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Roadless lands in Colorado.
Federal appeals court rejects rehearing of earlier challenge
By Bob Berwyn
SUMMIT COUNTY —The 2001 national forest roadless rule withstood yet another court test this week, as the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected an effort by Wyoming to overturn the rule, which protects almost 60 million acres across the country from logging, mining and other development.
The latest ruling by the full appeals court came in response to a petition for a rehearing, filed jointly by Wyoming and the Colorado Mining Association. Not a single member of the panel was in favor of looking at the case again, said Earthjustice staff attorney Ted Zukoski. A three-judge panel originally upheld the rule last October.
Starting with its first legal challenge, Wyoming claimed the national rule was “pre-ordained” and adopted in violation of federal environmental laws, a fantastic claim given the extensive level of public input and analysis that was part of the rule-making.
Wyoming still has the option of appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court, which rejects about 90 percent of such cases.
Much of the recent coverage of the roadless rule has focused on the procedural and legal wrangling — to the point that the original intent of the rule has been overlooked. The Forest Service developed the roadless protections because the agency recognized that, for one, it couldn’t even begin to adequately maintain its existing road network.
Secondly, the Forest Service said roadless areas are crucial to protecting regional watersheds that provide critical resource for millions of people, including large urban downstream areas. Roadless tracts are also critical for wildlife and serve as buffers against invasive species.
This week’s ruling by the 10th Circuit Court is also set against the backdrop of the continued fight over a Colorado-specific version of the rule, developed during the past few years by the state and the Forest Service.
Zukoski said the decision once again shows that Colorado doesn’t need its own version. The state’s original rationale for adopting its own roadless rule (under a rarely used petitioning process) was to have an insurance policy should the national rule be overturned.
State officials most recently claim the state rule is more protective than the national version, at least for certain parcels of roadless areas, while enabling more flexible management to address particular circumstances, including wildfire mitigation and the needs of the economically important and politically influential ski and mining industries.
The state rule is in a draft phase with a final version expected by the end of next month. The draft identifies different levels of roadless areas, some deserving of more protection than others.
During the past two years, the Obama administration has received more than 200,000 messages from the public, a letter from 520 scientists, and open letters published in the Denver Post from outdoor industry and conservation groups – all of which have raised concerns about the Colorado proposal and called for the state’s 4.4 million acres of national forests to receive the protections of the 2001 rule.
According to Zukoski, the state rule is riddled with loopholes for the ski industry, oil and gas companies, and allows logging far into the backcountry — not just to mitigate fire danger immediately adjacent to homes and other developments.
According to Zukoski, the Forest Service analysis clearly shows that more roads could be built under the state rule than under the national version. Visit the U.S. Forest Service roadless rule website here.
“Today’s court decision gives President Obama a green light to implement one of the nation’s most important conservation polices.With the last legal barrier cleared, the administration should move quickly to enforce the roadless rule as the law of the land,” said Jane Danowitz, director of the Pew Environment Group’s U.S. public lands program. “The court’s action eliminates the need for the administration to pursue a separate policy in Colorado, undertaken when the roadless rule’s legal status was in doubt,” she added.
Filed under: Colorado, Environment, forests, Summit County news, US Forest Service Tagged: | forest service roadless rule, Roadless area conservation, roadless rule challenge rejected, United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, United States Forest Service
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The only reason for a roadless national forest is so the people can’t see what a lousy job the forest service really does. I have traveled all over the north west and have seen d ozens of giant stacks of logs that have sat in the mountains long enough to rot where they were left. Seems to me that if you cut the trees down and don’t harvest them it is a total waste of
Goodness, if there are giant stacks of logs that have been cut that sit in the mountains rotting, just how did this come about? There had to be a road[s] in order to cut down the trees, stack them in those giant piles, which certainly wasn’t done without the mechanical means to do so.