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I oppose rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule. The proposal would remove the national baseline protecting approximately 44.7 million acres of inventoried roadless lands. The record does not establish that eliminating this protection is justified by the best available science, fiscal evidence, or analysis of cumulative effects. 1. THE WILDFIRE JUSTIFICATION IS NOT SUPPORTED BY THE FOREST SERVICE’S OWN RESEARCH. The Forest Service’s peer-reviewed analysis of nearly 20 years of monitoring found that fuel-management activities occurred in roadless areas at higher rates per square kilometer than elsewhere in the National Forest System, and that forests with and without roads had burned at similar rates after adoption of the Rule. It concluded that speculation that eliminating road prohibitions would improve forest health was not supported by the monitoring data. It also found non-native plants were twice as common within 500 feet of roads. (Healey, U.S. Forest Service, 2020, Environmental Research Letters 15:104023.) That evidence directly undermines any categorical assertion that more roads are necessary to address wildfire risk. The agency should identify what evidence has changed and explain why it now reaches a contrary conclusion. 2. RESCISSION IS NOT A MERE ADMINISTRATIVE CHANGE. The proposal itself estimates that, where existing forest plans allow, permanent roads could become possible across approximately 18.2 million acres now protected by the Rule, while active-management opportunities could expand across approximately 4.8 million forested acres. (USDA Forest Service, Proposed Rule, 91 Fed. Reg. 53,827 (Aug. 20, 2026).) Those figures demonstrate the practical significance of rescission. Removing the national baseline changes the starting point for future decisions from protection subject to defined exceptions to project-by-project discretion. The final EIS should therefore analyze the consequences of removing the national protection itself—not merely assume that later project-level NEPA review will capture landscape-scale effects. 3. CUMULATIVE ROAD IMPACTS CANNOT BE DISMISSED AS PROJECT-SPECIFIC. Roads can fragment habitat, alter drainage, facilitate invasive species, increase human access, and affect water quality. A 2025 USGS study found a significant positive relationship between road density and fine sediment in stream habitats and a significant negative relationship between road density and median particle size. (Al-Chokhachy et al., USGS, 2025, Journal of the American Water Resources Association 61:e70006.) These effects can accumulate as road density increases. The final EIS should quantify cumulative changes in road density, habitat fragmentation, watershed condition, sediment, invasive species, and wildlife connectivity. 4. THE FISCAL ANALYSIS MUST ACCOUNT FOR LONG-TERM ROAD OBLIGATIONS. The Forest Service reported approximately $10.8 billion in deferred infrastructure maintenance as of the first quarter of FY2025, including $5.98 billion for roads and $987 million for road bridges. (USDA Forest Service, FY2026 Congressional Budget Justification, 2025.) Before expanding road-building opportunities, the agency should demonstrate that the federal government can afford the construction, maintenance, repair, and eventual decommissioning obligations associated with additional roads. Economic benefits should not be counted without accounting for those public costs. 5. THE AGENCY MUST EXPLAIN THIS POLICY CHANGE WITH PARTICULAR CARE. Under FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc., 556 U.S. 502, 515 (2009), an agency changing policy must display awareness that it is changing position and show good reasons for the new policy. Here, the Forest Service is removing a longstanding national conservation standard after decades of additional scientific evidence. The final rule should explain what material evidence has changed, why the agency’s own roadless-area monitoring no longer supports the 2001 approach, why existing exceptions are inadequate, and how cumulative and irreversible consequences were evaluated. The Forest Service should not remove the Roadless Rule first and leave the environmental consequences of that decision to be determined piece by piece through future project approvals. The agency must assess now the reasonably foreseeable consequences of eliminating the protection-including the cumulative effects of roads and development across previously protected landscapes-and determine whether those impacts can be avoided through less sweeping alternatives. I instead urge the Forest Service to withdraw the proposed rescission and retain the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule. Sincerely, Ainsley

Dear Secretary Rollins: The experience of traveling through genuinely roadless country has shown me that the 2001 Rule codified something the public had long sought but lacked the regulatory mechanism to secure — and the Department's proposed rescission would dismantle that mechanism without commensurate justification in the record. I live on Rattlesnake creek in Missoulla. I enjoy hiking up into the wilderness area every summer. I would hate to see logging or any road building in this area that so many of us Missoulians use. I would loose the ability to experience wilderness so close to home. Regarding the Rattlesnake in the Lolo National Forest, Montana: In the Rattlesnake Inventoried Roadless Area, Lolo National Forest, Whitebark Pine (Pinus albicaulis, G3, T) faces documented threat from 5.3 - Logging & wood harvesting at Slight or 1-10% pop. decline severity across Small (1-10%) scope. Road networks serve as vectors for the secondary impacts classified under 5.3 - Logging & wood harvesting: they open previously inaccessible terrain to resource extraction, facilitate introduction of invasive species, and concentrate human disturbance along corridors through Whitebark Pine habitat. Although proponents of rolling back the Roadless Rule claim it is needed for wildfire management, the peer-reviewed science shows the opposite A separate national analysis (Balch et al., PNAS 2017) found that 84% of all U.S. wildfires are human-caused. Roads are the primary vector for human ignitions, so building roads into roadless areas is likely to result in more fires, not fewer. Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz testified to the Senate that 24.5 million acres of inventoried roadless areas are within one mile of the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI)—calling it "our primary concern." A GIS analysis by The Wilderness Society using the Forest Service's own data found the actual figure is just 2.8 million acres—a nearly ninefold exaggeration. Less than 5% of inventoried roadless area acreage is in close proximity to the WUI, not 42% as Schultz claimed. Building more roads in national forests would be a drain on taxpayers. Even with the Roadless Rule in place, the Forest Service already has a 380,000-mile road system—twice as long as the U.S. highway system—crisscrossing national forests. The agency cannot afford to maintain it: the deferred-maintenance road backlog was estimated at $8.4 billion in the 2001 Final Environmental Impact Statement and is roughly $15.6 billion in today's dollars. The Roadless Rule is one of America's most popular conservation measures, and that support has not faded. Prior to its 2001 enactment, more than 600 public hearings were held nationwide and 1.6 million Americans weighed in to call for protection of these forestlands—more comments than any other federal rule had received at the time. When USDA announced its rescission proposal, the compressed 21-day public comment period in late 2025 drew approximately 600,000 additional comments. A detailed roadless.org analysis of the comment record found that more than 99.8% of submitters opposed the rescission. A February 2026 Pew Charitable Trusts national poll found that 76% of likely voters support the Roadless Rule compared to just 13% opposed, with bipartisan backing from 71% of Republicans, 80% of Democrats, and 80% of independents. More than 100 members of Congress have co-sponsored the Roadless Area Conservation Act of 2025 (S.2042 / H.R.3930) to codify the Rule so it could not be rolled back without an act of Congress. Finally, these figures serve the final rule as well as the environmental impact statement. The proposal reverses findings the Department made in 2001 about the effect of roadless protections on management, and this FACTS baseline is the factual finding on which that reversal rests. Where a new position rests on factual findings that contradict those underlying the prior policy, the explanation must be more detailed, not less. FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502, 515–16 (2009); Encino Motorcars, LLC v. Navarro, 579 U.S. 211, 221–22 (2016). I request that the final rule preamble address the corrected figures and the disaggregated series directly, and not by cross-reference to the FEIS response-to-comments appendix. Rescission serves the fewest. The Rule serves the most. Keep the Rule. Warm regards, Daniel Volkmann

