Those changes have been years in the making, and many are coming to a head this year, all with their own complicated backstories and varying timelines for public input. Many of these policies will be compromises hard fought between conservation and timber interests, bringing more environmental protections in some places and more timber harvesting in others.
“All of these things are layered on top of each other and they all have their unique consequences to communities, the timber industry, the mills, the manufacturers,” said Travis Joseph, president of the American Forest Resource Council, a timber trade association based in Portland.
These changes also mark a shift in protecting vulnerable species that have long been iconic to the Northwest, like coho salmon and the northern spotted owl. As a warming world brings new threats — deadly fires, bone-dry droughts, infestations — wildlife officials are no longer focused so much on recovering these creatures’ populations, but rather, saving them from the brink of extinction.
After 30 years, the Northwest Forest Plan is getting amended
In the 1980s and ‘90s, loggers and environmentalists clashed over the Pacific Northwest’s ancient trees in what is sometimes called the “timber wars.” Those conflicts culminated in the Clinton administration ushering in the Northwest Forest Plan in 1994, a sweeping series of forest policies that would change the trajectory of federal forestlands in the Pacific Northwest.
The idea was to protect endangered species — particularly the northern spotted owl, an enigmatic creature whose habitat dictated which lands the plan covered.
The plan broadly outlined when and where logging could occur across 24.5 million acres of federal land in western Oregon, Washington, and northwestern California. It set aside 7.4 million acres as protected reserves and banned clearcutting tree stands that were over 80 years old in those regions.
While national forests across the country also have their own individual plans, the Northwest plan is unique in its focus on a vast ecological region encompassing 17 national forests.
“It covers an entire ecosystem, which is the Douglas fir ecosystem that has spotted owls in it,” said Susan Jane Brown, an environmental attorney with the nonprofit firm, Silvix Resources. “That had never been done before and it’s never been done since.”
But those lands have changed over the last three decades as new threats emerged. Wildfires went from natural phenomena to catastrophic disasters, and tree-killing pests have ravaged forests, destroying spotted owl habitat. Then the invasive barred owl starting eating into spotted owls’ territory and competing for food. As a result, spotted owl populations have decreased since the plan’s implementation.
Brown said attempts to amend or update the plan have ebbed and flowed with the whims of presidential administrations. The U.S. Forest Service started working on an amendment under President Joe Biden. By summer 2023, it formed a 21-member advisory committee representing different industries, tribes, environmental groups and government agencies.
The committee would have less than a year to come up with recommendations. Many members say that’s not enough time.
“The public is frustrated around their ability to engage with this and really understand what the changes could be,” said Joseph, who co-chairs the committee with Brown. “Because the truth is, it likely will not be changed again or amended again in the foreseeable future.”
So far the committee has drawn up an 81-page draft outlining how the amendment could help vulnerable species, address a changing climate, and help struggling rural economies that once relied on timber.
For example, the committee recommends:
- The Forest Service meets regularly with the 89 federally recognized tribes whose ancestral lands are covered by the plan, as well as co-stewarding some lands with tribes.
- Conserving currently unprotected old and mature moist forests.
- Prohibiting salvage logging in many moist forests after a wildfire.
The Forest Service will have the final say in what’s ultimately included in the amendment, and there’s no requirement that it include any of the committee’s recommendations. At a late January meeting in Eugene, Forest Service staff slashed entire sections of the draft the advisory committee had spent months to develop, saying they weren’t relevant to an amendment.
Several committee members say the agency should have provided more guidance on what it was expecting earlier on.
“It’s difficult for us to be banging our head against the wall when there hasn’t been a lot of transparency from higher U.S. Forest Service leadership,” said committee member Ryan Reed during its January meeting in Eugene.
COMING UP: The advisory committee will deliver its recommendations in April. Then, early this summer, the Forest Service plans to publish a draft environmental impact statement, which will outline the amendment’s impact on forests and vulnerable species. The public will have 90 days to comment on the draft. The agency will decide whether to amend the existing Northwest Forest Plan after the environmental impact statement is finalized in October.
