University of Idaho School of Forestry - Forester Yearbook (Moscow, ID)

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THE IDAHO FORESTER 9 Road or other Federal Aid projects. The amount of money allocated to the state from these appropriations has been dependent in considerable part on the acreage of federal forest lands in the state. At one time these contributions were figured at three cents per acre per annum based on government-owned lands in the state. In recent years they have been much greater. Up to July 1, 1932, the funds thus expended for direct road construc- tion and road maintenance work by the Fed- eral Government aggregated 259,500,000 for major public roads and 358,900,000 for forest development roads and trails. Since the major roads are of primary importance to communi- ties in or near the national forests, their con- struction by the government replaces an equal cost of construction which would have had to be undertaken by the counties or the state, if not carried on by the government. The forest development projects in part provide develop- ment which otherwise would have had to be undertaken by local agencies. GOVERNMENT SPENDS OTHER MONEY HERE The government's expenditures for admini- stration protection and development of the forests aggregate a very appreciable total. Practically all of the payroll expenditures in the state are put into circulation locally. There are close to 200 year-long forest service employees living in the state, varying from the highly trained, long experienced forest supervisors with heavy responsibilities, to the newcomers among the rangers, all of whom in normal times receive salaries aggregating about S475,000 annually. The recurrent seasonal employment of tem- porary men for prevention and control of fire and forest diseases, for the construction of forest development roads, trails, telephone lines, lookout houses, and other necessary structures, provides a tidy payroll. In the seven national forests in northern Idaho alone this is estimated conservatively to have aver- aged during late years upward of 2000 men for an average of about three months each year. These 6000 man-months represent around S500,000 in wages alone. This employ- ment is in large part made up of local resi- dents, and a very great proportion of their compensation is put into local channels of trade. The temporary occasional crews, spe- cially recruited for suppression of large fires, have aggregated 2000 men yearlyg while many of these have been obtained from outside the state, practically all available and suitable local men have been used first, and a very large proportion has been local, and a large part of their wages has been spent within the state. Large aggregates are spent on such things as subsistence, materials, equipment, transportation, rent, horse feed, and similar items necessary for carrying on this large field enterprise. The state's usual annual in- come from the government's national forest activities is indeed of considerable moment in the prosperity and welfare of the state. CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS This year a new enormous expenditure by the federal government is in the way of being made in the national forests of Idaho. The Civilian Conservation Corps, while it will largely be composed of men recruited from other states, will include a great number of Idaho citizens likewise and will liberate large amounts of money into the local channels of trade. Altogether it can safely be said that the direct financial contributions of the federal government, as a result of its national forest enterprise in the eighteen forests in Idaho, far exceed what would have been the tax re- turns to the counties if the land now in na- tional forests had been permitted to lie open to public entry fmining laws are still, of course, unrestrictedly applicablej and had been pri- vately acquired. It is to be noted that after all but a small proportion of the national for- est property would have been privately ac- quired and retained in private ownership as worth while for a private owner to hold, ad- minister, protect, develop, and pay taxes on. Of the indirect benefits of the national for- ests the government's timber production ef- ,forts have been and will prove permanently to yield the greatest return to the state and its people. This is by providing a source of tim- ber conversion activities both present and po- tential. It is not in illing the needs of the state for lumber itself, although it is not at all amiss to have available near at hand at no great cost of transportation virtually an un- limited supply of timber for use by the mines, the farms, and other less prominent activities in the state, and although the government policy is to sell, at cost of making and ad- ministering the timber sales, all material needed by local settlers, and to give away all dead material free of charge. Idaho's output of lumber alone has aver- aged between 800,000,000 and 850,000,000 feet annually. It has been estimated that each thousand board feet of timber logged and manufactured brings between 320 and S25 in labor, supplies, and equipment paid out in the local community. While most of the cut in the past has come from privately owned lands, the end of privately owned timber as a ma- terial quantity exploited annually is not very many years away. In northern Idaho, for in- stance, private timber holdings will at normal cutting rates be cut out generally in from eight to fifteen years, with only a few ex- ceptions running a little longer. Very ob- viously the 322.50 for each thousand feet of timber cut that goes into local circulation will have to depend more and more on the govern- ment timber as time goes on.