Re: Docket FS-2025-0001, RIN 0596-AD66 — Proposed Rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule (91 FR 53827) I oppose the proposed rescission and urge the Department to select the No Action alternative. My family and I have enjoyed hiking in the roadless areas in Virginia and West Virginia, and were attracted to visit these areas because they were pristine and untouched wildernesses. These areas – and those like them across our nation – are national treasures that we cannot recreate, nor can we restore the economies that depend on visitors to these exquisite areas. 1. The record does not justify the change. The preamble concedes near-term effects would be "modest and localized." Its own figures show about 4.8 million operable acres for timber (16% of forested roadless area). Even if every acre were harvested, that is a 5 -10% increase in national sawtimber and $5.2-11.4 million per year in revenue, against a $6.9 billion road maintenance backlog. Permanently removing nationwide protection for roughly 58 million acres in exchange for marginal, budget-constrained gains is not a reasoned trade. The agency also estimates recreation losses of $6.1 million annually and says total impacts could exceed $100 million. The cost-benefit analysis should quantify what is put at risk: drinking water, carbon storage, fish and wildlife habitat, and quiet recreation. 2. The wildfire rationale is overstated. The preamble acknowledges that added road access can increase human-caused ignitions, yet does not weigh that against the claimed benefits. The 2001 Rule already permits cutting to reduce the risk of uncharacteristic wildfire effects and to restore habitat. Only 24% of potentially affected acreage overlaps the wildland-urban interface. If the concern is community protection, the Department should analyze a targeted alternative that streamlines fuel-treatment exceptions near communities while retaining the prohibitions elsewhere. 3. Local planning is not equivalent protection. The Department says forest plans address similar conservation objectives. It also says supervisors may amend plans to expand roads and logging in these areas, then calls those amendments outside the scope of this rulemaking while requesting comment on their impacts. The final EIS must analyze the reasonably foreseeable cumulative effects of plan changes rather than deferring them. Protection that must be defended plan by plan, by a public and Tribes with limited resources, is a lesser protection. 4. Reliance interests. The rule has governed for 25 years and was upheld in California ex rel. Lockyer v. USDA (9th Cir. 2009) and Wyoming v. USDA (10th Cir. 2011). Communities, water utilities, outfitters, local governments, and recreationists have relied on it. The Department must identify and weigh these interests and give a reasoned explanation for the change. See FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502 (2009). 5. Tribal consultation is incomplete. The Department reports 64 consultation requests, with 29 held, and states that the majority of consulted Tribes oppose rescission. The rule should not be finalized until consultation is complete and the Tribal alternatives requested, including strengthened roadless protection and co-stewardship, are analyzed. 6. Process. A roughly seven-week comment period for a multi-volume draft EIS and economic analysis, with hearings announced only for Alaska, is inadequate. I request an extension and public hearings in the states containing affected roadless areas. For these reasons, the Department should retain the 2001 Roadless Rule. Thank you for considering my comments. Alexandra Collins Severna Park, Maryland

Re: RIN 0596-AD66 — Proposed Rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule I oppose rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule and request that the Forest Service retain the Rule or adopt substantially narrower alternatives. Rescission would remove national protection from approximately 58.5 million acres of Inventoried Roadless Areas after roughly 25 years. This would eliminate a landscape-level safeguard intended to prevent incremental fragmentation of roadless lands. Administrative Procedure Act and NEPA The Forest Service must provide a reasoned explanation for reversing longstanding policy and address important aspects of the problem, including reliance interests. Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Association v. State Farm, 463 U.S. 29 (1983); FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502 (2009). The Ninth Circuit has recognized that roadlessness itself has environmental significance, independent of wilderness designation. Smith v. U.S. Forest Service, 33 F.3d 1072, 1078–79 (9th Cir. 1994). It is therefore not enough to state that future projects will remain subject to NEPA. Project-level review cannot substitute for a national protection preventing incremental fragmentation. The EIS should analyze cumulative consequences of rescission, including road construction, timber harvest, habitat fragmentation, watershed impacts, wildlife connectivity, recreation, and loss of roadless character. Wildfire The proposal relies substantially on wildfire and forest-health concerns, but those concerns do not establish that nationwide rescission is necessary. Roads can improve access for some suppression and fuel-treatment activities, but can also increase human access and ignition risk, fragment habitat, facilitate invasive species, and create permanent maintenance obligations. The Forest Service should quantify the net wildfire effect rather than assume that additional roads necessarily reduce risk. The agency should evaluate whether fuel reduction and wildfire-response objectives can be achieved through existing roads, temporary access, targeted exceptions, or geographically limited amendments. It should also address recent research finding substantially greater wildfire ignition density near roads than in Inventoried Roadless Areas. Oregon Oregon contains extensive roadless lands on the Deschutes, Ochoco, Willamette, Mt. Hood, Umatilla, Wallowa-Whitman, Rogue River-Siskiyou, Fremont-Winema, and Siuslaw National Forests. These areas provide connected habitat, watershed protection, recreation, hunting, fishing, and solitude that cannot be recreated once permanent roads fragment them. This is particularly important in Central Oregon. Roadless landscapes around the Three Sisters, Mt. Jefferson, Paulina, Bachelor, and Metolius watersheds are part of the ecological and recreational landscape on which Central Oregon communities depend. The Forest Service should identify Oregon roadless areas vulnerable to new roads or commercial timber activity and the resulting cumulative effects. Alternatives and fiscal consequences Greater managerial flexibility does not itself establish that rescission is necessary. The Forest Service should evaluate retaining the Rule, targeted wildfire or forest-health amendments, geographically limited exceptions, temporary rather than permanent roads, and forest-plan-specific amendments. If these alternatives are inadequate, the agency should explain why with site-specific evidence. The proposal acknowledges a substantial backlog in Forest Service road and bridge maintenance. Before expanding the road system, the agency should quantify construction, maintenance, erosion, closure, and decommissioning costs and identify funding sources. Request I request that the Forest Service: 1. Retain the 2001 Roadless Rule unless it can demonstrate a legally and scientifically sufficient basis for rescission. 2. Address the Ninth Circuit’s recognition that roadlessness itself has environmental significance. 3. Quantify cumulative environmental consequences of foreseeable road construction and timber harvest. 4. Rigorously analyze roads’ competing wildfire-suppression and ignition effects. 5. Identify Oregon roadless areas and specific management needs allegedly requiring rescission. 6. Meaningfully evaluate narrower alternatives. 7. Address reliance interests created by 25 years of roadless protection. 8. Account for the fiscal consequences of expanding an already maintenance-constrained road network. The Forest Service should not equate increased managerial discretion with demonstrated environmental benefit. If the record cannot establish that rescission advances the agency’s responsibilities after accounting for cumulative consequences, the agency should retain the Roadless Rule. Thank you for including this comment in the administrative record for RIN 0596-AD66.

