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FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 26, 2005
Contact: Paul Hughes, Forests Forever, 415-974-4201
(from July 27 to July 29 between 11 am and 6 pm PST), paul@forestsforever.org,
or Marc Lecard, Forests Forever, 415-974-4202, marc@forestsforever.org
Andrew George, National Forest Protection Alliance, 919-933-3073,
andrew@forestadvocate.org
Sean Cosgrove, Sierra Club, 202-675-2382 Sean.Cosgrove@sierraclub.org
Naomi Zeff, Congressman Leach’s office, 202-225-6576, Naomi.Zeff@mail.house.gov
Leach and Slaughter propose ban
on commercial logging in National Forests
Legislation provides comprehensive solution to the 100-year
fight
over public lands management
WASHINGTON, DC: Representatives Jim Leach (R-IA) and Louise Slaughter
(D-NY) introduced the National Forest Protection and Restoration
Act today, which would ban commercial logging in national forests.
Over 200 scientists and 300 grassroots forest protection organizations
support the legislation because it provides comprehensive protection
for all U.S. national forests.
"This bill would return our national forests to the purpose
for which they were originally conceived," said Paul Hughes,
executive director of Forests Forever, "which is protecting
our forest heritage, rather than providing sawtimber for private
profit."
"The Forest Service and the Bush administration cannot be trusted
to do the right thing when it comes to our national forests,"
said Susan Curry, NFPA executive director. "The National Forest
Protection and Restoration Act will end this debate once and for
all by taking our forests out of the timber business and putting
them into the public trust, where they belong."
"The U.S. government is the only property owner I know which
in effect pays private parties to deplete its resources," said
Rep. Leach. "It is time to manage better our fiscal as well
as our ecological resources."
"Protecting America’s national heritage is a conservation
imperative," Leach noted. "It should also be a conservative
one. Indeed it is time to put ‘conservation’ back into
‘conservatism.’ For the essence of conservatism should
not only be concern for conserving traditional family and social
values but also our land, our air and our water."
"America’s national forests are a rich part of our nation’s
wild heritage that we want to protect and pass on to our children,
not squander for short-term profit," said Sean Cosgrove, Sierra
Club forest policy specialist.
The National Forest Protection and Restoration Act would:
* End the wasteful federal timber sale program, which costs the
taxpayer more than
$1 billion annually but provides less than two percent of our annual
consumption of wood-based products;
* Redirect these subsidies to the restoration of forests, streams
and wildlife habitat damaged by destructive logging practices;
* Fund retraining for displaced timber workers and help affected
communities diversify and strengthen their economies;
* Fund research into alternative materials to wood-based products.
For more information about the grassroots campaign to end commercial
logging in U.S. national forests, contact the National Forest Protection
Alliance at nfpa@forestadvocate.org or www.forestadvocate.org
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