Obama administration halts development in roadless parts of federal forests

The Obama administration today called a time out on any new development in roadless U.S. Forest Service lands.

"This interim directive will provide consistency and clarity that will help protect our national forests until a long-term roadless policy reflecting President Obama's commitment is developed," Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack said in a statement.

Vilsack's decision, which temporarily reinstates a Clinton era rule that was weakened under the Bush administration, applies to tens of millions of acres across the nation, including about 1.9 million acres of generally rugged, timbered areas in Oregon.

The directive signed by Vilsack Today means no new road building or timber sales could take place in those forests for one year without his approval.

"This directive doesn't mean they can't do it, it just means they have to get high-level approval," Mike Anderson, senior resource analyst for The Wilderness Society, said.

Northwest governors, legislators and environmentalists have been pushing Obama and his new forest team to reinstate the roadless rule, which Clinton adopted in 2001. The Bush administration replaced the rule with a process that required states to petition to have their roadless areas protected.

The Associated PressLogging in the area burned by 2002's Biscuit Fire in southern Oregon became a focal point for the debate over development in roadless areas administered by the U.S. Forest Service.

And various, often conflicting court rulings have called into question the status of roadless parts of the federal domain.

Today's announcement was welcome news among opponents of logging or mining in the nation's remaining undeveloped areas

"Other than issuing a budget for the forest service, this is the first policy decision they've taken on national forests that I'm aware of," Anderson said.

But the directive was not unexpected.

In a March letter to Gov. Ted Kulongoski, who supports the roadless rule, Vilsack said his agency would "move forward to conserve and protect these lands."

And as a candidate, Obama said he supported preserving roadless areas.

The decision does not cover forests in Idaho, which completed a management plan of its own for its roadless areas last year.

And, following the one year moratorium, Idaho should be the model for how roadless forests are managed in the future, said Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Council, whose members rely on logs from public lands.

"Rather than having a policy coming down from Washignton D.C., a dictate rather, that says you will or will not manage these lands," Partin said.

Both supporters and detractors of roadless protections agree that Thursday's announcement will have little immediate impact in Oregon because so few logging projects have been proposed or are pending in roadless areas in the state.