by Marilyn Wolff, Stevensville
Did you know the new Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, is closing nine regional Forest Service Offices including Region 1 in Missoula? Did you know Trump signed an executive order to rescind the 2001 Roadless Rule which protects millions of acres from timber harvest and unnecessary road building? Roads on public lands haven’t been adequately maintained before this action and more roads will destroy the beauty of long protected forest areas. Roadless areas preserve clean water, wildlife habitat, recreational opportunities, and mitigate climate change and drought by a forest canopy of old growth. Montana has over 6 million acres of inventoried roadless areas. Opponents of the Rule want wildfire mitigation by logging and say local management is better for local solutions! Then why close the Region 1 office? By the way, prescribed burns do more to manage wildfires than logging.
Further review shows DOGE fired 3,400 Forest Service employees, many with wildfire certification. Now there is a frantic need to rehire 1,400 employees lost to the ruinous actions of the Musk/Trump plan to downsize government. Many agencies have to rehire to operate adequately like the National Nuclear Security Administration that protects the nuclear stockpile, the National Weather Service that predicts serious weather events across the nation and the Bonneville Power Administration that manages power in the Northwest. We have unqualified idiots, untethered by Congress, making deep administrative cuts that will cause grievous harm to our country.
It’s interesting that the Secretary of Agriculture wants only five regional Forest Service offices or hubs in the nation. They are North Carolina, Missouri, Indiana, Colorado, and Utah. North Carolina has five national forests, Missouri one, Indiana one, Colorado eleven, Utah one. Montana has ten national forests. Utah is mostly desert.
If you feel that public lands are under attack, join me by contacting Secretary Rollins. Comments end 8/26/2025. Email reorganization@usda.gov or mail a letter to the Secretary, 1400 Independence Ave SW, Washington DC 20250. Now is the time to comment before all the ruinous actions get implemented.
Mike Mercer says
The Roadless Rule was never passed by Congress and locked up an additional 59 million acres as “de facto wilderness” where active forest management is effectively barred. It does not repeal any environmental laws, override local forest plans, or eliminate the need for site-specific environmental review and will restore the Forest Service’s ability to build roads where necessary for fuels reduction, forest restoration.