
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, April 9, 1991                   TAG: 9104090280
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A4   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

FOREST LOGGING SUBSIDY REPORTEDLY $175 MILLION

Poor management by the U.S. Forest Service cost taxpayers $175 million to subsidize logging in national forests last year, according to a new report by an economic consulting firm.

Based on official data on the costs and revenues of timber sales in the 156 national forests, the analysis by Cascade Holistic Economic Consultants in Oregon found that the government lost money on about 75 percent of the timber acreage that it allowed private logging firms to harvest in fiscal 1990.

The Forest Service rejects these numbers.

"We have some real concerns with the way the analysis is being presented," said Rick Prausa, head of the service's Timber Sales Program Information Reporting System.

- San Francisco Chronicle

by CNB