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TI-IE BENEFITS AND SERVICES RENDERED BY TI-IE NATIONAL FORESTS OF THE STATE OF IDAHO M. H. WOLFF Assistant Regional Fo-resteog Lands, Region One, U. S. Forest Servfice PRIMARILY Idaho's welfare is founded on its lands. Its small proportion of manu- facturing activity is essentially involved in the conversion processes of the raw materials from its own forests and mines. The stateis wel- fare depends primarily On the products of the fields, the ranges, the mines, and the forests. Land is the basis of all these-land and its utilization. Of Idaho's gross area of 53,000,000 acres about 23,000,000 are forest lands. The federal government owns about '79 per cent of the tim- bered area, practically all within the national forests, the State of Idaho about 4 per cent, and the private owners the remaining 17 per cent. Just so much as the large forested pro- portion of the state area is a material influ- ence on the social and economic development and welfare of the state, so correspondingly have the national forests, composing virtually three-fourths of the total area of forest lands, a very considerable place in serving local social and economic needs. The helpful influences of the national forests in Idaho on the state's welfare are many and varied. They are the basis of direct financial returns to the local government units and to the people in the form of actual cash payments or equivalents to the counties and the State, and of a source of employment and a market for local trade as the result of the national forest work. INDIRECT BENEFITS VARIED Very appreciable as are these direct finan- cial returns, of far greater importance in the immediate and long-time economics and social welfare, locally, are results of the benefi- cially planned utilization of the national forest resources and their development and pro- tection. These might be termed, for distinc- tion from the direct financial contributions to the state, as indirect benefits, The national forests are a source of raw materials for the timber-using industries, logging and milling of lumber materials and the production of other timber items, such as poles, posts, and pulpvvood. They insure a certain degree of stability in the production of these materials and provide a feasible way for continuing in timber production lands not now government owned, which otherwise threaten in large part to become waste and idle. The national for- est ranges, under constructive management, provide forage for livestock producers and also furnish this pasturage in a manner which promotes the stabilization of the livestock business. The beneficial effect of the forests on erosion and floods and other injurious vari- ations in waterflows is reflected in nothing but good for irrigation interests and water power users. The forests provide an enormous recreation ground for the inspiration, diver- sion, and play, first, of the local population, and secondly, for outside people and through that an additional source of business revenue. Most immediate of the direct financial bene- fits to the state is the federal government's payment to the counties for road and school purposes of 25 per cent of the gross revenue obtained from the payments and fees coming from the use of the forests and their products. This virtually amounts to a 25 per cent non- assessable equity in these lands. The value of any land is in direct relation to the net rentals therefrom. Considering that the rental re- turns cannot be obtained without at least some expenditure, and that the payments to the counties are based on gross, not net receipts, the counties' interest might be considered as even materially in excess of 25 per cent. It is to be noted that these incomes are truly cur- rent rentals and not the removal of principal values, since a fundamental of national forest utilization is use without depreciation. This 25 per cent when applied to timber is really the equivalent of a 25 per cent yield tax 5 this far exceeds the most hopeful yield tax rate ever proposed in this or any other state. ROAD AND SCHOOL REVENUE LARGE ' This 25 per cent contribution in Idaho for the six-year period preceding the fiscal year 1931, when the efects of the depression be- came evident, totaled S979,686, indicating a normal average at this stage of development of about S163,000 per year. This income is based on only a partial utilization of the na- tional forest resourcesg with the more com- plete utilization fully to be anticipated in the future the returns to the counties can be ex- pected to increase. In addition to contributing this 25 per cent of its gross income to the counties, the federal government spends 10 per cent of its gross in- come in any state for road construction within that state. An appreciable part of this re- places an equivalent amount that would other- wise have to be expended for this purpose by the local governments. Hence, that amounts to an additional financial contribution. The 10 per cent road fund apportionment to Idaho has reached an aggregate of close to 31,000,- 000. YVhile the 10 per cent road construction has attained considerable proportions, it has been vastly exceeded by the direct appropriations made by the federal government for f0I'9St highways and forest development projects- These have been separate and apart from POS'C