I oppose rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule under Alternative 2 (full) and Alternative 3 (partial), and ask that you adopt Alternative 1, no action. Removing protection from 44.7 million acres is not a return of local control. It is a one-way door. Roads, once built, are not unbuilt, and no later administration can restore what this decision converts. I live in Wyoming and use this country: the Bridger-Teton, Gros Ventre and Bighorn, and roadless areas across the West. Wyoming holds 3.2 million roadless acres, roughly 35% of our national forest land. By your own analysis, 2.36 million of them sit where forest plans already permit roads and only this Rule prevents them - 3.77% of the state, an area larger than Delaware. THE WILDFIRE JUSTIFICATION IS CONTRADICTED BY THE RECORD, INCLUDING YOUR OWN. Roads cause fires. A three-decade analysis of every national forest ignition in the contiguous U.S. (Aplet et al., Fire Ecology 22:8, 2026) found ignition density lowest in wilderness (1.75 fires per 1,000 ha) and inventoried roadless areas (1.97), and highest within 50 meters of a road (7.99) - four times higher. The authors conclude that roads built into roadless areas will produce more fires, some of which will grow large. Roughly 89% of U.S. wildfires are human-caused (NIFC). The Forest Service found the same in 2001. The Rule's Final EIS concluded that roads in roadless areas would likely increase human-caused ignitions. The draft EIS neither acknowledges nor rebuts it. An agency reversing a prior factual finding must supply a reasoned explanation (FCC v. Fox, 556 U.S. 502 (2009)). None is offered. The Rule already permits the work you say it blocks: suppression, fuel treatments, and roads under imminent threat. Nearly 2 million roadless acres have received hazardous fuels treatment under the Rule, including 32% of all such treatments on Wyoming's national forests. YOUR OWN ECONOMICS DO NOT SUPPORT IT. The Rule secures drinking water for roughly 25 million Americans and 62,000 river miles with no other legal safeguard (PLOS Water, 2026), and habitat for 57% of the nation's vulnerable terrestrial species on 2% of the lower 48 (Defenders of Wildlife). You propose to trade that for $5.2-11.4 million a year to the Treasury and $4.6-10.6 million to industry - figures assuming harvest on every operable acre, which the document calls unlikely, modest and localized. Against that: a projected $6.1 million annual loss to the recreation economy and a $6.9 billion deferred-maintenance backlog on roads you already own. A wash at best. The benefits are contingent; the cost is permanent. USDA says the rescission does not mandate road construction. The draft EIS anticipates near-term permanent road additions across 18.2 million acres, 45.5% of the affected area. You cannot analyze that as the expected effect of your action and then disclaim it. THE PUBLIC AND THE TRIBES HAVE ANSWERED. Scoping drew more than 625,000 comments, overwhelmingly opposed, including 38 Tribal submissions. The proposed rule states that majority Tribal sentiment is opposition. Of 64 consultation requests, 29 had been held at publication. The draft EIS concludes full rescission carries the greatest adverse effect on Tribal rights - and selects it. The consultation records are not in the docket. DEFECTS THAT MUST BE ANSWERED ON THE RECORD. None of these, corrected, would make rescission acceptable; the analysis fails because the action is unsupportable. You must respond to each in the Final EIS, and a record that does not cannot sustain the rule. Analyze road construction as an irreversible commitment of resources under NEPA; no later plan revision can restore roadless character. Reconcile the 2001 FEIS finding on road-caused ignitions with the current justification, or show with evidence why it was wrong. Quantify expected ignition increases on the 18.2 million acres. Quantify fire-risk reduction from rescission not already achievable under the Rule's existing exceptions. Reconcile "no mandate" with 18.2 million acres of anticipated permanent roads. Present net economic effect: realistic timber revenue less recreation losses and road costs against the $6.9 billion backlog. Explain selecting the alternative most adverse to Tribal rights, and place the consultation record in the docket before the final rule. Withdraw the proposed rule and retain the 2001 Rule as written. There is no revision of this proposal I would support. If wildfire is the real concern, spend the money on home hardening, defensible space, and keeping the roads you already have passable - not on cutting new ones into the places where fires are least likely to start.

