Anita Burroughs was never one for the outdoors growing up — until she moved into the heart of the White Mountains with her hiking-bound husband some 30 years ago.
Together, with time and lots of hard work, they climbed every 4,000-footer in New Hampshire. When Burroughs, a Democratic state representative, heard that parts of the undisturbed wilderness they enjoyed together could be threatened, she worried.
The Clinton-era “Roadless Area Conservation Rule” prevents road construction and timber harvesting on nearly 60 million acres of land in the United States, including 235,000 acres of the White Mountain National Forest.
The Trump administration is moving to rescind the rule, saying that it restricts 30% of the National Forest System from being properly managed for fire risk and timber production and that it hurts economic development in rural areas.
The threat of repeal has worried advocates and residents like the Burroughs.
“This is what makes New Hampshire great,” she said. “This is such an important part of so many people’s lives. I mean, it was just really startling to me.”
More than 400 public hearings were held across the country leading up to the Roadless Rule’s adoption, providing overwhelming support. Jerry Curran, public lands committee chair at the New Hampshire Sierra Club, said the organization has started to facilitate similar conversations to keep the rule in place.
Curran said New Hampshire’s first hearing at the Conway public library had an unexpectedly high turnout.
“I have never worked on an issue that resonated with the public like this one does,” he said. “We were just amazed that 100 people would show up on a Monday night to learn about what could happen with the Roadless Rule and what could happen in the National Forest.”
Roadless areas foster habitats for wildlife, promote recreational activity and prevent overlogging and disruptions to natural landscapes, Curran said.
Zack Porter, executive director of Vermont-based advocacy organization Standing Trees, which unsuccessfully sued the U.S. Forest Service in an attempt to block logging in the White Mountains, called the Roadless Rule a “foundational shift” in the agency’s management of public lands.
Roadless areas provide significant water quality benefits for millions of Americans. They make up over 70% of the 914 national forest watersheds, half of which act as drinking water sources, according to a 2011 Soil and Water Conservation Society study.
Road building disrupts aquatic ecosystems, changes stream structure and interrupts physical landscapes that could lead to greater flooding, the study notes. Porter said the Merrimack River has experienced a host of problems, from stormwater runoff to bacterial pollutants, but it is helped by the fact that it is partly sourced from the White Mountains.
“If you were to increase logging in these roadless areas in the headwaters, we would have even worse water quality problems than we do right now,” he said. “That would be a disaster for a river like the Merrimack that has enough other problems to deal with.”
Repealing the rule may not be a total loss for local forests. Many forests in New Hampshire are helped by active forest management, where experts intervene in certain areas to create variability in landscapes, grow quality wood or make suitable habitats for a wider range of species.
Jasen Stock, the executive director of the New Hampshire Timberland Owners Association, said his organization opposed the Roadless Rule because it makes intervention impractical.
“We as the broader community already determined that these are areas where we want to see active management, and these are areas where we want to see developed recreation,” Stock said. “The Roadless Rule kind of tosses that out and says, ‘No, this is a new standard.’ In these new areas, as defined by roadless, you’re going to be restricted in terms of what you can do, particularly when it comes to wildlife and forest management activities. That’s a problem.”
The Association works to promote better forest management and ensure a strong wood products industry, according to its website. Only a small percentage of logging activity comes from the White Mountains, with most of New Hampshire’s annual timber production occuring on private land.
Stock said there are laws in place — such as the National Forest Management Act and the National Environmental Protection Act — that ensure an in-depth planning and discussion process happens before any logging or forest management projects take place.
“The planning process will always be in place and have integrity,” he said. “I have no concern that, if the Roadless Rule gets repealed, there’s going to be a problem.”
Burroughs co-sponsored House Resolution 44, a statement from the House of Representatives that opposes the Roadless Rule’s rollback, which passed by a voice vote in March. In Congress, both the House and Senate are evaluating bills to codify the Roadless Rule in statute.
While Burroughs said the resolution “doesn’t really have teeth” in terms of enforcable legislation, she believes it will still send a message to the federal administration.
“I think that [the House] really became aware of how dangerous this was and we really appreciated their support,” she said.
Curran said the Sierra Club is holding another public hearing in Hanover on May 16 and will eventually hold a Zoom call accessible to all residents of New England. The Forest Service is developing a draft environmental impact statement that will trigger a public comment period once released.
“These roadless areas, they’re some of the last intact wild forests we have that protect clean drinking water provide critical wildlife habitat and offer unmatched opportunities to hunt fish, hike and camp,” Curran said.
