"The 20 million board feet of commercial timber produced from stand improvement thinning on the Rogue-Siskiyou is only a fraction of the six billion board feet that needs to be thinned for forest health across the Region," DeFazio said, "but it's five times what the Home Page timber sale would have produced, it will create more jobs and the work can be done with little or no controversy."

The seven-year-old Home Page timber sale proposed to log 170 acres of intact old-growth forests, was mired in controversy and was estimated to yield only 4.6 million board-feet. Supervisor Conroy announced plans today to instead thin timber from previously managed stands which will yield 20 million board-feet, improve forest health and reduce fire risk.

Today's decision by the Rogue-Siskiyou National Forest contributes to the vision for forest management that DeFazio, a long-time critic of the Northwest Forest Plan, has advocated for more than a decade. DeFazio's opposition to the Northwest Forest Plan stems from its failure to provide a predictable, sustainable supply of timber, or protection for remaining old-growth that environmentalists and the public demands.

DeFazio's plan for forest management would direct the Forest Service to prioritize commercial thinning and stand improvement, just as Supervisor Conroy has done in this instance, to produce more volume, less controversy, and healthier, more fire-resistant forests. By aggressively thinning the millions of acres of young managed stands in the Northwest, the Forest Service estimates that it could produce six billion board-feet of timber over the next decade or more. Studies by the Forest Service and independent scholars indicate that this three-fold increase in volume could result in an estimated 3,000 wood-products jobs.