The Federal Timber Sale Program Cost Taxpayers Billions

The Forest Service has, for the past 50 years, had control over much of its timber sale receipts.  The agency has learned that by giving the timber industry what it wants - cheap, subsidized federal timber - it can receive increased appropriations for its own budget.  This results from the influence of industry lobbyists over Congressional representatives from forested states.  The agency can grow its own budgets, staffs and operations by selling more and more of the public's timber.  And it has.  Rather than managing the forests for their long-term health and full panoply of benefits wilderness, watershed, recreations, etc. - “getting out the cut" has become the measure of success within the agency.
    Recent trade agreements have expanded industrial forestry and global exports worldwide, increasing pressure on U.S. National Forests, too.  The agreements have created a secure and enforceable framework of international rules from which global corporations can enter new markets.  As corporations search the planet for new markets, they have pushed governments to eliminate trade and investment barriers.  The result is further  market integration and stiffer competition which allows only those firms that vigilantly suppress costs to survive.
    Reducing expenditures for social and ecological safeguards (such as providing safe working conditions or complying with environmental laws) can be an easy way to boost a firms competitiveness.  In response to heightened competition created by these new arrangements, governments have introduced measures at the national level designed to boost the competitiveness of domestic firms by increasing subsidies, deregulating logging practices, and increasing access to forest resources.
    The result is a public lands logging program that operates at a net loss of nearly $1 billion each year. The American people pay for timber sale administration, logging road construction and repair as well as damage from floods, mudslides and forest fires caused by logging.  Timber companies' contributions to these costs are minimal.  From 1980 to 1991, the U.S. Forest Service timber program operated at a net loss of $7.3 billion.  In fiscal year 1996, nearly $800 million was appropriated from the general fund of the U.S. Treasury and another $532 million was spent from off budget accounts for the timber sale program.  None of these receipts were returned to the Treasury, resulting in a net loss to taxpayers of at least $800 million. (Hanson, Chad, "Ending
Timber Sales on National Forests, The Facts," 1997.)
    The replacement cost of a forest hundreds or thousands of years old is incalculable.  The considerable damage to watersheds, community water supplies, fisheries, and to the tourism and recreation industries are not fully considered in the Forest Service calculus.  Some costs, however, can be approximated.  Logging is a primary cause of floods and mudslides, and substantially increases the risk of forest fires.  In fiscal year 1996, $485 million was appropriated for the Forest Service's wildfire fighting program and $830 million was spent in fiscal year 1997.  As for floods, the preliminary damage estimate of the 1996 winter floods was $538 million for Oregon alone, much of which taxpayers covered through disaster relief appropriations.  In fiscal year 1996, $60.8 million was appropriated for "emergency supplemental" expenditures to repair roads and facilities
damaged by mudslides.
 
 "The Forest Service budgeting process, which allows the Forest Service to keep a percentage of the funds it realizes from timber sales, provides an incentive for Forest Service to sell timber below cost or at a loss. Also, to maximize its budget, the Forest Service uses expensive timber management and restoration techniques, such as clearcutting.  Again, conflicting interests lead to perverse results: clearcutting provides the Forest Service with a higher congressional subsidy because the Forest Service can request preparation and administrative costs.  Consequently, decisions may be made, not because they are in the best interests of the American people but because the benefit the Forest Service’s fiscal interest.”

 --Chief Judge Boyce E Martin, Jr., 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, 1997 decision regarding National Forests in Ohio. (Sierra Club v.  Thomas, 105 F.  3rd 248 (6th Cir.  1997)).

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