Bush Administration Abandons Effort to Undercut National Forest Protections

U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton found that Bush administration officials had bypassed legally required environmental review and endangered species protections in creating a new management system for the national forests.

SAN FRANCISCO, California. Conservation groups are declaring a "victory for public participation" as the U.S. Forest Service and the timber industry Monday abandoned their appeals of a federal court decision that invalidated a Bush administration rule removing environmental protections for the 192 million acre National Forest System.

Regulations issued in 2005 by the Forest Service sought to overhaul the land management planning process for national forests by eliminating mandatory protections for wildlife and clean water, and mandatory limits on timber harvesting.

These regulations also curtailed public participation in the process.

The National Forest Management Act requires the Forest Service to protect wildlife in the national forests and to allow citizens to participate fully in management decisions.

The Bush rules invalidated the 1982 standards for national forest management instituted under President Ronald Reagan that protected species and required public review of the environmental impacts of proposed national forest plans governing timber harvest levels and natural resource protection.

U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton ruled March 30, 2007 that "because the 2005 Rule may significantly affect the quality of the human environment under NEPA [the National Environmental Policy Act], and because it may affect listed species and their habitat under ESA [the Endangered Species Act] the agency must conduct further analysis and evaluation of the impact of the 2005 Rule in accordance with those statutes."

"The USDA is ENJOINED from implementation and utilization of the 2005 Rule until it has fully complied with the pertinent statutes," Judge Hamilton ruled.

Her ruling prohibits the "implementation and utilization" of the Bush rules nationwide.

On Monday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, USDA, which includes the Forest Service, filed a motion to dismiss its appeal of this ruling, saying only that, "Following internal review, USDA has decided not to pursue its appeals."

Two timber industry organizations - the American Forest & Paper Association and the American Forest Resource Council - which had filed intervenor appeals in the case, joined in the motion to dismiss.

"We are glad the Bush administration has thrown in the towel," said Trent Orr of Earthjustice, who argued the case before Judge Hamilton. "The national forest planning rules are like the Constitution for our national forests, and the Bush administration tried to throw out the Bill of Rights."

"The Bush rule made any wildlife provisions in forest management plans aspirational, not mandatory. Our wildlife deserve better than a hope-and-a-prayer planning system," Orr said.

Judge Hamilton found that Bush administration officials had bypassed legally required environmental review and endangered species protections in creating a new management system for the national forests. The Bush rule eliminated enforceable environmental protections from the forest planning process.

Judge Hamilton also decided that the Bush administration had sprung its final forest planning rules on the public without sufficient notice of the paradigm shift that the rules accomplished.

The court's invalidation of the Bush rules is a strong signal that full public involvement in decisions regarding their public forests must be restored.

Earthjustice represented Defenders of Wildlife, The Wilderness Society, the Sierra Club and Vermont Natural Resources Council in the legal challenge to the Bush administration rule changes.

The Western Environmental Law Center represented Citizens for Better Forestry in a similar case that will also end with this motion of dismissal.