The Department of Agriculture announced on July 12, 2004 and published in the Federal Register (69 Fed. Reg. 42636-42641:July 16, 2004) it's proposed final roadless rule. The Bush Administration will render the roadless rule meaningless by requiring governors to petition the Forest Service within 18 months to not construct roads in or otherwise develop inventoried roadless areas. The Administration has also indicated that it intends to permanently exempt the national forests in Alaska from the roadless rule.

The "state petition" process that the forest service has proposed would require a rigorous two-step process for permanent protection of roadless areas on the national forests. First, a state governor would have to prepare an administrative petition "to adjust management direction" for roadless areas in their state within 18 months of finalization of the new rule; after that, petitions could still be submitted through the USDA's general petitioning process. The petition would have to show how the State involved the public, local governments, and resource experts in developing the petition.The forest service could simply reject this petition out-of-hand.

Second, if the petition were agreed to, the Secretary of Agriculture would establish a formal rulemaking process on a state-by-state basis to consider permanent protection of the roadless areas in question. The State would have to make a "commitment" to participate as a "cooperating agency" in any environmental analysis of the subsequent state-specific rulemaking. This means that the State could be required to allocate agency personnel, funds, equipment, and other resources to assist the Forest Service in preparing environmental documents required by NEPA. This administrative rulemaking is time consuming and the Administration could simply decide not to grant protection in the end.

In addition, the Bush Administration indicated in its Semiannual Regulatory Agenda that it would permanently exempt the Tongass and Chugach National Forests in Alaska from the roadless rule. This action would release nearly a quarter of all the inventoried roadless lands in the country from prohibitions against road building and logging, placing these unparalleled temperate rainforests and their wildlife at risk of permanent loss.

What You Can Do:

Please send in your comments protesting these changes to the Roadless Rule or write a letter to the editor about this rule change.It is important to increase public awareness to help stop this change.

Send comments to:

Content Analysis Team
Attn: Roadless State Petitions
USDA Forest Service
PO Box 221090
Salt Lake City, UT 84122

or e-mail at statepetitionroadless@fs.fed.us.