The Bureau of Land Management has filed a notice of intent to revise the resource management plan for nearly 2.5 million acres of forests in Oregon, potentially quadrupling the amount of timber open to logging on O&C Lands (Oregon and California Railroad Lands). The agency is seeking to increase its sustained yield timber harvest to around 1 billion board feet annually, an amount matching levels prior to conservation restrictions in the 1990s. Last year, logging on those lands only yielded around 250 million board feet. …Travis Joseph, president of the timber-industry association American Forest Resource Council, celebrated the possibility of a new management plan. …He said the BLM currently allows for only 20% of annual timber growth to be logged, which defies the O&C Act of 1937’s mandate to harvest as much timber as grows annually. …But conservationists say increased logging and replanting of dense timber plantations will exacerbate wildfire risk in the region.

Additional coverage:

• NBC News, by Craig Smullin: Bureau of Land Management plans to log 2.5M acres of Western Oregon timberland
• The Oregonian, by Alex Baumhardt: Trump’s ‘God Squad’ could override endangered species protections to clear-cut Oregon forests