In what has been hailed as a huge win for Southeast Alaska communities, wildlife, and the climate, the US Forest Service has reinstated Roadless Rule protections across the Tongass rainforest.
The 17 million-acre Tongass National Forrest is the homeland of the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian peoples.
The Trump administration had rolled back the National Roadless Rule for Tongass, stripping America's last great rainforest of vital protections and leaving millions of acres of undeveloped national forest lands at risk. Last week this was reversed in a move applauded by tribal leaders, recreational small-business owners, commercial fishing operators, and conservationists.
The reversal sees federal protection from industrial logging and road-building restored to more than 9.2 million undeveloped acres (over 3,723,109 hectares).
It provides habitat for an abundance of wildlife including grizzly bears, bald eagles, and wolves and is also serves as the United States's largest forest carbon sink; making its protection critical for any US effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
A joint statement from groups including the Organized Village of Kake, Native Movement, Tongass Women's Earth and Climate Action Network, Wild Heritage and many others the decision was welcomed.
Organized Village of Kake president, Joel Jackson, said the Tongass Roadless Rule "is important to everyone".
"The old-growth timber is a carbon sink, one of the best in the world. It's important to our way of life — the streams, salmon, deer, and all the forest animals and plants," he said.
Native Movement environmental justice strategy lead Naawéiyaa Tagaban said the restoration of National Roadless Rule protections for the Tongass National Forest is "a great first step in honoring the voices of the many Tribal Governments and Tribal Citizens who spoke out in favor of Roadless Rule protections for the Tongass".
"We are grateful to the Biden administration for taking this first step toward long-term protections for the Tongass," he said.
"We hope that going forward true long-term protections will be established that do not rely on a rule which can be changed at the whim of a presidential administration. The administration must look to Tribal Sovereignty and Indigenous stewardship as the true long-term solution for protections in the Tongass.
"Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian people have lived in and managed the Tongass national forest for generations, true protections will look like the restoration of lands into Indigenous ownership."
Women's Earth and Climate Action Network Tongass coordinator, Wanda Culp, said the Tongass Forest is homeland to countless indigenous family species.
"The Tongass National Forest in Alaska is a national treasure, stored wealth, as is each of America's Public Forests. They should always be handled as the treasures they are — cherished and saved to enable our future generations to breathe fresh air," she said.
Environment America Research and Policy Center public lands campaign director Ellen Montgomery noted that the 9. Million acre roadless area had been protected from logging from 2001 until the Trump administration tore down the conservation measure.
"Now that this Trump era rollback has been restored, it's time for the Biden administration to move to increase protection from logging for all old and mature forests across the entire country," she said.
