To get an idea of how the state intends to protect the public interest in Maine’s forests, consider this recent conclusion from a report on sustainability by the Maine Forest Service:

During the recent Forest Practices Act rulemaking process, it became clear to both the Maine Forest Service and a number of stakeholders that we have reached the limits of what a command and control regulatory framework has to offer.

With that in mind, the Forest Service outlined criteria for water quality, timber supply and quality and public accountability. Four other criteria – on soils, aesthetics, biodiversity and traditional recreation – will be examined in a report due in 2003. But the three examined in the current report are particularly useful for learning what exists beyond command and control, an idea antithetical to the Fast World of the late ’90s.

The public has an interest in private forestlands because it owns the water on them as well as the wildlife and it has a right to see that neither is abused. It also provides a special low tax rate for land in tree growth, making up the lost revenue through other forms of taxation. It therefore has a further interest in seeing that this tax break is put to good use. Since the interests of the forestland owners and the public are inseparable, it makes all kinds of sense for representatives of these groups to work together.

They are working on a problem that, on its face, is simple: in 1996, the Maine woods grew 4.9 million cords. However, that same year loggers cut 6.5 million cords. Assuming harvest levels are going to be maintained, the problem becomes growing more wood in an ecologically sensible manner. The timber supply criteria in the report, however, is remarkably vague about how this will be done. Several of its benchmarks merely ask that the growth-to-cut ratios improve over the next six years.

A couple of the better supply criteria at least set specific goals of, for instance, reducing tree mortality and increasing sawlog and veneer volume. But it’s not clear from them who is responsible for increasing these volumes. Individual companies? The industry? The same difficulty could occur under the water-quality section, where the Forest service wants best-management practices increased from 47 percent in ’95 to 75 percent in 2005. The improvement would be welcome, but it isn’t clear who is responsible for making it.

The public accountability section depends heavily on increased professionalism in the industry, but without the old command-and-control model of regulation, this goal could lead to something good or it may lead to nothing at all. If the state is going to move away from specific regulations, it needs to set proper penalties for companies that do not properly protect the public’s value.

When the Legislature considers the Forest Service’s report, it should ask, first, who specifically, is charged with meeting these goals and, second, what happens if they fail?