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Kentucky Heartwood

We need forests we can get lost in; trees that make us gape; streams we can drink from. 
​Wild places sustain and define us; ​we, in turn, must protect them.

Farm Bill would gut National Forest Protections, calls to Congress needed!

4/15/2018

5 Comments

 
The U.S. House Agriculture Committee has released a draft of the 2018 Farm Bill. The Forestry Title begins on page 464. The bill includes some devastating provisions with regards to our national forests and the species that rely on them. Calls to our members of Congress are urgently needed.

Some of the awful provisions in the bill include:

  • Allowing up to 6,000 acres of logging, including clearcutting, for any reason whatsoever with essentially no public input and no environmental analysis under what's known as a "Categorical Exclusion,"
  • Loopholes to exempt logging projects from the Endangered Species Act,
  • Mandating that 50% of funds previously allocated for watershed restoration (including trail and road repairs) under the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act  be diverted to logging projects,
  • Eliminating environmental review and public input for new, permanent road construction through a "Categorical Exclusion," even though the Forest Service has a more than $3 billion maintenance backlog on its 370,000 miles roads. 

If enacted, massive logging projects on the Daniel Boone National Forest and Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area, like the 3,200 acres proposed for logging in the South Redbird Project and the 4,000 acres proposed for logging in the Pine Creek project, could happen without public input or environmental review. 

The Farm Bill forestry provisions largely mirror those in the Resilient Federal Forests Act of 2017 (the Westerman bill), which passed the U.S. House but did not advance in the Senate. Congress later approved a "fix" to the wildfire spending (aka "fire borrowing") issue in the 2018 Omnibus Appropriations bill, which also included some bad forestry provisions - including a 3,000 acre Categorical Exclusion to eliminate environmental review for logging projects deemed to address "hazardous fuels" issues. While the wildfire issue was supposedly the reason for loosening environmental protections in the Westerman bill, it's now abundantly clear that forest health and wildfire concerns have nothing to do with it. This is, plain and simple, a giveaway of our public lands to the timber industry.

Please take a minute to call your Congressional Representative and ask them to oppose the forestry provisions in in the 2018 Farm Bill. Congressmen Jim Comer (R) and John Yarmuth (D) voted against the Westerman bill. Please thank them, and ask that they continue to vote in support of Kentucky's public lands. Congressmen Barr (R), Massie (R), Rogers (R), and Guthrie (R), all voted in support of the Westerman bill. 

You can find your member of Congress here. 

If you make a call or send an email to your representative, please let us know!


5 Comments
Keith Williams
4/15/2018 05:14:55 pm

Please stop any and all legislation which allows logging in our beautiful National Forest. Our National Forest need to remain as pristine as possible. Our future depends on it.

Reply
james griley
4/17/2018 06:48:30 pm

Keep ALL of our forests pristine as possible.

Reply
Vertner Smith
4/18/2018 05:32:58 am

Let’s continue to share this story and remember those KY Reps in Nov who have voted in favor of this bill.

Reply
Kyle Roberts
4/24/2018 08:45:39 am

Please stop any and all legislation which allows logging in our beautiful National Forest. Our National Forests need to remain as pristine as possible. Our future and our duty to the generations-to-come depend upon it.

Reply
Tom Fuller
4/27/2018 11:11:05 am

Jim Scheff I called Congressman Comer's DC office today, 4-27-2018, and ask them to oppose the forestry provisions in the 2018 Farm Bill.
Many Thanks to KENTUCKY HEARTWOOD for all you do.
Tom Fuller

Reply

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  • Home
  • News and Events
    • Newsletters
    • Forest Blog
    • Music Festival 2022 >
      • Music Festival Pics
    • Past Events >
      • Stonecoal hike
      • Hemlock volunteer days
      • Red Hickory and Herbal Medicine Hike
      • Red Hickory Hike April '22
      • Music Festival 2021
      • Bat Meter Deployment Field Trip 2021
      • Virtual Membership Meeting 2021
      • The Three R's with Davis Mounger
      • White fringeless orchid mural
  • Forest Watch
    • FOIA
    • Jellico >
      • ORG COMMENTS
    • South Redbird Project
    • Blackwater (Cave Run Lake)
    • Red River Gorge
    • Pine Creek Forest Restoration Project
    • Greenwood
    • Pisgah Bay Project
    • Climax & Little Egypt >
      • Crooked Creek Photos 2011
      • Crooked Creek Photos 2010
    • Upper Rock Creek Logging >
      • Rock Creek Hike, November 2009
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    • ANNUAL REPORT 2022
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