Timber Tax Cuts Cost Rural Northwest Towns Billions. Polluted Water Drove Up The Price

By NWPB News
An aerial view of clear-cuts near the south fork of Gordon Creek, one of two water sources for Corbett, Oregon. CREDIT: Google Earth
In rainy Oregon, communities tap a network of streams and creeks to supply millions of residents with cold, clean water. The problem is that the land surrounding drinking water streams is, in many cases, owned not by the towns or the residents who drink the water, but by private timber companies that are now logging more intensively than ever, cutting trees on a more rapid Read More

Despite What The Logging Industry Says, Cutting Down Trees Isn’t Stopping Catastrophic Wildfires

By NWPB News
Oregon State University researcher Chris Dunn next to a Douglas fir, which burned in Oregon’s September 2020 fires and was later cut down by fire crews who considered it a safety hazard. CREDIT: Jes Burns/OPB
In the decades since government restrictions reduced logging on federal lands, the timber industry has promoted the idea that private lands are less prone to wildfires, saying that forests thick with trees fuel bigger, more destructive blazes. But an analysis by OPB and ProPublica shows last month’s fires burned as intensely on private forests with large-scale logging Read More
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