To the Department of Agriculture: As someone who has used roadless national forest in multiple regions and in multiple seasons, I am submitting these comments to establish that the public value the 2001 Rule has protected is observable, documented, and not recoverable once road infrastructure has been authorized and constructed within currently protected areas. I remember walking with my husband on some of our very first dates in Cheaha park and now we love to take our children. Sitting at the top of the lookout always felt like stepping back in time and getting away from all of the stress of modern life. My family loves to hike the area and bulldozed roadbeds would ruin those experiences. Regarding the Cheaha B in the Talladega National Forest, Alabama: “In 2001 the Agency Found These Prohibitions Benefited Listed Species; the Rescission Never Engages Its Own Prior Finding Both Draft Biological Assessments open with the same acknowledgment (USFWS BA p. 10; NMFS BA p. 7): "In the promulgation of the 2001 Roadless Rule, the Forest Service found that the Rule's prohibitions on road construction and timber harvest were not likely to adversely affect threatened or endangered species or adversely modify designated or critical habitat; were not likely to jeopardize proposed species or adversely modify proposed critical habitat; and may beneficially affect threatened, endangered, and proposed species and critical habitat… The Services concurred with the determination." The agency thus stands on a concurred-in finding that the prohibitions it now proposes to delete benefit listed species — and the current assessments anticipate widespread adverse effects from deleting them. When an agency reverses course, it "must show that there are good reasons for the new policy," FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502, 515 (2009), and where the prior policy rested on factual findings, it may not simply disregard them — the principle applied to this very rule's Tongass history in Organized Village of Kake v. USDA, 795 F.3d 956, 966–68 (9th Cir. 2015) (en banc). Neither the DEIS nor the assessments explain what changed in the biology. I request the FEIS directly address the 2001 beneficial-effect finding and state the factual basis for departing from it.” “Road networks cause habitat fragmentation and create edges with high resource availability that can act as important channels for the spread of invasive alien plants in various habitats, including nature reserves. In natural secondary forests, species richness, density and the proportion of invasive species significantly decreased with distance from the road; natural secondary forests contained only 5 invasive versus 67 native species, yet invasive species were concentrated near road edges. Human-induced changes to environmental conditions along roadsides increase soil moisture, soil disturbance, soil nutrients, exposure to sun and soil temperature, all of which are factors known to promote plant invasions. — Diversity and Distributions / Wiley Online Library, 2025 (https://doi.org/10.1111/ddi.70002)” The Analysis Concedes Recreation Losses Are "Most Likely," Quantifies Them as Costs, and Cannot Even Count the Visitors at Risk The Economic Analysis concedes at page 25: "In the long-term, any changes in aggregate economic benefit to recreationists that occur under the proposed rule are most likely to be losses because timber harvest and road construction is anticipated to negatively change the recreation settings and opportunities for trail-based and dispersed area recreation within potentially affected IRAs… The magnitude of those losses is unknown." At page 30 it books real costs: "Costs include forgone recreation benefits (minimum of $6.1 million annually) and forgone passive use values ($5.3 to $11.5 million annually) from increases in timber harvest in roadless areas." At page 28 it concedes the mechanism: "The construction and use of roads can degrade the unique characteristics of roadless areas… leading to loss of conservation values… These impacts from road development could negatively impact tourism and outdoor recreation." And at page 16 it admits it cannot even measure the exposure: "The number of recreation visits to IRAs is unknown and, thus, the recreation visitor spending in local communities associated with IRA recreation cannot be directly quantified." Certain-direction losses of unknown and unmeasured magnitude are precisely what NEPA requires an agency to analyze rather than wave through. Robertson, 490 U.S. 332; State Farm, 463 U.S. 29. I request the FEIS quantify recreation exposure (visitation and spending) in affected IRAs before relying on an analysis that concedes losses it cannot measure. When this process is over, I want the Roadless Rule still standing. I'm filing this comment to help make that happen. Most respectfully, CommentID: RLC-20260909-GQZC8R

To the USDA Roadless Rule Rulemaking Team: As a conservationist, I track public land outcomes, not just rules. The Roadless Rule's outcomes have been good. Rescinding it ends them. Since I was a kid I’ve wanted to explore public lands which lead me to making a career out of it. I’ve seen how special these places can be for generations of people and wildlife. You can’t recreate these places once they are gone. Losing more public land protections is going to affect not just me, but future generations from being able to explore these spaces. Regarding the Williams Fork Ptarmingan Adjacent in the Arapaho & Roosevelt NFs, Colorado: Alpine Tundra Habitat for White-tailed Ptarmigan — The roadless area encompasses Rocky Mountain Alpine Tundra at elevations above 11,800 feet, providing the specialized habitat that white-tailed ptarmigan depend on year-round. Colorado populations of this species have declined significantly since the 1970s, and the area's intact alpine ecosystem—with its characteristic low-growing vegetation and minimal disturbance—represents critical refuge as climate warming pushes treeline upward and reduces available tundra. Loss of connectivity between alpine patches through habitat fragmentation would isolate remaining ptarmigan populations and accelerate local extinctions. Roadless areas fill gaps in the existing protected-area network. Adding all Inventoried Roadless Areas to the U.S. protected-area system would reduce the number of imperiled wildlife species considered "poorly represented" in protected areas by 38 species. Roadless areas particularly increase representation of underprotected ecosystem types, including temperate grasslands (+57%) and cool temperate forests (+52%) (Talty et al. 2020; Dietz et al. 2021). — Talty et al., 2020 (https://doi.org/10.1111/csp2.288); Belote, 2020 (https://doi.org/10.1111/csp2.288); Dietz et al., 2021 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2021.e01943); UNKNOWN, 2021 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2021.e01943) Rescinding the Roadless Rule would open the Williams Fork Ptarmingan Adjacent, Arapaho & Roosevelt NFs to road construction and associated ground disturbance. The direct and indirect effects of that activity are precisely what makes a specific comment about this area necessary. Removing the protections of the Roadless Rule would be heartbreaking. The habitat and species that could be destroyed… we only have so few of these protected spaces left. Why take them away to? In 2001 the Agency Found These Prohibitions Benefited Listed Species; the Rescission Never Engages Its Own Prior Finding Both Draft Biological Assessments open with the same acknowledgment (USFWS BA p. 10; NMFS BA p. 7): "In the promulgation of the 2001 Roadless Rule, the Forest Service found that the Rule's prohibitions on road construction and timber harvest were not likely to adversely affect threatened or endangered species or adversely modify designated or critical habitat; were not likely to jeopardize proposed species or adversely modify proposed critical habitat; and may beneficially affect threatened, endangered, and proposed species and critical habitat… The Services concurred with the determination." The agency thus stands on a concurred-in finding that the prohibitions it now proposes to delete benefit listed species — and the current assessments anticipate widespread adverse effects from deleting them. When an agency reverses course, it "must show that there are good reasons for the new policy," FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502, 515 (2009), and where the prior policy rested on factual findings, it may not simply disregard them — the principle applied to this very rule's Tongass history in Organized Village of Kake v. USDA, 795 F.3d 956, 966–68 (9th Cir. 2015) (en banc). Neither the DEIS nor the assessments explain what changed in the biology. I request the FEIS directly address the 2001 beneficial-effect finding and state the factual basis for departing from it. Keep the protections, please. With thanks, Kyla Nurkowski

