Communities Successfully Stop Illegal Logging Project in Pisgah National Forest

Wild lands and wildlife conservation advocates are continuing to fight efforts by the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) under Trump to log and despoil sensitive habitats and old-growth areas in the North Carolina mountains and elsewhere around the nation.

In the latest example, conservation groups succeeded in stopping a logging project in the Pisgah National Forest which was to take place in a designated North Carolina Natural Heritage Area near the Nolichucky River. After the groups sued, the Forest Service cancelled the project and removed logging equipment from the area. 

Keeping NC Outdoors Pristine

In a news release last week, the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) described the project as illegally initiated without necessary permits and in violation of the Forest Service’s own Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Plan, which directs the Forest Service to manage the area as undeveloped backcountry and a reserve for old-growth forests. SELC represented two other conservation groups, the Center for Biological Diversity and MountainTrue, in the lawsuit. 

Communities Spoke Up and Won

“One of the country’s wildest gorges was spared additional harm because local communities spoke up. They saved an exceptional forest, imperiled wildlife, and a world-class river,” said Will Harlan, Southeast Director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Unfortunately, wild places will continue to be targeted by this administration, so we will continue standing shoulder-to-shoulder with communities to protect beloved forests and rivers.” 

“Public notice, transparency, and accountability are the absolute bare minimum of what the Forest Service owes our communities before it opens these forests for logging,” said Sam Evans, leader of SELC’s National Forests and Parks program. “As long as the Forest Service refuses to do even that bare minimum, we are going to continue to haul them into court.”