Actually, the Northwest is getting two major changes to its federal forest plan
In 2022, President Joe Biden called on the U.S. Forest Service to prioritize the country’s old-growth trees. In response, the agency in 2023 announced it would amend all 128 national forest plans in one fell swoop. That meant the Northwest Forest Plan was in store for not just one, but two amendments.
Forest Service officials are still working out amendment language that’s broad enough to cover the vastly diverse ecological needs of 128 different forests across the country.
Similar to the Northwest amendment, the other national forest plan amendments follow a tight turnaround with public comment deadlines this year.
Many tribal representatives say the Forest Service isn’t giving them enough time to engage and provide input on how to care for ancestral lands that remain critical to their diverse cultures.
“We’re really questioning, as tribes, if this is really respecting our treaty rights, our history, and our sovereignty with these stringent timelines,” said Elaine Harvey, environmental coordinator with the Yakama Nation, during the Northwest advisory committee meeting in Eugene. Harvey is a member of the committee.
Many members of that committee say politics are fueling these deadlines. If Biden wants to change federal forest policy, the best time is before his four-year term ends — especially if he doesn’t get reelected in November. It’s unclear what would happen to this work if Biden loses his seat.
COMING UP: The U.S. Forest Service plans to publish a draft environmental impact statement in May, followed by a 90-day comment period. The statement is expected to be finalized by January 2025.
The Elliott State Research Forest is moving ahead
Many of those protests that led to the Northwest Forest Plan took place along logging roads weaving through Oregon’s Elliott State Forest — an 83,000-acre coastal forest spanning Coos and Douglas counties.
For decades, the Elliott had been heavily logged to generate revenues for schools through the Common School Fund.
The Elliott is also home to several federally protected species, including coho salmon, marbled murrelets and the northern spotted owl. In a 2012 lawsuit, the nonprofit Cascadia Wildlands successfully argued the state violated the U.S. Endangered Species Act by cutting down swaths of mature and old-growth trees in the Elliott. As timber sales decreased, then eventually ceased entirely, the Elliott stopped generating revenues for the school fund and instead started costing the state money in maintenance.
So the state put the forest up for sale in 2016.
“People had an incredibly, incredibly strong reaction to that idea,” said Ali Hansen, spokesperson with the Oregon Department of State Lands. “People were getting in their cars and coming to Salem with signs and chants and just saying, ‘Nope, that cannot be the future for our wonderful beloved Elliott State Forest.’”
So officials instead opted to keep the Elliott as a public resource, this time as a research forest — meaning a place where researchers could study imperiled species, logging impacts and the effects of climate change on the forest. Forestry officials also say they will collaborate with local tribes to integrate Indigenous forestry practices, such as using prescribed fire to maintain overgrowth and replenish the ecosystem.
Once established, the Elliott would become the largest research forest in the country.
In 2019, the state partnered with Oregon State University and appointed an advisory committee to help steer the project.
“And for the last six years, we’ve been trying to develop a new vision that protects imperiled species, supports local economies, increases recreation, generates research, and creates a collaborative atmosphere for this forest,” said committee member Bob Sallinger, executive director of Bird Conservation Oregon. “And we are finally at that point of making that happen.”
The university was initially going to manage the forest — that is, handle the timber sales, species protections and general upkeep — in addition to having its researchers work among the landscape. But late last year, just before a major legislative deadline outlined for the Elliott, OSU walked away from the deal.
In a letter sent to several media outlets, OSU President Jayathi Murthy announced she would not recommend the Board of Trustees move forward with managing the Elliott, highlighting a list of concerns around timber harvesting, research access and issues raised by tribes.
It was a contentious move that riled many people who had worked closely on the Elliott for years — but nonetheless, the research forest would carry on. Now, the Oregon Department of State Lands will manage the forest. Most revenues from timber sales will go toward that management work, and the remaining funds will go toward research projects in the Elliott. The department is in the process of finding a research partner, a role that could still be filled by Oregon State University.
COMING UP: The Department of State Lands is revising OSU’s forest management plan for the Elliott — an extensive document detailing how long-term logging practices and species protections will align with other goals and policies. A draft is expected in April for public input, then it’ll go before the State Land Board in June. The department is also working on an operations plan, which will outline day-to-day activities in the forest in the near term, including timber sales and habitat restoration. That should be ready for public input in June.
