent forested. About 50 percent of Sweden is actively managed, productive forest. This includes national, county and municipal land holdings as well as private holdings. Harvesting of forest resources in Sweden is as common as farming in the Willamette Valley. 

Forestry practices in Sweden are highly regulated and strictly enforced, and there is a long history of careful management dating back more than 100 years to when the first forestry regulations were enacted at the national level. Even with active management of productive forests on this scale, the Swedish standing timber inventory continues to increase, as it has for more than 50 years. This is worth repeating: Even with increases in forest production for five decades, the inventory of standing timber continues to expand in Sweden. 

Sweden is well beyond using timber for just lumber and paper; the country gets more than 35 percent of its total energy (including transport energy) from biomass resources, and most of that comes from the forest. In addition to heating most of a very cold country with biomass -- a country where temperatures are often well below freezing in the winter (as cold as 40 C below zero) -- Sweden is making world-leading advancements in the use of forest and agricultural biomass to replace fossil fuel-derived fibers, chemicals, liquid transport fuels, plastics and other compounds that are used in everyday life and in industrial applications. Remember, it is not just gasoline and diesel that we take from oil; there are many other items taken from oil refineries. 

Sweden decided 40 years ago that it had to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels because it had no native production. The country had become very dependent on imported oil for heating and electricity, and after the oil embargoes of the 1970s and given its climate, it could not afford to be at risk because of oil disruptions. Leaders looked, in part, to their massive forest resource for the answer to oil dependence. 

Forestry is so important to the Swedish economy now that more than one-quarter of all transport in Sweden is devoted to forestry and downstream industries. This on a scale of more than 9 million people and a state three times the size of Oregon. The economic impact of the forest and forest-related industries is massive, supplying hundreds of thousands of direct and indirect jobs. 

Is it any wonder that Sweden, of all the developed, industrialized countries in the world, has the healthiest national economy at the moment? It has enjoyed GDP growth for the past three years above 5.5 percent annually and has a shortage of skilled labor in many of its markets, while Oregon has been mired in high unemployment for the past three-plus years. Does it have to be this way in Oregon with its rich forest resource? 

There are such things as sustainable forest production practices, and there is movement toward the use of forest resources to help reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and thus reduce long-term fossil fuel emissions. This is being done successfully in Sweden, Finland, Austria, Germany, Italy and other states in the European Union. Certainly it can be done successfully in Oregon and to the benefit of all parts of a healthy, sustainable society. 

Ken Swanson is from Forest Grove and, after 23 years in the high-tech industry, has been living and working for seven years in northern Sweden. 

Two bills would expand Rogue wilderness

Wyden, Merkley wrote Senate bill; Walden's House bill has timber industry backing

March 23, 2012

By Paul Fattig

Mail Tribune

Testifying before a Senate subcommittee in Washington, D.C. on a bill that would increase protection of the lower Rogue River, Grants Pass native Dave Strahan said the watershed enriches lives and livelihoods.

"The Rogue and its watersheds provided my family and me countless hours of outdoor recreation and enjoyment — family camping, fishing, hunting and boating was what we did when I was growing up," he testified Thursday morning before the subcommittee on public lands and forest chaired by U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.

"When I die, I hope to leave a Rogue River that my kids, my grandkids and their peers can continue to build memories around for generations to come," said Strahan, a 1972 graduate of Grants Pass High School who now sells recreational equipment.

Strahan was testifying in support of the Rogue Wilderness Area Expansion Act of 2011, submitted late last year by Wyden and fellow U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore. The bill would expand the existing wilderness area by some 60,000 acres, place 93 miles of the river's tributaries under wild and scenic protection and withdraw some 50 miles of tributaries from mining activity.

But on the same day that Strahan testified, the American Forest Resource Council, a timber industry coalition based in Portland, announced its opposition to the Senate bill. In 2010, the coalition had dropped its opposition to additional wilderness designation in the area following negotiations between it and environmental groups.

