Steve Pearce: “I find the arguments amazing. The Lincoln National Forest is in the Second District of New Mexico. One of the retired…”

“I find the arguments amazing. The Lincoln National Forest is in the Second District of New Mexico. One of the retired foresters grabbed me one day and said, You know, I used to run this 1 million acres by myself and one part-timer. Then he said, Myself and the part-timer did all the timber sales, all of the conservation projects, all of the business opportunity projects by ourselves. Now the Lincoln National Forest has 142 people. If the gentlemen were really interested in the operation, in the use of the operation of the Forest Service and the use of Federal funds, they would go in and de-fund every timber sales department that has not sold a tree in decades, because we are still funding timber sales departments that don't fund it. I find your arrogance tremendously offensive, that you come into another man's district and begin to take away his jobs. In the Second District of New Mexico, there used to be 22 mills that processed these forest products, and we are down to two. The Lincoln National Forest is in a position to offer them the product that would keep them in business. They grow 50 million board feet a year of new timber in Lincoln. They will not even commit 12 million. There is a policy and culture in our Forest Service that says we will not cut trees, we will not keep our forests healthy. We will watch them burn down before we cut a tree. That is what I find offensive about the debate from our friends on the other side of the issue.”