Lack of Legal Mandate and Staff Threatens Key Historic, Cultural, Archaeological Sites on National Forest Lands in 44 States
New National Trust for Historic Preservation Report Recommends Making Protection of Historic and Cultural Resources a Forest Service Priority
Posted May 14, 2008 | Contact pr@nthp.org or 202-588-6141
Contact: Gary Kozel | 202-251-0220
Denver, CO (May 15, 2008) - Native American archaeological sites and Revolutionary and Civil War battlefields are among more than 300,000 places of landmark historical or cultural significance at risk of ruin because cultural and historic resources are a low priority for the U.S. Forest Service which lacks the legal mandate and staff to protect them.
The 2008 report, The National Forest System: Cultural Resources at Risk -- An Assessment and Needs Analysis, recommends giving the Forest Service explicit authority to manage historic and cultural resources on the 193 million acres of national forests and grasslands found in 44 states and Puerto Rico. The report was prepared by the National Trust for Historic Preservation and T. Destry Jarvis, former senior advisor to the assistant secretary of interior and now president of the Outdoor Recreation and Park Services, LLC.
Threats to these historic sites include grazing, damage from off-highway vehicles, mining, timber harvesting, insufficient funding and the lack of political will on the part of senior agency officials. Indeed, while some of the nine Forest Service regions have taken steps to comply with federal directives to preserve our nation's heritage, the agency as a whole "regularly chafes" at laws believed to interfere with what it perceives as its official mandate: to manage timber and watersheds, the report states.
Currently, less than 2,000 of 325,000 Forest Service sites identified as culturally or historically significant have been listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Nearly 200,000 identified sites remain unevaluated, and about 80 percent of Forest Service lands have yet to be surveyed for cultural, archeological, and historic resources.
The report makes 11 recommendations to improve the Forest Service's ability to protect cultural sites dating from prehistoric times and including Native American sacred places, historic farmsteads, trails used by the Lewis and Clark expedition, fire lookouts, and cabins.
The extent of the threat extends beyond the known sites, according to National Trust President Richard Moe. "There are literally thousands of other sites spanning all 193 million acres of National Forest that have yet to be identified let alone protected," Moe said.
"The preservation of these national treasures should be a top priority of our elected leaders, and it's not." Moe urged significant changes in nearly all aspects of Forest Service operations, including statutes, regulations, funding and staffing.
The recommendations are grouped in two areas.
Laws, Regulations and Policies
The report notes that the Forest Service must abide by "a diverse and complex web of regulations," including more than 200 statutes. Among those are the National Forest Management Act of 1976 (NFMA) and the Forest Service Facility Realignment and Enhancement Act of 2005 (FREA). Yet, none of the laws places an explicit duty on the Forest Service to manage historic and cultural resources.
Recommendations include amending NFMA to "explicitly recognize the agency's responsibility for historic and cultural resources" and FREA to retain funds from the sale of historic administrative sites "for maintenance or restoration of retained historic structures that are listed in or eligible for the National Register."
Heritage Program
A substantial portion of the Forest Service's revenue comes from timber sales, which have dropped from about $1.3 billion annually in the early 1990s to about $364 million in 2006. Replacement funds through general appropriations have been scarce, and with wildfire prevention emerging as what the report calls "an all-consuming occupation of the Forest Service," budgeting for most other Forest Service programs, including the Heritage Program, has declined.
Even volunteer labor to promote heritage tourism has been compromised because of budget cuts. In 2004, the Forest Service turned away more than one-third of the people seeking to help agency archaeologists -- "not due to lack of work to be done," the report states, "but rather to lack of personnel and budget to organize it."
The report recommends line-item funding for the management of historic and cultural resources, with a minimum annual increase of $15 million for inventorying and monitoring of heritage sites and stepped-up law enforcement. In addition, each region of the Forest Service should receive funding to develop a comprehensive heritage plan as specified in the National Historic Preservation Act.
The Forest Service also should document the amount of funding that actually reaches heritage program activities, "promoting transparency and accountability for the use of heritage program funds," the report states.
Other recommendations include:
- Amending the Forest Service's Travel Management Rule. This designates routes for motorized vehicle use but does not set standards for protecting historic or cultural resources. The amendment would target, specifically, off-highway vehicles, which have increased ten-fold in popularity since the 1970s and caused direct damage to cultural sites.
- Expanding Forest Service authority through Section 111 of the National Historic Preservation Act to form public-private partnerships that will enhance its historic preservation responsibilities. The few partnerships the Forest Service has entered into concern projects related to timber management and not recreation, heritage, education or other programs that would benefit the public.
