Trump revokes “roadless rule” that protects 58 million acres of national forests
The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Monday that it would revoke a decades-old rule that protects 58.5 million acres of national woodland from road construction and timber harvests.
The USDA, which is in charge of the U.S. Forest Service, said it would eliminate the “roadless rule” in 2001, which established lasting protection for specific wilderness areas within the U.S. national forests. The study found that building roads could shatter habitats, damage ecosystems, increase erosion and sediment pollution in drinking water, and other potentially harmful consequences.
USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins described in a statement that the rule (about 30% of national woodland) is an outdated and overly restrictive rule.
“Again, President Trump eliminated the ridiculous barriers to common sense management of our natural resources by abolishing excessively restricted “roadless rule”,” Rollins said in a statement. “This move opens up a new era of consistency and sustainability for the forests of our nation. It is clear that properly managing our forests can preserve their devastating fires and allow future generations of Americans to enjoy and enjoy the benefits of this enormous land.”
More than 40 states have rule-protected areas. According to the USDA website, in California, it accounts for about 4.4 million acres of land in 21 national forests, including Angeles, Tahoe, Inyo, Shasta-Trinity and Los Padres National Forests.
Environmental groups quickly condemned the USDA’s decision.
“Secretary Rollins is conducting a fire on a landmark rule that protects nearly 60 million acres of national forest from severe impacts, not only against wildlife and their habitat, but also the country’s drinking water sources,” Vera Smith, a statement from Vera Smith, director of the National Forest and Public Land Program.
Josh Hicks, director of the conservation campaign for the nonprofit wilderness association, said the policy “has been very successful in protecting American forests from mining, logging and road construction in nearly 25 years.”
“Any attempt to undo it is an attack on the air and water we breathe and drink, a critical buffer for the abundant recreational opportunities that millions of people enjoy each year, a haven for wildlife and a community threatened by increasingly severe wildfire seasons,” Hicks said.
According to the Forest Service’s 2001 impact report on the rule, national forests are an important source of drinking water in the United States, and areas designated as “roadless” help protect the source of hundreds of watersheds that supply millions of people.
As for wildfires, Rollins said revoking the 2001 roadless rule would allow the federal government to better manage forests for fire risk and wood production. Of the 58.5 million acres of land covered by the rule, 28 million acres of wildfires are high or high.
Several opponents disagree that eliminating the rules will reduce fire risk.
“For actions to reduce the risk of wildfires or improve recreation, it is ridiculous for Secretary Rollins to spin it,” a statement from Rachael Hamby, policy director at the Western Priority Center for conservation advocacy. “Business records have exacerbated climate change and increased the intensity of wildfires. It’s nothing more than a huge giveaway to timber companies, at the expense of every American and forest for all of us.”
Drew McConville, a senior fellow at the nonprofit Center for Progress, said the administration “seems to have cleared our public land as soon as possible.” “Under the guise of wildfire prevention, this action will shamelessly provide some of our most precious national forests for drilling, mining and timber. President Trump should now be clear that the American people don’t want their forests and parks to be sold to the top bidders.”
The decision coincides with President Trump’s latest executive order, aiming to expand mining, logging and drilling on public lands, including a controversial Senate proposal to sell millions of acres of public land as part of Trump’s “a large beauty bill.”
Trump also issued a directive in April to open more than 112.5 million acres of national woodland for industrial logging, which involved all 18 national forests in California.
The president said the actions would remove expensive barriers to U.S. business and innovation, help increase domestic wood supply, and enhance energy independence, among other benefits.
In many states (especially in California), the theme of managing forests to reduce wildfire risks has been a question of political debate, and Trump famously told California during his first term that it needed to “rake the forest floor” to prevent exacerbated fires.
Experts say California fires have made up for a lot of vegetation over the decades in California, which has exacerbated larger and more frequent fires. However, many of the same experts warn that the removal brushes are different from large-scale logging or clear cutting, which eliminates shadows and moisture that suppresses fires and leads to the growth of newer combustible non-native plants and grasses.
Chris Wood, who helped develop the 2001 roadless rule while working at the Forest Service, now serves as the Unlimited CEO of the Conservation Organization, said the policy is “one of the most important and most popular conservation achievements in American history.”
“Gifford Pinchot, the first head of the Forest Service, had used protection as ‘common sense of common interests to the application of common problems,” Wood said. “Hopefully the common sense prevails and the government reconsider its proposal.”
