Alabama State Forester Linda Casey recently appointed representatives from seven state and federal organizations to a task force to oversee the implementation of Alabama’s Forest Action Plan, Forests at the Crossroads. The group is putting the final touches on an FY12 work plan to carry out priority strategies that will focus on the top three threats to Alabama’s forest resources: urban development, forest fragmentation and parcelization and invasive species.
Forests at the Crossroads was developed when the 2008 Farm Bill encouraged State Foresters to complete statewide assessments of Alabama’s forest resources. The Alabama Forestry Commission saw this as an opportunity to fulfill its own legislative mandate “to make exploration, surveys, studies and reports concerning the timber and forest resources and to publish such thereof as will be of general interest.”
Over an 18-month period, the Alabama Forestry Commission collaborated with 33 organizations, 37 subject matter experts, and with public comments from 865 citizens to produce Forests at the Crossroads. The document was approved on June 18, 2010 by the U.S. Forest Service on behalf of the Secretary of Agriculture.
The task force will present their recommendations to the seven agency heads for approval, which represent the Alabama Forestry Commission, Alabama Department of Environmental Management, Alabama National Forests, Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, Auburn University School of Forestry & Wildlife Sciences, Alabama Cooperative Extension System, and Natural Resource Conservation Service.