Oregon Public Broadcasting

A year after the federal Department of Interior dropped a controversial logging plan for forests in southern Oregon, there’s still no word on what a potential replacement plan will look like.

The Obama Administration dropped the Western Oregon Plan Revision, or WOPR, because officials feared it wouldn’t survive a court challenge.

The Interior Department created a task force to chart a new course. So far, the task force has given no hint of which way it’s leaning – and has only released the names of some of the people interviewed.

Several sources have told OPB that the task force report is done, but hasn’t been released because top Interior officials have been distracted by the BP oil spill.

Tom Partin is with the timber industry group, American Forest Resouce Council. He says the year of delay has been costly.

Tom Partin: “It’s impacted the forests, it’s impacted our local communities, and it’s impacted our industry and we need some help. In fact, I think we need as much help as the Gulf Coast people do.”  

The Bureau of Land Management says in the absence of the WOPR, loggers will cut less than half of timber this year than they would have.