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10 TI-IE IDAHO FORESTER YIELD CAPACITY DETERMINES CUT The amount of national forest timber that may be cut in any year is controlled by the sustained yield capacity of the forest land. The yield at the present time, based on the present forest land acreage, is in the neigh- borhood of 550 to 600 million feet annually. This is much below the past average annual cut in the state. Furthermore, a large- pro- portion of this yield is in species not now in great demand, or consists of the younger stands too small to fill market requirements, or is so inaccessible that for quite a number of decades it cannot be economically utilized. Consequently, there promises to be a material gap in the lumber industry's output for a period commencing about fifteen or twenty years from now until about fifty or sixty years from now, when the younger stands come into merchantability. What this means to local welfare needs no emphasis. The eiect of cessation of lumbering activities in several of the counties and towns in northern Idaho is already well known. However, looking ahead to the future the national forests are definitely a provisiong first to ameliorate the trying conditions re- sulting from cutting out of timber, and sec- ond, to build up the raw material output to even greater yi-eld possibilities than hitherto have been utilized. The first is accomplished through limitation of cutting-' on national forest lands to their sustained yield. A movement is further on foot, using the government timber as a foun- dation and nucleus, to work out a scheme in- volving- northern Idaho timber whereby the timber of other than government ownership will be thrown in with it and together be cut and managed on a sustained yield basis. SECOND GROWTH ESSENTIAL The second growth is accomplished through the care and protection the government is giv- ing to its young timber growth of no present commercial value as well as to the older mer- chantable stands. Such a policy is not fully pursued by any other forest landowner in the State of Idaho, not even the state itself on its own land. Its accomplishment is also further- ed through the authority for acquiring cut- over or young growth areas, nonagricultural in character, heretofore privately owned and adding them to the existing national forest lands. The lands thus added, having been se- lected for their timber quality in the days of free public land acquisition before the insti- tution of the national forests, are generally far better than average in timber production capacity. Hence, the future yield of the na- tional forests will be increased far out of proportion to the increase in acreage. Utilizing land unfit for agriculture, keep- ing land productive which otherwise would lie waste, and at no cost to the state, cannot otherwise than benefit the state. It is well known that vast acreages of privately owned land, cut-over, burned, or with unmarketable second growth, which have no value for agri- culture or any other purpose than timber pro- duction, are going back to the counties through tax delinquencies. The counties, even though their officials realize full well their responsi- bility and the vital importance of custodial at- tention to these lands, are financially unable to undertake this burden. The state cannot do so. Somewhat limited authority is available for the government to take over these lands. This has afforded a means for keeping much of these new public domain lands productive and in the way to deliver their manifold bene- fits to the people of the state. INVESTMENT FIGURES LARGE In these ways the national forests areplay- ing the part of bringing stability to the large lumbering and allied industries of the state upon which very many other gainful occupa- tions depend in great part. In 1927 there were in Idaho 96 lumber and timber products establishments, over 10,000 salary and wage earners faverage for the yearlg salaries and wages totaled over 314,000,000 and materials, fuel, etc., exceeded 310,000,000. The value of the manufactured product exceeded 330,000,- 000. The figures for 1929 were appreciably higher, but 1927 data are accepted as more conservative. The 322.50 per thousand feet that is estimated as going into local circula- tion, on 800,000,000 feet of annual cut comes to 318,000,000 The figures from one large lumber company indicate that on anpinvest- ment of around 39,500,000, about 32,500,000 yearly has circulated in the local communities for the past two decades. The lumber and allied industries comprise directly a material part of the taxable prop- erty of the state. From the 1931 report of the Idaho State Board of Equalization is indicated that this comes to between 345,000,000 and 350,000,000 Just how much more taxable values come from business, residence and similar properties, and even public utility values, and farm values stimulated by local markets resulting from the lumbering indus- try, it is impossible to determine, but un- questionably their aggregate is v-ery great. The continuance of the tax return from these properties is inevitably bound up with the con- tinuance of these industries. Of vast importance indeed in the economic welfare of the state in the future is the as- sured stability of raw material production. This assurance of a stable output of forest crops is not or cannot be assured by any other agency than the federal government. Despite these enormous benefits, the obligation has not been undertaken by any of the county govern- ments and is redeemed in only a secondary way by the state. While the justifica- tion of the federal government's raising tim- fContinued on page 465