Oregon Wild Winter-Spring 2013 Volume 40, Number 1 Oregon's forests on the edge ANNUAL REPORT INSIDE 1 Winter-Spring 2013 Volume 40, Number 1 Working to protect and restore Oregon’s wildlands, wildlife, and waters as an enduring legacy for future generations. Main Office Western Field Office INSIDE THIS ISSUE 5825 N Greeley Avenue Portland, OR 97217 P.O. Box 11648 Eugene, OR 97440 Phone: 503.283.6343 Fax: 503.283.0756 454 Willamette, Suite 203 Oregon's forests at the crossroads {4-7} www.oregonwild.org Phone 541.344.0675 Fax: 541.343.0996 The e-mail address for each Oregon Wild Conservation & Restoration Coord. Doug Heiken x 1 Snow on your shoes, mud on your boots {8-9} staff member: [email protected] Old Growth Campaign Coordinator Chandra LeGue x 2 (for example: [email protected]) Annual Report {15} Membership Associate Marielle Cowdin x 213 Eastern Field Office Wilderness Coordinator Erik Fernandez x 202 16 NW Kansas Avenue, Bend, OR 97701 Phone: 541.382.2616 Fax: 541.385.3370 Director of Finance & Admin. Candice Guth x 219 Communications & Outreach Tommy Hough x 223 Eastern OR Development Coordinator Jonathan Jelen x 224 Wildlands Advocate Tim Lillebo Wildlands & Wildlife Advocate Rob Klavins x 210 coVer photo: fred AN Many of the forests around Mt. Hood enjoy significant protection, but Conservation Director Steve Pedery x 214 Southern Field Office equally spectacular forests elsewhere around the state are at a management crossroads. Executive Director Sean Stevens x 211 P.O. Box 1923 Brookings, OR 97415 Phone: 541.366.8623 Oregon Wild Board of Directors Wildlands Interpreter Wendell Wood Megan Gibb, President Daniel Robertson, Vice President & Secretary Pat Clancy, Treasurer Vik Anantha Shawn Donnille www.facebook.com/OregonWild Leslie Logan Brett Sommermeyer @oregonwild William Sullivan Jan Wilson Oregon Wild is a tax-exempt, non-profit charitable organization. Newsletter printed on New Leaf 100% recycled, 50% post-consumer, FSC certified paper with soy based inks. Oregon Wild is printed locally by Environmental Paper and Print, an Oregon Wild donor and business partner. Winter-Spring 2013 Volume 40, Number 1 2 From the Director’s Desk Our votes and our vision Sean Stevens, Executive Director ver the past year, Oregon Wild the outcome at the polls had expendable – open to sale for the has been crafting a new diverged. Given the lack of attention highest bidder. strategicO plan to chart our course for paid to environmental issues during the future. It’s an important and this election, you’d be forgiven for not It is our deeply-held notion of exciting process we undertake every knowing the major conservation responsibility to future generations which has always prevailed. More four years – and we’re almost done. policy differences between Barack SUE newman The path ahead toward protecting Oregon’s Obama and Mitt Romney. and more this sentiment is backed by special places will be long and arduous – but it will be worth it. We’ve spent the last several months an economic argument made by re-evaluating our programs, asking The two most frequent questions I’m powerful allies in the outdoor hard questions about what’s working asked when it comes to politics and recreation industry – whose voices Wilderness in 1984 with a year we came in ahead of budget, and what’s not, and thinking about the environment are: Can we become more influential as their Republican president and two raising more revenue than expected the Oregon we want to live in four accomplish anything for the footprint in the western economy Republican senators (one of them thanks to hundreds of supporters years from now. environment when all anyone talks grows. oft-described as a “timber beast”). who found a way to give a little extra about is the economy? And how can this past year. Our membership is Our strategic planning process As for the mess in Congress, there is While hopeful, we also know it will growing and our e-mail alert list can we break through the partisan take hard work to keep Oregon on usually coincides with the gridlock? no denying partisanship has stalled easily flood the inboxes of decision quadrennial presidential election – in many worthwhile legislative efforts. the right track. The threat of public makers with 1,000 messages in a part because the ultimate decisions It’s true, and appropriate, that the A long-shot omnibus bill in the lame lands privatization and massive single day. about public lands are made in the economy dominates our current duck session is all that’s stopping the increases in clear-cut logging still sits halls of Congress and from the Oval political dialogue. But we know the 112th Congress from becoming the on the horizon (more details on page Your activism, your financial support, Office desk. short-term cry of “jobs above all