The Rise of Multiple-Use Management in the Intermountain West: A History of Region 4 of the Forest Service

The years from the creation of the first forest reserves in the Intermountain Region in 1891 to the delivery of the forest plans in 1985 have seen an enormous change in emphasis. Initially custodians primarily concerned about protecting what were perceived as deteriorating timber stands and watersheds, the forest officers gradually became stewards managing a broad array of lands and resources for which they had increasingly to adjudicate conflicting interests. Once horseback rangers, Forest Service employees now constitute a complex and sophisticated group of line officers and specialists who must work together to balance clashing demands.

It is important to recognize that the present-day employees of Region 4 face current problems with a background of some substantial successes by their predecessors in the management of public resources. From the beginning, the regional officers recognized the control of livestock ranges, the protection of watersheds, and the effective management of forests as their principal responsibilities and problems. In the 40 years since World War II, the region has largely solved the first of these three problems and has achieved considerable success in dealing with the second. Under current conditions, however, the third problem, despite progress, seems beyond solution even for a "can-do" outfit like the Intermountain Region.

With a few relatively minor exceptions, Region 4 generally has achieved successful management of its range lands. Some problems persist on the Manti-LaSal and the Fishlake, but, given the magnitude of the grazing problems the region faced from the very beginning, by any measure the relatively effective management of the ranges today must be seen as a major success. From the 1890's through the early 1960's, range management was the most serious problem the region faced. The combination of effective researchers led by J.R. "Joe" Pechanec of the Intermountain Station along with a host of dedicated Region 4 land managers brought most ranges under good management by the early 1970's.

The same combination of research and management has provided relatively effective protection for the region's watersheds. No longer do we hear of extensive devastation of areas of Region 4 by summer mud-rock floods, for instance. The work by Reed Bailey, A.R. "Bus" Croft, and their associates at the Davis County Experimental Watershed and elsewhere must receive a great deal of the credit. The land managers of the region and the national forests must be credited for their ability to take the research findings and recommendations and implement them through such measures as watershed acquisitions, contour trenching, and revegetation. The major remaining unsolved aspect of the watershed problem is the wet-mantle and frozen-mantle floods that so devastated some parts of the region during the past few winters.

Although Region 4 has made some significant inroads on forest management in particular areas, the third problem is nowhere near solution. Except on portions of the national forests of western Idaho, the region is a long way from achieving the ideal of sustained-yield forestry. Nevertheless, the region has made some substantial headway in timber management. Regional employees have cooperated with the timber industry in inaugurating successful methods of timber harvesting that can be carried on without inordinate watershed damage. The region's problems of planting and growing healthy timber essentially have been solved. The continuing inadequate demand for old-growth timber, however, in many parts of the region, means that large blocks of deteriorating and insect-killed timber will remain a problem for the foreseeable future. At the same time, the region faces the challenge of balancing the demands to harvest such dead or deteriorating stands with the increasing criticism of below-cost salvage sales and the strong opposition from those who want such stands left alone.

However, the Intermountain Region's most serious and persistent problem for the future appears to be none of the three perceived initially as difficult, yet it is related to all of them and to others. This overriding difficulty derives from an increasingly large number of conflicting perceptions—both public and internal—as to what the Forest Service ought to do with the lands and resources under its stewardship. This has been made abundantly evident in the Tixier Committee report, in the many news stories dealing with the forest plans, and in numerous popular articles and books on the operation of the national forests. The basic problem is that, as the Forest Service has committed itself to planning and practicing multiple-use management, it must satisfy a potpourri of publics made up of thousands of people with many outlooks and interests who cannot agree on the dimensions or proper mixture of the management elements.

