Coos
March 2010
Where: The Red Lion, Coos Bay
Date: Thursday, March 18
Time: 6:00 social time, 6:30 dinner, 7:00 Program
Speaker: Gary Haga D&H Logging
Topic: Making Cash from Slash. This is a joint meeting with Association of Oregon Loggers and Coos Chapter SAF. Gary Haga plans to build a system to chip and dry slash on site. The creation of a portable dryer could make utilizing landing piles profitable.
RSVP: To Phone Tree.
February Meeting Recap
Guest Speaker, Pam Blake with Oregon DEQ: Coquille Basin Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) Development
Pam discussed some of the historical practices resulting in a degraded watershed, including the clearing of riparian vegetation and splash dams. Currently the Coquille River has many water quality problems for humans and fish including high temperatures, low dissolved oxygen, nutrients, sediment, and bacteria. When looking at water quality, it is important to consider the whole watershed, which is comprised of urban, rural residential, agricultural, and forestry land. The setting of TMDLs should not affect forestry practices much because the forest practices act rules have been deemed sufficient protection to the watershed. Additionally, voluntary actions by the forest industry, including riparian improvement, road improvement/decommissioning, and being careful in slide prone areas, help matters greatly.
Pam mentioned that she is very worried about poorly planned and executed home site developments. Often these are started without permits and result in significant erosion and sediment transport to streams due to shoddy earth work and road construction. She mentioned that to the untrained public eye these projects may reflect poorly on the forest industry because people could think these home site developments are forestry operations (because trees are often being logged and roads are being built). Forestry professionals would do well to discourage these poor practices when they see them and inform the public that it is not forestry. Tristan Huff
Executive Committee Meeting Briefs 2/18/10
Tristan Huff put together a survey to send out to area foresters to see what types of professional development topics are of interest locally. Please be sure to complete the survey and return it.
Shaun Harkens attended an OSAF leadership conference where recruit- ment and retention was discussed. He mentioned that OSAF will be sending out a survey to identify how SAF can better support members in the summer/fall of this year.
Natural Resource Days
Thank you for your support as a chapter to provide the needed supplies of rite-in-the-rain paper and snacks for the field days. This support is in addition to the earlier purchase of compasses for the program. A big thanks goes out to those members that took the time out of their busy schedule to learn the activities and then to interpret them to 247 fifth grade students. All the instructors both experienced and new were fabulous, even with the bigger group size and the crazy, hyper afternoon kids. We were lucky to have a decent week of weather and we hope the streak continues next year. If you did not make out this time, please keep it in mind for next year. Thanks Again!! Eva Bailey
Request for Your Attendance at Chapter Meetings
Some of you may not realize, but the Red Lion has a twenty person minimum for the free use of its meeting rooms. If only eighteen people attend the meeting, the chapter must pay for two dinners. This chips away at our budget, which is better spent on other things. Please make an effort to attend our Chapter meetings.
Phone Tree
Please RSVP your attendance to one of the following members:
Industry: Rick Spring, 670.8679
Consultants: OSWA: Greg Stone, 267.2872
Retirees: Jerry Phillips, 267.6178
Government: Estella Morgan, 751.4422
Beer Mugs for Sale
"NEW" Coos Chapter Beer Glasses available for purchase at $10 each. Support the Coos Chapter Foresters' Fund and have a chance of winning a glass at each monthly meeting. Glasses will also be given out to recognize chapter members for service above and beyond.
2010 Chaper Officers
Chair Dick Heaney (), 541.269.5909
Chair-elect vacant
Secretary: Tristan Huff (), 541.572.5263 x294
Treasurer: Bruce Schlaebitz (), 541.267.1853
Delegate-at-Large: Rick Spring (), 541.756.4669 or 541.670.8679 (c)
Please send articles for the newsletter and/or comments to Estella Morgan (), newsletter editor.
----------------------------------Timber Harvest on Federal Forests: A Positive Response to the Expiration of the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000 (PL 106-393)
A position of the Coos Chapter, Oregon Society of American Foresters (OSAF) (pdf version)
With the expiration of PL 106-393, the Coos Chapter of the OSAF advocates increases in timber harvests on federal forest lands (BLM and USFS) to promote a stronger and better integrated balance between social, economic and environmental values in the management of these lands. This approach will provide funds needed by counties to support schools, roads and services such as law enforcement; it will emphasize active management to promote forest health and provide the multiple values Congress intended to achieve on federal forests; it will support the local milling and manufacturing infrastructure, provide family wage jobs, and promote long term intergenerational community stability. The U.S. is now experiencing very large trade and budget deficits. Increases in timber harvest from federal lands can help reduce the import of foreign wood products and these deficits. Increasing the timber supply from federal lands can enhance the forest products industry, employment, and favorably affect local economies through the economic multiplier effect, and reduce or eliminate county dependency on federal appropriations.
Issue
On January 3, 2007 the Coos County Commissioners announced that, because the federal Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act (PL 106-393) had expired and its mandated payments to counties lost, the county would be forced to layoff nearly one-quarter of its work force. This reduction is expected to severely impact most government services provided by the county, including law enforcement, social services and many others. Congressional representatives are actively trying to renew this federal program but it may only be restored at a lower funding level or for a short period of time. These serious developments are occurring at a time when local federal forests have an increasing amount of standing timber that could benefit from active management to promote forest health, diverse habitats, and reduced wildfire hazards.