Formal Public Comment Draft SUBMITTED VIA: www.regulations.gov (Docket ID: FS-2025-0001 / Document ID: FS-2025-0001-223869) AGENCY: Forest Service (USFS), USDA ACTION: Proposed Rule; Draft Environmental Impact Statement (36 CFR Part 294) TITLE: Special Areas; Roadless Area Conservation DOCKET / RIN: Docket No. FS-2025-0001; RIN 0596-AD66 Re: Opposition to Proposed Rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule; Habitat Fragmentation, Fishery Degradation, and Corporate Exploitation (36 CFR Part 294) I. Identification of Commenter and Statement of Opposition I am submitting this comment as an active American sportsman, angler, and hunter in formal opposition to the Forest Service’s proposed rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A), the National Forest Management Act (NFMA), 16 U.S.C. §§ 1600–1614, and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), 42 U.S.C. § 4321 et seq. The Forest Service must withdraw this rule and preserve nationwide roadless protections. As an angler pursuing wild salmon and trout, I depend on cold, silt-free headwaters. As an upland hunter pursuing wild turkey with airguns, I require undisturbed backcountry far from motorized access. I support sustainable commercial logging, but true multiple-use management requires balance. Hundreds of millions of public acres and over 370,000 miles of roads already accommodate active timber operations. The 2001 Rule preserves the last intact conservation baseline. Rescinding it will irreparably harm public lands to facilitate corporate exploitation against overwhelming public opposition. II. Irreparable Harm to Public Fisheries, Game Habitat, and Conservation Balance * Sedimentation of Coldwater Fisheries: Native trout and anadromous salmon runs rely on clean spawning gravels in roadless headwaters. Logging roads cause severe slope erosion and thermal canopy loss, elevating stream temperatures and suffocating spawning beds. * Fragmentation of Upland Game Habitat: Stalking turkey with airguns requires unfragmented interior cover. Road penetration introduces noise, poaching corridors, and invasive cheatgrass, degrading forage and permanently displacing game. * Disruption of Multiple-Use Balance: Under the Multiple-Use Sustained-Yield Act (MUSYA), 16 U.S.C. §§ 528–531, timber must balance against wildlife and recreation. Sacrificing the remaining unroaded backcountry tilts public policy toward private extraction at the expense of outdoor sportsmen. III. Administrative and Empirical Defects Under APA § 706 Under Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Ass'n v. State Farm, 463 U.S. 29 (1983) and FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc., 556 U.S. 502 (2009), the agency must rationally justify reversing course and address its prior factual findings: * Contradicting Fire Science: While the agency cites wildfire risk, over 80% of wildfires ignite along road corridors. Roads expand fire vulnerability rather than mitigate it. * Unfunded Maintenance Liabilities: The Forest Service already faces an unfunded road maintenance backlog exceeding $3 billion. Adding remote logging roads while neglecting existing infrastructure is arbitrary and fiscally reckless. * Flawed Decentralization: Subordinating uniform national protections to fragmented local forest plans abdicates statutory stewardship (Wyoming v. USDA, 661 F.3d 1209 (10th Cir. 2011)). IV. Corporate Exploitation vs. Public Stewardship This proposal prioritizes corporate timber volume over the public interest. The public has repeatedly opposed opening these lands. Rescinding the rule privatizes resource profits while offloading environmental and fiscal costs onto American taxpayers and sportsmen. V. Requested Regulatory Actions * Withdraw the Proposed Rule: Retain 36 CFR Part 294 and the 2001 Roadless Rule protections. * Select the No-Action Alternative: Preserve the 58.5 million protected acres in the Final EIS. * Focus Active Logging on Existing Road Networks: Direct fuels reduction to degraded roaded corridors and the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI). Strategic Audit * Authorities Cited: 16 U.S.C. §§ 528–531, 1600–1614; 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A); 42 U.S.C. § 4321; 36 CFR Part 294; State Farm, 463 U.S. 29; Fox Television, 556 U.S. 502; Wyoming v. USDA, 661 F.3d 1209.

I oppose USDA’s proposed rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Rule (RIN 0596-AD66; Docket FS-2025-0001) & urge the USFS to select the No Action Alternative. This is not an abstract issue for me. I’ve lived in WNC for 35 years & have always used these mountains & forests. I hike/recreate on these public lands weekly. Their roadless character—the solitude, clean streams, intact forest, wildlife habitat, scenery, & absence of development is precisely what I use/value. My past & future use of these lands is publicly documented on my Insta account.⁷ The Nantahala & Pisgah National Forests contain approximately 152,488 acres of Inventoried Roadless Areas (IRAs).¹ The current Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Plan recognizes their undeveloped character & value for wildlife, biological diversity, & dispersed recreation. Critically, that plan expressly states that IRAs are governed by the Roadless Area Conservation Rule & directs that the undeveloped character be retained.² USDA should not assume that individual forest plans are an equivalent substitute for the national rule. The current local plan was written against a regulatory baseline in which the Roadless Rule (RR) exists. Before rescission, USDA should identify exactly what protections survive independently, which depend upon the RR, & whether remaining protections would actually be equivalent. The issue is urgent after Hurricane Helene. The Forest Service documented winds over 100 mph, washed-out roads,trails, extensive treefall, & hundreds of miles of blocked roads.³ Recovery is ongoing. WNC is not entering this rulemaking from an undisturbed environmental baseline. More roads & associated timber activity can create erosion, runoff, stream crossings, culvert/drainage impacts, & long-term obligations. USFS research specifically recognizes forest roads as potentially major sources of erosion & stream sediment.⁴ Risks are particularly consequential in this area following Helene’s landslides, debris flows, erosion, stream alteration, & slope disturbance. These forests are drinking-water infrastructure. USFS’ current plan states that many WNC communities obtain more than 50% of their municipal water from the Nantahala & Pisgah National Forests.**² USDA should specifically evaluate overlap between IRAs & source-water watersheds & analyze the cumulative effects of new roads, timber ops, & associated soil disturbance with Helene watershed damage. APA also requires reasoned decisionmaking when an agency rescinds existing regulation. Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Ass’n v. State Farm, 463 U.S. 29 (‘83),Supreme Court held regulatory rescission subject to arbitrary-&-capricious review & requires the agency to consider important aspects of the problem & provide reasoned explanation.⁵ FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502 (‘09), Court further explains when a policy change contradicts prior factual findings or implicates serious reliance interests, those matters must be addressed.⁵ That principle has been applied specifically to the RR. Organized Village of Kake v. USDA, 795 F.3d 956 (9th Cir. ‘15)(en banc), USDA’s Tongass exemption was invalidated due to the agency failed adequately to explain its reversal of previous facts.⁶ Although persuasive rather than controlling precedent in North Carolina, Kake applies State Farm & Fox to this same agency & same RR. Existing RR also contains exceptions for public health/safety, catastrophe, restoration, existing rights, & other specified circumstances.² If USDA believes provisions impede necessary forest-health or emergency work, it should consider targeted amendments, not wholesale rescission of nationwide protections. I also ask USDA to consider my interest personally. I continue weekly use. If these forests lose their roadlessness, my injury would be direct & cannot be remedied by the existence of other public land. A roadless forest is itself a public resource. Solitude is a use. Backcountry recreation is a use. Clean water is a use. Wildlife habitat is a use. Multiple use does not require every use on every acre. For these reasons, as a WNC resident with documented, longstanding use, I strongly urge USDA to retain 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule. ¹ USDA Forest Service, Assessment for the Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests (2014) (152,488 IRA acres). ² USDA Forest Service, Final Land Management Plan, Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests, R8-MB-160 (2023). ³ USDA Forest Service, Wildfire in Wake of Hurricane Helene (2025). ⁴ USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Grace, Modeling Erosion from Forest Roads with WEPP (2007); Kochenderfer, Erosion Control on Logging Roads in the Appalachians, RP NE-158 (1970). ⁵ Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Ass’n v. State Farm, 463 U.S. 29, 41–57 (1983); FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502, 514–16 (2009). ⁶ Organized Village of Kake v. USDA, 795 F.3d 956, 966–70 (9th Cir. 2015) (en banc).

