Month 3, Day 14: It’s PI Day!

Heavy rain brought down our landline and FIOS internet last night. I’m piggybacking on my neighbor’s wireless at the moment. No time to write anything original; I’m sending my Senators and my Rep a version of yesterday’s letter, opposing the Tongass logging bills.

Dear Senators Kerry & Brown / Representative Markey,

This letter is to request you to oppose S. 881 and H.R. 2099, legislation addressing usage considerations with regard to land that is currently part of Alaska’s Tongass National Forest. These bills will permit Sealaska, an Alaskan Native corporation, to log 80,000 acres of the Tongass. While it is important to secure economic benefits for Native Americans, it’s crucial to recognize that the Tongass is one of the country’s top “carbon banks” (carbon-storing forests).

Pacific Northwest forests, including the Tongass, store one and a half times as much carbon as this country burns in a year. It is an act of profound environmental irresponsibility to allow such a carbon bank to be logged off. Sealaska may need to cut 80,000 acres of trees to maintain their balance sheet, but our country’s environmental balance is far more endangered than theirs.

Maintaining and expanding our national forests is a crucial element of our national environmental policy. Not only are these forests crucial carbon banks (and therefore one of our first lines of defense against CO2 emissions), they possess inherent value as places of beauty, peace and respect for the natural world. When our country learns to stop thinking of them as commodities worth so much per board foot, we will have, perhaps, grown up a little.

Please oppose this legislation.

Thank you,

Warren Senders

14 Mar 2010, 9:16pm
by Timo Tuomainen


what a great story Warren! and great photos!

 

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