In the Register Guard, Letters to the Editor, November 28, 2008
I write this letter on behalf of Citizens for Public Accountability.
We join tens of thousands of citizens who wrote comments to the Bureau of Land Management on its Western Oregon Plan Revisions and note that those comments on the plan were overwhelmingly negative.
Many public officials — including Sen. Ron Wyden, Rep. Peter DeFazio, Secretary of State Bill Bradbury, Eugene and Corvallis city councils and some county elected officials — have criticized the WOPR publicly.
In its current revised form, the WOPR would open 100,000 acres of remaining old growth to logging and construct 1,300 miles of new logging roads subsidized by taxpayers.
The WOPR clearly conflicts with the goals of the current Northwest Forest Plan and other plans and policies, which elected officials and other official entities worked hard to adopt as a compromise between competing stakeholders.
The current plan drastically cuts existing environmental protections and does not add any new protections to these forests that stand as a buffer against regional and global climate change.
Citizens for Public Accountability, many other organizations and a vast number of citizens urge Gov. Ted Kulongoski to reject the Western Oregon Plan Revisions before the end of the current 30-day public protest period.
Without a courageous stand by our governor, the BLM will release its record of decision soon after this protest period. The time to act is now to defend our ancient forests, defend our streams and waterways, and stop the continual building of roads in our forests.
Bob O’Brien
President, Citizens for Public Accountability