Background (See Selected References 3 and 4)
Congress enacted in 1908 and subsequently amended a law (35 Stat. 251, 260) that requires 25 percent of the revenues derived from National Forest System lands be paid to local counties in which the lands are situated, for the benefit of public schools and roads. Similarly, in 1937, Congress enacted and subsequently amended a law (O&C Act) that requires that 75 percent of the revenues from O&C lands in western Oregon managed by the BLM and USFS be distributed to the counties based on the (counties) proportionate assessed land value in 1915. These funds were not considered a "gift" but rather reflected the recognition by Congress that extensive federal lands deprived local counties of property taxes and other revenues they would otherwise receive if the lands were in private ownership.
For over half a century, Coos and other counties received significant revenue from the sale of timber from the lands managed by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. These funds thus were an established and important part of the budget foundation for county services to its citizens. Beginning in the 1990s, however, legal decisions and appeals involving the Endangered Species Act and other policies dramatically reduced federal timber harvest in the region. In the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993, Congress recognized this trend and ameliorated its adverse effects with an alternative annual "safety net" payment to 72 counties in Oregon, Washington, and northern California where Federal timber sales had been restricted or prohibited by administrative and judicial decisions.
Also in the1990s, the Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP) was developed under five key guiding principles: "never forget human and economic dimensions of issues; protect long-term health of forests, wildlife and waterways; focus on scientifically sound, ecologically credible and legally responsible strategies and implementation; produce a predictable and sustainable level of timber sales and non-timber resources; ensure that Federal agencies work together". After 10 years of application, however, there remains a high degree of dissatisfaction with this plan. Some have disagreed with efforts to modify or reduce management restrictions under the NWFP while others have been concerned that the continued lawsuits, appeals and rigid requirements have led to only about one-third of the planned timber harvest volume of 1 billion board feet per year. Clearly, the Northwest Forest Plan has not produced the balanced integration of social, economic and environmental values that was its original goal. The fiscal crisis that many counties are now experiencing is an obvious reflection of this failure.
The 1993 Act (above) that provided payments to counties was scheduled to expire in 2000, Congress then passed PL 106-393 - The Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000. This legislation directed $1.3 billion over a 6 year period to be paid to Oregon counties for education, roads and county services, but it was allowed to expire in 2006 and with no replacement legislation these payments to the counties have ended.
Conclusion
The expiration of PL 106-393 precipitated the current funding crisis for Coos county, but the root cause of this situation has been the dramatic reduction in federal timber harvests from the 1980's to the present in Oregon (i.e., from an average of 4 billion board feet to less than 400 million board feet). Complicating the renewal or replacement of PL 106-393 is the very large budget deficit our country is now experiencing, which is a critical and much broader issue. In the near term, the Coos SAF chapter supports new legislation similar to PL 106-393 to alleviate the immediate crisis. Over the long term, however, new federal legislation is needed to establish timber harvest levels that balance social, economic and environmental values in a much more effective and sustainable manner.
Selected References
1. Oregon SAF. 2007. Commercial timber harvest on public lands in Oregon - A position of the Oregon Society of American Foresters. Adopted February 1, 2007. 2 p.
2. Oregon SAF. 2003. Active management to achieve and maintain healthy forests - A position of the Oregon Society of American Foresters. Adopted September19, 2003. 2 p.
3. Public Law 106 - 393, 106th Congress. October 30, 2000. Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000. Section 2 - Findings And Purposes.
4. Regional Ecosystem Office Website. 2006. Northwest Forest Plan Overview.
Adopted by the Executive Committee of the Coos Chapter, OSAF. August 7, 2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: To Help Solve The Current Fiscal Crisis in Coos County, the Coos Chapter of the Society of American Foresters Proposes a Balanced Increase in Timber Harvest From Federal Forest Land.
With the expiration of PL 106-393 (Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000), the Coos Chapter of the Oregon Society of American Foresters advocates increased timber harvests on federal forest lands (BLM and USFS) to promote a strong integrated balance of social, economic and environmental values in the management of these lands.
This approach will provide funds needed by counties to support schools, roads and services such as law enforcement. It will emphasize active management to promote forest health and provide the multiple values Congress intended to achieve on federal forests. It will support the local milling and manufacturing infrastructure, provide family wage jobs, and promote long term forest health along with inter generational community stability.
The U.S. is now experiencing very large trade and budget deficits. Increases in timber harvest from federal lands can help reduce the need for importing foreign wood products that contribute to an imbalance in trade. Increasing the timber supply from federal lands can sustain the forest products industry, employment, and favorably affect local economies through the economic multiplier effect, and reduce or eliminate county dependency on federal appropriations and the budget deficit.
To learn more about the Coos Chapter's Position Statement proposing increases in federal timber harvest visit the chapter's web site.
The Society of American Foresters (SAF) is the national scientific and educational organization representing the forestry profession in the United States. Founded in 1900 by Gifford Pinchot, it is the largest professional society for foresters in the world. The mission of the Society of American Foresters is to advance the science, education, technology, and practice of forestry; to enhance the competency of its members; to establish professional excellence; and, to use the knowledge, skills, and conservation ethic of the profession to ensure the continued health and use of forest ecosystems and the present and future availability of forest resources to benefit society.
For further information contact Darren Mahr (), Chapter Chair at or Jim Nielsen (), Chapter Policy Chair.