Comment Analysis · Docket FS-2025-0001

FS-2025-0001-594646

Opposes rescissionA1 strongSubstance 14/24Owed an answerPosted October 6, 2026 On Regulations.gov

In short: The comment establishes that the agency's DEIS and Cost Benefit Analysis contain internal contradictions regarding wildlife sensitivity, wildfire ignition rates, and economic net benefits that the agency has failed to reconcile in its proposal to rescind the Roadless Area Conservation Rule.

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, 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

Wildlife Habitat
- “bird richness declines with road presence”
- “road-noise experiments... cut bird abundance by over a quarter”
- “roads built for oil extraction may have altered mule deer migration routes”
- “recovery of deer populations by preserving old-growth winter shelter”
Forest Management Wildfire
- “human-caused wildland fire is nearly five times more likely to occur on essentially roaded lands”
- “far higher fire density on roaded land than inside the affected roadless areas”
- “wildfire justification... collapses against the agency's own ignition data”
Recreation Tourism Public Use
- “I backpack, fish, and take in the scenery”
- “paddle the Buffalo River, the White River, and Syllamore Creek”
- “recreation losses of at least $6.1 million a year”
- “forests that remain unroaded”
Legal Regulatory Framework
- “Ninth Circuit found that approach legally deficient”
- “Tenth Circuit has already spoken... REVERSE the district court's order”
- “2001 rule was within the authority Congress granted under the Organic Act and MUSYA”
- “local decision-making can incrementally erode nationally significant roadless values”

What it names

National Forests: Ouachita National Forest
Law cited: 28 U.S.C. Section 1291

The comment

Shaded passages are the ones the analysis quoted as evidence for a dimension: Specific placeLocal knowledgeEA analysisAnalytical gapEvidenceRequestLegal

Re: Rescission of the Roadless Area Conservation Rule, Docket FS-2025-0001 The birds and the terrain keep pulling me back. I backpack, fish, and take in the scenery in the Ozark National Forest, and I also backpack in the Sequoia and Inyo National Forests. I ride the Syllamore Mountain Bike Trail in the Ozark and the Ouachita Trail in the Ouachita National Forest. I paddle the Buffalo River, the White River, and Syllamore Creek. Wherever I go, I am looking for birds, especially woodpeckers and songbirds, and for deer and other mammals. Every one of those pursuits depends on forests that remain unroaded, and the agency's own record explains why opening them to roads would damage what I go there to find. I oppose this rescission. The wildlife case against this proposal is written in the agency's own science. The DEIS cites findings that bird richness declines with road presence in forested habitat, and that road-noise experiments in a roadless area cut bird abundance by over a quarter, with 31 percent of species avoiding the noise entirely. The woodpeckers and songbirds I seek in the Ozark are exactly the interior-forest species this research describes. I want the agency to explain, by direct reference to those cited studies, how it concludes that expanding the road system inside currently protected areas will not degrade the bird communities its own DEIS describes as road-sensitive. On deer, the agency's own record is equally plain: the DEIS cites Wyoming research finding that roads built for oil extraction may have altered mule deer migration routes and increased their movement speed, and the agency's Tribal Summary Impact Statement credits the rule's protection with the recovery of deer populations by preserving old-growth winter shelter. Those findings come from the agency, not from opponents. The agency should explain how it reconciles the rescission with its own documentation of what unroaded security provides to deer populations. The wildfire justification the proposal offers collapses against the agency's own ignition data. The DEIS states: "Building a road into a forest at high risk from uncharacteristic wildfire effects could increase the incidence of human-caused fires. A human-caused wildland fire is nearly five times more likely to occur on essentially roaded lands than on essentially unroaded lands." That is the agency's language, in its own draft environmental impact statement, and it directly contradicts using fire management as a rationale for road construction in currently protected areas. I ask the agency to explain why this proposal departs from its own prior findings on fire occurrence and to reconcile the rescission with the ignition data in its own DEIS, which reports far higher fire density on roaded land than inside the affected roadless areas. The economic arithmetic the agency offers does not hold up either. The agency's own record states: "the total timber volume affected by this rule is less than 0.5 percent of total United States production, and the total oil and gas production from all National Forest System lands is currently about 0.4 percent of the current national production." Against those figures, the agency's own Cost Benefit Analysis projects $5.2 to $11.4 million a year in timber revenue to the Forest Service against recreation losses of at least $6.1 million a year and a net present value spanning negative $92 million to positive $199 million, all while the road system already carries a $6.9 billion maintenance backlog. An analysis that cannot establish a net benefit is not a justification. The agency must reconcile those numbers before it acts. The legal ground under this proposal is also shaky in ways the agency has not confronted honestly. When the agency last abandoned the national rule for a state-by-state approach, it described its own dissatisfaction with the Roadless Rule and "highlighted its rejection of the Roadless Rule's 'inflexible one-size-fits-all nationwide rulemaking approach.' 70 Fed.Reg. at 25,656." The Ninth Circuit found that approach legally deficient. The agency needs to explain how this proposal avoids those same deficiencies and address its own prior finding that local decision-making can incrementally erode nationally significant roadless values. On the question of statutory authority, the Tenth Circuit has already spoken: "Exercising jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. Section 1291, we REVERSE the district court's order granting Plaintiffs declaratory relief and issuing a permanent injunction, and REMAND the case for the district court to vacate the permanent injunction." That court held the 2001 rule was within the authority Congress granted under the Organic Act and MUSYA and did not create de facto wilderness. The agency has not explained on the record the basis for any contrary position, and it should be required to do so before this proceeding advances further. Sincerely, Dennis Powers Heber Springs, AR 72543