COLLABORATION

Good forestry is good for the land and the communities it supports.

The immediate need is to rebuild the forestry side of the Forest Service. This means that Republicans and Democrats in the next Congress need to find an extra $5 billion in Fiscal 2021. Funds must be specifically allocated for forestry staffing and forest management – not wildfire.

For those of you who want to take notes, my title is, “No Mill, No Market, No Forest, No. 2.”I delivered No. 1 at a Forest Service-sponsored conference in Denver in January of 2004. Why I was invited remains a mystery to me, but it was easily the second most hated speech I've ever given. More on that in a moment.

Your conference seeks to encourage you to become better leaders. That's a good thing because leadership is sorely lacking in the forestry and forest products manufacturing worlds today. Everyone seems to be going their own way. There are no leaders and there is no script. We are all freelancers doing our own thing in a world in which most now get their news through their favorite social media algorithms.

The Great 1910 Fire, which leveled some three million acres of virgin timber in northern Idaho and western Montana, most of it in a wind-driven 48-hour firestorm that claimed the lives of 87 firefighters – most of them skid row bums recruited from the streets of Spokane, Washington.

Most all of us have rolled the dice in Monopoly a time or two. Buying up properties on the Boardwalk can be tons of fun until you land in Jail. That's when its lovely to have a “Get-out-of-jail-free” card in your hand. It sure beats having to sell properties to bail yourself out of the clink.

So, for the past 12 years, representatives of the timber industry, conservation community, U.S. Forest Service, non-profit sector and the state of Montana have been working to get to “yes”.

In our interview Christiansen addresses some tough questions on harassment, fire borrowing, staffing, fire management, wildfire and safety, forest management, collaboration, the budget, sawmill infrastructure, pace and scale, performance standards and reviews, and more

Dennis Becker is the Director of the Policy Analysis Group [PAG} within the College of Natural Resources [CNR] at the University of Idaho.

Because it took us more than 30 years to bridge our chasm, some 90 million National Forest acres – an area nearly as large as Montana – are dying or are already dead. We have no more than 30 years left in which to rescue what can be rescued.

Ms. Christiansen, who was appointed March 9, following the March 7 resignation of Tony Tooke, said all the things you would expect an incoming Chief to say in her first public outing, but she made no mention of the sexual misconduct difficulties that led to Mr. Tooke's resignation.

“We have shared the incommunicable experience of war. We have felt, we still feel, the passion of life to its top. In our youth, our hearts were touched with fire.”

Although it will seem counter-intuitive, our advocacy for science-based forestry has led us to the conclusion that a publicly-granted license to practice forestry is the best defense against criticism that a forest landowner – public or private – can ever hope to attain...

Rodney Smoldon is the Forest Supervisor on the 1.1 million-acre Colville National Forest in northeast Washington. From his office in Colville, he commands a staff of approximately 135 permanent employees and an additional 100 summer employees. His annual budget is about $12 million.

The Forest Service's abysmal won-loss record at Silver, Biscuit and now Chetco Bar [0-3] is a detriment to every living creature struggling to right itself within our fire-scarred landscape. Is this the best you can do?

This must be a bitter pill for Seeley Lake residents who last summer endured weeks of smoke so thick that air quality meters could not accurately measure carcinogenic pollutants generated by the fire. The “new normal” we're told.

Marijuana growers have been practicing their trade in remote National Forests in southern Oregon and northern California since the early 1970s.

If we have the sense of a goose, we will stick by one another, no matter what.

Please consider an end of the year, tax-deductible donation.Your donation ensures we can continue our 30+ years of progress.

A sea change in how federal judges view collaborative forest restoration is underway. The transformation is revealed in the anatomy of two recent rulings.

Two U.S Forest Service Supervisors discuss their commitments to congressionally-blessed Good Neighbor Authority projects.

Resources: Articles, Links and Presentations - Learn more about Anchor Forests and the Practice of Anchor Forestry.

This Press Kit is to describe and promote Anchor Forests and the practice of Anchor Forestry.

A report on the current state of our forests in Montana.

Change. In this exclusive and quite timely Evergreen interview, Governor Otter offers his thoughts on the significance of President-elect Trump's improbable victory and the millions of acres of federal forest and rangeland that is in environmental crisis. Somewhere between 80 and 90 million acres of federal forest land in the West are on the brink of ecological collapse. These lands are vital to our entire nation’s social, economic and environmental health. We have a lot of work to do and not much time left in which to get it done.

There is something unethical about allowing a person or a group that refused to participate in the collaborative planning of the project to file an appeal on the project.  The essence of collaboration means that you work through the issues within a project and help solve the problems.  Bring a solution, not litigation.

McGee discusses collaborative success. "As a direct result of all their hard work we have a pathway forward. We also have the science, tools, technologies and skill sets needed to move forward with the restoration work necessary to protect forests that are the cornerstones and building blocks of both our rural and urban lifestyles."

