Plans to clearcut about 900 acres of old-growth forest near the Klehini River moved one step closer to fruition last week when the state denied the appeal of Lynn Canal Conservation and two other conservation groups.
In April, LCC, Greenpeace and Oregon-based Cascadia Wildlands appealed the Division of Forestry’s decision to authorize the “Baby Brown” timber sale, claiming the cut would be economically unsound, environmentally irresponsible and visually unappealing.
Gabriel Scott, the Alaska legal director for Cascadia, said the groups are analyzing their options in the wake of the denial, which basically boil down to suing the state or moving on.
“It forces us – people who have concerns – to either sue the government and take that dramatic step, or accept that it’s a good idea to do all of this logging,” Scott said.
The state also denied a request by the organizations to hold a one-day hearing in Haines on the economic, environmental and aesthetic issues outlined in the appeal.
Scott is analyzing the efficacy of a lawsuit. The appellants have 30 days from the Oct. 6 issuance of the denial to file the suit.
Department of Natural Resources commissioner Mark Myers wrote in the denial that LCC’s economic concerns were “unfounded,” specifically the group’s charge that a large, export-oriented sale defies the objective of creating a healthy, sustainable timber industry in Alaska and Haines.
Because the sale is designed for the export of raw, whole logs, it won’t pencil out for the state, nor will it help Haines, said LCC president Eric Holle. “I fail to see how exporting raw resources from Haines is going to do any local people any good. The state is continuing to treat the Haines State Forest and the Chilkat Valley like a resource extraction colony,” he said.
Far more jobs could be created by cutting smaller amounts and processing it locally, Holle added.
Myers wrote that local mills and producers could buy a chunk of the Baby Brown timber if it is developed as several smaller sales, and in the event that it isn’t, there is still enough of the Haines State Forest for them to get wood elsewhere.
The state estimates the sale will generate $300,000 and 20 jobs, another claim LCC contested in the appeal. Myers said this allegation, too, is unfounded. “A review of recent state and private timber sales in Southeast Alaska confirms that the economic return estimates are also within a reasonable range,” he wrote.
As for environmental concerns, including the loss of wildlife habitat and impacts to fish streams, Myers acknowledged that development does not commonly come without any impact to surrounding flora and fauna.
“The state timber program is not to be conducted without any effects at all – it is not required to avoid all environmental impact of any kind at the expense of timber harvest and use. The dual mission of DNR to conserve and develop natural resources means that a balance must be struck. And in that balance, in the interest of promoting development, some impacts will occur – which are consistent with, rather than contrary to, this balance,” he wrote.
Views from the Haines Highway were also a concern for the appellants. Cascadia’s Scott said the clearcut, approximately 80 percent of which would be visible from the highway, could adversely impact tourism.
“It looks ugly. Tourists do not like it. Whatever the Division of Forestry thinks, they are just wrong. People do not like looking at clearcut,” Scott said.
Myers wrote that the Division of Forestry will make the harvest “less obtrusive” when possible, though he reiterated the division may not, and is not required to, eliminate impacts completely.
“While logging activity in prime recreation areas may detract from tourism to those areas – logging in appropriately planned areas throughout Southeast Alaska has, in general, not disrupted tourist activity. Some of Alaska’s premier tourist destinations are located in and around a century of logging activity and logging communities within the Tongass Forest,” he wrote.
Scott said he was disappointed in the denial because it just reiterated the state’s legal rationale for making the sale, rather than addressing concerns raised by the public. “It just sort of reads like a legal decision of, ‘Here is why we would be allowed to do these things.’ But they didn’t engage with the fundamental argument, which was, should you?”
Holle called the denial “discouraging.”
“I think what this denial of our appeal indicates is the Walker administration’s decision to remain in the dark ages of forestry, via the Parnell administration, and dating all the way back to the days of the pulp mills,” he said.
At 20 million board feet, Baby Brown would represent the largest timber sale the Haines State Forest has seen in decades. It involves approximately 855 acres of spruce and hemlock from state lands in the Porcupine and Jarvis Creek area of the Haines State Forest.