In October 1999, President Clinton circumvented Congress through executive rulemaking and proposed that 40 million acres of the national forest system be designated de facto wilderness. His goal is to protect the roadless areas within the 192,000,000-acre national forest system, which includes 140 national forests in 37 states. Unfortunately, his plan smacks of political convenience rather than forest protection.
In simplistic terms, his plan bans all future road building. However, the president’s agenda behind the plan is far from simplistic. First, President Clinton is using executive directive to establish roadless areas, or de facto wilderness, without going through Congress. Congress sets the tone for resource management with such acts as the Multiple Use Sustained Yield Act, the Wilderness Act and the National Forest Management Act. Nonetheless, the Forest Service is complying with the president’s request and undertaking an environmental review on the proposed road ban. Wilderness designation is a congressional function, and it is the strictest category for preservation. For example, federal protected wilderness areas cannot be used for mining, grazing, logging or oil drilling. In addition, vehicles are not allowed in the area, including dirt bikes, mountain bikes and other off-road vehicles.
Furthermore, the president’s plan is unnecessary since road construction is at its lowest level since the 1950s. Moreover, Forest Service supervisors are capable of making road closure decisions. Roadless area advocates correctly cite environmental damage as a result of past Forest Service road construction. However, a U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) report states that major soil erosion problems have occurred in our national forests due to poor road construction and maintenance by federal resource agencies. While Clinton decrees the end of road construction, he is failing to acknowledge and correct the inadequate road maintenance, a problem that rests on how forests are managed.
Let’s consider the effects of the president’s proposal on Georgia’s wilderness areas. As background information, Georgia’s roadless areas, according to the Southern Appalachian Assessment Roadless Inventory, consist of 61,557 acres or about 8 percent of the Chattahoochee National Forest. U.S. Forest Service figures report ten designated wilderness areas in Georgia equal to 114,616 acres, or about 15 percent of the Chattahoochee National Forest. The Chattahoochee also contains the largest congressionally-designated wilderness in the Southeast – the Cohutta at 35,268 acres.
Roadless inventories supposedly include land of 5,000 acres or more, yet President Clinton’s proposal includes land of 1,000 acres or more contiguous to Georgia’s Wild and Scenic Rivers and to its congressionally designated wilderness areas. Such small acreage will certainly raise the amount of roadless areas in the Chattahoochee more than 8 percent. All told, lands of 1,000 acres or more and existing roadless areas can result in wilderness areas exceeding 18 percent. This percentage means more land to manage for fire and disease suppression. Moreover, mechanical removal of dead wood is necessary, in many instances, to minimize fire damage. Without roads, forest management efforts are hampered. Profligate spending on road construction for timber purposes should not, of course, be supported. But the demand for NO roads ignores the many beneficial effects of having SUFFICIENT roads to allow for recreation, the practice of sound forestry, and logging where it is economically justified.
Georgia’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) opposes the roadless area policy, but Georgia residents complain that DNR is not doing what they should to protect wilderness values. Let’s remember states are not subsidiaries of the national government. In fact, Georgia is within its rights to question federal policies, especially when the decision ignores the duly elected congressional leadership who represent Georgia’s interests. Therefore, the real issue is the president’s usurpation of a congressional power. It is Congress who legally designates wilderness areas. We vote for Congress to make the weighty decisions, not one person acting out of political convenience.
If we want wilderness, Congress is the proper branch of government to make the determination. We fought a revolution over one person having too much authority over the lives of its citizens. From that event, we created a Constitutional form of government with duly elected representatives to voice our concerns. But all of this raises the question, are roadless areas being protected for ecological reasons or to boost Vice President Gore’s election chances this fall? Given the president’s track record, we are left with no choice but to question his true motives. That is unfortunate.
Jefferson G. Edgens, Ph.D., a native of Rome, Georgia, is a Natural Resource Policy Analyst at the University of Kentucky. He is also an adjunct scholar with the Georgia Public Policy Foundation. The Georgia Public Policy Foundation is a nonpartisan, member-supported research and education organization based in Atlanta, Georgia, that promotes free markets, limited government and individual responsibility. Nothing written here is to be construed as necessarily reflecting the views of the Georgia Public Policy Foundation or as an attempt to aid or hinder the passage of any bill before the U.S. Congress or the Georgia Legislature.
© Georgia Public Policy Foundation (December 20, 1999). Permission is hereby given to reprint this article, with appropriate credit given.
