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<DIV><A
href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/08/06/MNEK194ED1.DTL">http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/08/06/MNEK194ED1.DTL</A><BR> ---------------------------------------------------------------------<BR>Thursday,
August 6, 2009 (SF Chronicle)<BR>Court upholds ban on roads in national
forests<BR>Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer<BR><BR><BR> In a major
victory for environmentalists, a federal appeals court upheld a<BR>ban Wednesday
on most new road-building in 40 million acres of national<BR>forests and said
the Bush administration's repeal of the so-called<BR>roadless rule was
illegal.<BR> The decision by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
in San Francisco<BR>restores a regulation passed in the final days of President
Bill Clinton's<BR>administration, in January 2001, designed to protect trees and
resources<BR>in remote forest areas by prohibiting construction of new roads as
well as<BR>logging.<BR> The fate of the roadless rule is still
unsettled, as a judge has declared<BR>the Clinton regulation invalid in a suit
by the state of Wyoming, now<BR>pending before a federal appeals court in
Denver. The Ninth Circuit court<BR>did not discuss the potential impact of that
case Wednesday.<BR> But in contrast to the Bush administration,
which argued against the<BR>roadless rule in court, President Obama's
administration praised the court<BR>for reinstating the rule.<BR>
"The Obama administration supports conservation of roadless areas in
our<BR>national forests and this decision today reaffirms the protection of
those<BR>resources," the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in a
statement.<BR> While the case was pending, Agriculture Secretary Tom
Vilsack announced in May that he would personally approve or veto all
road-building and logging plans in roadless forest areas for the next
year.<BR> Clinton's regulation contained some exemptions for
emergencies, such as<BR>areas damaged by fires, but it was opposed by timber
companies and groups of off-road vehicle users. In May 2001, before the rule was
to take<BR>effect, President George W. Bush's administration suspended it and
said<BR>each state would be allowed to propose its own roadless plan, subject
to<BR>federal approval, with no nationwide prohibition on
road-building.<BR> The Bush regulation took effect in May 2005 and
was halted by a federal<BR>magistrate in September 2006. The administration did
not approve any state<BR>plans during that period, but allowed logging on 535
acres of previously<BR>roadless forest land in Oregon and permitted some oil and
gas leases in<BR>Rocky Mountain states that the Clinton rule would have
prevented, said<BR>Kristen Boyles, a lawyer for environmental groups in the
case.<BR> In October, under separate legal authority, the Bush
administration<BR>approved Idaho's plan for 9 million acres that allowed new
road-building<BR>in some areas. Boyles said road-building is also permitted in
Alaska's<BR>Tongass National Forest, with nearly 10 million acres, under a
2003<BR>settlement of a suit by the state of Alaska against the
federal<BR>government.<BR> In Wednesday's ruling, the appeals court
upheld U.S. Magistrate Elizabeth Laporte's 2006 decision that the Bush
administration's state-by-state rule was invalid because the government had not
studied its impact on the forests, endangered species or their
habitat.<BR> The ruling applies nationwide, except for Idaho and the
Tongass forest,<BR>which were removed from the case after the Bush
administration approved<BR>their individual road-restriction plans. The
magistrate's decision had<BR>been limited to a group of Western
states.<BR> Wednesday's ruling "turns back an assault on areas that
we value as<BR>national treasures ... pristine areas of public forests, where
people<BR>spoke out about how they wanted to preserve hiking and hunting and
fishing<BR>and bird-watching," said attorney Kristen Boyles of Earthjustice,
which<BR>represented numerous environmental groups in the case. They were joined
by California, New Mexico, Oregon and Wyoming in support of the Clinton
rule.<BR> A timber industry group expressed
disappointment.<BR> The Bush administration's state-by-state
planning process "lets the people<BR>who are most impacted have a say in the
disposition of those lands,"<BR>rather than subjecting them to "blanket policies
coming out of the<BR>government," said Tom Partin, president of the American
Forest Resource<BR>Council, which represents nearly 100 forest products
companies.<BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>