Oregon is changing how it protects imperiled species while logging west of the Cascades
Any time logging occurs, whether on public or private lands, the owner has to ensure they won’t “take” any federally endangered species in the process. That term, as defined by the U.S. Endangered Species Act, means “to harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect, or to attempt to engage in any such conduct.”
There are a few ways to comply with that federal law. One that Oregon forestry officials have used on state lands for more than 30 years is called “take avoidance.” Before an area can be harvested for timber, biologists carefully survey the habitat for any protected species and outline ways to protect it during logging.
Oregon Department of Forestry officials say this process has historically opened the agency up to legal challenges that allege the department harmed protected species despite its survey efforts.
So forestry leaders are pursuing a habitat conservation plan. That’s a planning document that allows, to a certain extent, a project to harm specific endangered species during activities like timber harvesting. It also outlines ways the project will otherwise protect those same species.
By admitting some endangered species will be harmed during logging, officials say the landowner can’t be sued for violating the Endangered Species Act.
“It’s an insurance policy,” said Mike Wilson, state forest division chief for the Oregon Department of Forestry. “You’re not going to get sued over incidental take for these species, because you’ve got a permit for it.”
The Western Oregon State Forests Habitat Conservation Plan covers 640,000 acres of state lands west of the Cascades, mostly in Tillamook and Clatsop counties. The draft outlines protections for 17 species of fish, birds, mammals and amphibians for the next 70 years. They include the northern spotted owl, the marbled murrelet, several salmon species, and the coastal marten — all of which rely on mature and old-growth forests.
The plan’s protections include larger buffers around streams to protect water quality and maintain cooler temperatures. Many conservationists applaud these changes, even if the protections don’t go as far as they’d like.
“The HCP is not a recovery plan,” said Michael Lang, policy manager at the Wild Salmon Center. “It’s a save-from-local-extinction plan.”
Still, many timber companies and local officials oppose the plan due to projections showing it will significantly decrease timber harvests on state lands. Much of those revenues go to counties and special districts, like schools and rural firefighting.
Even so, Wilson said the plan will provide stability in knowing how much timber it can harvest over the next several decades. As more species become listed under the Endangered Species Act, or more stringent protection policies get put in place, the state could see declines in harvests even without the habitat conservation plan.
“I don’t think people really think about it that way,” Wilson said. “They assume that if we don’t get an HCP that that harvest is just going to continue, when in fact it could get shut down quite radically.”
COMING UP: State Forester Cal Mukumoto provided input on this habitat conservation plan to the Board of Forestry on Friday, recommending the department move forward with its current draft. The board will discuss Mukumoto’s recommendation at its meeting on Thursday. Without any major hurdles, the state could finalize it by the end of the year, then get federal input in 2025.
Privately owned forests are also getting a habitat conservation plan
After decades of conflicts between conservation groups and timber companies over logging practices, the two sides came together in 2020 and came up with an agreement aimed at protecting aquatic species, primarily fish. That agreement is now called the Private Forest Accord.
The agreement was codified into three separate bills that require the state to do a few things, including offering financial incentives to landowners who harvest less and increasing riparian buffers. The Oregon Department of Forestry then further refined those laws through administrative rules, some of which went into effect this year.
The agreement also calls for a habitat conservation plan. Similar to the state’s plan, the Private Forest Accord’s habitat conservation plan would provide private landowners legal protections and stability in knowing how much timber they can harvest, while also creating protections for specific endangered species.
This 50-year plan covers all native salmon and trout, as well as several species of salamanders and frogs. Once finalized, it would govern 10 million acres of private and non-federal forests in Oregon. The agreement calls on the state to complete this habitat conservation plan by 2027. Otherwise, all of the policies and administrative rules that have come out of the Private Forest Accord so far will disappear.
COMING UP: The Oregon Department of Forestry will submit its draft habitat conservation plan to federal agencies in June. Those agencies will later draft an environmental impact statement, accompanied by public comment periods.
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