Forest Service

The Forest Service's 1999 proposed planning regulations would make ecological sustainability, rather than economic or social sustainability, the agency's top priority, in order to provide a sustainable flow of products, services, and other values from national forests, consistent with laws and regulations guiding their use. Elevating the maintenance or restoration of ecological systems over other uses of the national forests is consistent with agency's evolving mission. This priority has evolved over the years; it is not driven by statute. GAO recommends that the Forest Service work with Congress to reach agreement on the agency's mission priorities. The agency's proposed planning regulations do not require that forest plans be clearly linked to goals, objectives, and strategies. Although the Forest Service agreed with the desired outcome of GAO's earlier recommendations about linking objectives to the strategic plan, it declined to revise its planning regulations, opting instead to revise its system of directives that implement the planning regulations.

GAO noted that: (1) a lack of clear direction on how to resolve conflicts among competing uses on national forest lands has contributed significantly to inefficiency and waste in the Forest Service's development and implementation of forest plans; (2) to address this deficiency, the agency's 1999 proposed planning regulations would make ecological sustainability, rather than economic or social sustainability, the agency's top priority, in order to provide a sustainable flow of products, services, and other values from national forests; (3) elevating the maintenance or restoration of ecological systems over other uses on the national forests is consistent with the agency's evolving mission, which now favors resource protection over production; (4) however, the priority assigned to ecological sustainability is not driven by the statutory authorities specific to the management of the national forests; (5) rather, it has evolved over many years, responding, in part, to the requirements in environmental laws and their implementing regulations and judicial interpretations; (6) as a result, Congress has never explicitly accepted ecological sustainability as the Forest Service's highest priority or acknowledged its effects on the availability of timber, recreation, and other goods and services on the national forests; (7) the Forest Service has made some progress in developing goals, objectives, and strategies that help translate its priorities into on-the-ground projects and activities; (8) the agency is refining its goals and objectives to better focus on outcomes and results to be achieved over time; (9) it is also developing a strategy to reduce the incidence of uncontrollable and often catastrophic wildfires; (10) yet, even though many of these goals, objectives, and strategies are to be implemented through on-the-ground projects and activities governed by individual forest plans, the agency's proposed planning regulations do not require that these forest plans be clearly linked to the goals, objectives, and strategies; (11) in developing and implementing forest plans, national forests have not always: (a) based their decisions on accurate and complete data; (b) adequately involved the public and other government agencies throughout the forest planning process; or (c) lived up to monitoring requirements, particularly those for monitoring the effects of past planning decisions; and (12) this has resulted in legal challenges to the plans and limited the implementation of efforts to expedite the planning process.

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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