9A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2016
Timber: County has thousands of acres of valuable timber land
Continued from Page 1A
“This is strictly an opportu-
nity for commissioners to hear
from their constituents about
an issue of great importance to
our community,” Lee told the
large audience.
Reese, as a representative
of the North Coast State Forest
Coalition, and others argued
that the lawsuit, funded in
large part by the timber indus-
try, could have disastrous con-
sequences on forest manage-
ment, placing public lands
firmly into private hands. They
fear a successful suit would
result in increased harvest,
which would further degrade
river systems, hurting salmon
and other wildlife.
Speaking out
Of the 25 people who spoke
publicly, only two people —
one of them Sheriff Tom Ber-
gin — asked commissioners to
remain involved in the lawsuit.
The forests are sustainable
and provide a steady stream of
money that helps fund public
safety, Bergin said. The county
isn’t required to put any money
forward in the lawsuit and
stands to gain a potential $300
million if the suit is successful,
he argued.
“If we don’t stay in, I firmly
believe we won’t have a place
at the table,” Bergin said. “I
think it’s imperative that we
do.”
The remaining 23 people,
however, urged the commis-
sioners to opt out, saying the
only winners would be the pri-
vate timber industry groups
that are backing it. Court docu-
ments show the Oregon Forest
Industries Council, Hampton
Tree Farms, Stimson Lumber
Co. and the Sustainable Forest
Fund are carrying a huge part
of the suit’s legal costs.
Warrenton resident Kath-
leen Zunkel brought a petition
she had circulated around the
county. In the last four days,
she collected more than 200
signatures from county resi-
dents who want no part in the
lawsuit, she said.
“You cannot put a price on
our forests,” she said. “Please
do not give in to short-term
greed. Opt out of this lawsuit.”
Contract dispute
The Linn County lawsuit
The Daily Astorian/File Photo
A LS&D Logging worker prepares Douglas fir logs for sorting at a landing in the Clatsop State Forest near Jewell in 2014. Fifteen Oregon counties
receive timber revenue generated from state-owned forests.
Tom Bergin
Lianne Thompson
against the Oregon Depart-
ment of Forestry, from a legal
standpoint, is a contract dis-
pute, explained County Coun-
sel Heather Reynolds.
Linn County alleges that
while a contract existed
between the state and Ore-
gon’s timber counties in 1941,
allowing the state to manage
county forestland on the coun-
ties’ behalf, the terms of the
contract changed in 1998 with-
out the agreement of all parties.
The lawsuit claims the state has
not maximized value on timber
harvests and owes the counties
and more than a hundred asso-
ciated taxing districts $1.4 bil-
lion in damages.
But the forests are more
than the value of their tim-
ber, said Chris Farrar, an Asto-
ria resident and member of
the Clatsop County Planning
Commission.
He urged the commission-
ers to “get on the other side of
this case.”
He recommended the
county file a “friend of the
court” brief on behalf of the
state. The county would not be
a party to the Linn County suit
but, by filing the brief, would
declare it has a strong interest
in the matter and is on the side
of the Department of Forestry.
“This thing needs to be put
down,” Farrar said about the
Linn County suit. “This is a
corporate conspiracy, if you
like that term, to take away the
rights of the people to determine
what happens in the county and
state … the people have the say,
not the corporations.”
Valuable timber
Clatsop County, with its
thousands of acres of valu-
able timber land, represents
a huge portion of the forest-
lands under discussion in the
lawsuit. If the county refused
to participate, it would send a
message, people said.
One woman raised con-
cerns about Commissioner
Lianne Thompson’s involve-
ment. Thompson is married to
Ralph Wyatt, Linn County’s
administrative officer. She
asked that Thompson recuse
herself from discussions
about the Linn County suit.
After the meeting, Thomp-
son called this a personal
attack. She and Wyatt mar-
ried in January, and the law-
suit was not filed until March.
It had been discussed by Linn
County officials in meetings
she was not privy to, she said.
She learned about the suit
when it was filed.
“I’m not compromised,”
she said. “I’m devoted to
representing Clatsop Coun-
ty’s interests in the best way
possible.”
