Injunction halts two Eastern Oregon timber sales

BAKER CITY, Ore. (AP) - An injunction has halted work on two timber sales and one prescribed burning project in the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest.

The injunction issued Nov. 26 is the latest in a batch of legal rulings prompted by a lawsuit filed by the Sierra Club against the U.S. Forest Service. The lawsuit challenges the agency's 2003 policy that exempts certain logging and prescribed burning projects from appeals.

Wallowa-Whitman timber sales officer Carla Monismith told the Baker City Herald that loggers had already cut about 60 percent of the trees in one timber sale, near Greenhorn.

The other project, in Wallowa County, is half done.

The prescribed burn is 80 percent finished, but Monismith says the goals have been already been achieved, so there's no need to complete the remaining 20 percent.

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