Feds to hold more meetings about plans for 2 NC forests

ASHEVILLE, NC (AP) — The U.S. Forest Service has scheduled more public meetings about its plans for Pisgah and Nantahala national forests after the first sessions ended in controversy.

The supervisor of North Carolina’s national forests tells the Asheville Citizen-Times the new series of meetings are tentatively scheduled for April. Supervisor Kristen Bail says she hopes these meetings will be marked by collaboration.

A draft copy issued publicly in October indicated about 700,000 of the 1 million acres in the Pisgah and Nantahala were in management areas that would be open to logging.

Forest Service officials now say the acreage available to logging will be closer to 300,000 acres. Of that, records indicate about 1,000 acres have been logged annually in the last decade in the two forests.

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Information from: The Asheville Citizen-Times, http://www.citizen-times.com

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