Last week, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins announced the repeal of the 2001 Roadless Rule. The Clinton-era rule had restricted timber harvesting and road construction on 58 million acres of U.S. Forest Service (USFS) lands, about a third of U.S. forest lands. Closing off access to public, working USFS lands has stifled responsible forest management and halted economic opportunity for local communities.
In Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, the Roadless Rule restricted access to 9.2 million acres of the forest, which spans 16.7 million acres total. The first Trump administration briefly made a small portion of the Tongass eligible for timber harvesting and road construction in 2020. The result? Only 186,000 more acres of timber harvest would have been eligible, and only 50 more miles of new roads could be constructed over the next 100 years. President Biden announced a review of the Roadless Rule within hours of his inauguration and subsequently reinstated the 2001 limits.
Sustainable forest management entails the selective cutting of some trees to thin the forest and decrease the fuel load, reducing the risk of catastrophic wildfires. For forests within the inventoried roadless areas, the restrictions limited the ability of the USFS to undertake prescribed burns, mechanical thinning, and other timber harvesting activities, as well as impeded access for firefighters.
Secretary Rollins said that the rescission of the rule removes “absurd obstacles to common sense management of our natural resources” and that “properly managing our forests preserves them from devastating fires and allows future generations of Americans to enjoy and reap the benefits of this great land.” The press release also estimates that of the acreage impacted by the Roadless Rule, 28 million acres are in areas at high or very high risk of wildfire.
The Roadless Rule has also harmed local communities. The USDA’s press release states that “Utah alone estimates the roadless rule alone creates a 25% decrease in economic development in the forestry sector.” More than 70,000 people live within the boundaries of the Tongass. Southeast Alaskans who depend on the timber industry near the Tongass have seen employment decline to fewer than 400 jobs in 2020, a tenth of the jobs available in 1990.
Chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, Bruce Westerman (R., AR), said that the decision “acknowledges that we cannot lock up our forests and throw away the key.” Utah Governor Spencer Cox said of the rule, “A good forest is like a garden. You actually have to tend it and take care of it. If we do this the right way, we can prevent fires and improve production.”
Kudos to the administration for tending to the gardens that are the working lands of the U.S. Forest Service.