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The Seventh American Forest Congress:  A Strategy

"If there is no struggle, there is no progress...Power concedes nothing
without a demand.  It never
has and  it never will."  --Frederick Douglass

Forest management policy reform has emerged as one of the most important
issues of the decade.
Several attempts have been made within recent years to formulate a
strategy to achieve this goal, to
no avail.  These strategies have not been implemented largely due to the
inability of  "leading
groups" to agree on a common agenda.  The Seventh American Forest Congress
has been
proposed as the latest venue for addressing forest management policy
reform.  Many believe this
Congress may be failing, once again, to create a mechanism equal to the
task.

This Forest Congress is the brainchild of The Society of American
Foresters, Yale University School
of Forestry, and the Weyerhaeuser Company.   There are those who believe
that an industy-
sponsored Congress will not  fairly consider solutions which favor true
reform.  This is consistent
with the philosophy that industry has too much vested interest in the
status quo to seek real reform.

Proposed here is a "grassroots"  alternative to this industry-sponsored
Congress.   The strategy is
simple...let us begin by taking advantage of this opportunity to gather,
which has been made
possible by   industry's underwriting of the expenses of many who have
signed up for the Congress.
All indications are that many of these participants have realized that the
"deck has been stacked",
and they are looking for an alternative.  At least one group is proposing
a walkout if the Congress
does not endorse a repeal of the salvage rider, something industry is not
likely to allow.  A walkout,
therefore, is likely.  There are those who have announced that they will
boycott the event altogether.
If people walkout they could join the boycotters, and hold a real Congress
for reform.   Logically,
there would  be great things to be gained by a union of these two groups.

The objective of "consensus" also lies at the heart of the problem.  Past
attempts have been
blocked by the propensity of larger groups to promote their own agenda at
the expense of
consensus.  Quite frankly, egos play a big part too.  Therefore, this
proposal is made anonymously,
in the interest of the consideration of ideas, not who made the proposal.

The proposal

The Conservation Community should take advantage of the opportunity
created by the gathering of
the Forest Congress to reconvene in a cohesive grassroots effort to craft
a unified agenda of reform
proposals.  This Bill of Reform should be presented in the form of demands
to the United States
Congress.

The Bill of Reform would include:


1)   Eliminate timber targets.

2)   No new roads in the public forest.

3)   No more timber harvesting in old-growth or roadless areas.

4)   Create positive incentives:

4a)   Create a Department of  the Environment and Natural Resources.

4b)   Move the Forest Service from the Department of Agriculture to the
Department of the
Environment and Natural Resources.  Also move the Bureau of Land
Management from the
Department of the Interior to the Department of the Environment and
Natural Resources.  Other
federal land management agencies could be moved to the Department of
Environment and Natural
Resources as well.

4c)   Significantly reduce "commercial" logging on public land.  Wood
products could continue to be
extracted from public land in the interim, but only by techniques and at
volumes and locations 	
approved by conservation biologists, qualified foresters and wildlife
biologists.  In such cases, 	
Forest Service or Bureau of Land Management supervisors would hire
contract labor to perform 	
the work, and would sell the wood products (at their true ecological
value) directly in the retail 	
market.  Receipts from such sales would return to the Department of
Environment and Natural 	
Resources, earmarked to fund further ecological research and restoration
activities.

4d)   Increase funds for the Forest Stewardship and Stewardship Incentives
programs.

4e)   Eliminate line item appropriations for public land managers, and
replace with one appropriation
for Ecosystem management.

4f)   Create a new Management Area zoning system for public lands to
include:  Core Areas,
Ecological Restoration Areas, and Economic Development Areas.

4g)   Strenghthen environmental laws and add citizen suit provisions.

4h)  Eliminate PAC money from electoral campaigns, and offer alternatives
that would cut the need 	
for such funds, such as public television air time allotments to
candidates for public office.