This inherent conflict in multiple-use management is often cast in terms of commodity versus noncommodity interests or developmentalists versus preservationists/environmentalists. The struggle is, however, much more complex than that. In spite of charges to the contrary, it seems unlikely that most stockmen and loggers would prefer to return to the days of overgrazed ranges, eroded slopes, and silted spawning grounds. On the other hand, most environmentalists do not want to rid the national forests completely of livestock, and most recognize that logging is acceptable in some places and situations. Forest Service research has shown that a timber sale may actually improve wildlife habitat by releasing critical browse and other forage for use by large animals like deer and elk. Other Forest Service research, confirmed by considerable work by other researchers in the United States and abroad, has shown that judicious grazing of some arid lands actually can improve their condition. [1]

Unfortunately, some critics fail to recognize the improvement that has taken place on forest ranges since the 1950's. These critics often appear unaware of the great difference between the generally overgrazed Bureau of Land Management ranges and the generally well-managed national forest ranges of Region 4. Recent articles by environmentalists such as Gary Macfarlane and Edward Abbey, and even scientists such as Kimball Harper, for instance, group the two agencies together, cite the defects of BLM ranges, and conclude that Region 4's ranges suffer from the same mismanagement. [2] Similar misperceptions are shared by supporters of the livestock industry, which is as badly served when its defenders argue that range may actually be better if it is in fair or poor rather than in excellent condition. [3]

Stockmen also damage their case when they resist the imposition of grazing fees that more nearly approximate the fair market value of the resource their animals eat. For the 1986 grazing season, for instance, if left under the current beef-market formula, national forest grazing fees will drop to $1.02 per AUM, which is the lowest level since the current system was inaugurated. Stockmen would pay $3 to $7 charges for the use of comparable private land. [4] Even allowing for different costs and values on public and private range, the inadequacy of the national forest fees ought to be obvious. The economic costs of multiple-use management on public lands could be estimated and factored into the grazing fee.

In fairness to the livestock and other commodity interests, it should be pointed out that recreational interests on the national forests hardly pay their way either. Certainly the campground fees currently charged on the national forests are not commensurate with those at private campgrounds that provide a comparable recreational experience. Wilderness enthusiasts pay the public treasury nothing except taxes for their adventures. The Forest Service charges no entrance fees at the national recreation areas to assist in road, visitor center, and habitat maintenance. Whereas State fish and game departments charge for the privilege of hunting and fishing, the Forest Service receives no fees for managing or improving wildlife habitat. Owners of summer homes pay special-use fees, but political pressure has kept these fees well below the market value of the national forest lands occupied.

On the other hand, unlike livestock, some commodity interests do pay something approaching market value for the use of public resources. National forest timber is sold at auction to the highest bidder. Mining interests pay royalties to the Federal Government, and ski area operators and summer resorts pay a percentage of their income to the Service in return for the privilege of operating on the national forests.

Such fee inequities illustrate the basic problem in public resource management—its political nature. This reference to politics is not meant to be disparaging, as, in a free society, the public through its elected representatives ought to determine public land and resource policy, including the relative repayments for values and allocation costs to taxes and user payments. It is, however, difficult to think of anything that has created more difficulties for Region 4 in particular and the Forest Service in general over the years than political conflict. The center of a maelstrom during Pinchot's administration, the Service became the subject of repeated attempts to wrest control of the public lands from the Federal Government and transfer them either to the States or private interests.

Since at least the 1960's, however, political problems have become, if anything, even more complex. The public lands have become a battleground in which numerous groups with conflicting conceptions of the good society and proper land management have fought to achieve management on their terms. This conflict has been particularly difficult for Region 4. The congressional delegations, particularly the senators from Idaho, Nevada, Wyoming, and Utah, have tended to side with commodity interests and Nevada was the home of the Sagebrush Rebellion. At the same time, powerful partisans of the environmental interests who generally reside outside the region—Congressmen John Seiberling of Ohio and Morris Udall of Arizona, for example—tend to dominate House committees considering public resource matters.

