There is a permit required for logging plans (THPs), but unlike most other permits, there is no fee attached. So the state general taxpayer foots the bill by paying for the extensive work (weeks and sometimes months) which several state agencies do to review the THPs on the ground and on paper.
The Dept of Forestry (CDF) always sends an inspector to the site, and the 'other' agencies -- Water Quality, Fish and Game, Mines and Geology -- may go inspect and typically at least one or two of them do. A big plan takes two days at least to inspect on the ground, and then the THP has to go through another review in the office, with the various agencies participating (or not).
All this is paid for by the general taxpayer; the permittee, who will be generating income off the logging, pays not a cent. If you get a building permit, you have to pay for the privilege. Why don't timber owners pay?
This does not seem equitable to me, and since we have a state budget deficit of large proportions, I think the legislative analyst's suggestions that the the person or entity which BENEFITS FINANCIALLY should pay the permit fee makes more good sense. This would then pay some of the salary cost of reviewing and monitoring the THP.
Senator Wes Chesbro has voted against THP fees in committee, I am informed, and the rationales I've heard are silly. They are:
1) Fees won't improve the quality of THPs.
True (at least directly -- maybe not, indirectly), but irrelevant. And if quality is Wes' concern, let us ask him what has he DONE about THAT??
2) Fees would impose another crushing burden on those already suffering.
The basis for the supposed suffering of the whole bunch of timber owners, as far as I can gather from legislative staff, is anecdotal -- and based on just one anecdote, at that -- a friend of Wes' went bankrupt and blamed it on the price he was getting for his logs.
What nonsense. The owner does not find out the price of his logs as a shock AFTER having cut them: he has solicited bids if there is more than one buyer available. If he would lose money by cutting -- then he lets the trees stand there increasing in size, and waits for another day, with a better price. Of course if a mill owner can't get a good price for the logs when they are converted into lumber, then he was very foolish to have bought logs for more money than he can recoup, let alone make a profit.
Who knows the specifics of such an example? But one anecdotal example is hardly a sound basis for an important policy.
At any rate, if a political candidate is unwilling even to EXPRESS a position which is unpalatable to timber owners, then maybe we need to do more checking into our candidates. At least we can make our positions known forcefully.
Helen Libeu
PS. I am a timber owner, and I have done a THP in 2001. I support owners paying fees, not because I WANT to cough up some of my ill-gotten gains, but because it makes economic and equity sense.
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