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Federal plan for Nantahala and Pisgah national forests greeted with criticism from environmentalists

A long-awaited land management plan for Nantahala and Pisgah national forests was released Friday by the U.S. Forest Service. Environmental groups say it's a disappointment.
Posted 2023-02-17T21:12:59+00:00 - Updated 2023-02-18T15:46:00+00:00
New federal plan could open parts of western NC forests to logging

A long-awaited land management plan for the Nantahala and Pisgah national forests was released Friday — the culmination of a drawn-out comment period that attracted thousands of objections from environmental groups.

The U.S. Forest Service, which manages the forests, called the final product "a balanced plan that supports the multiple uses and benefits of national forests, including recreation, water, wilderness and wildlife habitat, healthy and resilient forests, and sustainable management."

Environmental groups say it's a disappointment and that the government didn't take their objections seriously.

“The Forest Service flat-out refused to listen to the public and consider easy, win-win solutions that were widely supported,” said Will Harlan, a scientist with the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the environmental groups involved in the feedback process. “Instead, it’s pursuing its own hyper-aggressive logging agenda that sentences the forest to decades of conflict, litigation, and community resistance.”

Since 2014, the federal agency has been working on a 30-year management plan for the future of the land. The forests, which stretch along the state’s western border and include parts of the Appalachian Trail and Blue Ridge Parkway, drive recreational tourism in the 18 counties they touch. But the land is also a key resource for the state’s forestry industry.

Last year, after many meetings with stakeholder groups, the Forest Service released a draft plan that would open more areas to logging than stakeholders had even asked for. It received more than 22,000 objections to the plan — more than any other in the agency’s history, mostly in support of more protections for the forests.

In a companion document released with the plan, James Melonas, state supervisor of the National Forests, said the plan "accelerates the development of young forest and open forest, which are currently underrepresented on the landscape, while also ensuring that there are places on the landscape where development of old growth characteristics will be prioritized."

According to Harlan, the final plan would quadruple the amount of logging allowed in the forest, opening nearly two-thirds of the total area to potential logging, including 44 thousand acres of old-growth forest. It would also prioritize logging in the Craggy National Scenic Area, and would not protect some threatened species and areas critical for biodiversity.

"For more than a decade, the public has been sending a clear and consistent message: Protect more of the Pisgah-Nantahala," he said. "The Forest Service didn’t listen.”

The Forest Service's regional spokesman, Alan Abernethy, countered that only about 800 acres per year are currently harvested in the Nantahala and Pisgah forests, less than one-tenth of a percent of the million-acre area, which he said is "not enough for a healthy, diverse forest."

"Some young trees, like the oaks that we have had here for centuries, need tons of sunlight to grow. Without more sunlight hitting the forest floor, the species mix will change, and the forest will become less resilient to threats," Abernethy said. "Timber harvest is a tool used to improve forest health by creating more diversity. Diversity in tree types, age and structure makes forests more resilient to insects, disease, and climate change."

Abernethy said expanding logging and replanting will also create needed additional habitat for birds and pollinators that need young forestland to thrive, but he added that the plan also protects "very old forest."

The North Carolina Forestry Association declined to comment on the plan, saying it was still digesting the hundreds of pages in the plan and its accompanying documents.

Harlan said his and other environmental groups will likely challenge the plan in federal court.

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