Oregon lawmakers yesterday unveiled a sweeping plan to increase logging and preserve new wilderness and wild and scenic rivers on roughly 2.5 million acres in their state.

Reps. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.) and Greg Walden (R-Ore.) released a draft bill for the state's Oregon and California Grant Lands, known as O&C lands, that would create new timber jobs, preserve forest health and provide long-term funding for counties to pay for schools, roads and law enforcement.

The bill would designate a little over half the area as "trust lands," which would remain under federal ownership but be managed by a board of trustees. The lands, which would generally consist of previously managed timber stands younger than 80 years and not older than 125 years, would be managed for sustainable, dispersed timber production with legal certainty for the forest industry, the lawmakers said.

In addition, the proposal would provide legislative protection for some 2.6 million acres of old-growth forests, including 150 miles of wild and scenic rivers and 90,000 acres of wilderness. More than 1 million acres of land would be transferred from the Bureau of Land Management to the Forest Service.

Importantly, the bill would provide counties with a dependable source of income at a time when federal payments under the Secure Rural Schools program have recently expired and prospects for a reauthorization look dim.

"Given the serious fiscal crisis our forested communities face, we believe a new approach is necessary to create jobs, help stabilize Oregon's rural communities, and better manage our forests," DeFazio said in a statement yesterday.

The draft was introduced the same day that the House Natural Resources Committee passed a bill by Chairman Doc Hastings (R-Wash.) that would require vast increases in timber production on Forest Service lands across the West, including O&C lands (see related story). The Oregon lawmakers had hoped to attach their proposal to the package, but they faced resistance from leaders over whether the bill would be considered an earmark, Schrader said.

"Doc and other committee members seem very interested in this being part of the bill," Schrader said.

Prospects for the Oregon bill passing the House on its own are uncertain.

Schrader said debate over the payroll tax extension had limited time for negotiations with the committee over the past weeks, but that he is hopeful the measure can be included as a manager's amendment when the Hastings bill is taken up on the floor.

Reaction in Oregon

In the meantime, the delegation will seek public input in Oregon, where the proposal has been met with cautious optimism by the timber industry and skepticism by environmentalists.

"We're asking our environmental community to step up," Schrader said. "We're getting a million acres of old growth, which I think is reasonable for our environmental friends."

Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Council, said that while parts of the delegation's proposal are difficult for industry to embrace, the draft represents "a serious bipartisan attempt to end the forest wars that have crippled rural Oregon for nearly two decades."

He added that timber harvests in Oregon had declined to less than one-quarter of the 1.1 billion board-feet of annual forest growth of the lands. He pointed to a "barrage" of lawsuits, appeals and controversy facing forest users since the early 1990s.

"It also appears to give rural Oregon far more certainty than it has had in decades by ensuring that sustainable forest management will again contribute to the economic and social fabric of these forested communities," Partin said. "With the continuation of reduced Secure Rural Schools payments in serious jeopardy -- and short-lived at best -- it is high time for all of Oregon's elected officials to begin confronting the real challenges facing rural Oregon, particularly the need for these forests to begin contributing to the economic vitality of these communities."

The 18 O&C counties stand to lose more than most Western counties if Congress fails to extend Secure Rural Schools.

Oregon State University in a recent study found Oregon's rural counties would lose between 3,000 and 4,000 jobs and that business sales would drop up to $400 million if the payments are not continued. Counties would stand to lose up to $300 million in revenues.

Schrader said he ultimately hopes the O&C proposal can be attached to a bipartisan Senate plan to extend Secure Rural Schools.

The proposal by Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and several others would extend the program for five years with revenues declining by 5 percent per year. House leaders have balked at the idea of a five-year extension, arguing it would kick the problem of forest management down the road.