On Thursday, however, council President Tom Partin said the group supports a bill in the House which also would set aside the additional wilderness and provide "real certainty for local governments and industries" dependent on timber dollars. That bill has been introduced by Oregon representatives Greg Walden, a Republican, and Democrats Peter DeFazio and Kurt Schrader.

"We cannot support additional restrictions on federal forests in Western Oregon unless they are part of a broader resolution to the real threats facing our rural communities," Partin said in a prepared statement.

"The time for partial solutions that meet the needs of single-interest groups is past," he added. "We need a comprehensive solution that considers both the economic and environmental contributions we deserve from our federal forests."

Both bills would officially create a wilderness out of the nearly 60,000-acre Zane Grey tract, a largely roadless area immediately upstream from the 35,800-acre Wild Rogue Wilderness in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest. The Zane Grey area, named for the famous writer who fished the Lower Rogue from World War I into the early 1930s, is on the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's Medford District.

The Rogue River was one of the first rivers in the nation protected by the 1968 Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. A decade later, Congress created the Wild Rogue Wilderness.

During Thursday's hearing, Mike Pool, the BLM's deputy director, said the agency supports the bill introduced by Wyden and Merkley.

The area where protections would be expanded is the natural habitat for bald eagles, elk, bear, sturgeon, salmon and steelhead, Wyden told the committee.

"The Rogue River is part of Southern Oregon's recreational tradition attracting thousands of hikers, rafters and outdoor enthusiasts each year and pumping millions into the local economy," he said. "Preserving this land will protect the ecosystem for generations and ensure that the recreational economy in this area is allowed to thrive as well."

Strahan, who is a regional salesman for outdoor recreational equipment, agreed. He was representing 110 Oregon businesses as well as the Northwest Sports Fishing Association of some 300 outdoor businesses in the region.

A 2009 economic study estimated that economic benefits generated from fishing, hiking and white-water rafting on the Rogue exceeded more than $18.1 million each year, he said.

"The Rogue has long been an international draw for tourists and has also provided sanctuary for notable celebrities over the years," he said, noting that list includes former heavyweight champion George Foreman and writer Grey.

" 'The happiest lot of any angler would be to live somewhere along the banks of the Rogue River, the most beautiful stream in Oregon,' " Strahan said, quoting Grey.

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

A Tale of Two Birds

Jim Huffman | Mar 09, 2012 |

WIND, TIMBER AND HYPOCRISY IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST –

Originally published on The Daily Caller — 3/9/12 –

Writing in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal, Robert Bryce described the toll that the nation’s burgeoning wind farms have taken on endangered birds. At one site alone — Altamont in Alameda County, California — 2,400 raptors, including 70 golden eagles, have been killed by the giant whirling blades. In 2009 the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimated the national death toll from wind turbines at 440,000 birds that year alone.

That seems like a lot of birds, particularly for those of us in the Pacific Northwest, where a once-vibrant timber economy has been devastated in a failing effort to save the spotted owl. Of course, we’re losing a lot of birds to wind farms as well. One 2010 estimate put the annual death toll in Oregon and Washington at 6,500 birds and 3,000 bats, but that seems low if the Fish and Wildlife estimate is correct.

But whatever the number, there is no controversy that birds, including birds listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act, are being killed in significant numbers by the wind turbines. Though there is concern among environmentalists and government officials alike, thus far these bird kills have been accepted as a cost of advancing alternative energy.

I’ve got to imagine that, for an unemployed logger in rural Oregon or the owner of a shuttered lumber bill, there is something not quite right about this picture.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of endangered birds are being “taken,” in the parlance of the Endangered Species Act, yet the government presses ahead with plans, subsidies and tax breaks to expand an industry that cannot begin to compete on price and will never provide a reliable source of energy. The dramatic revival of natural gas as a cheap source of energy makes wind power even less competitive going forward. Yet there is no sign that the Obama administration will rethink its commitment to wind power. (There is, however, resistance in Congress to renewing the Wind Production Tax Credit that provides significant subsidies to the wind power industry.)

