The U.S Forest Service held a public meeting in Haines on Saturday to discuss why they are seeking a full exemption of the Roadless Rule in the Tongass National Forest.

About a dozen Haines residents sat under a large Christmas tree in the library to hear the Forest Service’s presentation. The decorations were cheery, but the mood somewhat dreary among attendees. Some said the agency’s decision didn’t reflect the will of the people in the region.

Many were critical of the decision on environmental grounds.

“There was nothing in there about climate change or global warming or ocean acidification,” Kathleen Menke said.

“All the things that really are strongly impacting us in this community where we live, and that the Tongass being roadless currently is literally our firewall.

The Forest Service issued a draft environmental impact statement in October that favors a complete rollback of the Clinton-era roadless-rule provision. It protects 9.2 million acres of the Tongass National Forest from development. Forest Service Environmental Coordinator Ken Tu was often on the defensive.

“We’re just the process people,” he said.

Tu explained that the Forest Service is only responsible for doing the research and developing the different management plan alternatives.

“We knew the Secretary of Agriculture, the responsible official in this, could select any one of the alternatives we developed.”

Of 144,000 public comments, most people favored “no action”, which would keep the 18-year old roadless rule in place. Tu said it was about 90 percent of the response.

Yet Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Purdue deferred to elected officials when he directed the Agency to pursue a complete exemption. Alaska Senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan and Representative Don Young support the rollback, as does Gov. Mike Dunleavy.

Tu told residents that an exemption to the roadless rule would have minimal effect on the visitor and fisheries industries.

“One of the one of the reasons people are have been criticizing us, you know, they look at this chart and they say, ‘Well, clearly, you know, alternative six, you know, you’re dropping all the roadless protections across 9.2 million acres, how can you have such little effect?’ And the reason we don’t have a lot of effects and you know, across all the alternatives, is is the 2016 Forest plan is kind of the backstop.,” he said.



He said the majority of impacts would be caused by road building for timber harvests. Since the timber harvest is set by the 2016 Forest and Resources Management Plan it does not change across any of the six alternatives. But the 2016 plan isn’t law, it’s just a plan.

Forest plans can and do change, but it takes time.

“It should be three to four years, but it usually takes six to eight. And in the Tongass, I guarantee you it will take longer,” said Frank Sherman, the Tongass deputy forest supervisor.

The 2016 Forest Management Plan calls for a transition to young growth logging. They said only about 24 miles of road would be built in the next hundred years under that plan.

The agency took oral testimony from the public during a subsistence meeting after the presentation. Six Haines residents spoke up in favor of maintaining the Roadless Rule. All of them cited environmental concerns.

Retired business owner Thom Ely said the implications of the decision are global.

“The Tongass forest is temperate rainforest. It plays a huge part in combating climate change. And that should be the most significant decision that the Forest Service can make in its planning for the forest is what the forest does for the world, not what it will do for a dying timber industry.”

Old growth stands in the Tongass sequester carbon, a contributor to increasing global temperatures. The forest makes up about a third of the world’s supply of old growth forest. Studies find that deforestation and forest degradation contribute more greenhouse gases than transportation.

The agency expects Agriculture Secretary Perdue to make a final decision by spring or summer 2020. Conservation groups anticipate litigation if Perdue selects the Forest Service’s preferred option to open up the Tongass.

The Forest Service will take public comment on the proposal through Dec. 17.