By Taxpayers Association of Oregon Foundation,
U.S. Senate Democrats say a bill designed to battle wildfires is likely doomed to failure after Republicans attached an amendment to eliminate the 2001 “roadless rule,” which curtails construction of new roads in 59 million acres of federal timberlands, including about 2 million acres each in Oregon and Washington. The original Wildfire Prevention Act drew bipartisan support by mandating controlled burns and thinning in federal forests to curtail wildfires—until the Republican majority on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee attached the amendment to eliminate the roadless rule. U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, condemned the move as an attempt to sell off American public lands to private companies, but timber leaders and Republicans describe the 2001 rule as arbitrary based on artificial lines on a map that curtail construction of roads that could help firefighters battle blazes.
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