To the U.S. Forest Service: I have grown up in an area surrounded by wilderness protected by the Roadless Rule. These lands are a huge draw for people to visit and live in the area as they provide innumerable opportunities for hiking, backpacking, fishing, hurting, paddling, whitewater rafting, and just spending a day by the river or in the woods alone. Rescission of this rule would cause a loss of habitat for plants and animals and a source of recreation for humans that will never be able to be replaced I have spent 33 years in these forests protected by the Roadless Rule, they are precious to me and many people I know. As a 9 year old with my family, I backpacked 35 miles of the Foothills Trail which introduced me to the wild beauty of the wilderness of Upstate South Carolina. We planned this 3 day trip specifically to connect with nature and each other, away from "real" life and its distractions. If this rule was rescinded, I would lose access to the beauty of areas where I regularly hike and spend time on the river (or those areas would be degradated as a consequence). My 80 year old father also spends the equivalent of weeks out there each year, drawn by their peace and quiet. We are risking the loss of connection to ourselves by rescinding this rule, as well as risking the lives and well being of countless species of plants and animals who call it home. “In 2001 the Agency Found These Prohibitions Benefited Listed Species; the Rescission Never Engages Its Own Prior Finding Both Draft Biological Assessments open with the same acknowledgment (USFWS BA p. 10; NMFS BA p. 7): "In the promulgation of the 2001 Roadless Rule, the Forest Service found that the Rule's prohibitions on road construction and timber harvest were not likely to adversely affect threatened or endangered species or adversely modify designated or critical habitat; were not likely to jeopardize proposed species or adversely modify proposed critical habitat; and may beneficially affect threatened, endangered, and proposed species and critical habitat… The Services concurred with the determination." The agency thus stands on a concurred-in finding that the prohibitions it now proposes to delete benefit listed species — and the current assessments anticipate widespread adverse effects from deleting them. When an agency reverses course, it "must show that there are good reasons for the new policy," FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502, 515 (2009), and where the prior policy rested on factual findings, it may not simply disregard them — the principle applied to this very rule's Tongass history in Organized Village of Kake v. USDA, 795 F.3d 956, 966–68 (9th Cir. 2015) (en banc). Neither the DEIS nor the assessments explain what changed in the biology. I request the FEIS directly address the 2001 beneficial-effect finding and state the factual basis for departing from it.” “On the topic of the Forest Service's claim that this action would reduce fires: The Draft EIS reports that "77 percent and 74 percent were reported as naturally ignited in wilderness areas and potentially affected IRAs, respectively," while "the majority (57 percent) of fires with cause determinations on other NFS lands were reported as human caused" (Environmental Impacts, Wildfire Occurrence section), yet no dataset or cause-determination methodology is cited to support either figure. These percentages materially qualify the fire-risk rationale for opening IRAs to road construction, since a peer-reviewed 2026 study found ignition density highest within 50 meters of roads (7.99 fires/1000 ha) and lowest in wilderness and roadless areas (1.75 and 1.97 fires/1000 ha respectively) — evidence directly bearing on whether expanded road access would increase, not decrease, fire risk. Did the agency consider this or comparable ignition-density research, and if so, where does the record explain its rejection? An agency must rely on accurate, disclosed data rather than unsupported statistics. Blue Mountains Biodiversity Project v. Blackwood, 161 F.3d 1208 (9th Cir. 1998). I request the agency cite its fire-occurrence dataset and cause-determination methodology and reconcile it with contrary ignition-density findings.” The Department should keep the Roadless Rule in place. I think the record supports that, and so does the public. Respectfully submitted, CommentID: RLC-20260904-JTO8PV

I regularly visit the inventoried roadless areas of the Sam Houston National Forest in Texas (Big Creek, Winters Bayou, Big Woods, Little Lake Creek) and formerly visited the San Bernardino National Forest. I oppose the rescission and comment on both the proposed rule and the Draft EIS. I request a specific response to each numbered item in the Final EIS. 1. The cost-benefit analysis does not support the action The preamble estimates annual recreation losses of about $6.1 million against $5.2-11.4 million a year in Treasury and Forest Service revenue, a figure assuming harvest across every operable acre, which the Department calls unlikely. It states these against a $6.9 billion road maintenance backlog, and concedes impacts could exceed $100 million. The FEIS should state plainly whether the projected timber revenue exceeds the lifecycle maintenance cost of the roads required to obtain it. If it does not, the economic rationale fails. 2. The wildfire rationale is contradicted by the Rule's text 36 C.F.R. § 294.13(b)(1)(ii) already permits cutting generally small diameter timber to maintain or restore ecosystem composition and structure, such as to reduce the risk of uncharacteristic wildfire effects. Section 294.12(b) permits roads for public health and safety. Nothing restricts prescribed fire, managed wildfire, hand thinning, or mastication. Small diameter material is what fuels reduction targets; the Rule restricts commercial removal of large trees, which is not fuels reduction. The preamble concedes that greater public access can increase human caused ignition potential. The Department cites the Rule's statement that such cutting "is expected to be infrequent," but that states an expectation, not an operative limit: it sets no cap and adds no approval condition. I therefore request that the FEIS identify, by project name, forest, and year, each hazardous fuels project in the last ten years a responsible official could not implement solely because of the 2001 Rule. Without this list, the stated purpose lacks record support under Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Ass'n v. State Farm, 463 U.S. 29 (1983). 3. The treatment statistic does not establish causation The low treatment rate in high hazard roadless acreage since 2014 is equally consistent with appropriation limits, workforce capacity, and WUI prioritization. The preamble itself says budget and physical constraints will limit road construction after rescission, conceding the constraint is fiscal. The FEIS must analyze these rather than assume the Rule is the cause. 