Statements On Introduced Bills And Joint Resolutions

Floor Speech

By Mr. WYDEN:

S. 2895. A bill to restore forest landscapes, protect old growth forests, and manage national forests in the eastside forests of the State of Oregon, and for other purposes; to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce critical forest legislation for my home State of Oregon.

For too many decades, Oregon has been at war with itself over the fate of one of our most abundant--and most threatened--resources, our forests.

Nowhere has the negative impact of this battle been greater than in Oregon's eastside forests.

Over-logging and disastrous fire suppression policies of the past gave way over time to excessive litigation and gridlock.

With each passing month, our inability to take action, our inability to address the needs of Oregon's declining forests means that they are growing more at risk of preventable fire and disease.

With each passing month and each attempted timber sale and threatened lawsuit, the relationship between the environmental community and the timber industry has grown increasingly bitter.

Each side in these disputes has thoroughly armed itself politically enough to survive, but never enough to succeed.

The end result is that today, across Oregon's Federal forest landscape, we have around 9.5 million acres of choked, at-risk forest in desperate need of management, and millions of acres of old growth, species habitat, and watersheds face an uncertain future.

Unless something fundamental changes, that number and that peril will grow, not shrink, in coming years.

Today, good and decent people on both sides of these difficult issues have come together with me to craft legislation that will bring peace, jobs, and a healthier tomorrow to 8.3 million acres of Federal forest in eastern and central Oregon.

Today, for the first time in memory, timber executives are standing shoulder-to-shoulder with leaders of the Oregon environmental community to take shared responsibility for saving our endangered forests.

These folks have been a part of negotiations with my office for over 8 months, and have made difficult concessions in order to save our threatened Eastside forests.

Today in eastern Oregon we are down to only a small handful of surviving mills. Without far greater certainty of supply and an immediate increase in merchantable timber, more mills will close.

If that happens our Eastside forests will pay the price.

Without mills to process saw logs and other merchantable material from forest restoration projects, there will be no restoration of our Eastside forests.

The folks my office worked with to come to an agreement set aside their differences and found common ground that will prevent that from happening.

The legislation that we are rolling out today, the Oregon Eastside Forests Restoration, Old Growth Protection and Jobs Act of 2009, will provide an immediate supply of logs in the short term to jump-start restoration efforts and keep our timber mills alive.

Job One must be saving our remaining forest management infrastructure in central and eastern Oregon while preserving our old growth and watersheds.

Over the long term--in 3 years from its passage to be precise--this legislation will also provide the long-term certainty required to restore each of the six Eastside national forests, protect our most sensitive environmental assets, and restore countless jobs to rural communities.

I want to make clear that the road ahead is likely to see some challenges. Our coalition will be tested. But I have great faith that the decent people who helped to put this bill together will honor the components of this agreement and will fight to preserve its many elements as we move through the process.

I also want to point out that none of our efforts will succeed unless Oregon Federal forests are also adequately funded to properly manage and restore these valuable Federal assets.

Together, we have entered a partnership that goes beyond the four corners of this legislation. Together, as a team, we will fight for the funding to put our people back to work and restore the health of our forests.

Together, we have demonstrated something that I think my colleagues here in the Senate will appreciate: working together on a difficult issue is not only possible, it yields far greater results than working apart.

Later today, and tomorrow, I will be sitting down with key members of the Obama administration and the timber industry so that the administration can better understand the peril and opportunity in Oregon's Eastside forests. This is a united front that has not been witnessed by a White House since the onset of the timber wars.

It is my hope we will learn to work together, we will develop real trust, and that we will use these new experiences to tackle the difficult issues that await us on the west side of the Cascades.

I also want to single out a few individuals who have endured thousands, of hours of difficult work and negotiations to reach this point: John Shelk, president of Ochoco Lumber; Andy Kerr; the American Forest Resource Council, represented by Heath Heikkila and Tom Partin, who spearheaded negotiations.

I also want to recognize others that joined me earlier today to rollout this legislation Tim Lillebo with Oregon Wild; Tom Insko with Boise Cascade; Mary Scurlock, with Pacific Rivers Council; Randi Spivak, with the National Center for Conservation Science and Policy; Ben Bendick with the Nature Conservancy; and Bob Irvin with Defenders of Wildlife.

I also want to recognize back in the State, their colleagues that could not join me earlier today; Rick Brown with Defenders of Wildlife, Joseph Vaile of Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center, Steve Pedry with Oregon Wild, and Michael Powelson with the Nature Conservancy, as well as the other members and mill owners of AFRC.

I want to thank my staff, Michele Miranda, Mary Gautreaux, and Josh Kardon, who gave their nights and weekends to get us to this point.

I am proud to introduce this legislation today, and I am going to keep working with all the folks in my State who are willing to talk in good faith about restoring our eastside forests.

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