Protest of BLM South Deer Timber Sale & Decision Record (.pdf)

Lake Selmac Bald Eagle Management Plan (.pdf)

Water Quality Management Plan (.pdf)

RMP evaluation for spotted owl reports (.pdf)

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Thursday, September 29, 2005

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Friends of Deer Creek Valley protest BLM ‘fire sale’ and launch Save South Deer Campaign

SELMA, OREGON – During a rally in Medford today, Friends of Deer Creek Valley announced the launch of Save South Deer, a campaign to reduce fire risk, safeguard watersheds and create local jobs by restoring natural forests and protecting old-growth groves. The campaign was sparked by a hotly contested Bureau of Land Management (BLM) ‘fire sale’ that will allow private logging companies to cut South Deer’s last virgin old growth and turn the valley into a tinderbox by converting fire-resistant natural forests into tree farms.

In formal written protests filed with the BLM last week, independent scientists and grassroots groups contend that all of the South Deer Project should have been placed under the stewardship of the Natural Selection Alternative, a community supported, forest friendly, science based system proven to reduce fire risk, provide permanent timber jobs, promote eco-tourism and protect watersheds and wildlife habitat.

The Cascade Resource Advocacy Group (CRAG.org) filed a legal protest against the South Deer Timber Sale and BLM Decision Record on South Deer Landscape Management Project on behalf of Deer Creek Valley Natural Resources Conservation Association, KS Wild (KSWild.org), Siskiyou Project (Siskiyou.org) and the Illinois Valley and Rogue Group Sierra Club Chapters. KS Wild filed a separate legal protest on behalf of Cascadia Wildlands Project (CascWild.org), Oregon National Resources Council (ONRC.org) Siskiyou Project and Umpqua Watersheds. Independent protests were also filed by the Oregon National Resources Council and Roger Brandt, a highly respected recreation and tourism specialist.

Under the current South Deer decision, the Natural Selection Alternative was awarded 640 acres–just 7 percent of their proposal–which included a 139-acre intact old-growth grove for temporary protection­. Seen as a good first step by residents and experts, the award was an historical first for the BLM and the Natural Selection Alternative but not enough to satisfy growing community concerns about fire safety, water quality and local economic stability.

Supporting statements

“When it comes to forest health and real fire safety, big business and big government literally can’t see the forest for the trees,” said Orville Camp, the fourth generation Illinois Valley logger who developed the Natural Selection Alternative. “They need to recognize that other species create and sustain natural forests and that there is nothing humans can do to improve on this. Sustainability necessitates retaining natural forests. The most fire resistant forest is a natural old-growth forest with a closed canopy that prevents high fire hazard fuel buildups below. Opening up the canopy encourages high fire hazard fuel conditions. Under the BLM alternative, canopies will be opened up to meet a timber sale, and natural forests will be converted into unnatural tree plantations with the ongoing costly struggle of trying to keep nature from restoring it. Taxpayers will be subsidizing the same out-dated destructive forestry management practices that turned our beautiful valley into a tinderbox in the first place. It’s a vicious cycle initiated by profit driven corporate stockholders and fueled by government land managers under the guise of federally mandated fire hazard reduction. I have lived and worked in the forest all of my life, and I can tell you that Bush’s so-called Healthy Forests Initiative is a misleading misnomer of mythic proportions that is bad for forests and bad for communities. This administration and its corporate constituents are playing on the public’s understandable fear of fire. What they are not telling us is that private corporations will reap huge profits at the expense of forest and community health putting our communities at even greater risk and forcing taxpayers to foot the bill. The Illinois Valley, Deer Creek in particular, is struggling to recover from over a century of unsustainable forestry practices, and our community is committed to working with the BLM to heal not harm our valley.”

“The Natural Selection Alternative is the only alternative that actively promotes non-timber forest products resulting in multiple economic benefits for a wide range of timber and non-timber beneficiaries,” stated Roger Brandt. “In particular, the Natural Selection Alternative pays close attention to opportunities to use the forest to produce timber in a way that attracts the interest of the traveling public and helps the community to capture a share of the significant tourism dollars that pass through this region annually,about 40 million each year. The Natural Selection Alternative would allow the public to recreate in their forest while at the same time accommodating the needs of local forest workers to earn a living. It would create a compromise between conflicting forest uses that would cast a positive light on the local community as a productive and collaborative society that is able to generate and innovative, sustainable economy with a minimum of controversy.”

Friends of Deer Creek Valley is a community coalition committed to working with federal land managers and private land owners to create a sustainable local forest economy by restoring natural forests to late-successional old-growth conditions.