Feds blasted for Lake Tahoe logging
By Nick Cahill, Courthouse News Service
SACRAMENTO — A federal judge refused to dismiss a professor’s claim that the U.S. Forest Service is damaging the Lake Tahoe watershed by clearing timber and brush and depositing the slash in streams and wetlands.
U.S. District Judge Garland Burrell Jr. ruled Tuesday that the Forest Service’s argument was based upon faulty evidence and that plaintiff Dennis Murphy did not waive his legal challenge to the Upper Echo Lakes Hazardous Fuels Reduction Projection by failing to comment during a public comment period.
Burrell denied all three of the Forest Service’s claims for dismissal.
Murphy, a former consultant for the Forest Service, claims the agency violated the National Environmental Protection Act when it invoked a categorical exclusion for an environmental assessment, and falsely claimed that the project “does not individually or cumulatively have a significant effect on the human environment.”
The Forest Service also implemented the project contrary to the description in a memo sent to the public, Murphy said.
It is difficult to determine the motivations of the forest service. Yes, it can be fire prevention or keeping their folks employed or exercising dominion over the land in accordance with the latest whims of a supervisor. I think at least some of their projects fly in the face of current good science. Logging by Echo Lakes is ridiculous as any of you who have been there know all too well. Accolades to the person bringing this lawsuit. The problem is that a great deal of irreversible damage will be done and wildlife, the environment and recreational users will all pay the price. Some of the projects already completed locally are eye sores and will be for generations to come. I was told that Fallen Leaf Lake would recuperate rapidly and start to look pretty good. It looks awful.
Thank goodness that someone is paying attention and calling the FS on their arrogant folly and their practice of ignoring everyone except those in their ranks.
Logging goes on! Once they finish with So. Shore they will start on the west side of the lake and then head to the north shore. Chain saws, bulldozers and logging trucks all lined up.
Oh wait! It’s not called logging anymore. Now it’s “thinning the trees for a healthy forest” or “fuel reductonn to prevent wildfires”. Yeah, I guess it’s a healthy forest when it’s all been cut down!
Now that’s a healthy forest when your cutting a lot of it down and then having “prescribed burns” as they are now.
What a bunch of madness!!! OLS
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’d rather lose a few trees to logging than all of them to a wildfire. Get a clue! A wildfire will do much more damage than logging. The bottom line is, our forests are not healthy! Clearcutting causes them to grow back far thicker than normal. Then, the environmentalists say it’s natural.
Some people will only learn the hard way. How will you environmentalists feel when we have something like the rim fire or the king fire here at Tahoe? In a perfect world, if the forests were already healthy, I would oppose the logging too, but the forests are far from a natural state.
greengrass
Where I live it is obvious that the FS didn’t consider the impact on humans when they cut mostly live trees and some dead. Thousands of homes are in additional danger if a fire starts with the thousands of piles really close by. I personally do not feel safer for the FS thinning. If they make it through burning all these piles without burning down the basin- then I’ll feel like it was worth it. Something like 70% of wildfires start from ‘controlled burns’.
What they are doing on sunset ranch on the truckee river by the airport is a crime. Another meadow being destroyed
Yes of course logging can be used to reduce fire danger, but it is just as easy to use it as a pretext for other things. The devil is in the details.
I noticed the other day trees marked along the entrance road to Pope Beach?? and of course there are dozens if not hundreds of trees marked for cutting along the bike path on the way to Camp Rich (and the are in addition to all the trees being marked and removed by Cal Trans along Hwy 89.) When one looks at which trees are marked and where they are, it doesn’t look like marking for fire or hazard tree reduction, it looks more like a prescription to get at board feet to make some other part of a project more economically feasible. And yes, the Forest Service has special management guidelines for stream zones and there are a lot of projects that are going to use the word “fire hazard reduction” to get the project through the hoops.
What is unfortunate is that in many situations treatment by logging may be beneficial but by overusing the rationale or using questionable techniques when actually doing it, the public is going to get skeptical, the Forest Service is going get a lot of flack, and then start to become reluctant to put the energy into thoughtful fuels reduction. After all, whether through lack of budget or lack of energy, the absence of balanced and creative management is what got the forests in the shape they are now to begin with.
Ljames,
Yes, you make some good points. There are some of the beautiful old growth Jeffries and Ponderosas being removed on Hwy 89 for no discernible reason except what you suggest.
In spite of public concern the FS will have some agency-speak rationalization for whatever it has done or intends to do in the future. It would be nice if they actually incorporated public concerns and current science into their decisions but they won’t.
I cringe when I see the huge logs stacked up out there. What happened to the 30″ DBH maximum?
Isee, can you give a source for your statement that “Something like 70% of wildfires start from ‘controlled burns’.”?
Both sides of Highway 89 north of the SLT city limits appear decimated and unsightly where all the trees have been cut. Let’s hope the Forest Service knew – or knows – what it is doing. And one can only wonder why Mr. Murphy is no longer a consultant for the Forest Service, violation by the Forest Service of a federal environmental protection act would seem to be a serious issue.