In the closing hours of the 1985 congressional session, for instance, Senator James McClure of Idaho succeeded in attaching a rider to a continuing resolution that transferred predator control from the Department of the Interior Fish and Wildlife Service to the Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. Reportedly, McClure's parliamentary move was an attempt to reverse a 1972 ban, already modified by the Reagan administration, on the use of compound 1080 in coyote control. Approving the McClure rider, Agriculture Secretary John R. Block said he hoped to see a more industry-responsive program for predator control under his administration. In response, Seiberling and Udall have threatened to kill the whole predator control program, as an economy measure under the recently enacted Gramm-Rudman-Hollings budget-balancing legislation. One commentator has suggested that this move may open predator control to the livestock interests without any regulation. [5]

Such conflicting views of the management of public lands have expressed themselves, in part, during the writing of the forest plans. [6] Some recreationists, wilderness enthusiasts, wildlife groups, and outfitter interests would like to see the Intermountain Region's timber harvest program sharply curtailed. Craig Gherke of the Wilderness Society's Boise office argues for regional specialization, pointing out that the Southern States have no caribou or grizzly bears but they "can grow trees twice as fast there." In this view, the South should specialize in growing timber; the Intermountain Region in wildlife and wilderness. Industry representatives and some rural political leaders fear, however, that an underfunded timber management program, coupled with environmental pressures, may hasten the closing of a number of sawmills and bring about the demise of some small one-industry towns. Environmentalists counter that recreation can replace timber as the mainstay of rural towns, as it did in McCall, which was transformed from a mill town to a recreation haven in less than 5 years. Unfortunately, few mill towns have an outstanding scenic and recreational feature like Payette Lake in their front yards.

Past experience has shown that the Intermountain Region can marshal its resources and employees to address complex problems if it has strong public support. Examples include accepting the philosophy of multiple-use management in spite of internal resistance by a number of staff and line officers, rehabilitating spawning grounds for anadromous fish, restoring damaged watersheds caused by overgrazing or excessively ambitious timber harvesting, and bucking political pressure in order to manage grazing lands properly. But gaining strong public support will be extremely difficult today and likely even more difficult in the future—largely because of the varied and often conflicting public perceptions of both the nature of the problems and the legitimate scope of the solutions.

Given the way in which the forest advisory committees had been used, there seemed a decreasing need to continue them in the early 1970's, when their abolition was mandated. At present, however, as the Tixier Committee observed, there is a great need for some effective mechanism to involve key people from outside the Service in an ongoing dialog. Certainly the work of the information office has helped, but programs such as "Inform and Involve," hearings on the forest plans, and the addition of information officers located in State capitals have not succeeded in convincing the various publics that the Service is managing the national forests in the public interest.

It is clear that some more effective mechanism must be developed to address this problem. The exact form it takes is not important. But an effective approach must adequately involve leaders of the commodity groups, the environmental interests, the general public, the State and local officials, and the regional and national forest officers in a dialog that seeks—and finds—generally acceptable answers to the hard questions of resource management. Creating this dialog cannot be left to the information office or to other token forest representatives. It is clear that planned hearings like those designed to elicit public comment on the forest plans are no substitute for frequent interaction with the various interests. Show-me tours cannot serve this purpose either. In spite of their enormous management responsibilities and pressures, rangers and forest supervisors must somehow find ways to spend more time in public relations programs that involve getting acquainted personally and having direct discussions with the various key representatives of the publics with which they have to deal.

Such interaction must also provide more time for the opposing interests to get to know one another as human beings, rather than merely as adversaries. Such get-togethers might be modeled after the pack trips, fishing expeditions, and informal visits that Chet Olsen, Floyd Iverson, Vern Hamre, and other forest officers arranged with selected key individuals. It should be understood, however, that this sort of interaction can work only if those involved join the enterprise with good will. In practice, the process may be something like that involving various specialists in planning with the inter-disciplinary teams. As with the interdisciplinary teams, participants must learn to free themselves from intractable positions, or the process cannot succeed.

One area in which Region 4 has succeeded very well in its relations with the larger public has been in cultural resource management. The development of national recreation areas such as the Sawtooth and Flaming Gorge and emphasis on special historical and archeological values, for example, the mining dredge at Yankee Fork and the aboriginal Fremont culture at Clear Creek, have involved considerable and extraordinarily successful interaction with the general public, universities, and Federal, State, and local agencies. At present, it appears clear that management of cultural resources will be an increasingly important part of Region 4's activity in the future.