I would absolutely encourage anyone to pursue a career in forestry or any other natural resource-based career. The more we can introduce local kids to the career opportunities available in their backyard, the better. There's also a shortage of professional truck drivers.  We need young people to bring their families back to their hometowns to fill those jobs, especially in light of recent mill closures that will have serious social and economic impacts on communities.

It is a myth to say Categorical Exclusions will over-ride federal environmental laws and exempt logging from any analysis or disclosure of adverse environmental impacts and eliminate public involvement

The National Environmental Policy Act is the legal foundation on which all successful collaborations rest. You cannot saw this branch off the legal tree and expect that diverse forest stakeholder collaboratives built on trust and mutual respect will continue to prosper as citizen, project-based tools for resolving disagreements over how our national forests should be managed.

The Forest Service shares Governor Bullock's concern and his goal. Minus the presence of local, competitive and sustainable larger timber manufacturing infrastructure, the kind of collaborative forest restoration work we all envision is not possible. We are basing this forest’s five-year planning revision on the Governor’s Priority Landscape project on this forest.

If collaboration is to mean anything it has to have definition and intention. It must also retain flexibility to respond to local conditions, resources and partnerships.

We are at a crossroads with forest health, our mills and the future condition of our forests. The aftermath of a years-long mountain pine beetle epidemic, stalled projects on thousands of acres of national forests, and continued threats from wildfires provide a strong basis for increased focus on how we manage forests and how we ensure we have a vibrant wood products industry providing good-paying jobs for Montanans.

f we use insect and disease attacks as indicators of genetic simplicity, and resilience to these pests as indicators of genetic robustness, we can use harvesting to assist natural selection to build a more resilient forest ecosystem with a greater ability to survive climate fluctuations and associated perturbations. This may mean changing certain silvicultural paradigms and not selecting for the fastest growing or tallest trees - but intermediate sized trees that use their energy reserves for defense and water conservation as well as growth.

When cases are litigated misusing the intention of the Equal Access to Justice Act, the losses add up - whether the agency wins, loses, or the case is settled. Collateral damage  includes lost local and regional business activity, decline in community health, lost timber sale revenue, foregone and delayed work, and analytical and administrative costs the Forest Service must pay from public funds.

We humans possess extraordinary problem solving skills, and nature provides excellent templates to follow that light the way to a better future by providing real world solutions to complex problems.

Resolving differences is what collaboration is all about. It's time to move beyond the extremes that have controlled the forest debate since the 1980s and reinvest in the land and in the people who can best care for it.

Do the right thing in the woods: forest first and money second. The goal is constant timber stand improvement, while making a real and measurable contribution to forest stewardship and conservation.

Collaboratives  take time, patience and a shared understanding that conservation and active forest management are not mutually exclusive goals.

Elk habitat is changing due to poor forest management, disease, wolf predation, wildfire and climate change.

Sawmills are vital to forest collaboration and restoration, healthy landscapes, and a productive self- sustaining community.

In this interview, Rodney Smoldon discusses the use of innovative management tools to reduce the risk of wildfire in Northeast Washington.

In this interview, Kurtis Vaagen, Tribal Liason for Vaagen Brothers Lumber Company, discusses the potential for forest collaboration to replace litigation.

In this interview, Jim Doran discusses the potential of forest collaboration in combating climate change.

In this interview, Ron Gray discusses the Northeast Washington Forest Coalition's commitment to the process of forest collaboration.

In this interview Barry Wynsma, a long-time ranger in the Forest Service, explains why he remains skeptical of forest collaboration.

In this interview, Mark Teply discusses the use of forest collaboration in his work as Project Manager for the Mill Creek A to Z Project.

In this interview, Bruce and Chas Vincent discusses the family's generational commitment to forest collaboration.

In this interview, Russ Vaagen, Vice President of Vaagen Brothers Lumber Company, discusses forest collaboration in Northeast Washington.

In this interview, Mike Petersen, Executive Director of the Spokane Lands Council, discusses why he embraced forest collaboration in Northeast Washington.

In this interview, Phil Hough discusses the Scotchman Peaks Wilderness group and the role of collaboration in creating balanced forest plans.

In this interview, Chad Hudson discusses some of the issues being addressed by The Panhandle Forest Collaborative.

In this interview, Duane Vaagen, CEO of Vaagen Brothers, discusses how he came to support forest collaboration and its importance in overcoming litigation.

In this interview, Mary Farnsworth discusses the role of forest collaboration in preparing disaster plans for large scale fires.

In this interview, Liz Johnson-Gebhardt discusses her transformation from “typical granola” to her leadership role in Idaho's oldest forest collaborative.

Part 4 in a series about forest collaboration. In this interview, Mary Farnsworth discusses collaborative projects undertaken by the Forest Service.

Part 3 in a series about forest collaboration. In this interview, Glen Bailey discusses opportunities presented by collaboration.

Part 2 in a series about forest collaboration. In this interview, Mike Petersen explains his hopes regarding collaboration with former adversaries.