A U.S. Forest Service biologist is suing his bosses over whether their practice of sprucing up old logging roads without an environmental review is legal.
A lawsuit by Glenn Ith, a longtime Forest Service biologist, alleges the federal agency is reconstructing so-called "Roads to Nowhere" in Alaska's Tongass National Forest without analyzing the potential effects on the environment. Ith contends that the Forest Service is trying to encourage logging by circumventing the law, an allegation the federal agency denies.
In court papers filed Friday, Ith and co-plaintiff Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics say the road rehab violates a federal law requiring environmental study and a public process before the government can authorize certain activities. The law is called the National Environmental Policy Act.
Ith, who lives in Petersburg, filed the lawsuit in March in U.S District Court in Anchorage, which assigned the case to Judge John Sedwick.
The Forest Service says clearing brush, grading and resurfacing old roads is routine maintenance that falls outside the requirements of NEPA.
An attorney for the Forest Service, in a brief filed Thursday, said logging roads are built to low standards and need upkeep for public safety and to preserve the water quality of nearby streams.
"Maintenance is necessary from time to time regardless of whether a timber sale is being planned in the vicinity," attorney Bruce Landon wrote.
Landon said Friday that he could not comment on the lawsuit. Ith could not be reached.
In press materials from Eugene, Ore.-based Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, Ith says the road projects he's challenging are being reconstructed so loggers can access timber north of Ketchikan and near Petersburg.
Because the old logging roads lead to timber the Forest Service may offer for harvest, the agency must do an environmental review and involve the public, Ith's lawsuit says.
Road maintenance and potential logging are two separate things, Landon wrote.
The Oregon group, known for bringing whistle-blower cases against the Forest Service, doesn't buy it.
"We certainly did not sue without asking the Forest Service to explain what was going on, but we found their explanation to be not credible," said Andy Stahl, executive director of FSEEE. "The minute the Forest Service said this is regular routine maintenance that had nothing to do with the timber sale ... we realized we were being lied to."
The Forest Service has a huge maintenance backlog for the more than 4,500 miles of logging roads in the Tongass.
"We have an obligation to maintain as much of it as possible," said Forest Service spokesman Ray Massey.
The agency received $5 million from Congress last year to build logging roads in the Tongass, and it needs to use or lose that money by the end of the year, according to Stahl.
"Senator Stevens earmarked 5 million bucks in the appropriations bill for road construction on the Tongass, and the Forest Service ran out of legal places to spend it, meaning timber sales that have already gone through the environmental review process. Rather than lose the money and incur his wrath, they decided to spend the money on timber sales that haven't been approved," Stahl said.
"I highly doubt we would do it just because someone says Senator Stevens would get mad if we don't spend the money," Massey said.
Critics recently slapped Tongass logging roads with the "Roads to Nowhere" label, comparing them to two proposed Alaska bridges that have been mocked as national examples of wasteful government spending.
The House voted this week to bar the Forest Service from spending federal funds on building new logging roads in the Tongass, citing the tens of millions of dollars the government loses every year running the timber program.Anchorage Daily News
