on the cover / By Malcolm Terence

Klamath: Direct Action!

Jeremy Wuerfel, a forester/log buyer for Timber Products, said his mill had no other operations going to occupy the crew and that the 6.5 million board feet scheduled for harvest was a sizeable part of the 60 million milled each year at his Yreka mill.

“I assume we’ll go back. We’re counting on that,” he said. He said his crews were just trying to follow the contract and that he thought the completed project would better protect the town of Orleans from wildfires.

He said that it was not a standard timber sale because there was so much removal of non-merchantable wood as fuels reduction that costs would far exceed the revenues. The approach, called stewardship, was a good one for the Forest Service, in Wuerfel’s opinion, and he said his mill has already done one on Forest Service land closer to Yreka.

Colegrove said nearly a million dollars was allocated to the Orleans project by the Regional Office that covers all of California.

The loggers “are just laid off and getting by on unemployment,” according to Cade Crawford, from Crawford Logging.

Bill Rice, who was the Forest Service’s main officer in the planning of OCFR and Colegrove’s predecessor, has now transferred to the Lower Trinity Ranger District where he is working on another thinning and fuels-reduction project in the Waterman Ridge area northeast of Willow Creek. He did not respond to questions by telephone and e-mail for this article.

By dinner of the second day the numbers at the training had grown to nearly 40 locals — Indian and non-Indian alike. Molli Jane and Annelia, aided by many volunteers, were expertly slicing and roasting a small glacier of fresh meat. Dania Rose Colegrove from Hoopa, a veteran of many KJC actions and a distant relative of the new Orleans District Ranger, said the meat, and the steelhead from the night before, were contributed by KJC supporters “on the Rez.”

When it was suggested that the diners could have both the fish and the meat at the same meal, Charlie Myers smiled and said, “Of course, you could eat both at once but it isn’t done. It would be too boastful.”

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 NEXT PAGE >SHARE