Keep on cutting

by Dustin Solberg

OREGON


Keep on cutting


By a margin of 878,000 to 208,000, voters defeated a ban on clear-cutting forests on public and private lands in Oregon. Popular Gov. John Kitzhaber spoke out against the ban, and mainstream groups such as Oregon Trout Unlimited refused to support the measure's backer, Oregonians for Labor Intensive Forest Economics. Opposition was led by the timber industry's Healthy Forest Alliance.





"The voters were very clear. The initiative process is not the place to write forest management rules," says Bill Wynkoop of the Healthy Forest Alliance in Lane County. "It's too complex."


Oregonians did approve Measure 66, by a margin of 723,000 to 355,000, which allows the state to spend some lottery funds on parks and the protection of wildlife habitat and beaches.





" Dustin Solberg


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