Meanwhile, the Northwest timber industry is in its third decade of economic desperation due largely to the closing of millions of acres of forests to harvesting — all in the interest of the survival of the northern spotted owl. Some will be quick to insist that the timber industry’s travails are due to the economic downturn and the associated slump in housing construction, but the truth is that when the housing market comes back, most of the lumber will be supplied from places other than the Pacific Northwest. Yet there are few places on the planet with the productive capacities of Northwest forests.

So this is the picture: On the one hand we have an uneconomic wind energy industry being promoted and heavily subsidized by the government with the full knowledge that it is killing thousands of endangered birds and hundreds of thousands of other flying critters. On the other hand we have a moribund timber industry shut down by government in a failing effort to save a few hundred spotted owls. And because the spotted owl continues to decline in numbers despite the millions of acres of forest set aside as owl habitat, the government now plans to shoot hundreds of barred owls that compete with the spotted owl. (Barred owls also interbreed with spotted owls, but never mind what that might imply for the spotted owl’s status as an endangered species.)

Is there any wonder that people sometimes have their doubts about the effectiveness of the federal government?

DeFazio touts logging plan to help finance Oregon timber counties

Published: Sunday, March 11, 2012, 10:55 PM     Updated: Monday, March 12, 2012, 6:11 AM

 By Eric Mortenson, The Oregonian 

View full sizeJamie Francis/The OregonianPrivate timber operations are still going on in Curry County and logs from federal lands are also being harvested but not at the rate to make up for budget shortfalls.

U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio said his bipartisan proposal to designate some federal land for logging and a preliminary Senate vote to extend forest payments may provide breathing room for Oregon timber counties on the edge of insolvency. 

DeFazio, a Democrat who represents the 4th District in southwest Oregon, has joined fellow Oregon Reps. Kurt Schrader, a Democrat, and Greg Walden, a Republican, to increase logging on what's called the Oregon & California Railroad land. 

In a talk to the Portland City Club on Friday, DeFazio said half of the O&C land, containing the best old growth, would be left alone, preserved except for thinning or other work needed to keep the forest healthy. The other half would be logged over time; some of it on 60- to 80-year harvest rotations and some on 120-year rotations. 

DeFazio said the O&C lands are "absolutely, statutorily unique." About 2.3 million acres of timber, scattered in checkerboard pattern over 18 counties, were granted to a railroad company. When the company failed, the federal government took the land back and put it under the control of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. 

Because the land was no longer on the tax rolls, the federal government pledged to share timber harvest revenue with counties. In the past 20 years, "gridlock" in the forest due to environmental restrictions and lawsuits has greatly reduced logging and timber sale money. 

DeFazio noted that conservation groups have criticized his idea, but he said they will never be able to defend old growth against the current Congress and U.S. Supreme Court. 

The situation is complicated by the loss of federal forest payments, intended to help counties that lost timber revenue from national forests managed by the U.S. Forest Service. The Senate last week gave preliminary approval to a plan that would restore funding at reduced levels for one year. 

About a dozen Oregon counties face insolvency in a year or two if replacement funding isn't found. Curry County, in southwest Oregon, hopes to stave off collapse by putting a sales tax on the ballot. 

DeFazio said the trouble could spread "county to county to county." 

"If Curry goes down then Coos goes down, and if Coos goes down then Douglas and Lane go down, and if Douglas and Lane go down -- I say it probably doesn't stop until it gets to Multnomah," he said. 

"I've been involved in the forest wars for 27 years," he said. "It started as a fight over old growth and it's going to end with preservation of old growth." 

DeFazio also talked to the City Club about the country's transportation infrastructure. 

"I'm going to talk about America falling apart," he began. 

