San Bernardino Forest Management Project Gets Court Nod

A logging project in the San Bernardino National Forest was upheld by a federal judge who ruled that tree removal isn’t a highly controversial method for managing the risk of wildfires.

While Friends of Big Bear, the John Muir Project and the San Bernardino Valley Audubon Society pointed to studies and an agency analysis that showed mass thinning creates drier and windier conditions, Judge Sheri Pym said these viewpoints “were contrary to the scientific consensus,” in a Monday opinion granting summary judgment to the government. The groups challenged the North Big Bear Landscape Restoration Project, which calls for the removal ...