Government selling off National Forest

The White House announced its plan today to sell 200,000 acres of US National Forest in various states, mostly California.

Article link

I think this is ridiculous. It might only be 200,000 acres now, but then they'll realize what a great way to make money it is and soon the whole National Forest system is sold off to private citizens. Now, don't get me wrong, I'd love to own some of the National Forest land. But I also know that there are a lot of other amazing places that I wouldn't be able to go anymore if it became private. I think it needs to be left alone in its present state where everyone has access to the land.

Logan,
My little prediction here is that the only way for you to get a little piece of the forest will be to buy it from developers, that will be able to buy it at cut rate prices. Do you think that the big logging companys will get to bid on the national forest? Mining companys? I seriously doubt if any land will be available to private individuals unless they have the right connections.

Call your Rep. congressmen and tell them, this sucks.

[edit on 10-2-2006 by whaaa]

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration will unveil a proposal Friday to sell up to 200,000 acres of national forest land in "isolated parcels" ranging from a quarter of an acre to 200 acres, much of it in California.

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Environmentalists charge that the short-term gain would be more than offset by the loss of public land. Congress would have to approve the land sales, but it has rejected similar recent proposals.

Its not set in stone yet as the article points out and Congress has had a history of not passing such proposals, so if were lucky they will continue their streak and turn this idea down.

Let's all at least e-mail our congressmen if not phone them and tell them what we think about this. Just because they didn't pass it in the past doesn't mean we should rely on them to automatically do the same now. I'm going to email mine now.

Someone on another site jokingly figured out the idea behind all of this. They sell off the national forests and then seize them back with eminent domain and pay them far less than they bought them for. Free money! Probably not their plan but I thought it was funny and... well, if the government reads it they might get ideas and actually do it...