He said the "legacy system" of transportation infrastructure, largely built during the Eisenhower administration in the 1950s, needs extensive work. He said 150,000 bridges need repair or replacement. Forty percent of the highway system road surface has failed, DeFazio said, and there is a $60 billion backlog of work needed for existing transit systems. 

The country is spending a fraction of what China, India and Brazil spend for transportation system improvements, he said. 

Maintaining and improving transportation infrastructure, the systems that move people and goods, has traditionally been a bipartisan effort, DeFazio said. 

"Well, it is a problem now," he said. 

Some Republicans in Congress have adopted a "devolution" view that the federal government has no role in a coordinated national transportation system, that it should "devolve" to the states. He said about 80 members of the House have "bought into this nonsense." 

-- Eric Mortenson 

U.S. Senate approves one-year extension for county payments

 By Charles Pope, The Oregonian 

Doug Beghtel/The OregonianThe Senate on Friday voted to continue the star-crossed county payments program for another year, increasing the odds that desperately needed federal funds will continue to flow to cash-starved rural counties in Oregon and nationwide.

WASHINGTON -- The Senate easily passed a one-year extension of the federal timber payments program  Thursday, giving hope of a reprieve for Oregon's economically distressed rural counties. 

Though 33 of Oregon's 36 counties have received the federal money, rural parts of the state have gained the most money and have been the most dependent on it for their services. Rural counties also have been the most desperate as payments ended this year, leading Curry County to put a sales tax on its May ballot, and the Oregon Legislature to pass a bill allowing strapped counties to use road fund reserves for sheriff's patrols. 

Thursday's lopsided 82-16 vote in the Senate was important not just for passage but for the negotiations to come with the House. 

The county payments language was attached to a transportation bill that the Senate is expected to finish next week. It then goes to the House. Differences must be resolved in a conference committee. 

Though it seems an odd mix of subject matter, attaching the program to the transportation bill gives it a strong chance of success. Congress must approve a transportation bill by the end of March because the federal government's authority to grant highway funds and collect taxes ends then. 

Negotiators supporting the timber payments are strengthened by the bipartisan vote on the amendment and the fact that the Obama administration included $294 million for the program in the budget the administration submitted last month. That budget would extend the county payments program in the next fiscal year. 

After Thursday's vote, both of Oregon's senators hailed the outcome. 

"County payments are the financial lifeline many rural counties in Oregon depend on," said Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat. "The program not only funds necessities such as roads and schools, it also provides rural counties with the fiscal security they need to get on and maintain a sound fiscal path." 

Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley called it "inexcusable" that the payments were allowed to lapse. "The federal government must keep its commitment to Oregon, and I will not let up until this bill is on the president's desk and signed into law." 

Counties and local governments faced a loss of money as early as spring for such crucial services as schools, libraries and law enforcement. The provision approved by the Senate calls for $346 million in payments for this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30. Of that total, Oregon would receive by far the largest share -- $102 million. 

The county payments program was created in 2000 to reimburse counties for lost income from the sale of timber on federal lands. In many of the counties, the federal government owns more than 50 percent of the land, pinching the tax base and in some cases limiting the ability of officials to develop their local economies. 

The payments were also acknowledgment that the federal government should help local governments after logging on federal land was reduced. Counties receive 25 percent of the revenue from timber sales but when logging plummeted, so did revenue. By law, the money was to be used to finance public education. 

In 2008, $250 million poured into 33 Oregon counties from the program. 

But the program has been in jeopardy for years, with some in Congress saying the money should have been only temporary relief from the timber crisis, not a long-term plan for financing local government. 

Repeatedly the counties have prepared for disaster. And repeatedly Oregon's congressional delegation has managed to get more money approved. 

-- Charles Pope

Comment On Rep. DeFazio's OpEd from Bob Zybach

Congressman DeFazio begins his editorial with the seemingly rhetorical question: "What if someone told you there was a bipartisan agreement in Congress to protect the iconic Rogue River, end the forest wars by saving the remaining old growth in western Oregon, help failing rural counties provide basic government services, create thousands of family-wage jobs, and save the federal government millions of dollars every year?"