4. Reliance interests are unaddressed The Department invites comment on reliance interests. Reversing a twenty five year policy requires more detailed justification where serious reliance interests exist (FCC v. Fox Television, 556 U.S. 502 (2009); Encino Motorcars, 579 U.S. 211 (2016)). Land management plans were revised against this backdrop and allocated timber production elsewhere; recreation businesses, outfitters, and water providers invested on the same assumption. The proposal analyzes none of it. 5. "This rule authorizes nothing" does not excuse NEPA analysis The Department justifies rescission by its expected effects while failing to analyze them. Its own figures, permanent roads newly permissible across 18.2 million acres and temporary across 11.3 million, are foreseeable consequences NEPA requires it to examine. The FEIS must quantify sediment and drinking water impacts, ESA effects and § 7 status, and cumulative effects with the reinstated Alaska Roadless Rule and E.O. 14225 timber targets. 6. The range of alternatives is inadequate The DEIS carries forward only three alternatives: no action and two rescission variants. No intermediate conservation alternative was analyzed in detail, including those Tribes requested. The FEIS must analyze: (a) retaining the Rule while broadening and streamlining the § 294.13(b)(1)(ii) fuels exception near the WUI, with mandatory temporary-road decommissioning (b) a state and Tribal petition process (c) delegating exception approval to forest supervisors, with deadlines (d) geographically limited rescission supported by unit-level evidence 7. The process is inadequate The Department allows 30 days for a proposed rule, three volume Draft EIS, and cost benefit analysis governing 58.5 million acres, with hearings only in Alaska under ANILCA § 810. Of 64 Tribal consultation requests, 29 have been held, and the Department acknowledges majority Tribal sentiment opposes the rescission. I request a comment period of no fewer than 90 days, hearings in each affected state, and completed tribal consultation before any final action. Requested action: withdraw the proposal and retain 36 C.F.R. Part 294, Subpart B. Alternatively, extend the comment period, hold hearings outside Alaska, complete consultation, and analyze the item 6 alternatives. Respectfully submitted, an anonymous member of the public

I strongly oppose the proposed rescission of the Roadless Rule. The proposal is legally and scientifically inadequate because it fails to justify abandoning long-standing protections that have safeguarded watersheds, wildlife habitat, recreation, ecosystem integrity, and climate resilience since 2001. The Forest Service should withdraw the proposed rescission or prepare a legally adequate analysis that fully evaluates the Roadless Rule’s continuing ecosystem- and wildfire-related benefits. 1. Arbitrary and Capricious Agency Action (Administrative Procedure Act) The Forest Service has not provided the reasoned explanation required by the Administrative Procedure Act for reversing a nationwide policy that has been implemented for more than two decades. The agency does not show that roadless protections are ineffective, identify changed conditions that eliminate the need for them, or address the evidence supporting their watershed, wildlife, recreation, and ecosystem benefits. Under FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc. (2009), an agency changing course must acknowledge and justify the change. 2. Inadequate NEPA Analysis USDA’s environmental review does not take the required hard look at the consequences of rescission. The analysis fails to adequately evaluate cumulative impacts from new roads and timber harvest, effects on wildlife, old-growth forests, watersheds, carbon storage, and climate resilience, reasonable alternatives to full rescission, and unsupported assumptions that road construction will reduce wildfire risk. 3. Conflict with National Forest Management Act (NFMA) The agency’s reliance on individual forest plans under NFMA is insufficient. NFMA requires maintenance of ecological integrity and multiple-use values at landscape scales, and forest-by-forest decisions may not protect roadless values consistently across the National Forest System. A national baseline better fulfills NFMA’s long-term conservation purposes. 4. Wildfire Rationale USDA’s wildfire rationale is unsupported. The existing Roadless Rule already allows many fuel-reduction activities, and the agency has not shown that rescission would materially reduce fire risk. New roads may instead increase human-caused ignitions, access-related disturbance, and long-term maintenance costs. Recent research shows ignition densities are far higher near roads than in wilderness or roadless areas, undermining the claim that more roads necessarily improve wildfire outcomes. 5. Endangered Species Act (ESA) The Roadless Rule provides important landscape-scale protection for listed species by maintaining large, connected, low-road-density habitats, movement corridors, and areas with reduced human disturbance. The Draft EIS must show that project-level ESA review would provide equivalent protection if the national rule is removed. 6. Scientific record and habitat connectivity The original Roadless Rule was based on extensive findings about habitat fragmentation, watershed protection, and ecosystem integrity. The Forest Service has not adequately explained why those findings no longer apply, particularly regarding road impacts on connectivity, sensitive and listed species, sedimentation, water quality, carbon storage, and climate adaptation. Road ecology literature identifies roads as major drivers of habitat fragmentation, wildlife mortality, impaired movement, and aquatic degradation. Studies have found that roadless areas fill gaps in the national conservation network, provide habitat for imperiled species, overlap with key biodiversity priorities, and support regional connectivity that is increasingly important as species respond to climate change. 7. Watershed protection and climate resilience Roadless areas provide clean water, intact watersheds, dispersed recreation, carbon storage, and climate resilience by limiting road-related erosion, sedimentation, fragmentation, and disturbance. The agency’s own 2000 EIS recognized these values, and the proposal does not provide evidence that they are no longer relevant. 8. Reliance Interests The Forest Service also failed to adequately consider reliance interests. States, tribes, local governments, recreation businesses, water agencies, conservation organizations, and the public have relied on roadless protections for more than 25 years. Before eliminating the rule, the agency must explain how it considered those interests, including recreation, clean water, backcountry character, and ecosystem services, as required by Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of the University of California (2020). 9. Public Trust and Watershed Protection Arguments The Forest Service has public responsibilities to protect municipal water supplies, intact watersheds, recreation opportunities, wildlife habitat, and backcountry values. The proposal gives insufficient weight to these public benefits and the costs of losing them.

