Striking a Balance

As members of the MCC it is our goal to understand the multiple uses of our public lands. Our latest trip to the Forest Service's Tally Lake Ranger District has certainly been an insightful opportunity for TS Crew in this regard.

While it is commonly believed that National Forest is protected land, left unscathed by extraction, these forests are, in reality, regularly logged by private companies who are often contracted through the forest service!!!! While this may strike you as ironic, the Forest Service must strive to regulate forestry in order to protect both people, and forest, striking a delicate and seemingly contradictory balance. This balance is forced to be maintained due to the development and growth adjacent to the fire-prone forests, known as urban interface. While populations grow around the forests, controlled timber reduction and controlled logging are also established as a means of reducing the potential for the forests to be susceptible to widespread fire.

The Forest Service refers to the practice of fuel reduction, and controlled logging as The Healthy Forest Initiative.

We approach a new generation dedicated to conservation rather than extraction of our public lands. This is an encouraging trend. The value of preserving our public lands can actually be measured by the economic boom of surrounding regions. While the quality of human life can now be measured by the preservation of our lands, we should also recognize that economic boom means development and development is really an antonym, in this case, to preservation. We too, like the forest service, must recognize a balance by reducing interface therefore preserving our majestic forests.