The commissioners have
until Jan. 25 to decide whether
or not to opt out. The county
and its associated taxing dis-
tricts are already named in the
suit and will remain unless
commissioners decide to
withdraw.
Other taxing districts in
Clatsop County — those not
under the county’s jurisdic-
tion — will need to make their
own decision about whether
or not to opt out.
“We’re getting a lot of
written comments,” County
Manager Cameron Moore
said.
The county is collecting
all the comments and pass-
ing them on to commission-
ers. Written comments will be
received through Jan. 6.
“Tonight is not the end of
this discussion,” Moore said.
Salmon: NOAA’s recovery plan complements Oregon’s plan
Continued from Page 1A
cooperation between a vari-
ety of partners, from local
watershed groups to timber
companies.
Habitat loss
Coastal coho are listed as
“threatened.” The National
Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration’s
recovery
plan will provide guidance
for conservation and manage-
ment decisions affecting coho
recovery down the road.
Most of the West Coast’s
species of salmon and steel-
head declared threatened or
endangered under the Endan-
gered Species Act come with
recovery plans attached or in
the works.
But the timeline on these
plans is typically much lon-
ger than the 10 years proposed
for coastal coho. The plan for
salmon and steelhead on the
Snake River, for instance, out-
lines a 50- to 100-year timeline
for recovery.
Unlike many of these
salmon species, the coho
salmon populations grouped
under the heading “Oregon
Coast coho” aren’t overly
affected by snowpack or dams.
Theirs is a rain-based ecosys-
tem on the coastal tributaries
and estuaries from Seaside to
Port Orford.
And other pressures —
incursions from hatchery
fish and overfishing — have
dropped away over the years.
The one major remaining issue
coho face, say fishery manag-
ers, is habitat loss.
“It’s fascinating to con-
template that Oregon Coast
coho might be the closest of
all of them to recovery,” said
Rob Walton, NOAA Fisheries
recovery coordinator for west-
ern Oregon, in a press confer-
ence Wednesday.
Since the coho were first
listed, their populations have
been doing much better. But
the runs are still vulnerable,
and the number of returning
adults can fluctuate greatly
from year to year.
While NOAA can never
control the ocean — it is a con-
stantly shifting environment
— it can work with other part-
ners to target habitat issues in
freshwater, giving young coho
the strongest head start possi-
ble. Over the years, these trib-
utaries have been impacted
heavily over the decades by
logging, development and
farming.
What it is
The Oregon Coast Coho
Recovery Plan pulls together
what has been, up until now,
a mix of official and unoffi-
cial goals and strategies to
successfully delist coast coho
populations. For the first time,
it defines what this success
looks like, said NOAA Pub-
lic Affairs Officer Michael
Milstein.
NOAA’s recovery plan
complements Oregon state’s
own coho recovery plan and
builds on the decades of
research and recovery work
already done or still in motion.
“This (plan), in my opin-
ion, is elegantly simple,” Wal-
ton said. It zeroes in on habi-
tat and what can be done to
improve or, in some cases,
rebuild what has been lost.
The plan addresses climate
change, development, timber
harvest, beaver dams, farming
practices, water quality, ocean
fluctuations among dozens of
other topics.
What it does
The recovery plan is not a
regulatory document. Every
strategy it outlines — from
changes to timber and agricul-
tural practices to habitat prior-
ities on different tributaries —
is voluntary. Its success rides
largely on the willingness of
partners from the state to local
watershed councils and tim-
ber companies to landowners,
farmers, fishermen and hunters
to work together.
Regulatory protections are
a complementary part of the
plan, however. The plan calls
for partners’ help in chang-
ing both timber harvest and
agricultural practices, among
others.
“The plan recognizes the
critical role of local landown-
ers and communities in bring-
ing about recovery,” said
Guido Rahr, president and
CEO of the Wild Salmon Cen-
ter based in Portland. His orga-
nization is leading the devel-
opment of another important
piece of NOAA’s strategy: a
business plan that will help
guide local recovery measures.
NOAA researchers don’t
expect every strategy or action
item outlined in the plan to
be completed. Though, they
argue, the more partners can
complete the more likely it is
that Oregon Coast coho will
recover and meet the criteria
for delisting.
The recovery plan is, Wal-
ton said, “a menu of options.”
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