WildEarth Guardians

Friday, October 7, 2005
Red Tape Hits Yule Tree Plan

The Forest Service is using the spirit of Christmas, which is about giving, to steal our democracy
Contact: Helen Gaussoin Albuquerque Journal

There's no Tannenbaum turmoil or Christmas tree crisis yet, the U.S.Forest Service said Thursday.

Forest Service officials maintain they can still meet the schedule forcutting down a New Mexico tree picked for the U.S. Capitol's holidaydisplay in Washington, D.C., this year- despite a recent federal courtruling they say requires a monthlong comment period before the single bigtree can be felled.

Earlier this week, U.S. Sens. Pete Domenici and Jeff Bingaman issued apress release urging the Forest Service to press forward with harvestingthe 80-foot spruce from the Santa Fe National Forest, despite the courtruling.

A California federal district court recently ruled against a new ForestService policy to allow certain projects to move ahead withoutenvironmental review and public comment or appeals.

Gilbert Zepeda, the Santa Fe forest supervisor, said the rulingrequired the district to publish a notice for a 30-day public commentperiod before the New Mexico spruce can be cut. But he said the commentperiod would end before the Nov. 7 scheduled cutting of the tree.

He said only significant objections could stop the project, but "younever know what might come up."

Sue Probart, executive director of Tree New Mexico, the nonprofitconservation group handling donations and helping to organize the CapitolHoliday Tree project, said she has been assured by the Forest Service thatthe holiday project, which includes thousands of child-made decorations anda tour of the state, is on schedule.

"The Forest Service is totally confident we will stay on schedule," shesaid.

She said the ruling will have "no meaningful effect that I canperceive" on the Capitol holiday tree project.

Forest Service officials have come up with a "plan B," Probart said, incase objections are raised during the comment period. But Dolores Maese, aForest Service spokesman, said later there is in fact no alternative plan,for now. "We've talked about a plan B, but we don't have one," she said.

Environmentalists "are most concerned with appropriate roads- do wehave to cut new roads or do we have to largely disturb the area? The answerto both those questions is no," Probart said. "There will be a holiday treeto be lit at the Capitol."

Likening the delay of the tree to the "grinch who stole Christmas" andsuggesting the Forest Service was seeing "impediments" that didn't exist,Domenici, R-N.M., and Bingaman, D-N.M., said they sent a letter to the U.S.Attorney General and the Agriculture secretary asking them to "addressconcerns regarding the procurement of this year's Capitol Holiday Tree."

Bryan Bird of the WildEarth Guardians, the Santa Fe-based environmentalgroup, said the Forest Service is using scare tactics to generate supportfor its "categorical exclusion" policy, which would allow the agency topursue a project without public comment when the project isn't subject tostudy under the National Environmental Policy Act.

"They want to create a train wreck. They want attention from Congresson this issue," he said.

"The Forest Service is using the spirit of Christmas, which is aboutgiving, to steal our democracy," Bird said.

Zepeda said his understanding of the court ruling requires the publicnotice for the tree-cutting.

"From what we understand, the judge's ruling was very clear. Allcategorical exclusions were subject to notice and comment," he said.

Notice of the comment period was published in Monday's Journal.

The Forest Service "proposes to harvest a single Englemann spruce tree,approximately 60-80 feet in height along an existing open Forest systemroad," the notice says.

The Forest Service will not disclose the location of the tree selectedby the U.S. Capitol landscape architect for fear of vandalism.

The tree is scheduled to travel throughout New Mexico in Novemberbefore being transported to Washington for the lighting ceremony at theCapitol on Dec. 8.