Lawsuit targets logging in Georgia forests

Expressing frustration with the U.S. Forest Service’s commitment to protecting endangered species, the EarthJustice Legal Fund last week filed suit in federal court seeking to block logging activities in national forests. The suit, filed on behalf of eight environmental organizations, accuses the Forest Service of failing to comply with a 1999 court decision requiring a survey of rare and endangered wildlife prior to allowing logging in the Chattahoochee and Oconee national forests in Georgia.

“We again have to seek relief from a federal court to halt destructive logging because the U.S. Forest Service refuses to comply with their duty to protect rare and sensitive species in our southern national forests,” says René Voss of the Sierra Club.

“Our public forests are far too valuable to be left in the hands of an agency that blatantly ignores basic species protection requirements in order to satisfy the demands of private logging companies,” agrees Andrew George, executive director of the Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project.

Joe Walsh, a spokesman with the Forest Service in Washington, D.C., says the agency doesn’t comment on active litigation.