<p>In the owls-vs.-jobs conflict, Clinton says it's not just the
economy that matters
</p>
<p>By TED GUP/WASHINGTON--With reporting by Margaret Carlson and Nancy Traver/Washington
and Lynn Steinberg/Seattle, with other bureaus
</p>
<p> For three months, a team of bleary-eyed scientists, sociologists
and economists was sequestered behind an unmarked door on the
14th floor of the U.S. Bancorp Tower in Portland, Oregon, working
14-hour days, seven days a week, amid a welter of maps, coffee
cups and stale pizza. Their mission, direct from the President:
explore every conceivable option for preserving the Northwest's
ancient forests and its wildlife, while saving whatever can
be saved of the once proud and productive timber industry.
</p>
<p> That mission may have been virtually impossible, judging from
the outraged reaction to the unveiling last week of Bill Clinton's
long-awaited timber plan. Trying to strike a balance between
the needs of nature and the demands of man, the President decreed
that the amount of logging on federal land would be sharply
reduced and offered a $1.2 billion aid package to help timber
communities diversify their economies.
</p>
<p> But neither side in the great forest debate was pleased. A shocked
logging industry claimed that the plan would wipe out 85,000
jobs and devastate timber-dependent towns. "The program is dead
on arrival," fumed mill owner John Hampton, chairman of the
Northwest Forest Resource Council. And while protesting loggers
in the Northwest tossed empty caskets on a flaming pyre and
sent a funeral wreath to the White House, House Speaker Tom
Foley of Washington State was smoldering.
</p>
<p> Conservationists winced at the notion of any additional logging
in the remaining old-growth forests, warning it could push endangered
species to extinction and imperil one of the nation's most vital
natural habitats. Still, the antilogging forces sensed they
had advanced. "We had a chance for a major victory ending the
war," said National Audubon Society vice president Brock Evans.
"Instead we conquered another ridge and drove the enemy back,
but it's a very shaky victory because much of the policy is
vague."
</p>
<p> The White House's plan establishes an array of reserves encompassing
key watersheds and old-growth stands, an innovative strategy
intended to protect the most ecologically essential areas of
the forests and thereby preserve the habitat of spotted owls,
salmon and countless other species. The blueprint allows for
average annual timber harvests of 1.2 billion bd. ft.--less
than one-third of the mid-'80s peak of 5 billion bd. ft. a year.
Administration projections put job losses at fewer than 10,000,
not quite the apocalyptic vision of the timber companies. But
neither the $1.2 billion for worker retraining and community
investment nor Clinton's proposed removal of a federal subsidy
on log exports--a step intended to encourage the processing
of more logs in the Northwest and the creation of more sawmill
jobs--placated the industry's fury. The plan contained unsettling
news for environmentalists as well. An additional 1.9 million
acres--22% of the remaining old growth outside of wilderness
areas and parks--will be vulnerable to the chain saw. Even
more disturbing to conservationists were hints that to ensure
the timely release of timber, the White House might not oppose
congressional efforts to exempt logging in those areas from
court challenge.
</p>
<p> While Clinton's plan is a patchwork of political compromises,
it is part of a real shift in federal policy that shows a new
respect for nature. Throughout most of U.S. history, government
actions have encouraged human exploitation of natural resources:
logging, mining, drilling, grazing, damming rivers. That philosophy
reached its height during the Reagan years, when Interior Secretary
James Watt favored mining in wilderness areas.
</p>
<p> When Clinton and his environmentalist sidekick, Al Gore, took
office, they were already well aware that America's ecology
was in crisis. From the spotted owls and salmon in the Northwest
to woodpeckers and salamanders in the Southeast, many species
were on the brink of extinction, and the implications were ominous.
Says Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, architect of the Administration's
natural-resource policy: "This really isn't about just preserving
strange species with incomprehensible names. In every single
case, that species is the warning light about the decline in
productivity of an ecosystem." In the past, the debate was framed
in terms of economics vs. environment. But, observed Clinton,
"the one cannot exist without the other." Pollution from logging
operations in the Northwest, for example, runs off into rivers
and threatens the spawning grounds of salmon. And if the salmon
die out, 60,000 jobs will be lost in fishing and other industries.
