Board of Forestry charged with authorization of illegal logging

Today, the seven members of the Oregon Board of Forestry were served with a complaint for violations of the federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) stemming from their authorization of private industrial logging that harms protected salmon. The case focuses on clearcut logging of steep slopes where ensuing landslides will reach coho-bearing streams throughout the range of Oregon Coast coho salmon.

PRC v. Brown, the original lawsuit filed by five environmental and fishing groups in Portland's federal district court during February 2002, is the first case ever filed in Oregon to enforce ESA regulations against harm to salmon caused by private logging. The case originally named only Oregon's State Forester as a defendant because he was the official who formally approved logging operations. The original case addressed logging that harms coho only in Oregon's North Coast.

In addition to adding the seven Board members to the list of defendants, the suit will now cover the entire range of Oregon's Coastal coho salmon -- an area that covers all or part of fourteen coastal counties. (The area is bounded to the North by streams near the city of Gearhart, and to the South by Cape Blanco, just south of Bandon). The case still targets only logging on industrial ownerships of 5000 acres or more.

Since the original case was filed, the Department of Forestry and its attorneys have avoided addressing the question of whether the state's forestry rules addressing riparian and unstable land protection adequately protect listed salmon from harm. Instead, ODF leadership worked out a legal strategy with the timber industry to quickly change the rules and lobbied the legislature to amend the Forest Practices Act -- actions intended to weaken the state's role in approval of individual logging operations. Their goal is to convince the court that state officials are not subject to ESA enforcement actions like the Pacific Rivers case. But the groups defending coho salmon have consistently said these changes don't make the lawsuit go away.

"The Board of Forestry has given a blanket authorization to all logging operations that comply with the state's minimum rules, including clear-cuts on steep slopes that are likely to trigger landslides and kill salmon," says Patti Goldman, of Earthjustice. "The law is clear that Board members are legally responsible for harm to protected salmon caused by activities they authorize."

"All we want is for the state to stop authorizing the same kind of logging that helped bring these fish to the brink of extinction," said Mary Scurlock of Pacific Rivers Council, the lead plaintiff in the case. "When we first went to court, we naively hoped the Board would use its authority to solve the problem by strengthening the state's logging rules to better protect salmon. Now it's crystal clear that the Board's head-in-the-sand current attitude makes them part of the problem, not part of the solution."

"Logging on landslide-prone steep slopes is a huge problem for fish and water quality in the Coast Range," said Chuck Willer of the Coast Range Association. "Local watershed councils are doing much to help streams recover through voluntary downstream restoration, but there's no question that the big timber companies must also stop making a mess in steep headwater areas. Its now apparent that stopping big timbers steep land clearcutting will take a court order.

In December, the state will file a new motion to dismiss the case, arguing that the Board cannot be legally responsible for violations of the ESA. Similar claims were soundly rejected last year by Judge Anna Brown when the state asked her to dismiss the original suit against the State Forester.

Earthjustice filed the complaint on behalf of Pacific Rivers Council, Audubon Society of Portland, Coast Range Association, Native Fish Society and Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermans Associations. The Department of Forestry (ODF) is responsible for approval of thousands of logging plans every year in Oregon, many of which affect water quality and coho habitat. The groups are asking the court to stop ODF from allowing one of the most harmful of timber practices clearcutting extremely steep and unstable slopes.