[Federal Register Volume 60, Number 151 (Monday, August 7, 1995)]
[Notices]
[Pages 40154-40155]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 95-19378]



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DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

Augusta Timber Sale, Willamette National Forest, Lane County, 
Oregon

AGENCY: Forest Service, USDA.

ACTION: Notice; intent to prepare environmental impact statement.

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SUMMARY: The Forest Service will prepare an environmental impact 
statement on a proposal to harvest trees and build roads in the Augusta 
drainage of the Blue River Ranger District. Approximately 200 acres of 
trees will be harvested and approximately 0.5 miles of road will be 
constructed. The proposal results from an extensive landscape design 
and watershed analysis conducted in the Augusta area. The dominant 
theme for that design was to base landscape and watershed objectives, 
designs, and prescriptions on an interpreted range of ``natural'' 
variability of disturbance processes.

DATES: Comments concerning the scope of the analysis should be received 
in writing by September 10, 1995.

ADDRESSES: Send written comments to Lynn Burditt, District Ranger, Blue 
River Range Station, P.O. Box 199, Blue River, Oregon, 97413.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
Karen Geary, Resource Planning Assistant, (503) 822-3317.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The Augusta Creek timber sale proposal is 
one result of the Augusta Creek Project, a natural disturbance-based 
landscape ``design'' for a managed forest. The landscape design was 
projected for 200 years into the future using 20 year time steps. This 
specific timber sale proposal includes writing prescriptions for the 
nine blocks that would be in early seral conditions at the end of the 
first 20-year time step. This will result in harvesting approximately 
200 acres of trees in the first timber sale entry and building 
approximately 0.5 miles of roads to access the trees. The nine blocks 
are located in T19S, R5E, Section 1; T19S, R51/2E, Sections 9 and 16; 
T18S, R5E, Sections 35 and 36; T18S, R51/2E, Sections 31, 32, and 33 
(Lat 43 deg.56'00'', Long 122 deg.7'30'').
    Detailed ground review and alternative development will be 
concentrated on these nine landscape blocks. Decisions will include 
identification of the timing and location of timber harvests, 
silvicultural prescriptions, levels of green and dead tree retention, 
and the spatial patterns of retention trees.
    The Augusta Creek Landscape Design Project was initiated to 
establish and integrate landscape and watershed objectives into a 
landscape design to guide management activities within a 19,000 acre 
planning area in western Oregon. The objectives were to maintain native 
species, ecosystem processes and structures, and long-term ecosystem 
productivity in a Federally owned and managed landscape with 
substantial acreage allocated to timber harvest. A dominant theme has 
been to base landscape and watershed objectives, designs, and 
prescriptions on an interpreted range of ``natural'' variability of 
disturbance processes. A fire history study characterized fire patterns 
and regimes over the last 500 years. Changes in the existing and 
surrounding landscape due to past intensive human uses were also 
factored into the landscape design. Landscape prescriptions include a 
small-watershed based aquatic reserve system and major valley bottom 
corridor reserves. Where timber harvest is allocated, four landscape 
management areas prescribe varying rotation ages (100-300 years), green 
tree retention levels (15-50%), and spatial patterns as derived from 
interpretations of fire regimes. These prescriptions were linked to 
specific blocks of land, which provides an efficient transition to 
site-level planning and project implementation.
    The EIS will tier to the Willamette National Forest Land and 
Resource Management Plan (1990) as amended by the Record of Decision 
and Standards and Guidelines for Management of Habitat For Late 
Successional and Old-Growth Forest Related Species within the Range of 
the Northern Spotted Owl (1994).
    Scoping will include public meetings and potentially visits to the 
site. The first public meeting is scheduled for August 3, 1995 and will 
be held at the Lane Transit District office in Eugene, Oregon. 
Additional public meetings will be held in August and September.
    Preliminary scoping identified a few issues. One of the issues is 
the location of some of the units and possible road construction in the 
Chucksney inventoried roadless area. This is the reason the Forest 
Service is preparing an EIS. Other issues identified at this point 
include water quality in Augusta Creek 

[[Page 40155]]
and in the South Fork of the McKenzie River and the Wild and Scenic 
Study River values of the South Fork McKenzie river.
    The lead agency for this proposal is the Forest Service. The 
responsible official is Lynn Burditt, District Ranger. The Forest 
Service invites your comments or ideas on this proposal and asks that 
they please be sent in writing to the above address.
    The draft EIS is expected to be filed with the Environmental 
Protection Agency (EPA) and to be available for public review by 
October 1995. The comment period on the draft environmental impact 
statement will be 45 days from the date the Environmental Protection 
Agency publishes the notice of availability in the Federal Register.
    The Forest Service believes it is important to give reviewers 
notice at this early stage of several court rulings related to public 
participation in the environmental review process. First, reviewers of 
draft environmental impact statements must structure their 
participation in the environmental review of the proposal so that it is 
meaningful and alerts an agency to the reviewer's position and 
contentions. Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. versus NRDC, 435 U.S. 
519, 553 (1978). Also, environmental objections that could be raised at 
the draft environmental impact statement stage but that are not raised 
until after completion of the final environmental impact statement may 
be waived or dismissed by the courts. City of Angoon versus Hodel, 803 
f. 2d 1016, 1022 (9th Cir. 1986) and Wisconsin Heritages, Inc. versus 
Harris, 490 F. Supp. 1334, 1338 (E.D. Wis. 1980). Because of these 
court rulings, it is very important that those interested in this 
proposed action participate by the close of the 45-day comment period 
so that substantive comments and objections are made available to the 
Forest Service at a time when it can meaningfully consider them and 
respond to them in the final environmental impact statement.
    To assist the Forest Service in identifying and considering issues 
and concerns on the proposed action, comments on the draft 
environmental impact statement should be as specific as possible. It is 
also helpful if comments refer to specific pages or chapters of the 
draft statement. Comments may also address the adequacy of the draft 
environmental impact statement or the merits of the alternatives 
formulated and discussed in the statement. (Reviewers may wish to refer 
to the Council on Environmental Quality Regulations for implementing 
the procedural provisions of the National Environmental Policy Act at 
40 CFR 1503.3 in addressing these points.)
    The final EIS is scheduled to be completed by December 1995. In the 
final EIS, the Forest Service is required to respond to comments and 
responses received during the comment period that pertain to the 
environmental consequences discussed in the draft EIS and applicable 
laws, regulations, and policies considered in making the decision and 
rationale for the decisions in the Record of Decision. That decision 
will be subject to Forest Service Appeal Regulations (36 CFR 217).

    Dated: July 27, 1995.
Marsha Scutvick,
Acting Forest Supervisor.
[FR Doc. 95-19378 Filed 8-4-95; 8:45 am]
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