</p>
<p> This October the Administration will launch the $179 million
National Biological Survey, in which an estimated 950 biologists
will, for the first time, conduct a comprehensive inventory
of the nation's plants and animals. The experience in the Northwest
has taught policy planners to focus not on individual species
but on entire ecosystems. And a determination to avoid the protracted
court battles that deadlocked the owls-loggers dispute has spurred
the Administration to bring together industries, environmental
groups and local governments. An accord to protect the Southern
California breeding grounds of the endangered gnatcatcher was
reached in March by local developers, environmentalists and
the state government. One month later, the Fish and Wildlife
Service entered into an unprecedented arrangement with Georgia-Pacific
Corp., which agreed to conserve the habitat of the endangered
red cockaded woodpecker on the company's 4 million acres in
the Southeast.
</p>
<p> The Administration's new conservation policies got off to a
false start with its on-again-off-again effort to raise the
fees businesses pay for such activities as mining and cattle
grazing on federal land. Those proposals were originally part
of Clinton's budget plan, but the President backed away from
the idea after members of Congress from Western states squawked.
Babbitt sees the setback as a temporary retreat and vows to
raise land-use fees gradually through administrative actions
and support for legislation.
</p>
<p> Ultimately, the most dramatic policy shift could be the changing
view of dams, long the symbol of man's dominion over nature.
They are now seen by some as a testament to man's hubris--redirecting rivers, flooding dry lands and evicting wildlife.
For years, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission paid little
or no attention to environmental issues as it relicensed dams.
Now it is faced with a record number of relicensing applications--230 dams on 59 river basins--and is using this unique opportunity
to respond to pent-up ecological concerns, particularly the
needs of fish. Many of the dams up for relicensing will be required
to take costly steps to help fish reach their spawning grounds
and then return. That could mean ladders, lifts, pathways or
"trap-and-truck" measures, in which truckloads of fish are ferried
around the dam and released.
</p>
<p> A few dams could face a more radical solution. The modest-size
Edwards Dam on the Kennebec River in Augusta, Maine, produces
electricity but prevents many fish, including salmon and shad,
from reaching their spawning grounds. Audubon and Trout Unlimited
have called for the dam's removal. So too has the state's Governor,
John McKernan Jr.Studies of the proposal and the potential legal
brawls could take years, but even the thought of tearing down
a dam for ecological reasons is highly unusual.
</p>
<p> The Glines Canyon Dam and the Elwha Dam on Washington State's
Olympic Peninsula are also possible candidates for removal.
They block five species of salmon--the Chinook, the pink,
sockeye, chum and coho--from spawning grounds. Observes Shawn
Cantrell, director of Friends of the Earth's Northwest Rivers
Project: "If the final decision is made to remove the dams,
it will be a statement by our national government that past
exploitation of our natural resources can be corrected. We can
go back and fix the mistakes we made in previous generations."
</p>
<p> While such concern for endangered species can be irritating
and costly, it can also yield unexpected benefits for both wildlife
and man. Consider the case of Edwards Aquifer, which flows about
175 miles across six Texas counties and is relied upon for irrigation
and as the sole source of water for 1.7 million people in and
around San Antonio. It is what biologists call a "hot spot,"
because the aquifer's spring system is home to 65 species found
nowhere else on earth. Among them: the fountain darter, the
Texas blind salamander and Texas wild rice. Falling water levels
in the aquifer, caused by unregulated and excessive usage, threatened
the species, and in 1991 the Sierra Club sued the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service, forcing it to take action.
</p>
<p> "They were just pumping the place dry," says Interior Secretary
Babbitt. Last month, under threat of increasing federal intervention,
the Texas legislature passed a bill empowering the state to
regulate and manage the withdrawal of groundwater in Edwards
Aquifer. The state will now devise a plan for equitable water
distribution that will enable the springs to flow even in times
of drought, while protecting the delicate ecosystem that provides
that water. "This is a spectacular success," says Babbitt, "a
really remarkable evolution in which a small fish facing extinction
triggered a lawsuit, which triggered a legislative response
that is now going to work for the benefit of everybody in Texas."