I oppose USDA’s proposed rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Rule (RIN 0596-AD66; Docket FS-2025-0001) & urge the USFS to select the No Action Alternative. This is not an abstract issue for me. I’ve lived in WNC for 35 years & have always used these mountains & forests. I hike/recreate on these public lands weekly. Their roadless character—the solitude, clean streams, intact forest, wildlife habitat, scenery, & absence of development is precisely what I use/value. My past & future use of these lands is publicly documented on my Insta account.⁷ The Nantahala & Pisgah National Forests contain approximately 152,488 acres of Inventoried Roadless Areas (IRAs).¹ The current Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Plan recognizes their undeveloped character & value for wildlife, biological diversity, & dispersed recreation. Critically, that plan expressly states that IRAs are governed by the Roadless Area Conservation Rule & directs that the undeveloped character be retained.² USDA should not assume that individual forest plans are an equivalent substitute for the national rule. The current local plan was written against a regulatory baseline in which the Roadless Rule (RR) exists. Before rescission, USDA should identify exactly what protections survive independently, which depend upon the RR, & whether remaining protections would actually be equivalent. The issue is urgent after Hurricane Helene. The Forest Service documented winds over 100 mph, washed-out roads,trails, extensive treefall, & hundreds of miles of blocked roads.³ Recovery is ongoing. WNC is not entering this rulemaking from an undisturbed environmental baseline. More roads & associated timber activity can create erosion, runoff, stream crossings, culvert/drainage impacts, & long-term obligations. USFS research specifically recognizes forest roads as potentially major sources of erosion & stream sediment.⁴ Risks are particularly consequential in this area following Helene’s landslides, debris flows, erosion, stream alteration, & slope disturbance. These forests are drinking-water infrastructure. USFS’ current plan states that many WNC communities obtain more than 50% of their municipal water from the Nantahala & Pisgah National Forests.**² USDA should specifically evaluate overlap between IRAs & source-water watersheds & analyze the cumulative effects of new roads, timber ops, & associated soil disturbance with Helene watershed damage. APA also requires reasoned decisionmaking when an agency rescinds existing regulation. Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Ass’n v. State Farm, 463 U.S. 29 (‘83),Supreme Court held regulatory rescission subject to arbitrary-&-capricious review & requires the agency to consider important aspects of the problem & provide reasoned explanation.⁵ FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502 (‘09), Court further explains when a policy change contradicts prior factual findings or implicates serious reliance interests, those matters must be addressed.⁵ That principle has been applied specifically to the RR. Organized Village of Kake v. USDA, 795 F.3d 956 (9th Cir. ‘15)(en banc), USDA’s Tongass exemption was invalidated due to the agency failed adequately to explain its reversal of previous facts.⁶ Although persuasive rather than controlling precedent in North Carolina, Kake applies State Farm & Fox to this same agency & same RR. Existing RR also contains exceptions for public health/safety, catastrophe, restoration, existing rights, & other specified circumstances.² If USDA believes provisions impede necessary forest-health or emergency work, it should consider targeted amendments, not wholesale rescission of nationwide protections. I also ask USDA to consider my interest personally. I continue weekly use. If these forests lose their roadlessness, my injury would be direct & cannot be remedied by the existence of other public land. A roadless forest is itself a public resource. Solitude is a use. Backcountry recreation is a use. Clean water is a use. Wildlife habitat is a use. Multiple use does not require every use on every acre. For these reasons, as a WNC resident with documented, longstanding use, I strongly urge USDA to retain 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule. ¹ USDA Forest Service, Assessment for the Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests (2014) (152,488 IRA acres). ² USDA Forest Service, Final Land Management Plan, Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests, R8-MB-160 (2023). ³ USDA Forest Service, Wildfire in Wake of Hurricane Helene (2025). ⁴ USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Grace, Modeling Erosion from Forest Roads with WEPP (2007); Kochenderfer, Erosion Control on Logging Roads in the Appalachians, RP NE-158 (1970). ⁵ Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Ass’n v. State Farm, 463 U.S. 29, 41–57 (1983); FCC v. Fox Television Stations, 556 U.S. 502, 514–16 (2009). ⁶ Organized Village of Kake v. USDA, 795 F.3d 956, 966–70 (9th Cir. 2015) (en banc). ⁷https://www.instagram.com/j_mess91

I oppose the proposed rescission. My objections concern specific deficiencies in the proposed rule, the Draft EIS, and the cost-benefit analysis. I request a response to each in the Final EIS. 1. The Regulatory Flexibility Act certification is inconsistent with the Department's own analysis. USDA certifies that the rule will not have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities (91 FR 53831). In the same document it estimates $6.1 million in annual lost economic benefit to recreationists, states that recreation and tourism could experience trade-offs, and acknowledges total additional impacts could exceed $100 million (91 FR 53830). Outfitters, guides, lodges, and rural recreation businesses are overwhelmingly small entities under 5 U.S.C. 601(6). A certification under 5 U.S.C. 605(b) cannot rest on the absence of compliance obligations when the agency has separately quantified losses concentrated in a small-entity sector. Loss of the resource a business depends on is an economic impact. I request that the certification be withdrawn and an Initial Regulatory Flexibility Analysis prepared under 5 U.S.C. 603. 2. The federalism determination contradicts the preemption statement in the same document. USDA finds no federalism implications under E.O. 13132 (91 FR 53831), then states under Civil Justice Reform that upon publication all State and local laws and regulations that conflict with the proposed rule or that impede its full implementation would be preempted (91 FR 53832). A rule that preempts conflicting state and local law by its own terms has substantial direct effects on the States. This inconsistency should be resolved on the record before a final rule issues. 3. The wildfire rationale is not supported by the Department's own figures. Only 4.8 million acres, 16 percent of forested inventoried roadless area, are estimated to be operable for timber harvest, and USDA concedes a $6.9 billion deferred road maintenance backlog constrains activity (91 FR 53829). The existing rule already permits cutting generally small diameter timber to maintain or restore ecosystem composition and structure, expressly including reducing the risk of uncharacteristic wildfire effects, under 36 CFR 294.13(b)(1). Small-diameter material is precisely what hazardous-fuels reduction targets, and prescribed fire is not restricted at all. If the binding constraints are funding, workforce, and operability, rescission does not address the stated need. I request that the Final EIS disclose how many proposed hazardous-fuels projects in inventoried roadless areas since 2001 were denied, withdrawn, or materially modified because of 36 CFR 294.13, as distinct from budget or capacity limits. The preamble also concedes that greater access can increase human-caused ignition potential (91 FR 53829) without quantifying it or netting it against the claimed benefit. 4. Reliance interests are not analyzed. The preamble invites comment on reliance interests (91 FR 53830), and an agency reversing a longstanding policy must address the serious reliance the prior policy engendered. FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc., 556 U.S. 502, 515 (2009); DHS v. Regents of the Univ. of Cal., 591 U.S. 1, 30 (2020). The Final EIS must address municipal and rural water systems whose source-water planning assumes undeveloped headwaters; recreation businesses that invested in unroaded settings; state wildlife agencies whose habitat and migration-corridor investments assumed a roadless baseline; Tribal governments; and Endangered Species Act consultations that treated roadless conditions as part of the environmental baseline. Stating that near-term effects are bounded by existing plan direction is a prediction about timing, not an analysis of reliance. 5. The range of alternatives appears inadequate under NEPA. Tribes requested a strengthened roadless alternative and a Traditional Homelands Conservation Rule during scoping (91 FR 53832). If these were not analyzed in detail, reasonable alternatives raised in scoping have been excluded. Intermediate options that would serve the stated purpose with less environmental effect also warrant detailed analysis, including broadening the existing 294.13(b) exception near the wildland-urban interface, or a state-petition pathway modeled on the Idaho and Colorado subparts. 6. Thirty days is not a meaningful opportunity to comment on a multi-volume Draft EIS, cost-benefit analysis, and Tribal impact statement covering 44.7 million acres. I request an extension to at least 90 days. I urge selection of the No Action alternative.