Karl Brauneis is a retired U.S. Forest Service forester, former smokejumper, and longtime student of federal forest policy and history. Over a decades long career in the woods, Karl witnessed firsthand how active forest management, rapid fire response, and sustained yield forestry once shaped healthier and more resilient forests across the West. In the following piece, he reflects on how federal forest policy changed over time and the consequences he believes followed.
Both the Northwest Forest Plan (1994) and the Roadless Rule (2001) played a key role in the destruction of our National Forests. Both plans were a recipe for conflagration. Every field forester knew it and time proved us right.
Continuous and frivolous lawsuits by environmental litigants delivered the final coup de grace. Forest Service Chief Jack Ward Thomas referred to it as “bayonetting the wounded.” The environmental industrial cartel lined their pockets with cash while our forests burned and people died. It sickens me.
In the 1930’s “Dust Bowl Era” the forests of Oregon burned throughout the entire decade with large fires like the Tillamook of ‘33 (350,000 acres). They were Oregon’s greatest fires in recent history until the New Millennium.
In 2020 more acres burned in Oregon in 48 hours then in the entire decade of the 1930’s (DR. Bob Zybach – Forest Ecologist). The key catalyst? The Northwest Forest Plan and the Roadless Rule that removed active forest management from our National Forests. Timber harvest dropped from 12 billion board feet per year to 2 billion after the plan. Forest’s soon became overstocked with dead and dying trees. A Tinder Box ready to burn and it did and it does. Forests also re-burn because the Roadless Rule will not allow for the roads required to salvage the burned timber and restore the land. It’s a one, two knockout punch.
In the 1970’s we often circled lightning storms in our DC-3/C47 (Doug) and Twin Otter aircraft and jumped fires as soon as they started. With 16 men on a “Doug” we could jump up to 8 fires with just one load. All of that beautiful timber was saved for harvest to build homes and provide for multiple timber products. We busted our rears to save those forests. So yes, it gets personal when others callously destroy your hard work.
In my career I saw my outfit shift from a highly decentralized conservation learning organization to a highly centralized environmental planning politburo. Fortunately, the present administration and our Wyoming congressional delegation are working overtime to get back to the basics of common sense and effective forest management. Rescinding the roadless rule is a good first step. It will not affect much of Wyoming but other states like Washington and Oregon will reap the benefits to both the land and the communities that live there and call it home.
