Forests and the Economy Symposium 2015: What was said
Well, at first we heard from from U.S. Congressman Peter DeFazio, who left us with some important parting words.
Then we got right into forestry sustainability with:
- Brent Davies, director of forestry at Ecotrust,
- Peter Hayes, co-owner, Hyla Woods, and former Oregon Board of Forestry member
- George McKinley, executive director, Southern Oregon Forest Restoration Collaborative
Here’s what they said in response to the first question: “What does sustainable forestry mean to you?”
McKinley: “Depends on perspective. For myself we focus on restoration on public lands. Stewardship of our land. As a private owner, it’ll mean something different.”
Davies: “We’ve been thinking about it for 20 years. Work to mimic natural process, following natural patterns and looking at long term.”
Hayes: “Simplistic systems of stewardship that have the greatest potential to work in the long run as they do short run.”
Next it was Forests on Fire: The Rising Costs of Action (and Inaction) Against Wildfire with:
- Timothy Ingalsbee, executive director, Firefighters United for Safety, Ethics, and Ecology
- Cassandra Moseley, director, Ecosystem Workforce Program, University of Oregon
- Craig Letz, independent fire management consultant
Key takeaways from a panel that discussed how complex and sometimes counterintuitive the issue of fighting wildfires can be:
Ingalsbee: “We’ve been taking from forests for so long; it’s time we give back.”
Then Congressman Kurt Schrader, Congressman, who represents Oregon’s 5th district, participated in a keynote Q-and-A.
The final panel was Lessons From John Day: The Pay-off and Promise of Collaborative Restoration Projects, in which three people involved in Blue Mountains Forest Partners described how how groups that are sometimes at odds came together to save sometime viewed as widely divergent came together. The result: a timber company receiving a grant to help steward the forest. The panelists were:
· Susan Jane Brown, attorney, Western Environmental Law Center
· Bruce Daucsavage, president, Ochoco Lumber Company
· Patrick Shannon, director, Forest Program for Sustainable Northwest
