Olympic National Park

The changing economy around the park

In 1991 the spotted owl took on the logging industry, most conservative organizations, and president George H.W. Bush and won. In what is now recognized as standard Bush family parlance, the President argued that we will be up to our necks in spotted owls and people, without the resources of the logging industry, would be endangered. Ten years later the spotted owl is still in trouble but the town of Forks continues on. Stores are still open, people are still working, and because the economy is changing from one that served loggers to one that serves yuppies in SUVs, the restaurants can now charge $6.99 for eggs rather than $2.99 and stores will sell you a $300 Gore-Tex jacket rather than a $30 vinyl one. The Northwest economy has not only refused to collapse, it is expanding. The lessons are simple: you can't encourage growth by hanging on to dying industries and you don't need to choose between the economy and the environment.

There is little growth potential in logging the Northwest and the political lobbyists and PR firms have long since moved on to the more fertile ground of water reclamation and oil drilling leaving the logging interest to handle their own spin with unsophisticated slogans like the one I saw on a sign just outside the park: "future forests begin with logging." Most of the logging that occurs in the state is by a select group of large corporations like Weyerhauser who own and manage entire forests. They have little incentive to fight for old growth logging, which would only compete with their core business. The real environmental fight for forests has moved overseas where the timber industry and the American consumer are taking advantage of depressed economies in undeveloped nations by clearing forests cheaply with little or no political resistance.

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