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TODAY Thursday 22 January 1998 Each weekday. Conn Nugent on what's new in the world, on the site.

 

TODAY IN THE WORLD: No More Roads

This morning the President of the United States is not thinking about the fuss stirred up by his proposal to declare a moratorium on road-building in heretofore roadless areas of the National Forests. If he's lucky, he'll turn his attention to the subject next week or so.

Too bad, because it's a winner. Not as written, but as sound-bit. People like the idea of no new roads in the national forests, and politicians -- even some politicians from western states -- are lining up to support it. But the "it" itself has problems, and enviros are screaming appropriately. To offer blanket exemption to southeast Alaska and then to restrict the moratorium to roadless plots greater than 5,000 acres calls the sincerity of the initiative into question. The Forest Service says that the moratorium as written would effectively preclude logging on less than ten percent of the forestlands now eligible for cutting in northern California, western Oregon, and western Washington. Logging levels would be reduced next year in that region by six percent at most.

The timber companies are evincing outrage anyway, on the grounds (maybe correct) that the moratorium might be a "reasonable" first step that leads to an eventual policy of zero-cut. If there were zero-cut, it's hard to say that the national economy would suffer: figures vary, but no one says that the national forests provide more than ten percent of the board-feet cut every year in the country. What would suffer, indubitably, are the communities of people who want to make their living harvesting and milling national trees. It can be argued that these communities in the long run are better off becoming eco-tourism centers and lures to laptoppers, but to a guy who operates a skidder that's cold comfort.

Life isn't fair, the neo-conservatives remind welfare mothers, but enviros have softer hearts. We can't bear looking into the eyes of the skidder guys and telling them that they're not entitled to make money from public property ("Who Owns the National Forests?"). We prefer compromise and the pursuit of the elusive "sustainable forestry." If I were involved in one of those conflict-resolution processes, like the Quincy Library Group, I'd be the same way.

But at this safe remove, reading Greenwire's list of pro-moratorium newspaper editorials, looking at the relative political strength of the forces in conflict, I'd say the enviros have a good issue here, where short-term tactical calculations coincide with long-term commitments to save habitats and remove pernicious subsidies. This is a ball to run with. So what do you think is going to happen with this White House intern thing?

 

TODAY ON THE SITE

Tom Turner logs in this morning with another installment of his weekly "In Other News..." column. Tom reports on, and talks about, the list of the top environmental stories of 1998, as predicted by a consensus vote of members of the Society of Environmental Journalists (to which I belong, Northeast Garment District Local 104).

 

Recent "Today" columns:

1/21: Swordfish
1/20: Electromagnetic Sleuthing
1/16: Good News Way Down Under
1/15: Twenty-Four Forty or Fight!
1/14: Your Tax Dollars at Work
1/13: Johnny Mobil Appleseed
1/12: Superbowl, Scientific Uncertainty, and the Future of Al Gore
1/9: Goodbye, Delaware
1/8: Leaf Blowers, Old Cars, Class Conflict
1/7: The Great Improvement That Didn't
1/6: Proactive, Shmoactive
1/5: Mediocre Landscapes and Hope for the Planet
1/2: The Greatest Environmental Cause of the Year
12/31/97: The Top Twelve Environment Stories of 1997

To access more "Today" columns, click "Archives" below.