Tongass National Forest

Contractual Modification Requirements of the Tongass Timber Reform Act Gao ID: RCED-91-133 March 28, 1991

Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO reviewed the Department of Agriculture's compliance with the Tongass Timber Reform Act, focusing on the implementation of modifications to two long-term timber sale contracts to eliminate the contractors' competitive advantage over independent short-term contractors.

GAO found that: (1) the Forest Service made extensive revisions to the two long-term timber sale contracts, generally by adopting and modifying provisions from independent short-term timber sale contracts to meet the act's requirements; (2) all modifications to the long-term contracts, except purchaser road credits, complied with the act's requirements; and (3) the modifications did not specify how the Service would perform environmental assessments or how large an area they would cover. GAO believes that: (1) although the contract modifications did not specify exactly how the Service would implement them, the modifications will require extensive additional effort on the part of the Service; and (2) the manner in which the Service implements the modifications will determine its compliance with the act's requirements.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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