1891 Congress gives the President authority to set aside portions of
the federal government’s vast
western land holdings as “forest reserves.”
1894 Regulations are adopted stating that no one could “cut, remove,
or use any of the timber,
grass or other natural products” on forest reserves. Livestock
grazing was “strictly prohibited.”
1897 Congress passes the Organic Act as a rider to an Appropriations
bill, opening the forest
reserves to logging.
1950 Industrial logging accelerates. Ninety-five percent of U.S.
forestlands are logged within 45
years.
1964 Congress passes the Wilderness Act, creating a National Wilderness
Preservation System
permanently protecting 9.1 million acres. The system now includes
more than 40 million acres of
National Forest.
1969 Congress passes the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), requiring
federal agencies
to inform the public of the environmental impact of major federal projects.
1973 Congress passes the Endangered Species Act (ESA) committing the
federal government to
prevent the extinction of the native plants, animals and their habitats.
1976 Congress enacts the National Forest Management Act (NFMA), requiring
forest plans that
protect watersheds, maintain minimal levels of biological diversity,
and limit clearcutting.
1981 John Crowell, former Louisiana Pacific executive and Reagan’s Assistant
Secretary of
Agriculture, says he believes the cut on National Forests can be doubled
without adverse
environmental effects.
1983 Environmental activists blockade the Bald Mountain road into the
North Kalmiopsis
Roadless Area in Oregon’s Siskiyou National Forest. Protests
continue in National Forests
throughout the 1980s and 1990s.
1985 Congress passes the first in a series of appropriations bill amendments,
or “riders,” lifting a
federal injunction in a lawsuit brought by the National Wildlife Federation
over logging on
unstable slopes in the Oregon coast range.
1988 A federal judge rules that a decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service not to initiate a
study of the status of the northern spotted owl is arbitrary and capricious.
Pubic interest
environmental organizations begin filing legal challenges against timber
sales throughout the
nation based on the Endangered Species Act, National Environmental
Policy Act, and National
Forest Management Act.
1989 U.S. District Judge William Dwyer blocks most National Forest timber
sales in western
Oregon and Washington until the Forest Service adopts a scientifically
credible plan for protecting
the northern spotted owl.
1990 The northern spotted owl is listed as a threatened species throughout
its range due to
destruction of its old growth forest habitat. In the following
few years, the marbelled murrelet,
several salmon and trout species, the Mexican spotted owl, the Indiana
bat, and several other
forest dependent species are listed as threatened and endangered.
1993 Clinton convenes the Northwest Forest Conference and promises to
produce a balanced
plan for the management of the old growth forest ecosystem within 60
days. Clinton adopts a
plan that reduces logging and increases protection for sensitive watersheds
but also allows about
one-third of the remaining old growth to be cut and sanctions salvage
logging and thinning in old
growth reserves.
1995 Clinton first vetoes then signs a budget bill containing a provision
called the “salvage rider”
that exempts virtually any timber sale on federal land from environmental
laws.
1997 Reps. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) and Jim Leach (R-IA) introduce the
National Forest
Protection and Restoration Act (NFPRA) the ends commercial logging
on federal lands and
redirects the Forest Service timber budget to ecological restoration,
worker retaining and
community assistance.
The National Forest System encompasses 191 million acres. Fifty
percent of the rain and snow in
the West falls on the National Forests. Many of America’s great
rivers emerge from National
Forest, including the Colorado, Rio Grande, Snake, Missouri and Allegheny,
supplying water for
thousands of communities and tens of millions of people. These
public lands provide habitat for
2/3 of the big game in the West. More than 1/3 of nearly 1,600
threatened, endangered and
sensitive species depend on public forest for food and shelter.
More picnickers, hikers,
backpackers, hunters, boaters, anglers, birdwatchers and sightseers
use National Forests than any
other federal land system in the U.S.