Plan to sell forest for rural schools draws criticism

WASHINGTON — A Bush administration plan to sell more than 300,000 acres of national forest to help pay for rural schools contains a disproportionate amount of land in the South and Midwest — while primarily benefiting schools in three West Coast states, a new analysis shows.

Nearly 60,000 acres in 13 Southern states and another 50,000 acres in 10 Midwestern states would be sold under the plan, while just 18,000 acres in forest-rich Oregon and Washington would be sold, according to an analysis by the Southern Environmental Law Center.

Southern states received $37 million for rural schools this year under the program the sales are intended to benefit, while the Midwest received $41 million, the analysis shows. Oregon and Washington got five times those amounts — $210 million, with Oregon alone receiving nearly $162 million.

About 80,000 acres in California would be sold; the state received nearly $69 million from the Forest Service this year.

In Utah, about 5,998 acres would be sold in counties such as Cache and Weber. And while supporters argue the parcels will be small and insignificant, the Sierra Club and other environmental groups maintain the proposal is a wrong use of public resources.

David Carr, public lands director for the nonprofit law center, called the regional disparity unfair, and said the land sale would set a dangerous precedent.

"Selling off America's natural heritage is not the way to fund government services," Carr said. "We need to be adding to the public-land base in the South, not holding a bake sale on bits and pieces of our limited national forests for short-term budget needs."

Sen. Jim Talent, R-Mo., also questioned the proposal, saying there was no guarantee that money generated by the sales would stay within Missouri.

"We need to see more of the benefit of this proposal than we are now seeing," Talent told Bush administration officials at a Senate hearing last week.

Under the Bush plan, 21,566 acres in Missouri's Mark Twain National Forest would be sold, with proceeds going to a general fund. The sell-off would be one of the biggest in the country, while Missouri's share of the school-funding is among the lowest at $2.7 million.

"Our schools need the money," Talent said.

Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, who directs U.S. forest policy, acknowledged the disparity, but said the law was devised to help those rural counties hurt by logging cutbacks on federal lands. Parcels proposed for sale are isolated, difficult or expensive to manage, or no longer meet Forest Service needs, Rey said.