Key Findings
1. Legislators and the Board of Natural Resources should continue to welcome input from tribes and others who are not represented on the board, but should not add new members.
2. Senate Bill 5838 would add two tribal members, comprising one-quarter of the members of the State Board of Natural Resources, which oversees management of state trust lands.
3. Giving tribes a vote on how state forests are managed would give tribes more control over state forests than the state has over tribal forests.
4. Adding two tribal members would create positions completely unaccountable to the people of the State of Washington or to beneficiaries of management of trust land.
5. Adding two members would give them more input than actual trust beneficiaries: counties whose income is dependent on trust land revenue and public schools.
6. Given tribal goals and priorities may be at odds with the interests of state trust lands, tribal representatives would inevitably face conflicts of interest. For example, a reduction in state timber harvests could increase prices for timber from tribal lands.
7. Stewardship of forests and land is best when those with unique, local knowledge and accountability for results are in charge. Tribal members would have neither unique knowledge nor accountability for outcomes on state trust lands.
8. Without direct accountability, every decision would face accusations of ulterior motives, making the BNR more divisive, more political and less scientific.
Introduction
For decades, the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs was responsible for managing forests on the Quinault Indian Reservation. The results were what one would expect when management was determined by bureaucrats who were not accountable to outcomes on the ground.
Over the past half-century, responsibility for those forests was gradually transferred to the tribe. Today, tribal foresters manage those forests more like private industry, with local knowledge and accountability for results. That combination helps explain why tribal forests in Washington are generally healthier than neighboring federal lands.
The proposal to add two tribal members to the Washington State Board of Natural Resources, however, violates the principles of local knowledge and accountability that make tribal forestry and management of state trust forests so successful.
Giving tribes a vote on how state forests are managed would inject more politics into state forestry, reduce accountability for decisions affecting state trust lands, and, ironically, give tribes more control over state forests than the state has over tribal forests. Legislators should reject this counterproductive legislation.
