Ashland councilman will file federal suit over city watershed plan
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Ashland City Councilman Eric Navickas and fire ecologist Jay Lininger
will file a lawsuit in federal court in Eugene this week against the
U.S. Forest Service, Navickas said today.
The pair will seek an injunction against a Forest Service plan to
prevent fires by thinning trees in the Ashland watershed, Navickas said
in an e-mail notice to the city on Tuesday.
The Ashland Forest Resiliency Project, approved by the council in
October with only Navickas dissenting, would be too invasive on
riparian and roadless areas, cut too many large diameter, old-growth
trees, endanger spotted owl habitat and impact sensitive soils, causing
erosion, the council member said.
"Our intent is not to stop the project," said Navickas, noting that he
is acting as a citizen, not a council member. "This is overreaching,
1950s style logging that they propose. It focuses on large-diameter
trees and they're going into virgin, pristine areas in the upper
watershed that have never been logged."
Navickas for years was a party in legal action against the expansion of
Mount Ashland, saying it would damage the city's watershed.
— John Darling, for the Mail Tribune
