Oregon Wild sounds the alarm over the forest service plan to gut the Northwest Forest Plan and open up sensitive areas to destruction:

The Forest Service has published its proposed changes to the Northwest Forest Plan, and the results are alarming. Despite your tireless efforts—through public comments, field testimonies, and outreach to elected officials—the new plan drastically undermines basic protections for our mature and old-growth forests, wildlife, and the climate.

The timing of this process also means the next administration will be able to re-write and finalize any changes to the Northwest Forest Plan, giving Trump and his timber industry allies the ultimate say over the fate of these critical forests. Yet even before the Trump administration can intervene, the Forest Service’s proposal is already a disaster.

Instead of safeguarding the forests that are critical to our salmon, clean water, and communities, the proposal prioritizes reckless levels of logging. Among the most troubling changes are:

• Exploiting these forests to double, and potentially triple, commercial logging volumes;
• Shifting the fundamental purpose of the NWFP from recovering more old growth across the landscape to only protecting what remains today;
• Redefining “mature” and “old-growth” forests to weaken protections and increase logging;
• Logging mature forests in reserves meant to protect fish, wildlife, and drinking water;
• Aggressive logging of mature and old-growth forests outside of reserves.

This plan doesn’t just fall short—it supercharges aggressive logging in public forests that should be protected. It proposes more than doubling the timber harvest to over 1 billion board feet annually, devastating forests that are still recovering from decades of excessive clearcutting in the last century.