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 DENVER  — The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s threatens wildlife, clean water, Indigenous communities, hunting, angling, and other outdoor recreation across nearly 60 million acres of national forests across the country. The Roadless Rule has been an effective conservation policy that limits road-building in intact forests that have largely been undisturbed by development. The Agriculture Department has begun the formal rulemaking process with an unreasonably short comment period that prevents the full, prior, and informed consent of Tribes and that severely limits public participation. 

“The 2001 Roadless Rule has prevented fragmentation of wildlife habitat, safeguarded clean water, and protected important Indigenous sites. The rule also facilitates world class hunting, angling, and other outdoor recreation pursuits that support rural economies,” said David Willms, associate vice president for public lands at the National Wildlife Federation. “There are some ways that the Roadless Rule could be improved, but the wholesale repeal of this key conservation tool goes against the best available science and overwhelming public opinion.”

“Robust consultation and meaningful input from Tribes and Tribal stakeholders is not only the law, but essential to achieving a just and equitable roadless policy. Tribal treaty rights must be centered and upheld in any revision of the 2001 Roadless Rule,” said Gloria Tom, senior strategic and special policy advisor at the National Wildlife Federation. “The current roadless policy protects important Indigenous sites, while allowing Tribes access for traditional food gathering, conducting religious practices, and other cultural practices. It is essential those provisions remain in place.”

“Across Southeast Alaska, we see the irreparable damage from so many decades of unsustainable clear-cut logging in the scarred landscapes and decimated fish and wildlife habitats — we cannot and will not go back to that, and we know that’s what public comment will show once again,” said Maggie Rabb, Executive Director of the . “Rescission of the Roadless Rule on the Tongass provides economic benefit to one exceedingly small sector of Alaska’s economy at the expense of thriving industries like tourism and fishing, not to mention the immeasurable impacts on Southeast Alaska communities who rely on the Tongass for so much more than a paycheck.”