From the Engelmann spruce stands in the High Uintas to the ponderosa forests of the Pine Valley Mountains, roughly four million acres of roadless areas span Utah’s national forests. Much of those remote lands have been protected from logging and road construction for over two decades, but the Trump administration just took the next step to potentially change that.
The U.S. Forest Service filed its official notice of intent to rescind the 2001 Roadless Rule on Friday, launching a 21-day public comment period.
“It is vital that we properly manage our federal lands to create healthy, resilient, and productive forests for generations to come,” U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins said in a news release on Wednesday. “We look forward to hearing directly from the people and communities we serve as we work together to implement productive and commonsense policy for forest land management.”
Not all feel the Agriculture Department is reviewing the issue as collaboratively as they could, though.
“We would, honestly, welcome a transparent, collaborative process to determine if tweaks to the rule would allow us to better protect the values of roadless areas while also better protecting communities of people at risk of catastrophic fire,” said Chris Wood, president and CEO of Trout Unlimited. Rescinding the roadless rule, Wood added, instead allows “chaos to unfold.”
Utah leaders have long opposed the roadless rule, though, and Gov. Spencer Cox celebrated when Secretary Rollins first announced the Trump administration’s plans to upend it in June.
Read more at sltrib.com.
This article is published through the Utah News Collaborative, a partnership of news organizations in Utah that aims to inform readers across the state.