He then says this proposal will do just those things. No it won't. Let's be realistic. Oregon Wild -- apparently privy to this plan before release to the rest of us -- will make sure it won't. They'll be helped by the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, and the lawyers at Western Environmental Law Center to make sure this can't and won't work. It's what they do, and have been doing successfully for decades. Even if the bill IS signed into law, which probably won't happen.

"Save our old-growth," which have been decimated by unprecedented catastrophic-scale wildfires since implementation of the Northwest Forest Plan? Passive management is a proven failure for "protecting" anything, yet this bill says "let's keep giving it a try, anyway, because that's what Oregon Wild and their cohorts want." One more give-away of the nation's resources to deadbeats, who would rather watch our forests die and rot in place than actually get a job making things better.

"Protect the Rogue River," by declaring humans pathogens that can only despoil its beauty and riches and therefore should be banned from its shores (unless wealthy enough and healthy enough to pay a whitewater rafting guide to babysit tourists through its canyons)? I don't think making a local fishing and boating and picnicking locations off-limits to continued uses is "protecting" anything. I think it is a statement of how some people view the rest of us -- their job, of course, being to "protect" nature against us darn humans (other than themselves, of course, who are somehow needed to enforce these protections).

No way this bill will end any such "forest war" -- the conflict was never really about "saving" old-growth anyway. The issue is about economic control of our rural communities and our natural resources. "Old-growth" and spotted hoot owls and "wild and scenic" rivers are just tools in achieving those results. Why compromise (or "collaborate") while dealing with constant success? The "war" has been over for many years -- beginning when our rural counties began accepting welfare payments instead of being allowed to pay their own way. Now it is time to reclaim our heritage and our communities.

Our forests are dead and dying. Our grasslands are choked with weeds. Our rural communities have been made dependent on government welfare, deeply affecting families and communities that have prided themselves for generations on self-sufficiency and their ability to pay their own way -- and still pay taxes and help the less fortunate. Now they've become the "burden" they used to help carry. This bill won't change that, either.

Centralized government management of resources did not work in Russia, did not work in Greece, and is not working here. The US government has demonstrated that it is incapable of managing key natural resources throughout the west (how many farms, ranches, fishing boats, gas wells and coal mines are government owned?), and that there is no logical reason to continue trying to do so.

The best long-term solution -- to my way of thinking -- is to transfer ownership of forests and grasslands (but not parks, highways, or military installations) to the reservations and counties in which they are located. Jobs will jump through the roof and tax monies will go toward Salem and DC, instead of welfare payments being needed to pay for food, rent, utilities, and basic services such as police, libraries, and schools.

That won't happen anytime soon, of course, but maybe the Congressmen CAN make it illegal for the environmental industry to continue suing the government at taxpayers expense. That would help.

Forest proposal: Conservation act would benefit Oregon communities

By Peter DeFazio  

What if someone told you there was a bipartisan agreement in Congress to protect the iconic Rogue River, end the forest wars by saving the remaining old growth in western Oregon, help failing rural counties provide basic government services, create thousands of family-wage jobs, and save the federal government millions of dollars every year? 

Impossible, right? 

After months of negotiation and hard work, Rep. Greg Walden, Rep. Kurt Schrader and I recently released a discussion draft of the O&C Trust, Conservation and Jobs Act. Our agreement would accomplish all of these things and put our struggling state back on a path toward prosperity, improve forest health and community livability, and jump-start rural economies. The Oregon Legislature found time during a contentious session in Salem to pass a resolution supporting our bipartisan agreement. Early indications show we will also receive the support of individual O&C counties that will be most affected by our proposal. The broad and overwhelming local support we have received in Oregon will be crucial to winning the backing of our colleagues in Congress and the approval of the president. 

