By Milan Lombardo and Sofia Lussiez
In the next few months, the U.S. Forest Service is planning to cut nearly half the trees in our
107,000-acre watershed. The Santa Fe Mountains Landscape Resiliency Project consists of a mass
cutting of 50,566 acres comprising our watershed.
The Forest Service believes this is necessary to prevent possible “future disturbances including
wildfire, climate change, and insect outbreaks.” This proposal is based on their approach of
preventing such “what if” scenarios — especially forest fire.
But here is the problem: This approach would make almost all future scenarios more dire. This
project arises from the Forest Service’s outdated belief that “the forest is simply a source of fuel.” By
attempting to prevent the possible “what if” scenarios, the Forest Service is actually increasing the
susceptibility of the environment to the very problems they are seeking to preven