OCR Text |
Show FOREST SERVICE BLAMED. H The Salt Lake Tribune quotes approvingly the following, as a conspicuous case of forest service oppression, taken from the Portland Port-land Oregonian, "The Dead Hand of Conservation". The reason why Herbert Hultine has to trael 240 miles to reach Port Townsend, though he lives within fifty miles of that cltv, is that th For-r For-r wtri" Bureau has Iald Its blighting hand on the Olympic peninsula. It blocks settlement and development and prevents the construction of roads The county, deriving no revenue from taxes on land included in the re-servo, re-servo, which has little population besides trees, wild beasts and rangers is not Justified In building roads. The Forestry bureau has no funds for building anything but occasional trails, for use of the rangers. If it had Its policy is not to build roads, for it alms to keep the country Inaccessible! rtot to render It accessible rJ5?,!ie Q7if Inthetl01vymi)IcLPnlnSula rich valleys, more valuable for Jgriculturo than for timber. There are several fruitful prairies, devoid of S. if i ?Ui ? ma who s,oea upon them lo locate a homestead finds him- otleJon It wT terdvd fr0m markcts' forced t0 Pa hs 8Up. . ' S;in blbBCl' aniharried y rangers who covet his 'land for ranger I?tp Am Jf!raJkre "ft" "ht ?0e6 1,ve ,n that count 8t ??S! J!Sfi t0 1Iv as 0 the natives in the jungle of the upper Amazon , and to wait many years until the dead hand is lifted. What we would like the Portland Oregonian to do is to inform us why the Olympic peninsula, with its rich valleys, was not developed de-veloped by railroads or opened up by wagon roads long prior to the time when that region was set aside as a forest reserve. The forest service is only a few years old and, therefore, cannot can-not be held responsible for the failure to build roads in the long years before the "blight" of conservation fell upon the land so graphically and pathetically related in the story of Herbert Hultine. It is just possible that the application of the conservation policy has worked an injury to Mr. Hultine and perhaps retarded the development of the Olympic peninsula, but it is to be expected that, even in the honest enforcement of any beneficial policy aimed at the go6d of the people as a whole, there will be those in small numbers who will be injured. The true test of the worth of conservation is not to be found in exceptional and isolated cases, but must be looked for iij the general operation of the policy so ably outlined and established es-tablished by Gifford Pinchot. |