Forests Forever Press Release

Judge denies preliminary injunction
to stop Jackson State Forest timber harvests
But says forest advocates likely to win lawsuit against the California Department of Forestry

Advocates of Jackson State Forest’s century-old redwoods received bad news Tuesday when a judge denied their request for a preliminary injunction to stop two logging plans for the forest.

Yet Forests Forever Foundation and the Campaign to Restore Jackson State Redwood Forest were heartened by Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Richard Henderson’s comments that the two groups were likely to prevail in their lawsuit against the California Department of Forestry (CDF).

The two groups have sued CDF on the grounds that the legally required Environmental Impact Report (EIR) accompanying the new management plan for the forest contains glaring shortfalls. The groups requested the preliminary injunction to hold off logging in the taxpayer-owned forest until the lawsuit, which goes to trial July 7, is resolved.

Two timber harvests encompassing 900 acres currently are planned for one of Jackson’s most scenic and ecologically valuable areas.

An island of public land in the midst of a half million acres of industrially owned, devastated timberland, Jackson’s 50,000 acres provide one of the only still-unprotected large sanctuaries in Mendocino County for salmon and other endangered redwood-related species.

Although Judge Henderson denied the preliminary injunction to halt the two harvests, he said the groups are likely to succeed on at least two of their three arguments regarding the EIR’s deficiencies. The first of these arguments was the groups’ contention that according to state law, the state Board of Forestry should have been the agency to certify the EIR, not CDF. The second was the argument that the EIR did not adequately evaluate the environmental setting surrounding Jackson.

"It appears reasonably probable that (Forests Forever and the Jackson Campaign) will prevail on their contention that the Board of Forestry should have been the lead agency and should have certified the final EIR," Henderson wrote. He also stated that it is likely the groups "will prevail on their argument that the EIR does not contain an adequate description of the environmental setting."

Henderson said he could not say whether the groups would prevail on their argument regarding the EIR’s failure to evaluate the cumulative impacts of logging proposed in the management plan. The groups’ attorney Paul Carroll of Menlo Park said he believes the cumulative impacts argument is the strongest of the three, however. Cumulative impacts are those environmental effects resulting from a given project’s effects, coupled with past and future effects of nearby projects. California environmental law requires each EIR to evaluate cumulative effects.

Forests Forever Foundation Executive Director Paul Hughes said he was disappointed by the denial of the preliminary injunction, but was encouraged by Henderson’s comments.
"The state’s largest taxpayer-owned forest is on the chopping block and we have been forced to sue the state government to force it to obey its own environmental laws," Hughes said. "We think it sends a pretty clear signal as to just how hungry CDF is to liquidate our oldest unprotected redwood trees in order to pad its budget."

For more information on Jackson Forest, please visit:
www.forestsforever.org/archives_resources/action-alerts/.