But the process has not been easy. It is not surprising that breaking the gridlock on federal forests through creative thinking and bipartisan compromise has faced criticism. What is surprising and disappointing is that a handful of conservation groups -- including Oregon Wild -- strongly opposed the bipartisan agreement before it was finalized and made public. And despite the major conservation victories included in the recently released discussion draft, Oregon Wild and its friends continue to stick to stale talking points intended to generate public controversy and fear. 

County commissioners Pete Sorenson (Lane County) and Bill Hall (Lincoln County) have followed suit by criticizing the O&C Trust, Conservation and Jobs Act in this newspaper, claiming the bipartisan agreement does not do enough for the environment ("Don't sacrifice forests to solve financial crisis," Feb. 29). Their claims are identical to those of Oregon Wild and other groups that have publicly stated they have already compromised long ago on federal forest policy. 

They are missing a huge opportunity. 

Under the Northwest Forest Plan -- the current law of the land -- hundreds of thousands of acres of Oregon's old growth are open to clear-cutting. While administrative rules and judicial decisions offer some temporary protection for old growth, a stroke of the pen by a future administration, Congress or Supreme Court could mean the liquidation of Oregon's irreplaceable forests. 

Our bipartisan plan would provide the first-ever legislative protection for mature and old-growth forests -- offering certainty to Oregonians and finally ending the decades-old controversy that has plagued rural communities. Our plan would also add 58,000 forested acres to the Rogue Wilderness, provide wilderness protection to the Devil's Staircase -- one of Oregon's most rugged and pristine places on the coast -- and add 150 miles of Oregon rivers to the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. It would mandate that half the trust lands be managed on a long rotation to provide ecological diversity and require an integrated pest management plan. 

Naysayers such as Sorenson and Hall and a few of their environmental friends would have you believe these landmark conservation victories in a Republican-controlled House of Representatives would be insignificant, despite enthusiastically advocating these same protections for decades. They insist the bipartisan agreement would "liquidate" public lands and take forest management back "a decade or more." These are the same recycled arguments, fear-mongering and distrust that have plagued federal forest policy for decades. Similar strategies have prevented Oregon from crafting a meaningful long-term solution at the expense of our rural communities, our economy and our forests. 

It is time to turn the page. 

No, we should not return to the unsustainable harvest levels of the 1980s that decimated old growth, harmed threatened species and deteriorated our drinking water. But yes, we can sustainably and responsibly log in younger stands on federal lands to create jobs, provide reduced but certain levels of payments to counties and improve forest health. The bipartisan O&C Trust, Conservation and Jobs Act is a balanced approach that offers Oregonians certainty and opportunity. I will be the first to admit the plan is not perfect and required compromise. But I worked with my Democratic and Republican colleagues in good faith to secure critical support necessary to move a solution forward that works for Oregon. That's what Oregonians expect and deserve. 

I am disappointed that instead of joining me and the vast majority of Oregon's elected officials in working out a realistic long-term solution that benefits rural counties and our forests, a small minority continues to offer the public unworkable solutions. 

Suggesting, as Sorenson and Hall did in their guest opinion, that rural counties with real unemployment rates near 20 percent should double their property taxes or that the state should raise taxes and divert revenues to counties instead of to struggling state education and health care programs is irresponsible. I would expect more from these commissioners. If they are serious about these "solutions," why haven't they proposed doubling property taxes within their own jurisdictions or approached the state Legislature about increasing state taxes? 

I will continue to work with those who want a realistic, long-term solution. I hope interested Oregonians will visit my Web page (defazio.house.gov) to submit meaningful comments on the publicly available discussion draft to make the proposal even stronger. We can break out of the decades-long logjam on federal forest policy, put Oregonians back to work, help save failing rural counties and improve forest health. The O&C Trust, Conservation and Jobs Act is a great start. 

Democrat Peter DeFazio represents Oregon's 4th District in the U.S. House of Representatives.