It should be understood that in managing cultural and other resources, procedural reform and prohibitions cannot guarantee particular outcomes. All they can do is regulate the means of achieving such outcomes. Experience has shown that such attempts at reform may have unintended results that damage the agency and its relationship with the public. Two examples come to mind.

One is the drafting of national forest multiple-use management plans. The process forced the national forests to reexamine their priorities and after much consideration to make their various alternatives public in formal hearings. In the process, the region paid certain costs. The forests drafted these plans and held meetings, at the cost of informal interaction with the public. The process was an enormous financial drain. One Forest Service economist estimated in the early 1980's that 30 percent of the budget went into "planning-like functions." [7]

A basic problem is that the scientists who wrote the regulations for drafting the plans seem to have failed to reckon adequately with the costs. In retrospect, the process may have been worthwhile, but in the future those who mandate such activities should understand and anticipate all of the costs. Most importantly, they must recognize that such activities can be carried out only at the expense of other functions.

In some ways the possible methods of planning resource management are analogous to the different ways of trying to get an orphan calf to drink from a pan of milk. You can starve a calf so long that it is forced to drink in desperation. You can force its nose and mouth into the milk until it begins sucking. Or you can get a pan of milk and stick your fingers in the milk and then into the calf's mouth. The first two methods may be effective, but at a considerable cost to yourself or the calf. The third, equally effective, method creates much less pain both for you and for the calf.

Similarly, planning can be accomplished by forcing the Forest Service to pay the cost by jumping through numerous procedural hoops, neglecting other activities, isolating itself from informal interaction with the public, and tying itself up in red tape. Alternatively, Congress might consider devising a more pleasant method to negotiate the mix of various uses of the national forests.

A second example is the effect of the absolute prohibition of certain activities. The region can undoubtedly tolerate some general limitations such as those of the size of clearcuts, since such limits provide for better management of watershed and wildlife values while still permitting reasonable timber utilization. Absolute prohibitions, however, such as the one forbidding the use of all herbicides, will not stop the region from improving its rangelands, something its managers must do under multiple-use management principles; such bans can, however, make the improvement process much slower and far more expensive.

If the experimental results of the use of Grasslan, for example, are any indication, using that herbicide would be a more economical and less environmentally harmful means of eradicating selected patches of sagebrush than plowing and replanting. Preliminary findings of this sort probably warrant at least some carefully controlled trials in a few actual field situations. Like the acceptance of the forest plans, finding a way to get public acceptance of such field trials is a political problem. Until experience breeds enough trust to convince environmental interests that the Service will assume needed precautions in the trial use of such herbicides, they will undoubtedly exercise their considerable influence to prevent such trials.

Changes in the Forest Service and in Region 4 during the 1960's and 1970's have had enormous impact on grassroots administration. In 1981, Christopher K. Leman sought to reexamine and update Herbert Kaufman's pioneering study of the forest ranger. [8] In the intervening years, Leman pointed out, many changes have taken place that affect the life of the ranger. These changes have gone unrecognized by the general public and even by specialists writing about the Forest Service. The requirement that rangers keep daily diaries of their official activities ended in the early 1960's. The inspection system was severely curtailed in the 1970's, and the term "inspection" is no longer used to designate the methods of control and evaluation of the rangers' work. Most important, the ranger has become more of a line officer, managing a staff of specialists who do the jobs on-the-ground, rather than the lone representative of the Forest Service, doing most of the fieldwork himself.

There is also a tendency, mentioned earlier, for observers to miss the substantial management differences between the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service. As Leman pointed out, the Forest Service is still one of the most decentralized bureaucracies in the world. Nevertheless, the Service has changed. Professional standards, rather than an elaborate inspection system, promote conformity within the organization. The pride, esprit de corps, and decentralization are still there, but management and operations are infinitely more complex.

