Urge your Representative to Oppose the House Farm Bill H.R. 2
The Agriculture and Nutrition Act of 2018 (H.R. 2) is brimming with attacks on America’s bedrock environmental laws and our national forests. The House Farm Bill includes numerous Congressional exemptions for up to 6,000-acre forestry projects, including exemptions from public input and other critical environmental review. Such exemptions would prioritize logging over clean water, recreation, and wildlife.
Please call your Representative and tell them you oppose H.R. 2
This bill promotes logging over other uses of public lands and creates backward incentives that would shift emphasis and funding from environmental restoration to timber production. The bill reverses the long-sought-after and hard-won bipartisan fire funding compromise signed into law only weeks ago as part of the FY18 Omnibus Appropriations Act. Before the ink is even dry on the Omnibus, this farm bill threatens to renege on the bipartisan wildfire budget deal with dangerous with provisions that severely weaken protections on our national forests.
This partisan, one-sided farm bill goes on to attack the Roadless Area Conservation Rule (RACR) by creating a loophole to allow logging and costly road building in areas currently protected by the RACR. If that wasn’t bad enough, The Endangered Species Act will be undercut by removing a requirement for expert consultation regarding endangered species and critical habitat. Congress should allow the Forest Service to use the many tools it has at its disposal to keep our communities safe from wildfire and protect the priceless values that our national forests provide.