Comments of Grace Anderson, resident of the forests in the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit (LTBMU)
1. Withdraw the proposal to rescind the long-effective and widely supported rule that protects select roadless areas of the forested lands owned by the US federal government.
2. Retain the 2001 Roadless Rule in its current form.
3. If a formal petition is received by a specific forest, examine the merits of reducing or increasing the present degree of protection afforded to the geography identified. Address all wildlife and habitat impacts and conduct a respectable, detailed fiscal analysis of any proposed change to protections.
4. Reduce the current level of protection only on a case-by-case basis, NOT through a generic, sweeper recession of a rule that covers all forests.
5. Acknowledge the known effects that road-building has on increase of human-caused fire ignitions and immense resources the USFS has to expend fighting wild land fires and then pursuing restoration of burned lands.
6. Acknowledge the impossibility the constrained USFS staff resources will face in managing incursion of new roads.
7. Address and mitigate the habitat fragmentation that building of new roads will inevitably cause.
Under no condition pursue this categorical, nationwide recision. I oppose changes to the 2001 Rule and urge no changes be made at this time.
I oppose this recision. Please extend the comment period to allow much greater use of public hearings in each individual forest unit.
Thank You
Grace Anderson