Borough 5-Year Timber Harvest Draft Schedule

Local need for saw logs, house logs, firewood and value-added use has been and will increasingly be important to sustain the growing need of local Borough communities, especially in the upper Susitna Valley.

The amount of revenue the Borough would receive from large-scale operators to clear-cut ("seed-tree harvest") any of the designated areas in the Five Year Timber Harvest Plan is paltry; the local jobs created, based on past such sales, non-existent. That use is not what we desire for Borough Forest lands within the Trapper Creek boundaries.

The Trapper Creek Community Council, therefore, is resolved that we want the timber in our area to be for local harvest only, primarily for local use.

The fact that large operators could out-bid residents for the rights to any harvest unit concerns us. It would be good if the final 5-Year Harvest Plan stated that no clear-cut extractions are allowable except in case of forest disease or fire prevention.

But our resolve is clear: local use only.

Thank you,

Trapper Creek Community Council
6/16/11

Get your "Geek On" and get over to the Trapper Creek Library and check out the DRAFT schedule. Public comment is no later than June 17, 2011.