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Dear Friend,
The Trump administration is attempting to eliminate the Roadless Rule, which is one of the best tools we have for protecting irreplaceable undeveloped areas in our vital National Forest System. Americans who have overwhelmingly supported the rule for over 25 years now have only a few more days to tell the administration NOT to eliminate this policy that conserves our nation's natural heritage for future generations. Roadless areas protect vital watersheds, provide important wildlife habitat, and create hiking, fishing, hunting, and other recreational opportunities on about 45 million acres of public land.
The administration's intent is simple: Open these special places in our national forests to industrial extraction for their cronies' private profit. We need your help to oppose this travesty, which is compounded by the administration's many other efforts to strip protections from public lands, wildlife, water, and air. Thanks to the overwhelming response, the Forest Service extended the comment period until October 6.
Please submit a unique public comment about why you oppose eliminating the Roadless Rule here by October 6. The most effective comments show how you've enjoyed roadless areas and/or why they are important to you. Here is a great guide.
Logging, fracking, and mining are destructive enough, but roads come with long-lasting harms like fragmenting wildlife habitat, degrading watersheds, increasing pollution, spreading invasive species, and worsening wildfire risk. The National Forest System is the largest municipal water supply source in the U.S., and eliminating the Roadless Rule would place our most vital resource at unnecessary risk. The Forest Service is already billions of dollars behind on necessary repairs for its road network—already twice the mileage of the U.S. highway system. Adding more roads at taxpayer expense primarily for private profit would be unwise at best.
Conservation, outdoor recreation, hunting, fishing, Tribal, wildland firefighter, and other groups are all uniting to generate 1 million comments by October 6. Please help us reach that goal—which combined with a previous round of comments would match the 1.6 million (overwhelmingly supportive) comments when the rule was created in 2001—by submitting your comment today. Here again is a useful guide.
You may already use roadless areas in our national forests. Check out this map from the Outdoor Alliance to identify roadless areas near and dear to you. Eliminating this rule would reduce protections for national forests on:
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2 million acres in Washington
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2 million acres in Oregon
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14.7 million acres in Alaska
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6.4 million acres in Montana
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4.4 million acres in California
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1.2 million acres in Arizona
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3.1 million acres in Nevada
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4 million acres in Utah
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3.3 million acres in Wyoming
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1.6 million acres in New Mexico
Roadless areas in our national forests are not disposable. Many are mature or old-growth forests—irreplaceable ecosystems that protect plant and animal diversity, clean drinking water, clean air, cultural sites, and more. Logging, mining, road-building, and drilling for fossil fuels in these areas would assault our life support system. Please take action to support this crucial national forest protection, and share this email with your friends and loved ones.
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