I write in strong support of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s proposed rule to rescind the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule in its entirety. This one-size-fits-all national restriction has constrained local forest managers for 25 years, limiting timely access for active management, hazardous fuels reduction, and wildfire response across more than 44 million acres of National Forest System lands. Rescinding the rule restores decision-making authority to the local level through existing land management planning processes under the National Forest Management Act, without mandating any particular road construction or timber harvest.
This change is especially important for communities like those in Skamania County, Washington, which border and depend on the Gifford Pinchot National Forest. The Gifford Pinchot contains substantial inventoried roadless areas (approximately 213,000 acres based on Forest Service inventory data). These lands sit amid a landscape that has faced elevated wildfire risk, including recent high and very high fire danger ratings, fire restrictions, and incidents such as the Backbone, and High Lava fires. Local officials in Skamania County have highlighted the heavy fuel loads on the forest and the need for strategic fuel breaks and treatments to protect communities, infrastructure, and residual old-growth and wildlife habitat from catastrophic fire.
The Roadless Rule has restricted road construction and reconstruction needed for efficient access to conduct thinning, prescribed fire, and other fuels treatments in many of these areas. Forest Service data indicate that more than 40 percent of inventoried roadless areas nationwide carry high or very high wildfire hazard potential, yet only about 5 percent have received hazardous fuels reduction treatments since 2014. A significant portion of these lands already lie near existing roads. Removing the national prohibition gives Gifford Pinchot managers the flexibility to evaluate site-specific needs—improving firefighter access, reducing response times, creating defensible space near communities and critical infrastructure, and treating fuels before they accumulate into extreme fire behavior—while still operating under full NEPA review, forest plans, and other environmental laws.
For Skamania County residents, the stakes are practical and immediate: safer communities, reduced risk of large, destructive fires that threaten homes, water supplies, recreation, and local economies, and the ability for the Forest Service to manage the land based on current conditions rather than a 25-year-old blanket restriction. Active management is essential to restoring forest health and resilience in the Cascades.
I urge the Department to finalize the full rescission of the 2001 Roadless Rule. Returning authority to local national forest managers will better enable the Gifford Pinchot National Forest and similar forests across the West to address wildfire risk, protect neighboring communities such as those in Skamania County, and sustain the multiple uses and values these public lands provide.
Thank you for the opportunity to comment and for prioritizing practical, science-informed forest management.
Sincerely,
Asa Leckie
asal00@msn.com