Over the summer, the Trump administration announced a proposal that would drastically change the way the Forest Service has to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The proposed changes would effectively gut the bedrock environmental law as it applies to national forests throughout the country.
The proposed changes would allow for projects up to nearly 11.5 square miles in size to be conducted without an environmental study that analyzes alternatives and that provides more than one public comment period. Under this same loophole, the agency would also be able to approve commercial logging on up to 6.5 square miles at a time. The changes would also eliminate public input entirely for an estimated 93% of projects including logging, drilling, mining, and road-building.
The proposal was accompanied by a 60-day comment period ending in August. ForestWatch joined with dozens of other organizations around the country in pressuring the administration to extend the public comment period by an additional two weeks. During the entire comment period, the Forest Service received over 43,000 comments, most in opposition to the proposed regulatory changes.
ForestWatch facilitated over 1,500 comments from members of the public throughout the region by creating a unique tool allowing for quick and simple comment submission. All of these comments were in opposition to the proposal.
Additionally, ForestWatch joined over 180 organizations from around the country in signing a letter detailing the seemingly endless number of problems with the proposal. The letter states,
Shortcuts cause mistakes. Despite good intentions, the Forest Service makes mistakes in many of its projects. During the existing NEPA process, these mistakes can often be caught by an engaged public. Indeed, the Forest Service’s own data show that projects change substantively in response to public input more than 63% of the time. This is how NEPA is supposed to work.
The letter goes on to point out that the proposed changes would increase litigation against the Forest Service rather than decrease it. The Trump administration has targeted litigation as one of the ostensible reasons for proposing the changes in the first place.
Over 230 scientists also opposed the proposal, signing on to a letter highlighting the issues with shutting scientists out of national forest decision-making. The scientists note,
The existing NEPA review and comment process is the only means available to ensure that best available, relevant scientific information is considered by the Forest Service before irreversible actions are taken that pose risk of long-term environmental harms.
The proposed NEPA rollbacks come alongside other attacks on bedrock environmental laws such as the Endangered Species Act. These proposals are part of wider deregulation agenda aimed at opening up public lands to commercial interests.
ForestWatch will continue to fight against these proposals and ensure that residents throughout the Central Coast region have a voice in public land decision-making. You can join our email list to receive alerts about future proposals and visit our Action Center to learn about steps you can take right now to help protect wildlife, watersheds, and wild places in our area.
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