Enviros Challenge Their Own Forest Restoration Project
Enviros Discredit Themselves, Challenge Their Own Forest Restoration Project
Building and reopening miles of roads in the Santa Fe National Forest for a massive restoration project designed to make the forest more resilient to wildfires and insects would cause more harm than good, according to a formal protest filed by the environmental group that helped the Forest Service develop the project.
The U.S. Forest Service released a final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and draft Record of Decision (ROD) for the project in August. WildEarth Guardians filed the objection this month, challenging a section of the project authorizing the roads to allow for logging and tree thinning across roughly 30,000 acres of the national forest.
One major goal of the overall project is to help protect watersheds by making the forests less vulnerable to intense wildfires.The landscape restoration project was developed over the past five years through a collaborative process with the Forest Service that included more than 40 stakeholders, including WildEarth Guardians, the New Mexico Forest Industry Association and the Nature Conservancy.
But the environmental group is protesting the plan because the benefits could be “outweighed by the negative effects on soil and water resources in a watershed that already suffers serious impairments to soil conditions and water quality.”
Hat tip: Scott Streater, at Greenwire