Two Alaska Lawsuits Seek to Overturn Roadless Rule for Tongass National Forest

ANCHORAGE, Alaska—The state of Alaska has filed two lawsuits seeking to remove the President Clinton-era Roadless Rule from management of the Tongass National Forest (Alaska v. U.S. Department of Agriculture; Organized Village of Kake v. U.S. Department of Agriculture).

The state filed an appeal June 17 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that seeks to overturn a March 4 district court decision that reinstated the rule for the Tongass. The appeal seeks to reinstate a Bush-era exemption to the roadless rule, which had been successfully challenged by a native tribal government and a ...