LAT: Opposition Dooms Bush Administration Sale of National Forest Land

[DeepModem Mom]

Opposition Dooms Sale of Forest Land
Even groups that typically ally themselves with Bush criticized the plan to raise money for rural communities by selling protected land.
By Bettina Boxall, Times Staff Writer
September 2, 2006

A Bush administration proposal to sell 300,000 acres of national forest land — a quarter of it in California — to raise money for rural counties has been shelved amid widespread opposition.

Congress refused to move the legislation this summer, and groups that typically ally themselves with the president, such as the National Rifle Assn., came out against the measure, spelling its doom in this congressional session.

Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, the proposal's chief architect, acknowledged as much last month when he agreed to find other funding for the program, which finances rural schools and roads....

***

Also dead is an accompanying administration proposal to require the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, the federal government's largest landowner, to dramatically boost its land sales to raise $350 million over the next decade.

The demise of the proposals marks the second recent defeat for efforts to sell substantial public holdings....

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-forest2sep02,0,7980856.story?coll=la-home-nation

[napi21]

1. Ohhh, the Shrub's got to begetting really pi**ed!

He's so used to getting his own was in everything, how in the world is he going to stand another defeat???

[jpak]

2. Good!

Bush makes James Watt look like a Boy Scout.

[Robbien]

3. Wonder why the people defeated the bill

Usually the lobbyists have bought the votes of enough Congressmen to get their awful bills passed.

Someone in the lobby firms probably lost their job.

[pinto]

4. This had broad opposition throughout the West. Another snip:

When the administration released its plan in February, officials said the forest parcels to be sold were isolated, hard to manage and of little value to the 193-million-acre national forest system. The sales list included 85,000 acres in California, the majority of them in the northern part of the state.

But interviews with local forest officials and checks by conservationists revealed that many of the parcels did not fit the administration's description. In California they included wildlands proposed for possible wilderness protection, areas used as winter range by deer and elk, the headwaters of salmon streams and commercial timber lands.

In response to comments, the Forest Service dropped some acreage from the list, but as of June, still proposed to auction 76,000 acres in California.

"It's like mortgaging your house to pay for the groceries," complained Barbara Boyle, senior regional representative of the Sierra Club. "It's taking an asset and getting rid of it for a very short-term goal.

"In a time when California continues to grow, and open space becomes increasingly scarce," she added, "protecting public land is increasingly important."

[NOLADEM]

5. Just wait for the illegal 'signing statement' authorizing it.....

Just wait.

This will happen.

It is too perfect.

Shitting on California, killing things needlessly and getting bribe money for rural yokels for an election cycle all at once.

Too perfect.

He will issue an executive order and it will be done.

I pray I am wrong.

[aquaman]

6. Thank Goodness

I was horrified at this ridiculous proposal. The Bush admin. continues on it's quest to be the most anti-environmental administration in our nation's history. I truly despise that man.