Over 94% of commenters raised their voices in defense of public forests.
Dear Standing Trees and Save Public Forests Community:
In the spirit of never letting a crisis go to waste, your comments, letters, and phone calls over the past six weeks demonstrated overwhelming public support for protecting our public forests from reckless logging. Thank you for showing the Green Mountain National Forest, and Vermont's Congressional delegation, how much our public forests mean to us and to the future of our planet.
Nearly 1,300 comments - approximately 94% of the comments regarding logging - were in opposition to the project. Another 13,000 petition signatures were received from across the country, as well as organizational sign-ons from 70 national and regional groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, Center for Biological Diversity, Earthjustice, and 350Vermont. It's safe to say that Telephone Gap is now well known nationally!
According to the Forest Service schedule, their next step is to review all the comments and begin work on a draft environmental assessment (EA) for the Telephone Gap logging project. When the EA is complete, they will open another comment period so the public can respond to the assessment. The Forest Service's timetable for this next comment period is June, so please stay tuned for updates.
Although the first comment period is over, you can still make your voice heard by contacting our federal representatives, who are very aware of Telephone Gap already but could benefit from hearing from more concerned citizens, whether or not you live in Vermont. For their contact information and to sign up for updates, see below. Please also sign the Climate Forests Coalition petition to President Biden, calling for rulemaking to protect all mature and old-growth forests on federal public lands.
Rep Becca Balint: (202) 225-4115, or use this contact form
Sen Bernie Sanders: (202) 224-5141, or use this contact form
Sen Peter Welch: (202) 224-4242, or use this contact form
Thanks again!
Sincerely,
Dan Batten,
On behalf of Standing Trees and the entire Save Public Forests Coalition