Oregon Public Broadcasting

The Obama Administration announced Wednesday it will move forward promptly on 62 new timber sales on Oregon forests.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says these new timber sales will buy time to develop a long-term plan for logging on Northwest forests.

From Bend, Ethan Lindsey reports.

The redone plan for Oregon’s federal forest land is a long-time coming.

The same rules have been in place since the early years of the Clinton Administration.

And those rules backlogged timber on millions of acres.

In July, Secretary Salazar withdrew the Bush Administration’s revision, calling it legally flawed.

Now, Salazar says the federal government has moved forward on 62 timber sales holding 200 million board feet of lumber – sales that are consistent with the Clinton-era’s environmental rules.

Ken Salazar: “We have been swiftly identifying timber sales that can get wood to the mills, so that we can protect jobs and vital timber infrastructure.”

Environmental groups like Oregon Wild say they are "okay" with the short-term timber sales, but they’re watching to see if any are clear-cuts or in old-growth.