Trump Administration Shuts Public Out of National Forest Projects, Wildlife Killings

WASHINGTON - The Trump administration today finalized rules to fast-track approval of logging, mining, drilling, road building and other projects in America's national forests by eliminating decades-old public participation requirements for environmental reviews.

The new U.S. Department of Agriculture rules also ax public notice and comment on federal bird flu responses and wildlife-killing activities.

"For decades, administrations from both parties have sought input from the public on the policies that affect all of us, and the outcome has been better policies," said Nat Shoaff, senior attorney at Sierra Club. "The Trump administration has decided the only input that matters is its own, and the outcome has been fast-tracked logging, mining, oil and gas, and other industrial projects. This is a serious threat to our environment and clean energy and spits in the face of decades of legal precedent and democratic tradition."

Environmental reviews required under the National Environmental Policy Act - one of the nation's bedrock environmental laws - are often the only way people can get information and provide input on the thousands of projects proposed each year on public lands.

"Information is power. Our voices are power. And the Trump administration is trying to strip both away so corporations can make a quick buck off our public lands," said Wendy Park, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. "We're not going to stand by while Trump officials rubberstamp destructive projects that'll devastate our forests, contaminate our water and harm nearby communities."

Earlier this year the Center for Biological Diversity and Sierra Club challenged the same fast-track rules in a federal lawsuit arguing the Department of Agriculture failed to seek public comment before they went into effect. The rules were initially introduced as supposedly interim measures last year.

A recent study found that public comments help agencies gather information and can influence agency decisions, including promoting measures to reduce environmental damage.

Today's rulemaking rejects more than 150,000 public comments opposing the changes, including comments from the attorneys general of 17 states, as well as Harris County, Texas, and San Miguel County, Colorado - where 60% of the land is federally owned - and many Tribal governments.

Numerous comments said the new procedures make it nearly impossible for the public to learn about proposed industrial development on public lands, flag environmental concerns the agency has overlooked, and have a say in how air, water, wildlife and national forests are protected.

For example, most development proposals within the 193 million-acre national forest system will no longer be publicly announced until after they are approved. Some - including projects to log more than 2,000 acres - may never be disclosed under the administration's new fast-track procedures.

The new rules also eliminate public participation in decisions related to the department's wildlife killing activities through its Wildlife Services program, which kills more than 400,000 native animals each year, including coyotes, bears, beavers, wolves and mountain lions. The changes eviscerate already limited public involvement and transparency in the federal government's responses to major disease outbreaks in factory farms , including the USDA's billion-dollar bird flu response .

The National Environmental Policy Act was designed to require the federal government to consider environmental harms before approving projects and to include the public in that process. The 1970 law has been under threat since President Trump's first day in office, when he issued an executive order directing the Council on Environmental Quality to coordinate a governmentwide rollback of NEPA regulations.