else” first in 40 years to fail to pass a single four). Meanwhile, the Devil’s and your passion for Oregon are the is not a winning policy for wilderness Wilderness bill. Staircase, Wild Rogue, and the key ingredients which fuel Oregon But as I sat in my living room with long-term. Jobs and conservation wildest stretch of the Molalla River Wild. Let’s keep the momentum my wife watching election results in have never been mutually exclusive, Still, we have hope. As I told the still await their turn in Congress. rolling for the next four years and November, I wondered if our goals and Oregonians have long since gathered crowd at our October photo beyond. and ambitions for Oregon’s contest unveiling, we passed the As an organization, we are primed for passed the era when we viewed the success. During our most recent fiscal environment would look different if natural world around us as largest ever expansion of Oregon 3 Winter-Spring 2013 Volume 40, Number 1 Oregon forests at the crossroads Chandra LeGue At the crossroads – which re-growing the next rotation of BLM is already taking steps towards way do we choose? timber to be clear-cut. clear-cutting under the guise of “ecological forestry” in new timber Enjoying a drive into the Coast Or are they? sales like White Castle, Second Show, Range between Eugene and The management of public and Rainbow Ridge. Corvallis, I stop at a trailhead which forestlands in western Oregon is at a We are faced with a stark choice: leads into the Alsea Falls Recreation crossroads. After decades of Area. I venture off the trail into a continue to restore our forests, aggressive logging on our public watersheds, and wildlife after decades forest well on its way to recovery lands, the managing agencies – the MahoganY AUlenbach of abusive logging, or make a U-turn after earlier logging, and stoop to U.S. Forest Service and BLM – have The boundary between find a golden chanterelle. Farther up back to the clear-cut logging which private and BLM land near begun to move towards conservation- brought us here. Alsea Falls. the trail I walk through a picnic area based thinning and restoration and down to Alsea Falls itself, where projects which enjoy the support of Our heritage forests at risk the South Fork Alsea River is lined conservation groups. While it isn’t by old-growth trees. Each year, the case everywhere, responsible We’ve given a great deal of coverage to thousands of visitors drive this scenic forest managers are increasingly BLM lands in recent years, from the byway through the forests of the focused on protecting and restoring development and eventual death of Coast Range, and stop to enjoy this public values like clean drinking the Bush administration’s WOPR recreation area with its many trails, water, wild salmon, threatened plan (Western Oregon Plan scenic picnic spots, waterfalls, and wildlife habitat, carbon storage to Revisions), to recent proposals to fall mushrooming. mitigate for global warming, and re-link county funding to public lands logging. The reason for all the Just a few miles off the scenic byway, nearby recreation. attention? The 2.6 million acres of up a winding gravel road through Not everyone is happy with this new western Oregon forest lands at stake hills stripped bare of trees, the direction. Proposals in Congress are among the most important public difference between private timber threaten to weaken environmental lands in our state. land and public lands – Bureau of laws and gut the landmark Land Management (BLM) lands in Northwest Forest Plan. The logging Western Oregon BLM lands contain this case – is stark. While the 50-year industry continues to oppose some of the last remaining low old plantation stand I enter was once endangered species recovery efforts, elevation old-growth forest in the clear-cut like the forests behind me, and some state and local politicians state, linking public lands in the Coast here the future plans are focused on are suggesting a return to public land Range with the Cascade and Siskiyou restoring the natural structure and clear-cutting to generate revenue to mountains. Because forests and Chandra LE GU E function of the forest, instead of wildlife on adjacent private lands have A patchwork of private bail out local budgets. In fact, the land clearcuts near Alsea. Winter-Spring 2013 Volume 40, Number 1 4 been ravaged by logging, these areas are often the only habitat available to Threatened forests near you imperiled species. BLM lands in the state also contain rivers and streams Some of western Oregon’s most iconic, beautiful, and familiar places are found on BLM lands. These include which provide clean drinking water the stunning ancient forests in Crabtree Valley, the wild landscape surrounding the lower Rogue River, and a to over 1.8 million Oregonians.