March 17, 2001

Forest Rules Postponed Again by Bush

By DOUGLAS JEHL

WASHINGTON, March 16 — The Bush administration signaled today that it might consider a settlement that could significantly scale back the effect of Clinton administration rules putting a third of the national forests off limits to development.

Facing the first court challenge to the rules, the administration essentially put off a decision on whether to defend them.

In a motion filed in a Federal District Court in Boise, Idaho, it also offered to postpone when the new rules would take effect, probably until at least early summer.

The administration said it needed more time to complete a review of the Clinton policy, whose wisdom President Bush has publicly questioned and whose effective date had already been put off until May 12, as part of a broader moratorium on rules issued late in the Clinton administration.

As originally scheduled, the rules would have taken effect this past Tuesday.

But the filing of the motion suggested more clearly than ever that the new administration is not inclined to support the rules as they now stand. The offer of a postponement essentially granted a request by Boise Cascade, the timber giant, which had asked a federal judge to grant a preliminary injunction barring the rules from taking effect.

The move also opened a window for possible negotiations between the Bush administration and the Western states, timber interests, off-road enthusiasts and others who have filed lawsuits aimed at overturning the Clinton rules, which would ban roadbuilding and logging across some 60 million acres of national forest.

"We want to completely understand and review what was a last- minute regulation, and this motion allows us to continue to do that while the lawsuit is ongoing," Claire Buchan, a White House spokeswoman, said.

Proponents of the Clinton plan suggested that the Bush administration recognized that the rules had broad public support and was trying to seek modifications as part of a legal settlement rather than through a head- on challenge to the policy.

"This is the first time that the Bush administration is showing its hand on the policy specifically, and it looks like they're buying time to come up with a settlement," said Phil Clapp, who heads the National Environmental Trust, an environmental group based in Washington.

In criticizing any further postponement in the effective date of the rules, Mr. Clapp and other environmentalists said that one result could be to open the way to several timber sales that would have been prohibited under the Clinton plan but for which planning is proceeding, particularly in the Tongass National Forest in Alaska.

Along with timber interests, the mining, oil and gas industries have been vehement opponents of the Clinton plan, the effect of which would be to curtail mining and drilling as well as logging.

The move follows Mr. Bush's decision earlier this week to reverse his pledge to regulate power plants' emissions of carbon dioxide, regarded as a key contributor to global warming. It was described by environmentalists who had championed Mr. Clinton's "roadless forests" policy as a further indication that the new administration is hostile to their agenda.

In contrast, a spokesman for the timber industry said he welcomed the move as a sign of the Bush administration's willingness to consider what he called the fatal weaknesses of the Clinton approach.

"We feel that the whole roadless initiative was very unfair, it was predetermined, it was slanted against us, it was dictated by a radical environmental community which distorted public opinion polls to make it look like there was vast public support for this," said Michael Klein, spokesman for the American Forest and Paper Association.

"What we felt from a Bush administration was that at least we'd get a fair hearing," Mr. Klein said. "It looks like they've heard our outcry that this policy stinks and needs to be looked at again, and it looks like they're going to do that."

A spokesman for Boise Cascade said the company would not comment on the administration's position until its lawyers had time to review the motion, which was filed late today.

The Clinton rules on roadless forests were adopted after a review that lasted more than two years, included scores of public meetings, and prompted written or oral comments from more than 1 million people.

But the broad thrust of the policy was clear from the start, with President Bill Clinton vowing to protect forest lands "before it's too late," and the timber industry and state and local officials in the West have complained that they were unfairly shut out of a decision-making process that would affect them directly.

The rules were among those issued in a flurry by Mr. Clinton's White House during his final days in office, as part of a plan that was intended to leave a strong environmental legacy but which also added to an impression of last-minute improvisation.

The rules' original start date was set back 60 days under the terms of a broader order issued by the White House chief of staff, Andrew H. Card Jr., to allow Mr. Bush's team time to review the Clinton decisions.

Forest Service officials who helped to write the roadless rules have said that, so far, the delay in their enactment has had no practical effect.

But environmentalists have said that in Alaska's Tongass forest in particular, local forest managers have been drawing up plans for possible timber sales, sales that would be barred under the Clinton plan but could be offered for bidding in the next few months if the rules are kept on hold.

"Forest Service planners are working as fast as they can to bring sales to market sales that are flatly illegal under the Clinton plan," said Niel Lawrence, a senior lawyer with the Natural Resources Defense Council.

In addition to concern about the effect on the timber industry, a major objection cited by critics of the Clinton roadless plan is that it would restrict access to public lands, particularly in Montana and Wyoming, that are seen as potential sources of oil and natural gas.


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