Public Participation in Forest Planning: Eight Attributes of Success

Abstract

F ederal ecosystem and adaptive management programs encourage collaboration with local forest communities. Such programs offer opportunities not only to experiment with approaches to forest management but also to capitalize on local knowledge and build support for management decisions. But for natural resources professionals, questions persist. What do we want from the public? What do they expect from us? How do we do public participa-tion? What would a successful participatory process look like? These same questions confronted the implementation team of the Central Cascades Adaptive Management Area on Ore-gon's Willamette National Forest. One place to look for answers was the public participation efforts of the not-so-distant past. We consulted with Forest Service personnel and local citizens to examine processes previously undertaken on the Willamette and learn from their experiences about the success and pitfalls of agency-public interactions. Comparative analysis An often-cited problem with learning how to conduct public processes is that every community is different, and each situation is unique. What works under certain conditions may not be relevant in other situations. In comparing five long-term planning processes that occurred between 1989 and 1995, therefore, we looked for common elements that stood out across settings. The groups varied from one organized to examine and advise on the forest's timber sale program to one that developed a new management plan for three designated wilderness areas. We interviewed 31 citizen and USDA Forest Service participants and asked for their best recollections of what had happened in those groups. Many were veterans of a range of Forest Service public meetings. We noted obstacles and frustrations but were particularly interested in those attributes that contributed to positive interactions or outcomes. Within each public process we found elements that were consistently connected with success , along with other elements that were almost always cited as counterproductive.