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Rare Temperate Rainforest at Risk in the Tongass JUNEAU, Alaska, February 25, 2002 (ENS) - One of the rarest ecosystems in the world - the low elevation old growth temperate rainforest of the Tongass National Forest in southeast Alaska - is at risk of logging and development, but a court ruling has given the public another chance to have input on the forest's future. In a case brought by the Sierra Club, Alaska Federal District Court Judge James K. Singleton, Jr. ruled last March that the 1997 Tongass Land Management Plan was illegal because the U.S. Forest Service failed to consider any alternatives with new wilderness recommendations in its Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). The court ordered Tongass National Forest managers to prepare a Supplemental EIS evaluating wilderness recommendations for roadless areas. The judge's order prohibits the Forest Service "from taking any action to change the wilderness character of any eligible roadless area" until the agency produces a new Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS). The SEIS will focus only on the roadless areas of the Tongass and their potential for wilderness. The Forest Service is expected to release its draft SEIS in late March detailing several alternative proposals. The public will then have 90 days to comment.
The 17 million acre Tongass National Forest includes a narrow mainland strip of steep, rugged mountains and icefields, and over one thousand offshore islands. It takes in roughly 80 percent of Alaska's southeast panhandle and extends 500 miles in a narrow band from Glacier Bay to Misty Fjords, near the British Columbia border. Two-thirds of the area is rock, ice, muskeg and scrub forest. Only one-third of the Tongass, 5.7 million acres, contains commercial forest land. Aurah Landau, grassroots organizer with the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council says that for over 30 years, Southeast Alaskan residents, businesses, and organizations representing commercial fishing, tourism, and native groups have worked to safeguard key watersheds on the Tongass National Forest. "These wildlands support wild salmon fisheries, deer, brown bear, wolves, and have high value for solitude and primitive recreation," Landau says. But more than 90 percent of the nearly 600,000 acres of former Tongass lands selected by village and regional native corporations under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1972 have been clearcut. About 6.6 million acres on the Tongass are Congressionally designated Wilderness, National Monument and LUD II lands occurring throughout the Forest. The LUD II lands are similar to the designated Wildernesses but are less restrictive on access and activities, primarily to accommodate recreation and subsistence activities. The 110 Inventoried Roadless Areas in the 1997 Revision covered about 9.3 million acres, including the LUD II lands described above. Landau points out that of the 6.6 million acres set aside by Congress as Wilderness and Legislated LUD II wildlands, 36 percent, 2.3 million acres, are classified as commercial forest land. Conservation groups are urging that those lands be protected as unroaded wilderness before they too are clearcut. Tongass Forest Supervisor Thomas Puchlerz, says the Forest Service will use a combination of methods to engage and involve the public throughout the development of the SEIS, including public mailings, public meetings, the news media, two newsletters, and establishment of a website specific to the SEIS.
During the Tongass Forest Plan Revision process, 110 inventoried roadless areas were examined for potential wilderness recommendations, Puchlerz said in a November 5, 2001 letter to interested citizens. In the updated impact statement, these 110 areas will be evaluated for the "relative contribution of each inventoried roadless area to the National Wilderness Preservation System," he wrote. In response to Judge Singleton's order, issued March 30, 2001, the Forest Service has stopped all timber harvest in roadless areas of the Tongass National Forest. The Alaska Forest Association (AFA), the local timber industry association, says that may force some of its members out of business. The association filed an unsuccessful intervention seeking to overturn the judge's order. Speaking for the AFA, Jack Phelps said the judge's ruling ignored the fact that each of the timber sales enjoined by the injunction have already gone through the full environmental impact studies and public processes required by the National Environmental Policy Act and National Forest Management Act. But the Sierra Club Alaska Branch says rainforest logging is "perfectly in step with the boom-and-bust rhythm of the Alaskan economy." "Two centuries ago Russian fur traders enslaved the Aleuts, forcing them to hunt the sea otter to near-extinction. Next, whales were slaughtered for lamp oil and ladies' corsets. Successive gold rushes left toxic mine tailings and polluted steams. Now the forest is being leveled at a record rate, with the trees that escape pulping exported as unprocessed logs to Japan, Korea, and China. On this last frontier," the group says on its website, "the goal is still to exploit local resources for a quick fortune." Nearly 50 years of industrial scale clearcut logging across all land ownerships in Southeast Alaska has resulted in the irretrievable loss of over 70 percent of this prime old-growth forest, says Landau. Conservationists envision a healthy Tongass forest that provides a sustainable economy - fishing, recreation, and a smaller scale wood products industry. They are not alone. In 1994, a team of scientists commissioned by the Forest Service's Pacific Northwest Research Station to review wildlife management on the Tongass wrote, "The Tongass National Forest is not only the largest national forest, it is one of the most important: it is the best example of temperate coastal rainforest remaining and its well-being is of critical interest not only to the people of Southeast Alaska but to all people of the United States and, indeed, the world." Members of the public are welcome to get involved with the planning process and wilderness designations. Log on to the Tongass National Forest SEIS website at: http://www.tongass-seis.net/ Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2002. All rights reserved. |
A portion of the Tongass National Forest
(Photo courtesy Southeast Alaska Conservation Council)
Lynn Canal in the northern part of the
Tongass National Forest (Photo courtesy 