Contact:
Joshua Davis, organizer 612-659-9124
Val Cunningham, volunteer 651-645-1124
DNR finalizes plan to log national forest roadless areas
Minnesotans stand to lose a third of state's potential wilderness
St. Paul, MN — A state agency today refused citizen requests to protect Minnesota's last unprotected wild forests. Department of Natural Resources (DNR) officials indicated that they will not change plans to log state lands around the Boundary Waters, including land in the middle of federally designated "roadless areas." Conservation groups have universally advocated for protection of the areas, which represent the last places in Minnesota that could be permanently protected federal wilderness.
DNR Assistant Commissioner Brad Moore delivered the news at a meeting with volunteers and staff from Sierra Club, The Wilderness Society, Audubon Minnesota, Friends of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy and the Izaak Walton League. The groups' requests that the DNR avoid logging the roadless areas were universally denied. The DNR officials who are in charge of the plan, Commissioner Gene Merriam and State Forester David Epperly, missed the meeting.
"In order to log these parcels in the national forest, they will have to cut roads and fragment valuable habitat in these pristine forest lands," said Val Cunningham, Sierra Club Forests Committee chair. "This is a real setback for those of us who enjoy non-motorized recreation and wildlife."
The DNR manages nearly 300,000 acres in the Border Lakes subsection of Minnesota, which includes Superior National Forest and the Boundary Waters. Under the 10-year logging plan, which the DNR plans to release to the public in two weeks, the agency will log around 20 percent of available timber land there, including acres inside the roadless areas conservationists want protected.
"The high cost of new roads and low timber yields make this a poor tradeoff for loss of wild forest for future generations. There are several proven options to protect this land and provide revenue for the school trust fund. The Pawlenty administration is not standing up to the timber lobby," said Clyde Hanson, a Sierra Club volunteer. "Clear-cuts for kids' educations is not a conservation lesson Minnesotans support."
"The Pawlenty administration will be responsible for forfeiting up to one third of the last wild forests in Minnesota," said Joshua Davis, a Sierra Club organizer. "We learned today that the Pawlenty administration doesn't care to protect wild forests, and didn't change their plan at all in response to public input. We've fought to protect these roadless areas for a decade, and never thought the real threat was from our own DNR."
Three other subsections — the North Shore, the Mille Lacs Uplands, and the Chippewa Plains overlapping Chippewa National Forest, will be released for public comment this spring.
One example of an area that will be lost is the Agassa Lake Roadless Area just north of Ely, MN, and adjacent to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. The area is full of old forests, wildlife, and hiking trails. The state owns just 3 percent of the land in this roadless area, and the 10-year DNR plan will log most of it and build two logging roads through the heart of the federal wild forest. After the logging, Agassa Lake may be too developed to qualify for protection as wilderness.
President Clinton's original Roadless Rule was the product of exhaustive studies and scientific, economic and public input, including 600 public meetings. Unprecedented in its overwhelming popularity, the rule garnered 10 times more public comments than any federal rule in history. Nevertheless, the Bush administration repealed the rule in 2005, allowing the US Forest Service to accept logging proposals from the DNR.
"By revoking the landmark Roadless Rule, the Bush administration left wild forests across the country vulnerable to destructive commercial timber sales and road building," added Cunningham. "That's hit home in Minnesota, and it's chopping off any hopes to protect wild forests for future generations."