FS-2025-0001-604368

I oppose the proposal to fully or partially rescind the Roadless Area Conservation Rule. I am a resident of the Portland, OR, metro region, a nonprofit professional, and a citizen deeply concerned about the growing threat of climate change on our society. I believe doing away with the Roadless Area Conservation Rule is a bad idea for many reasons. First, on a personal level, as someone who lives and works in an urban area, being able to retreat into nature for solitude and peace is very important to me. I deeply value my experiences going hiking or camping deep into the wilderness areas around Mt. Hood. I go into these areas to escape from the hustle and bustle of the city. There are so few areas remaining in our world today that are truly a way to escape from human impact. Second, I am very concerned about the negative environmental impacts that could come from rescinding the Roadless Rule. I am particularly upset about the narrative that adding more roads will help fight wildfires. That is demonstrably incorrect! Studies show that fires are 4x more likely to start near a road than in a roadless forest, and logging can increase fire hazard (Aplet et al., 2026). Living in the Western U.S., I live under constant threat of wildfire. As our climate warms and droughts become more common, our forests are literal kindling for the massive fires we see today. I understand that we need to return our forest management to practices passed down by indigenous people of this land from time immemorial; using low-level prescribed burns to clear out old brush, manage invasive species and pests, and rejuvenate the soil (Adlam & Berger, 2022). As we emerge from the misguided era of full fire suppression and deal with the consequences, it is important to be guided by the science and by indigenous practices that successfully supported these ecosystems for a long time--not by bringing high-powered modern machinery into protected wooded areas without clearance. And the Forest Service can't even pay to maintain the roads and other infrastructure it already has (an $8.6 billion backlog as of FY23, according to its own website). Third, I am appalled that the Department of Agriculture is even considering partially rescinding a rule that had such broad support across our country when it was adopted. Twenty years ago, thousands of citizens across demographics voiced clear support of the Roadless Rule. I am a nonprofit professional with expertise in violence prevention and the growing political violence and polarization of our times. It is clear that we must look to our common values as a way to start to repair our society. Today, when so much divides us, public lands remain one of the few places that all Americans share. Why on earth would the Department of Agriculture want to take away something that so clearly unites? Now is the time to protect and defend what brings us together as Americans and, frankly, as human beings who are just one small piece of this planet. For the reasons listed above, fully or partially rescinding the Roadless Rule under Alternatives 2 and 3 of the draft EIS would be a grave mistake. Again, I oppose the proposal to rescind or alter the Roadless Rule, and I support Alternative 1, the No Action alternative. Thank you. Aplet, G.H., Hartger, P. & Dietz, M.S. Three-decade record of contiguous-U.S. national forest wildfires indicates increased density of ignitions near roads. fire ecol 22, 8 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1186/s42408-026-00450-2 Adlam, Christopher & Berger, Carrie. Prescribed fire: Why we burn. Oregon State University Extension Fire Program (2022). https://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog/em-9339-prescribed-fire-why-we-burn