</p>
<p> The conflict in the Northwest would not be so easily resolved.
After a decade of unsustainable logging, court injunctions and
federal inaction, the situation was dire when Clinton came to
the White House. Said the President: "We have to play the hand
we were dealt." In April he convened the much ballyhooed "Timber
Summit" in Portland, where he promised to break the gridlock.
Clinton set up three teams to tackle the problem, of which perhaps
the most important was the Forest Ecosystem Management Assessment
Team, or FEMAT. Dressed in jeans, flannel shirts and running
shoes, the 37 members could look out from Portland's U.S. Bancorp
Tower and see the Willamette River and Mount Hood in the distance.
Their mission was simplified in the slogans that often flitted
across their computer terminals. One message read, "It's the
fish, stupid!" Another, "It's the ecosystem, stupid!" And finally,
"It's all of them, stupid!"
</p>
<p> But early on, team members were dumbstruck by the complexity
of their task. Joe Lint, a wildlife biologist with the Bureau
of Land Management, recalls discussing the forest's 20,000 species
of insects, spiders and other arthropods: "I sat there saying
to myself, `Wow, this thing is so big and complex, I have no
idea how this might all fit together.' It put us in a dif ferent
frame of mind." Out of the assemblage of foresters, biologists,
economists, plant and fish experts, geomorphologists, hydrologists
and social scientists emerged perhaps the most sophisticated
conservation analysis to date. A pioneering effort, says Babbitt.
Noted team leader Jack Ward Thomas, chief wildlife biologist
at the Department of Agriculture: "We're moving into ecosystem
management, which nobody has ever done before."
</p>
<p> Team members developed 10 options. At the far end of the spectrum
was option one, nicknamed "Save-It-All" because it allowed for
a minuscule 0.19 billion bd. ft. to be cut, and would have set
aside all ancient forests. At the opposite end was option seven,
which would have allowed 1.84 billion bd. ft. to be cut annually.
Thomas bristles at any suggestion that there was political interference
in the deliberations, but he refuses to discuss the substance
of periodic conference calls with Katie McGinty, the White House's
environmental-policy director. "Politics is not our bag," he
says. Still, two weeks ago, Thomas and forester Jerry Franklin
were flown to Washington to brief anxious members of Congress
from the Northwest. The meeting was described as "tense."
</p>
<p> By June 2 a committee of senior government officials from numerous
agencies began sifting through the options and prepared a decision
memorandum analyzing them for the President. In the margins
of the document, which had fewer than 50 pages, Clinton scribbled,
"Let's discuss" beside various options. White House sources
say the decision was Clinton's alone, though he discussed it
with Vice President Gore over their regular Thursday lunch in
the President's dining room. Clinton chose option nine--also
known as "the efficiency option"--which focused on watersheds
as the basic building blocks of the ecosystem and reflected
the growing importance assigned to fish.
</p>
<p> Just as important, of the 10 options, that one produced the
second highest amount of timber--about 1.2 billion bd. ft.--and preserved the second highest number of timber jobs--a projected 119,500 in the region. That compares with 125,400
jobs in 1992 and 145,000 in 1990. No one disputes that some
timber-dependent communities could be hard hit, but FEMAT economist
Brian Greber forecast that the job losses would have little
effect on the regional economy and negligible impact on the
American consumer.
</p>
<p> Lawmakers from the Northwest did not agree. "This is a sellout,"
said Oregon Senator Bob Packwood, who vows to fight the plan.
"The ratio of common sense is inversely proportional to the
number of scientists and bureaucrats involved," declared Oregon's
other Senator, Mark Hatfield. But it appears that Clinton will
not need to submit his plan to Congress, and for that, many
on Capitol Hill may be grateful. They can publicly attack the
proposal for the consumption of the audience back home, deflect
the heat, then quietly draw some measure of comfort from the
fact that, at last, there is a plan--a plan that most owls
