Comment Analysis · Docket FS-2025-0001

FS-2025-0001-334784

Opposes rescissionA1 strongSubstance 16/24Owed an answerPosted September 8, 2026 On Regulations.gov

In short: The comment provides empirical data and legal arguments demonstrating that the proposed rescission lacks a factual basis regarding fire risk, creates disproportionate economic harm, violates the Endangered Species Act, and fails to complete required tribal and subsistence consultations.

Scored directly — The comment's whole text was scored on its own.

Scorecard

Each dimension is scored 0–3; the eight sum to the substance score out of 24.

Specific placeNames a specific location — from a region down to an exact creek, trail, road, or map reference.
Local knowledgeDraws on a first-hand connection to the place — visits, sustained activity, occupation, or a professional role.
EA analysisEngages the agency's environmental analysis directly.
Analytical gapIdentifies something the analysis fails to address.
EvidenceBacks claims with specific facts, data, or research.
RequestMakes a specific, actionable request of the agency.
AlternativeProposes a different course of action.
LegalCites statutes, regulations, or legal obligations.

How hard it is to set aside

A1 strong: Must be answered — it names the law.

Owed an answer on Analytical gap, Evidence, Legal.

Standard dismissals it defeats

Already addressed The agency says its analysis already covers the point. Defeated when the comment cites the law itself: there is no analysis to cite against a statutory claim.
Misreads the proposal The agency says the comment misunderstands what is proposed. Defeated when the comment engages the proposal or a named place directly.
No cause and effect shown The agency says the comment asserts a harm without showing how the action causes it. Defeated when the comment shows the mechanism.
Outside the scope The agency says the comment asks about a different action. Defeated when the comment is specific and tied to this proposal.
Certified not substantive The agency certifies the comment raises nothing substantive. Defeated when the comment alleges illegality, which is substantive by the definition the certification runs on.

Still open to the agency

Alternative already eliminated The agency says it considered and eliminated the alternative the comment proposes, with a reason. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.
Deferred to a later decision The agency says the point belongs to a later, site-specific decision. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.
Not required The agency says the analysis the comment asks for is not required. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.
Preference noted The agency notes the comment as a statement of preference and takes no action on it. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.

Topics

Recreation Tourism Public Use
- “I bike, camp, hike, and hunt on national forest land, and roadless areas are usually the reason for the trip”
- “I have ridden, camped, and hiked in roadless country in North Dakota, Arizona, California, Utah, Vermont, Maine, Pennsylvania, and Colorado”
- “Rescission would change how I spend my time, where I travel, and what I plan my years around”
- “roughly $6.1 million in annual recreation losses”
Forest Management Wildfire
- “The evidence on fire contradicts the rationale for this rescission”
- “ignition density lowest in wilderness (1.75 fires per 1,000 hectares) and next lowest in roadless areas (1.97)”
- “Section 294.13(b)(1)(ii) allows cutting generally small diameter timber to reduce the risk of uncharacteristic wildfire effects”
- “direct fuels funding to the wildland-urban interface outside roadless areas”
Legal Regulatory Framework
- “The rulemaking is incomplete”
- “The DEIS analyzes neither”
- “The agency approved it that October without waiting for the biological opinion”
- “I ask the Department to retain 36 CFR part 294, subpart B in full”
Tribal Sovereignty
- “The Department concedes substantial direct effects on tribes, reports consultations ongoing”
- “tribes requested a strengthened rule or a co-stewardship alternative during scoping”
- “The ANILCA Section 810 subsistence hearings run September 29 through October 1”
- “complete consultation and the subsistence analysis while the public can still respond”

What it names

National Forests: Shawnee National Forest
Law cited: 36 CFR part 294

Attachments

1 file. Counts as 1 — Counts as one: The attachments enclose no one else's submissions; the comment counts as one.

