Our View: President Clinton wants to lock up huge tracts of forest land in Idaho. The state's Land Board is right in suing to stop him.

D.F. Oliveria - For the editorial board
http://www.spokane.net/news-story.asp?date=010500&ID=s728188&cat=section.forestry

It isn't hard to imagine what environmentalists would do if a Republican president arbitrarily ordered a dramatic increase in the timber harvest in national forests.

They'd scream about the process. Contact sympathetic congressmen. Picket. File lawsuits. Chain themselves to bulldozers. Live in trees. In 1995, they even fought a common-sense effort to exempt some salvage logging from environmental laws to harvest trees killed by forest fires.

Environmentalists should be as concerned as the timber industry that Democrat Bill Clinton is trying to set forest policy by fiat, even if they back that policy -- a move to establish de facto wilderness on 50 million roadless acres in national forests. If one president can get away with such a sweeping, unilateral action, another one who is less sympathetic to the environment might try to do so, too.

Clinton's effort to establish an environmental legacy has all but bypassed public participation and environmental analysis. It has skirted Congress. It hasn't provided enough time for public comment. It hasn't identified specific areas to be set aside.

The Idaho Land Board acted correctly last week in filing suit in federal court to block the land grab. After all, Idaho holds more than 8 million acres targeted by the Clinton administration. Gov. Dirk Kempthorne also acted in Idaho's interest in December by asking the U.S. Forest Service to extend the comment period four months beyond its Dec. 20 deadline. An extension would give the Forest Service time to respond to Idaho's Freedom of Information Act request seeking details about Clinton's plans.

"The bottom line," said state Attorney General Al Lance, "is that it is impossible for the state, or any Idahoan, to obtain information necessary to understand the Forest Service's proposal."

Public interest in Clinton's proposal is high. A Dec. 8 meeting in Orofino, Idaho, attracted so many concerned people that Forest Service officials continued it a second night so everyone would have a chance to speak. Recreation interests, from snowmobilers to outfitters, and timber representatives agreed they are being shut out of the process.

Idaho, which already has 4 million acres tied up in wilderness -- more than any other state in the continental United States -- has much at stake in this battle. So do other timber states. No crisis exists that justifies rushing Clinton's one-size-fits-all approach to wilderness into law. The Forest Service should take time to study this controversial proposal and gather more public input, even if that means clipping the wings of a lame-duck president.

D.F. Oliveria/For the editorial board