At Stoltze tour, Zinke stumps for forest bill

Montana Congressman Ryan Zinke toured the F.H. Stoltze Land and Lumber Co. mill last week while promoting the Resilient Federal Forests Act.

The Act looks to streamline timber projects on federal lands through a collaboration with local stakeholders. Projects that go through the collaborative process would also receive a categorical exclusion from the National Environmental Policy Act. Groups that want to challenge projects in federal court would also be required to post a bond equal to the estimated legal costs of defending a suit. It also shifts some wildland fire fighting costs to emergency federal funding, rather than dipping out of Forest Service coffers.

The bill made it through the House earlier this year, attached to a larger energy bill and awaits consideration in conference committee by the Senate.

Zinke, a Republican, said the bill is a “reasonable approach” and has the support of former Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth, who testified in favor of it.

Stoltze general manager Chuck Roady said national forests need to be actively managed if mills like Stoltze are to remain viable.

Running two shifts, the mill needs 40 to 50 million board feet of timber annually. The Flathead National Forest alone can support a sustainable harvest of 150 million board feet annually, he said.

But the Forest Service currently only harvests about 30 million board feet.

“We need to manage the land because it’s the right thing to do,” Roady said.

He noted that managing the forest is better for the economy, trees and wildlife.

“We need to treat the land and be good stewards of the land,” Roady said.

Zinke agreed.

“The bottom line is, we can do better,” he said.

Litigation is a big concern. The company has been active in several projects over the years that involved collaboration on projects, only to be sued by other environmental groups.

“They want to stop the flow of feed logs,” Roady said. “It really is a war about our forests.”

Roady noted that many western Montana mills are only operating at between 40 and 60 percent of their capacity.

He said locally, mills rely on each other, though they may compete at the bidding table. For example, Stoltze sends its sawdust to Weyerhaeuser’s medium density fiberboard plant because it can get more per ton than burning it in the company’s co-generation boiler, which produces about 2.5 megawatts of electricity. The boiler burns waste wood bark and produces enough electricity to provide power to about 2,500 homes.

“We can’t afford to lose any more infrastructure,” Roady said. “We need that MDF plant.”

Roady said the company recently invested more than $280,000 into one saw system and a single log moving machine cost about $1.3 million. It’s an expensive business.

While the talk was about increasing harvest, Zinke said selling federal land or handing it over to the states was not the answer.

He claimed that accusations from Denise Juneau’s campaign that he favored land transfer legislation were false.

He said increasing harvests was a Montana issue.

“Put politics in the back seat,” he said.

He also said he was willing to negotiate on the bill’s language.

“I’ll take a few yards up the field rather than a touchdown any day,” he said.