Editing Tongass National Forest (section)

===Roadless controversy===
{{Further|Alaska Roadless Rule}}
[[File:Tongass National Forest 3.jpg|thumb|A stream in the forest]]
The most contested logging in the Tongass has involved the [[roadless area conservation|roadless areas]]. Southeast Alaska is an extensive landscape, with communities scattered across the archipelago on different islands, isolated from each other and the mainland road system.  The road system that exists in the region is in place because of the resource extraction history in the region, primarily established by the Forest Service to enable timber harvest.  Once in place, these roads serve to connect local communities and visitors to recreation, hunting, fishing, and subsistence opportunities long into the future. Installing roads in the vast wilderness areas of the Tongass has been opposed by the [[roadless area conservation]] movement, which claims that it would promote [[habitat fragmentation]], diminish wildlife populations and damage salmon spawning streams. They argue that existing roads are sufficient.<ref name="TongassEJ">{{cite web|url=http://earthjustice.org/our_work/cases/2009/tongass-roadless-exemption|title=Tongass Roadless Exemption|work=Earthjustice}}</ref>

The Tongass National Forest was included in the Roadless Initiative passed on 5 January 2001, during the last days of the [[Bill Clinton]] Administration, and the initiative prevented the construction of new roads in roadless areas of United States national forests.

In September 2006, a landmark court decision overturned Bush's repeal of the Roadless Rule, reverting to the 2001 roadless area protections established under president Clinton. The Tongass remained exempt from that ruling. In June 2007, [[United States House of Representatives|U.S. House]] members added an amendment to the appropriations bill to block federally funded road building in Tongass National Forest. Proponents of the amendment said that the federal timber program in Tongass is a dead loss for taxpayers, costing some $30&nbsp;million annually, and noted that the Forest Service faces an estimated $900&nbsp;million road maintenance backlog in the forest. Supporters of the bipartisan amendment included the [[Republicans for Environmental Protection]]. Representative [[Steve Chabot]], an Ohio Republican who sponsored the amendment, said, "I am not opposed to logging when it's done on the timber company's dime… But in this case, they are using the American taxpayer to subsidize these 200 jobs at the tune of $200,000 per job. That just makes no sense."<ref name=ens />

In July 2009, the [[Obama Administration]] approved clearcut logging on {{convert|381|acre|km2}} in the remaining old growth forests of a Tongass National Forest roadless area.<ref>{{cite news| url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/16/obama-administration-appr_n_235311.html | work=Huffington Post | first=Katherine | last=Goldstein | title=Obama Administration Approves First Logging Contract in Alaska's Tongass National Forest | date=16 July 2009}}</ref> The timber sale was permanently stopped by a lawsuit.<ref>Los Angeles Times editorial, 21 December 2009. [https://archive.today/20130616042148/http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-tongass12-2009dec12,0,1738682,print.story Logging illogic].</ref><ref>US District Court, Alaska. 7 December 2009. ''Order and Opinion'' in case 1:09-cv-00003-JWS.</ref>

In March 2011, Judge [[John W. Sedwick|John Sedwick]] from the Anchorage federal district court, in his ruling,<ref name=sedwick>[http://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/Tongassdecision3-4-11.pdf A court order, ruling the Tongass exemption from the Roadless Rule invalid, Judge Sedwick (U.S. Dist. Court, Anchorage), 4 March 2011]</ref> reinstated the Roadless Rule on roadless areas in the Tongass, but with three of the Forest Service's recent timber projects excluded from that ruling "without prejudice." Those projects were Iyouktug Timber Sales ROD (record of decision), Scratchings Timber Sale ROD II, and Kuiu Timber Sale Area ROD.<ref name=sedwick/> The Order concluded in part:

{{blockquote|Because the reasons proffered by the Forest Service in support of the Tongass Exemption were implausible, contrary to the evidence in the record, and contrary to Ninth Circuit precedent, the court concludes that promulgation of the Tongass Exemption was arbitrary and capricious.

<blockquote>With the passage of the Roadless Rule, inventoried roadless areas, 'for better or worse, [were] more committed to pristine wilderness, and less amendable to road development for purposes permitted by the Forest Service.'"<ref>Lockyer, 575 F.3d at 1010 (quoting Kootenai Tribe, 313 F.3d at 1106).</ref></blockquote>

While the Forest Service may reevaluate its approach to roadless area management in the Tongass, it must comply with the requirements of the APA [the federal Administrative Procedures Act] in doing so.<ref name=sedwick/>}}

In October 2019, the [[Environmental policy of the Donald Trump administration|Trump administration]] instructed federal officials to reverse the limits of tree cutting at the request of Alaska's top elected officials, including Senator [[Lisa Murkowski]] and Governor Michael J. Dunleavy. In a statement, Forest Service officials said the new plan would be subject to public comment for 60 days.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/trump-administration-proposes-expanding-logging-in-alaskas-tongass-national-forest/2019/10/15/92e47db8-ef77-11e9-8693-f487e46784aa_story.html|title=Trump administration proposes expanding logging in Alaska's Tongass National Forest |first=Juliet |last=Eilperin|newspaper=The Washington Post|language=en|access-date=2019-10-23}}</ref>

The Forest Service removed most of the Tongass National Forest from roadless area designation in October 2020, allowing road construction and logging in more than 9.3&nbsp;million acres of rainforest.<ref name=":02">{{Cite news|last=Eilperin|first=Juliet|title=Trump to strip protections from Tongass National Forest, one of the biggest intact temperate rainforests|language=en-US|newspaper=Washington Post|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/10/28/trump-tongass-national-forest-alaska/|access-date=2020-10-28|issn=0190-8286}}</ref> Clear-cut lands lose the [[carbon sink]] of [[old-growth forest]], habitat for wildlife, and soil stability, causing landslides.<ref name=":02" />

In June 2021, the [[Joe Biden]] administration revealed its intent to "repeal or replace" Trump's removal of roadless designation. According to Matt Herrick, spokesman for the [[United States Department of Agriculture]] (USDA) under Biden, "We [the USDA] recognize the vital role the forest and its inventoried roadless areas play in communities, and in the economy and culture of southeast Alaska, as well as for [[climate resilience]]." The Biden administration planned to formally publish its intent to revise the Trump-era rule by August 2021, with details of the plan being finalized in the following two years. In November 2021, the administration officially published a rule to restore roadless protections in the Tongass National Forest;<ref>{{cite web |last1=Davenport |title=Biden Plans to Restore Alaskan Forest Protections Stripped Under Trump |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/11/climate/tongass-biden-climate.html |website=The New York Times |access-date=12 June 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Eilperin |first1=Juliet |title=Biden officials to propose road ban on much of Alaska's Tongass National Forest |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/11/18/tongass-national-forest-roadless-rule/ |newspaper=The Washington Post |access-date=30 December 2021}}</ref> The rule took effect in January 2023, restoring the 2001 roadless rule.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Friedman |first=Lisa |date=2023-01-25 |title=Biden Bans Roads and Logging in Alaska's Tongass National Forest |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/25/climate/alaska-tongass-national-forest.html |access-date=2023-01-26 |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>