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West Virginia
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WVEC Action AlertsOctober 14, 2003Quick, Easy Bottle Bill Action..... Take a minute and vote in today's poll in the Beckley Register-Herald asking you whether or not you would support a WV Virginia Bottle Bill..... http://www.register-herald.com/ Thanks! Linda
Mallet Our National Forests and Communities at Risk: The Bush Administration???s "Healthy Forest Initiative" Continues to Move through Congress Legislation modeled after the Bush Administration???s misnamed ???Healthy Forest Initiative??? is dangerously close to passage in Congress. With one version already passed in the House, the Senate is currently considering the legislation. A vote is expected in the Senate October 13-31. Now is the time to mobilize to protect our National Forests! In this Action Alert, see the following: 1. What is Bush???s ???Healthy Forest Initiative???? 2. What does this mean to us in West Virginia? 3. What is the latest update from Capitol Hill? 4. ACTION: What can YOU do? 5. Questions? 1. What is Bush's "Healthy Forest Initiative"? Since this summer, the Bush Administration has been touting the ???Healthy Forest Initiative??? as a program to control forest fires. However, the solution it offers for fire protection is landscape-wide logging, an approach that contradicts the general scientific consensus on fire protection. Not only is it bad forest management, but the HFI also has grave implications for citizen input and environmental protections in our National Forests. For example, if fully enacted, HFI would: 1. Limit environmental analysis and limit public participation by (a) excluding environmental analysis for any site-specific project the Forest Service and BLM claim will reduce hazardous fuels, including post-fire salvage projects; and by (b) limiting public participation by allowing "hazardous fuels reduction projects" to be categorically excluded and suspends citizen's rights to appeal projects. 2. Accelerate aggressive "thinning" across millions of acres of backcountry forests miles away from communities at risk to forest fires. 3. Uses 'Goods for services' as the Funding Mechanism by (a) allowing the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to give away trees to logging companies as payment for any management activity, including logging on public lands; and (b) creating a powerful new incentive to log large fire-resistant trees, old growth, and other commercially valuable forests. The so-called ???Healthy Forests Initiative,??? has been the mold for legislation that does not prioritize projects that would create a crucial defensible space around western communities. Instead it calls for logging 20 million acres of federal lands, often far from any community, and provides virtually no funding for fuel reduction on non-federal lands. With thousands of communities at risk from forest fires, the common-sense approach is to do the most important work first. In doing so, you get buy-in from all parties, provide communities protection, and get the biggest bang for the buck. 2. What does this mean to us in West Virginia? This legislation does not only effect western states where forest fires are most common. Under the banner of fire protection, this legislation could potentially open up our own Monongahelia National Forest to increased logging, while limiting citizen involvement in forest management decisions. Both Senator Byrd and Senator Rockefeller recognized the potentially damaging effects of this legislation. They voted last month to preserve citizen input in forest management. Despite their votes to protect our National Forests, legislation unsettlingly close to HFI is nearing passage. 3. What's the latest from Capitol Hill on this issue? Currently, a ???compromise bill??? is in the Senate, but it is little different from the Bush Administration's HFI. This bill, while purporting to 'protect' old growth areas, does little more than establish guidelines for logging them. Roadless areas remain unprotected, NEPA and the administrative process are truncated, and the judicial review procedures are undermined. While some funds are earmarked for the Community Protection Zone, this is solely at the discretion of the Secretaries of Interior and Agriculture. While providing little protection for western communities at risk from wildfire, here in the east the compromise bill would open up large areas to increased logging with absolutely no environmental review if they are defined as suffering from or susceptible to blowdown, other natural storm damage, or natural insect epidemics. This is still a very, very bad bill and will wreak havoc on our public lands as well as environmental review and public participation. We are apt to see a vote on this legislation between October 13-31, either as a stand-alone bill or as an appropriations rider. It's critical that we get the word out in our local papers and bring pressure to bear on key senators. 4. ACTION: What can you do? Please send in a letter to the editor and stay tuned for more information. A sample letter is below. Please be prepared to contact your Senators and urge them to work for real protection for our forests and our communities and oppose the Administration's ???Healthy Forests Initiative.??? ************* Senate Bill LTE (fill in the blank) DATE Dear Editor: The Senate recently released a 'compromise bill' which, if passed, will put into law the Bush Administration's 'Healthy Forests Initiative.' While this bill claims to protect ancient forests, it doesn't, nor does it protect communities at risk and guarantee essential rights of Americans to participate in the management of our public lands. It's another wolf in sheep's clothing, like many of this Administration's proposals designed to hoodwink the American people while benefiting friends in industry. The Senate will be voting on a measure that aims to log National Forests and suspend environmental laws under the guise of "fuel reduction." The compromise bill reflects the Bush Administration's effort to remove important forest protections and the right of citizens to be involved in the management of public lands. We would do well to heed the research of Forest Service fire scientists and academics who urge the Forest Service to focus their considerable skills and resources on areas around communities, replace dangerous building materials and then work out from population centers. I encourage NAME OF SENATOR to support legislation that protects communities from fires, maintains important forest protections, and preserves my right to participate in decisions that affect NAME OF LOCAL NATIONAL FOREST and other public lands. NAME 5. Questions? Contact anna.sale@sierraclub.org or www.sierraclub.org/forests for more information.
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