The Sierra Nevada, California's Range of Light, is remarkable by any measure. It gives rise to legendary rivers, harbors forests of red fir, Giant Sequoia and Jeffrey pine. It shelters wildlife ranging from spotted owls to bighorn sheep to the brilliant golden trout, California's state fish. And recent Forest Service actions have thrown its future into doubt.
The Range of Light
Mention the national forests of the Sierra Nevada and what comes to mind? Legendary rivers like the Feather, Yuba, Stanislaus, and Kings rise there. Forests of red fir, Giant Sequoia, mixed conifer, and Jeffrey pine blanket its slopes. And Saylor Basin, Duncan Canyon, and Lavazzolla Creek are bastions of precious old growth forests.
Its lavish complement of species includes spotted and great gray owls and goshawks. Marten, Pacific fisher, Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep, black bear, and perhaps wolverine live there, as do mountain yellow-legged frogs, Lahonton cutthroat trout and, and Salmo aguabonita, the golden trout.
Sierra Nevada Conservation Framework
The Wilderness Society has worked for years to shift the U.S. Forest Service's management in the Sierra Nevada to a regimen guided by land conservation, resource stewardship, and forest protection. Major milestones along the way have included the Sierra Nevada Ecosystem Project, California Spotted Owl Environmental Impact Statement and, finally, the landmark Sierra Nevada Conservation Framework.
In its closing days, the Clinton Administration finalized the Framework, the culmination of years of conservationists' dedicated work and a decade of Forest service analysis and planning. The Framework, meant to guide the Forest Service's management in the Sierra Nevada, affects 11.5 million acres in 11 national forests: the Modoc, Plumas, Lassen, Tahoe, Eldorado, Stanislaus, Sierra, Sequoia, Inyo, Toiyabe, and Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit. Its conservation elements are significant. The plan would:
- Protect 4 million acres as old forest emphasis areas encompassing the best remaining old growth forest in the Sierra Nevada. These lands form the core of the plan's old growth restoration goal.
- Reduce wildfire risk by permitting harvesting of trees 20 inches in diameter or smaller on 11 million of the 11.5 million acres the Framework covers. On the 4 million acres of the old forest areas, no trees larger than 12 inches in diameter can be cut.
- Require streamside protection zones of 300 feet along fish-bearing streams and establish 839,000 acres of critical aquatic refuges for protection of at-risk aquatic species.
- Set in place an honest and effective fire risk reduction strategy, one that focuses on the removal of small diameter trees, brush, and surface fuels, and emphasizes work on areas nearest homes and communities.
Sierra Nevada Plan Revised
With the arrival of the Bush Administration, the U.S. Forest Service began to weaken a number of important forest protection policies and the Sierra Nevada Framework was no exception. In 2004, the Forest Service announced plans to implement substantial and controversial revisions to the Sierra Nevada Framework. In the course of a single year, the U.S. Forest Service jettisoned a plan that was the product of over 10 years of scientific study, public participation, and consensus building.
The hastily prepared plan revisions allow for three times the amount of logging of Sierra forests, including logging of old growth trees up to 30 inches in diameter. In addition, the plan revisions weaken clean water protections and jeopardize imperiled wildlife like the California spotted owl in the eleven Sierra Nevada national forests. Notably, the revised plan also shifts fire prevention resources and activities away from communities and into remote backcountry areas.
We're Not Giving Up
The Wilderness Society is working closely with our partners in the Sierra Nevada Forest Protection Campaign to defend the original protections provided by the landmark 2001 Sierra Nevada Conservation Framework.
In February 2005, The Wilderness Society and a coalition of conservation organizations filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Forest Service in the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of California. At the same time, California's Attorney General filed a separate, but parallel suit, on behalf of the State of California. These lawsuits assert that the U.S. Forest Service failed to include essential scientific information about impacts to wildlife, forests, and water quality when it revised the Sierra Nevada Framework in 2004. In addition, the suit asserts that the revised plan fails to adequately protect Sierra communities from the dangers of wildfire. With this suit, The Wilderness Society seeks the reinstatement of the protections provided by the 2001 Sierra Nevada Conservation Framework. The lawsuit is still pending.
We're Not Giving Up
In response, The Wilderness Society is working daily with the Sierra Nevada Forest Protection Campaign to defend the landmark Sierra Nevada Conservation Framework. We are using every tool at our disposal-media outreach, public comment opportunities, policy analysis, congressional contacts, agency monitoring-to preserve the Framework from an administration and an agency bent on dismantling it.
County Economic Profiles
View economic profiles for counties in the Sierra Nevada region. Profiles provide details of trends and components of the local economies.
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