Oregon Wild Summer 2010 Volume 37, Number 2 Can we end the Timber Wars in eastern Oregon? 1 Summer 2010 Volume 37, Number 2 Formerly Oregon Natural Resources Council (ONRC) Working to protect and restore Oregon’s wildlands, wildlife, and waters as an enduring legacy. Main Office Western Field Office 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 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 INSIDE THIS ISSUE staff member: [email protected] Old Growth Campaign Coordinator Chandra LeGue x 2 (for example: [email protected]) Eastern Oregon old growth campaign {4-7} Wilderness Coordinator Erik Fernandez x 202 Eastern Field Office Director of Finance & Admin. Candice Guth x 219 16 NW Kansas Avenue, Bend, OR 97701 Oregon Wild Summer hikes schedule {8-9} Healthy Rivers Campaign Coord. Ani Kame’enui x 205 Phone: 541.382.2616 Fax: 541.385.3370 Development Assistant Denise Kayser x 213 Eastern OR Bill’s Excellent Adventures {14} Roadless Wildlands Advocate Rob Klavins x 210 Wildlands Advocate Tim Lillebo Development Coordinator Kristina Leamy x 224 Executive Director Regna Merritt x 214 Grants Coordinator Allison Oseth x 200 Conservation Director Steve Pedery x 212 Communications Associate Sean Stevens x 211 Wildlands Interpreter Wendell Wood x 200 Oregon Wild Board of Directors OWCLF Board of Directors President Gary Guttormsen President Pat Clancy Vice President/Treasurer Megan Gibb Treasurer Megan Gibb Secretary Rand Schenck Secretary Jan Wilson Susan Applegate Jim Baker Susan Applegate Jim Baker Pat Clancy Mike Helm Gary Guttormsen Leslie Logan Leslie Logan Daniel Robertson Rand Schenck William Sullivan Jan Wilson Oregon Wild is a tax-exempt, non-profit charitable organization. Oregon Wild Conservation Leaders Fund (formerly ONRC Action) is a tax-exempt, non-profit social welfare organization. Contributions to Oregon Wild are tax-deductible for those who itemize; contributions to OWCLF are not. Staff are employees of Oregon Wild, which contracts with OWCLF to carry out its activities. Portions of this newsletter are paid for by OWCLF. coVER PHOTO: BRETT Cole An inquisitive mule deer peaks out from behind an old-growth This newsletter is printed on New Leaf 100% recycled, 50% post-consumer, FSC-certified paper with soy-based inks. P onderosa pine. Find out more about eastern Oregon forests on page 4. Summer 2010 Volume 37, Number 2 2 From the Director’s Desk A time of transition Regna Merritt A legacy of achievement Oregon Wild under Regna Merritt R egna Merritt, then Northwest Field As an activist, Northwest Field Representative, and Executive Director, Representative, circa 1996 Regna Merritt has celebrated many victories—both large and small—at Oregon Wild. Here are some highlights: Dear Friends, fully enjoy family, friends, music - Oregon and across the Pacific and the amazing places Oregon Wild Northwest during eight very dark 1996: Opal Creek Wilderness protection Oregon Wild is in a time of has protected! Board and staff, with years. You protected the places that – standing with hundreds of activists to important transition. After my many expert support from the non-profit wildlife need to survive and thrive. permanently protect thousands of acres of ancient forest from chainsaws (CH and R A years with the organization, consultant TREC, are working hard And today, you and I are well LEGUE) including over ten years as Executive to ensure a smooth transition. I will positioned to forever protect and Director, we are fully engaged in the remain in my position until we have restore 8.3 million acres of Oregon’s process of securing new executive secured a great new Executive old-growth forests east of the leadership. At the same time, our Director. Cascades. 1996 and 2001: Bull R u n a n d L i t t l e S a n d y mission, goals, and commitment P rotection Act – keeping P o r t l a n d ’s d r i n k i n g remain constant. I am so proud of what we have Because of you, Oregon Wild will water clean and pure (Sam Beebe/EcoTRUST) accomplished together. always be my favorite organization. I For nearly two decades, I’ve happily will continue to support our common given most of my waking hours to My heartfelt thanks go to you for goals in every way possible. Indeed, Oregon Wild. Now, with exciting your advocacy and financial support. in this time of climate change, our 2009: Lewis and Clark Mount H o o d W i l d e r n e s s conservation victories on the horizon You contributed mightily to many mission is more important than ever. – gaining protections for 127,000 acres of and a great staff and board in place, successes, including legislation to And I count on you to support Wilderness and 83 miles of Wild & Scenic R ivers around Mount H ood and the Columbia the time is right to transition to new protect Bull Run, Opal Creek, the Oregon Wild as we move together Gorge (Tom KlosTER) leadership. Little Sandy, Mount Hood into a bright future. Wilderness and Wild Rivers – plus 2009: Defeating the Bush administration WO PR logging plan – protecting over 2 million acres Last year, I made a quiet decision to you successfully defended amazing With love and gratitude, of western Oregon BLM forests from increased enter a new cycle, with time to more old-growth and roadless forests in clear-cutting (DOUG HeIken) 3 Summer 2010 Volume 37, Number 2 Deep roots: How the old-growth forest protection movement has grown Chandra LeGue In October of 1991, the Northwest For three-and-a-half decades, Lillebo wildlife we fought to protect them. forest wars had reached a fever pitch. has been doing whatever it takes to When biologists warned of the dire The year before, the federal protect our dwindling old-growth impacts streamside logging would government had finally listed the forest ecosystems. For years that inflict on threatened salmon and trout northern spotted owl as a threatened meant driving all over eastern Oregon we worked to protect important species and a furious debate raged documenting old-growth logging, riparian areas. over how much critical old-growth challenging illegal logging sales in habitat to set aside. The future of court, and going head to head with Protecting our remaining wild areas is western Oregon’s ancient forests the Forest Service and the timber essential. But it’s not enough. Now, the hung in the balance. industry in public debates and the best available science tells us media. something new. We must also restore Over on the drier side of the the places and processes altered state—where spotted owls seldom For Oregon Wild, science has through past management. provided the guiding principles over ranged and the national media History of Abuse spotlight did not shine—a handful of the years. When ecologists said that dedicated activists continued their Wilderness areas and roadless forests Viewed from the air, both eastern and work to protect the imperiled were the last, best places for native western Oregon show the painful Ponderosa pine old-growth forests of SandY Lonsdale Old-growth pine logging in the 1980s near Black Butte, Deschutes eastern Oregon. One of those activists National Forest. An estimated 10% of eastern Oregon old-growth Ponderosa remains. was Tim Lillebo of Oregon Wild. A Bend Bulletin headline from that month reads: Foes of Augur Creek timber sale will file appeal. Oregon Wild and others were gearing up for a court battle to defend 2,000 acres of pristine pine and fir forest inside a roadless area. In the article, Lillebo was quoted: “Whatever it takes to keep the area in a natural condition, we’ll do it.” ELIZabeTH FERYL Tim Lillebo, Eastern Oregon Wildlands Advocate, circa 1990. Whatever it takes. Summer 2010 Volume 37, Number 2 4 legacy of 100 years of intensive understanding and appreciation of SandY Lonsdale Murderer’s Creek, in the Malheur National Forest, supports healthy streamside vegetation and clean logging – a patchwork of clear-cuts ecological science by the Forest water in protected and restored areas. and a spider web of logging roads. In Service, the unsustainable practices of addition, eastern Oregon forests have the past have lessened significantly. long been starved of natural fire and subject to extensive livestock grazing Today, there is common ground that has seriously degraded natural between conservationists, the Forest vegetation and streams. Service, and some in the timber industry around two ideas: 1) Oregon’s In the 1980s, billions of board feet of old-growth forests are too few and too CHandRA LEGUE Chainsaws at work!? R e s t o r a t i o n o f old-growth trees were cut in eastern important to continue logging; and 2) P onderosa pine forests in the Metolius R iver basin can include removing small trees around old-growth.. Oregon’s federal forests. Well into restoration thinning in certain areas the 1990s, timber sales like the one can improve forest health, and provide at Augur Creek were the norm, as jobs and wood products for rural the Forest Service and timber economies for decades to come. What gets protected in What gets restored in industry continued to demand old-growth logs for Oregon mills, But common ground is not enough, the Wyden eastside bill? the Wyden eastside bill? despite the drastic reduction of older and the tenuous administrative Streams and wildlife – Murderer’s Creek Scenic landscapes – Metolius River forests on federal lands.