Own letter

The comment

Shaded passages are the ones the analysis quoted as evidence for a dimension: Analytical gapEvidence

Please read the fuller comment with citations that is attached to this submission. I live in Chicago. I bike, camp, hike, and hunt on national forest land, and roadless areas are usually the reason for the trip. I have ridden, camped, and hiked in roadless country in North Dakota, Arizona, California, Utah, Vermont, Maine, Pennsylvania, and Colorado, and lived for years in four of those states. In Illinois I hunt the Shawnee National Forest, where I hold 2026 deer permits. Colorado's roadless areas fall under the separate Colorado Roadless Rule and are unaffected here. The other seven are not. I oppose the rescission. I ask the Department to select Alternative 1, No Action, and to reject Alternative 2 and Alternative 3. The rule already permits the work. Section 294.13(b)(1)(ii) allows cutting generally small diameter timber to reduce the risk of uncharacteristic wildfire effects. Section 294.12(b) allows road construction in specified circumstances, and existing direction delegates emergency wildfire and public safety actions to Regional Foresters. The preamble calls these exceptions inconsistently used but offers no data on how often officials sought them, how often approval was denied, or how long it took. Without that, the stated need is an assertion, not a finding. The evidence on fire contradicts the rationale for this rescission. Forest Service records from 1992 to 2024 across all eight contiguous regions show ignition density lowest in wilderness (1.75 fires per 1,000 hectares) and next lowest in roadless areas (1.97), rising as distance to a road falls. Aplet, Hartger, and Dietz, Fire Ecology 22(1):8 (2026). The proposal concedes that greater access can increase human-caused ignition potential. The Department also reports high or very high wildfire hazard within roadless areas ranging from 60 percent in California to 5 percent in the Eastern Region. The Department's own economics do not support the change. Roughly 4.8 million acres are operable, 16 percent of forested roadless acres. Cutting all of them annually, which the Department calls unlikely, would raise sawtimber harvest 5 to 10 percent and yield $5.2 to $11.4 million a year. Against that sit roughly $6.1 million in annual recreation losses, unquantified water costs, and a $6.9 billion maintenance backlog on existing roads and bridges. The benefit concentrates on a few operators and the Treasury, while the costs fall on recreationists, downstream water users, taxpayers, and tribes. More than 95 percent of roadless acreage lies in ten western states, so eastern forests supply almost none of the benefit while, under Alternative 3, losing nearly all protection. Alternative 3 is not a middle course. Its screens remove land within a half-mile of a road (13.3 million acres by the agency's count), land in the wildland-urban interface (10.2 million acres), and the Tongass. Applied to the East that is a full rescission. The Shawnee is fragmented federal parcels laced with roads and bordered by towns, and nearly all of it clears one screen or both. The DEIS should disclose the acreage each criterion removes by region and forest. Project-level review is not the backstop the proposal assumes. In August 2024 the Forest Service's own assessment found Indiana bats in the 67-acre McCormick project area in Pope County and found the project likely to adversely affect them. The agency approved it that October without waiting for the biological opinion. A contractor cut 40 of 67 acres before Judge Rosenstengel set the decision memo aside on August 31, 2026 as an ESA violation. That approval came under a prior administration. The problem is structural, not political. The rulemaking is incomplete. The Department concedes substantial direct effects on tribes, reports consultations ongoing, and defers the Tribal Impact Summary Statement to the final rule. Its own summary shows tribes requested a strengthened rule or a co-stewardship alternative during scoping. The DEIS analyzes neither. The ANILCA Section 810 subsistence hearings run September 29 through October 1, after this comment period closes, and the agency will not accept written comments there. If the Department's real problem is fire and forest health, the remedy does not require touching this rule. Use the existing exceptions, revise delegation and implementation direction if approvals are slow, direct fuels funding to the wildland-urban interface outside roadless areas, and pay down the road backlog so crews can use the roads that already exist. I ask the Department to retain 36 CFR part 294, subpart B in full, extend the comment period, and complete consultation and the subsistence analysis while the public can still respond. Rescission would change how I spend my time, where I travel, and what I plan my years around. It would change my way of life. Please see the attached for a more complete comment with citations. Rafael Risman Letzter, Chicago, Illinois