Borrowing a page from history and one of the most popular New Deal programs, The Legacy Roads Restoration Initiative today proposed a program to create a $500 million Forest Watershed Restoration Corps within the National Forest Service.
The Corps could be funded as part of the Economic Stimulus Package currently being planned by Congress and President-Elect Obama’s Transition Team and would restore ecologically damaged forest watersheds while creating 3,500 high-skill, family-wage jobs per year in rural communities.
The funding would be invested in the Forest Service’s Legacy Roads and Trails Remediation Initiative–a program first funded in 2008 to protect and restore clean drinking water, fisheries and aquatic habitat by reclaiming unneeded roads, restoring fish passage, and performing critical maintenance on needed Forest Service roads.
The proposal was announced in conjunction with an oversight hearing on green jobs and economic stimulus in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this morning. Nearly 100 individuals and organizations from around the country, including retired Forest Service officials, labor unions, and conservationists, have endorsed the program.
"This year, with the onset of the recession and job losses skyrocketing, the coalition saw an opportunity to tackle two problems with one solution," said Wildlands CPR Executive Director Bethanie Walder. "President-elect Obama’s economic stimulus package is not only a chance to create high-skill green- collar jobs with long-term economic benefits, it will also protect valuable resources–our forest watersheds and fisheries–from degrading."
The jobs proposed for the Forest Watershed Restoration Corps would go to local workers in rural, resource-dependent communities.
According to the Forest Service, more than 60 million Americans, in 3400 communities, get their drinking water from Forest Service watersheds.
"The first, and most important, step towards protecting clean drinking water, productive fisheries and critical wildlife habitat is to take care of the crumbling road system," said Emily Platt, Gifford Pinchot Task Force Executive Director. "National forests in Washington alone have a $300 million backlog just to meet minimum clean water standards."
One of the main obstacles to accomplishing the road decommissioning work has been a lack of funding for the needed studies and planning.
"Eight years ago the Forest Service determined that it’s road network was nearly twice as large as it needed to be, and that they should decommission up to 186,000 miles of roads by 2040," said Walder. "Here we are, nearly a decade later, and they’ve barely begun the needed planning and restoration work."
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