These days I have to drive to hike, but as a young adult I lived in Sitka where I had the joy of exploring the Tongass National Forest at my doorstep. What a place! Unspoiled for more than a hundred years, this is what a true forest looks like. The lack of clear cuts in Sitka was a revelation to me. It was much harder to find intact forest in the Washington state of my youth.<\/p>\n
My years of enjoying the forests of Sitka, however, coincided with a time of conflict over the then newly released Roadless Rule. This critical rule limits costly and environmentally-damaging road building and logging in unroaded areas of national forests. It protects taxpayers from expensive road projects and preserves wildlands with high conservation value across our nation.<\/p>\n
Thankfully, record-breaking public outcry helped to successfully block President George W. Bush’s efforts to rollback these critical roadless protections just days after they were finalized.<\/p>\n
[Opinion: Lift the Roadless Rule for the Tongass]<\/a><\/ins><\/p>\n In the two decades since then, the Roadless Rule has protected approximately 58.5 million acres of our national forests. Despite this success, it is under attack again. I was one of the many who spoke out for the Roadless Rule at its inception, and I’m standing up for it now — for Sitka and all of us.<\/p>\n Sitka, like many other parts of Southeast Alaska, is a place people dream of visiting — and for good reason. There were days in the high season when the throng of tourists from cruise ships clogged downtown Sitka. I endured it by imagining the older visitors were great aunties and uncles and with the realization that those visitors are also the economic backbone of the region. Twenty-six percent of jobs in Southeast are in tourism. What do tourists come to see? Our majestic forest. No one wants to visit a clear cut or other devastated area.<\/p>\n