By Jefferson G. Edgens
In October 1999, President Clinton circumvented Congress through executive rulemaking and proposed that 40 million acres of the national forest system be designated de facto wilderness. His goal is to protect the roadless areas within the 192,000,000-acre national forest system, which includes 140 national forests in 37 states. Unfortunately, his plan smacks of political convenience rather than forest protection.
In simplistic terms, his plan bans all future road building. However, the president’s agenda behind the plan is far from simplistic. First, President Clinton is using executive directive to establish roadless areas, or de facto wilderness, without going through Congress. Congress sets the tone for resource management with such acts as the Multiple Use Sustained Yield Act, the Wilderness Act and the National Forest Management Act. Nonetheless, the Forest Service is complying with the president’s request and undertaking an environmental review on the proposed road ban. Wilderness designation is a congressional function, and it is the strictest category for preservation. For example, federal protected wilderness areas cannot be used for mining, grazing, logging or oil drilling. In addition, vehicles are not allowed in the area, including dirt bikes, mountain bikes and other off-road vehicles.
Furthermore, the president’s plan is unnecessary since road construction is at its lowest level since the 1950s. Moreover, Forest Service supervisors are capable of making road closure decisions. Roadless area advocates correctly cite environmental damage as a result of past Forest Service road construction. However, a U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) report states that major soil erosion problems have occurred in our national forests due to poor road construction and maintenance by federal resource agencies. While Clinton decrees the end of road construction, he is failing to acknowledge and correct the inadequate road maintenance, a problem that rests on how forests are managed.
Let’s consider the effects of the president’s proposal on Georgia’s wilderness areas. As background information, Georgia’s roadless areas, according to the Southern Appalachian Assessment Roadless Inventory, consist of 61,557 acres or about 8 percent of the Chattahoochee National Forest. U.S. Forest Service figures report ten designated wilderness areas in Georgia equal to 114,616 acres, or about 15 percent of the Chattahoochee National Forest. The Chattahoochee also contains the largest congressionally-designated wilderness in the Southeast – the Cohutta at 35,268 acres.
Roadless inventories supposedly include land of 5,000 acres or more, yet President Clinton’s proposal includes land of 1,000 acres or more contiguous to Georgia’s Wild and Scenic Rivers and to its congressionally designated wilderness areas. Such small acreage will certainly raise the amount of roadless areas in the Chattahoochee more than 8 percent. All told, lands of 1,000 acres or more and existing roadless areas can result in wilderness areas exceeding 18 percent. This percentage means more land to manage for fire and disease suppression. Moreover, mechanical removal of dead wood is necessary, in many instances, to minimize fire damage. Without roads, forest management efforts are hampered. Profligate spending on road construction for timber purposes should not, of course, be supported. But the demand for NO roads ignores the many beneficial effects of having SUFFICIENT roads to allow for recreation, the practice of sound forestry, and logging where it is economically justified.
Georgia’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) opposes the roadless area policy, but Georgia residents complain that DNR is not doing what they should to protect wilderness values. Let’s remember states are not subsidiaries of the national government. In fact, Georgia is within its rights to question federal policies, especially when the decision ignores the duly elected congressional leadership who represent Georgia’s interests. Therefore, the real issue is the president’s usurpation of a congressional power. It is Congress who legally designates wilderness areas. We vote for Congress to make the weighty decisions, not one person acting out of political convenience.
If we want wilderness, Congress is the proper branch of government to make the determination. We fought a revolution over one person having too much authority over the lives of its citizens. From that event, we created a Constitutional form of government with duly elected representatives to voice our concerns. But all of this raises the question, are roadless areas being protected for ecological reasons or to boost Vice President Gore’s election chances this fall? Given the president’s track record, we are left with no choice but to question his true motives. That is unfortunate.
Jefferson G. Edgens, Ph.D., a native of Rome, Georgia, is a Natural Resource Policy Analyst at the University of Kentucky. He is also an adjunct scholar with the Georgia Public Policy Foundation. The Georgia Public Policy Foundation is a nonpartisan, member-supported research and education organization based in Atlanta, Georgia, that promotes free markets, limited government and individual responsibility. Nothing written here is to be construed as necessarily reflecting the views of the Georgia Public Policy Foundation or as an attempt to aid or hinder the passage of any bill before the U.S. Congress or the Georgia Legislature.
© Georgia Public Policy Foundation (December 20, 1999). Permission is hereby given to reprint this article, with appropriate credit given.
