United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office Resources, Community, and Economic Development Division author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 2000-02-15 monographic deposited born digital 57 p. GA 1.13:RCED-00-56 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56 P0b002ee180381af4 f:rc00056 DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-28 GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56 machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56 RCED-00-56 Data collection National forests Forest management Environmental policies Strategic planning Environmental monitoring Pacific Northwest Forest Plan Interior Columbia Basin Ecosystem Management Project Forest Service Great Lakes Ecological Assessment Michigan Wisconsin Minnesota Letter Report RCED Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Forest Service's ecosystem planning efforts, including the Great Lakes Ecological Assessment, focusing on the: (1) views of the Forest Service, other federal agencies, and GAO on key elements that broad-scale ecosystem based assessments should contain to maximize their value to the forest planning process; (2) extent to which the Forest Service has incorporated these elements into the Great Lakes Ecological Assessment and whether it has integrated the assessment into the forest planning process; and (3) extent to which the Forest Service's proposed planning regulations ensure that future broad-scale assessments contain these elements and are integrated into the forest planning process.<p/>GAO noted that: (1) in recent years, the Forest Service, others, and GAO have concluded that assessments should have certain key elements or characteristics to maximize their value in addressing issues that extend beyond the boundaries of national forests; (2) Forest Service officials in charge of assessments should make clear to Congress, the public, and their staff what the objectives of the assessment are and what its products will be, as well as who will be responsible for delivering the products, at what time, and at what cost; (3) if the agency does not conduct assessments at all or does not ensure that they contain these and other elements, it increases the risk that the planning process will continue to be costly, time-consuming, and less than fully effective; (4) in conducting the Great Lakes Ecological Assessment, the Forest Service has adopted some of these key elements and characteristics; (5) however, regional and forest officials have not viewed the assessment as a priority and have thus not provided the leadership, guidance, and funding necessary to successfully complete it in a timely manner; (6) in GAO's opinion, the Forest Service has not effectively integrated the assessment into its process for revising forest plans in the Lake States; (7) as a result, GAO believes that the agency risks repeating the inefficiency and waste of resources that occurred during the first round of forest planning, when it did not adequately address broad-scale issues and individual national forests independently attempted to gather and analyze data; (8) moreover, without the benefit of the assessment's analysis and conclusions on the range of ecologically viable and legally sufficient alternatives, the agency is more likely to find that the public will: (a) challenge the revised forest plans, causing the agency to delay, amend, or withdraw them; and (b) become frustrated with the planning process if the management alternatives it helped develop do not prove to be ecologically viable or legally sufficient; and (9) the Forest Service's proposed planning regulations also incorporate some of the key elements that are important to broad-scale ecosystem-based assessments, but they could be strengthened to ensure that future assessments have these elements and are better integrated into the forest planning process. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56/html/GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56/pdf/GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56.pdf GAO/RCED-00-56 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-RCED-00-56 Letter Report GAO/RCED-00-56; Forest Service Planning: Better Integration of Broad-Scale Assessments Into Forest Plans Is Needed; Data collection National forests Forest management Environmental policies Strategic planning Environmental monitoring Pacific Northwest Forest Plan Interior Columbia Basin Ecosystem Management Project Forest Service Great Lakes Ecological Assessment Michigan Wisconsin Minnesota