Leman found that both the general public and the professional literature have failed to recognize the enormously complex mix of responsibilities associated with management of such resources and activities as watersheds, timber, recreation, wildlife, range management, special uses, law enforcement, and mining. He found also a general public failure to understand the changes in methods of firefighting away from the use of lookouts toward aerial spotting and helicopter systems, the precautions taken to protect the environment in logging operations through skyline, balloon, or helicopter logging, and the increasingly complex technology adopted in other operations. Those, for instance, who still see range or timber management as the principal activities of Region 4 miss completely the complex mix of its various operations. Like certain forest officers during the 1960's, the general public must learn to understand the meaning of the term "multiple-use management."

Leman pointed out also that the size of the Forest Service organization and budget and the complexity and diversity of its staff and line officers are particularly misunderstood. By 1980, the Service was "easily the largest [bureau] in the Department of Agriculture," employing more people than the cabinet-level Departments of Commerce, Housing and Urban Development, Education, Labor, and State. [9] Its public welfare programs such as Senior Community Service Employment, Young Adult Conservation Corps, and various volunteer programs involve it in a wide range of valuable public service activities. Most important, perhaps, the number, variety, and complexity of the jobs done by managers like rangers and forest supervisors have increased significantly because of the substantially larger size and greater diversity within ranger districts and national forests. The public and the professional observers also tend to misunderstand the role of and the need for specialists in the Forest Service and in Region 4 and under-estimate the size of the organizations that rangers and forest supervisors must direct.

In one area, however, Leman seems to be mistaken. He argued that the emphasis on transfers within the Forest Service is not as great today as it was in the past. It is true that under management policy adopted in the early 1970's, Forest Service employees no longer need to transfer to retain their positions, except during a reduction-in-force. If, however, they expect to achieve posts at the key forest supervisor, regional staff director, deputy regional forester, or regional forester levels, they must be willing to accept multiregion and Washington Office transfers for broadening experiences.

Region 4 has been in existence now for some 80 years. The problems it faced in the past undoubtedly seemed as difficult to its managers then as those it faces now seem to the present administrators. The problems may never before have been so complex, but solutions were always hard to achieve. The leadership of the region recognizes its current challenges and has set about trying to respond to them. Perhaps because Regional Forester Tixier has been a leader in the current movement to try to address the Service's crucial political and public relations problems, Chief Peterson appointed him to chair the committee set up to define the problems and propose solutions to them. In that role, Tixier follows in a line of regional foresters such as C.N. Woods, Ben Rice, Chet Olsen, Floyd Iverson, and Vern Hamre and their many capable and dedicated associates who devoted their professional careers to solving problems of public resource management in the Intermountain Region.

Reference Notes

1. Allan Savory, "Saving the Brittle Lands: Holism and the Health of the Commons," Northern Lights, 1 (July-August 1985): 16, 18.

2. See for instance, Susan Schauer, "Report: Utah Range in Poor Condition," Daily Herald, January 5, 1986; Gary Macfarlane, "Livestock Grazing Must Not Dominate Public Lands," Salt Lake Tribune, February 10, 1985; Edward Abbey, "The Ungulate Jungle," Northern Lights, 1 (July-August 1985): 10, 12-14.

3. Ed Gomer, "Environmentalists Deceive the Public on Grazing Issue," Salt Lake Tribune, March 10, 1985.

4. Schauer, "Report," Daily Herald, January 5, 1986.

5. Gordon Eliot White, "Ranchers May Get More Help Against Varmints," Deseret News, January 5, 1986.

6. The following is extrapolated in part from Rocky Barker, "Differing Views at the Root of Forest Planning Problems," Deseret News, December 28, 1985.

7. Christopher K. Leman, "The Forest Ranger Revisited: Administrative Behavior in the U.S. Forest Service in the 1980's," p. 7, paper presented at the 1981 annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, New York City, September 3-6, 1981, copy in the possession of Carl Pence, Bridger-Teton.

8. The following is based on Leman, "The Forest Ranger Revisited."

9. Leman, p. 9.