EDITORIAL: Another roadless ‘time out’

The Obama administration took a good but temporary step towards protecting roadless wildlands in Oregon & across the country. The Eugene Register Guard argues that it's time to do more.

Congress should turn rule into firm law

The Obama administration on Friday renewed for another year its “time out” on road construction and other commercial activity on nearly 60 million largely undeveloped acres of national forests — 2 million of them in Oregon.

The extension of the popular roadless rule, which President Clinton signed in 2001, is a prudent move. The administration should use the coming year to ensure that the most vulnerable national forest lands have the complete and permanent protection that President Obama supported both as a presidential candidate and as a U.S. senator.

Obama’s support marks a welcome change. The Bush administration spent eight years trying to undermine the rule and replaced it with a policy that left logging, mining and other commercial activities under the control of the states. The result was a slapdash strategy that had everything to do with local politics and little to do with sound forest management and protection — and that left roadless areas intact in Oregon while allowing intensive road building and commercial activity in Idaho.

Under the original “time-out” and the latest extension, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has sole authority to approve logging or road projects in roadless areas. Mining projects are regrettably exempt from the roadless rule under the General Mining Law of 1872, but Vilsack instructed Harris Sherman, the Agriculture undersecretary for natural resources, to work with the Forest Service to minimize the effects from such activity.

The latest extension should allow the administration to reasonably protect roadless areas while the courts resolve appeals of the 2001 rule. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the rule last summer, but the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is expected to rule soon in a separate appeal.

But the protracted legal battle over the rule and the prospect of continued mining in roadless areas underscores the importance of prompt congressional intervention.

President Obama should work with Congress to turn the administrative rule into bedrock law, which would make it less vulnerable to legal challenges. Lawmakers should revive a bipartisan measure, which Obama supported as a senator, that would give permanent protection to roadless areas, including the 2 million acres that lie within Oregon’s borders, for the sake of future generations.

Congress should also reform the ridiculously outdated General Mining Law, which ensures a “congressionally granted right of reasonable access,” including road construction, for mining projects. The chairmen of the Senate and House natural resources committees have written bills that would give federal agencies authority to balance mining applications against other uses of public lands. Obama should support such legislation, despite resistance by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a vanquisher of past reform efforts. Reid represents Nevada, where 85 percent of the nation’s hardrock mining takes place.

The Obama administration has plenty to do in the next year preparing a comprehensive strategy for managing roadless areas. But the most important task falls to Congress, which should make their protection the law of the land.

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Click here to learn more about the Roadless Rule & Oregon's roadless wildlands