Section B · Page 6
The University. Daily Kansan
Thursday, October 14, 1999
Nation
President wants to protect forestland
Timber interests call conservation reckless
The Associated Press
REDDISH KNOB OVERLOOK, Va. With the Shenandoah Valley's first tinges of fall color for a backdrop President Clinton said yesterday that his sweeping plan to place 40 million acres of federal forestland off-limits to development would not harm the timber industry.
The remote, largely pristine parcels of land Clinton wants to preserve represent a mere fraction of federally owned forest,
he said. Vast reaches of other federal timberland already are available for logging and other development, he said.
"It is very important to point out that we are not trying to turn our national forests into museums," Clinton said as he detailed a plan environmentalists call progressive and the timber industry has called reckless.
His program would prevent or restrict road-building through the larger sections of currently roadless federal forest, most of it in the West.
Less than 5 percent of timber harvested in America comes from national forests, and of that amount just 5 percent comes from roadless areas, Clinton said.
Roads open forest areas to development.
erosion and pollution. They also disrupt wildlife, plant life and natural systems. But roadless federal land also contains some of the most desirable timber owned by the Forest Service. Timber companies and their allies in Congress oppose any effort to close off future development.
The president took a few swipes at congressional Republicans, several of whom already have denounced the forest plan, for what he described as shortlighted views on the environment.
He also threatened to veto the Interior Department spending bill, which controls funding for a host of environmental and preservation projects, if Republicans do not amend it to be more environmentally friendly.
911 caller kills 3 cops in shootout
The Associated Press
PLEASANTON, Texas — Three law officers were lured to a trailer park by a bogus 911 call and shot to death by a gunman who wounded two others before killing himself, authorities said.
Jeremiah Engleton, 21, kept firing from his hiding place in a thicket as up to 75 officers surrounded the rural area Tuesday night. After a three-hour standoff, he shot himself in the head, investigators said.
One of the slain officers had arrested Engleton early that morning on charges of beating his wife, and a counselor with the sheriff's department had persuaded her to take their 15-month-old daughter and
leave him.
That night, after England was released, he called 911. Then he ducked into a thicket of cactuses and mesquite trees and waited for the patrol cars to arrive, investigators said.
Sheriff's Deputies Mark Stephenson, 32, and Thomas Monse, 31, were shot to death as they approached the trailer. Neither had time to call for help.
State Trooper Terry Miller, 37, was sent to the scene when the deputies did not respond to radio calls. He pulled up 20 minutes later and was shot fatally through the windshield.
Engleton shot at police with an assault rifle until officers using infrared equipment from a helicopter spotted him in the thicket.
---