NJAS Opinion: Autumn, 1993

The following article is taken from the comments of the New Jersey Audubon Society given on 17 April 1993 to the Pinelands Commission Plan Review Committee on the 4.12c proposal to eliminate resource extraction as a permitted use in the Forest Areas and develop standards to prohibit the expansion of existing mining operations in the least disturbed subbasins within the Forest Areas and the Preservation Area District

We support this proposal to eliminate mining in the Forest Areas and to restrict operations in the least disturbed subbasins. We believe this restriction to be in the public interest because it will protect habitat and species communities in the Forest and Preservation Areas; it will help protect water quality; it will prevent forest fragmentation; and it will make a contribution to clean air. The rationale for choosing the least disturbed watersheds is quite strong. The lesson of the Chesapeake is clear: pollution correlates directly with the loss of forests in the watershed. A memo from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) in 1992, summarizing a study of watersheds, concluded: no watershed in the nation preserved water quality solely by limited buffers and stormwater management.

The Pinelands region has a rich fauna, with 290+ regularly occurring bird species and about 140 breeding species. These are grouped in communities ranging in species richness from 4 or 5 species over parts of the pine plains up to some 77 species in the mixed forests. There are some 34 mammal species in the Barrens, and 58 reptiles and amphibians. On the order of 20 of the state's endangered and threatened species are found in the Pinelands region. A large number of all of these categories of species occur in the Forest and Preservation Areas. The regulation will help to protect quality habitat.

This proposal will go a long way toward filling a regulatory gap which exists with respect to forests. Whereas wetlands and endangered species are given explicit protection in law on the state and federal level and in the Pinelands, forests are not. There is both a regional and a hemispheric imperative to protect forests not only for their species communities, but for their water and air quality contribution, for the contribution they make in preventing erosion and global warming, and for their recreational opportunities. Ironically, wetlands regulations have put pressure on uplands for developments of various kinds. Acquisition of land by public agencies by itself is insufficient to protect resources. The other two legs of the conservation triad also have to operate: voluntary stewardship (which by itself is also insufficient) and regulation of land use in the public interest, which is the case with this proposal. Deforestation and fragmentation have occurred rapidly in recent decades in New Jersey and the Northeast generally. Although slowing forest loss is a global issue, it requires local action. We need to take care of the forests in our own backyard. This proposal helps to do that.

Another important issue is the number of species found in forests. The majority of pinelands species are forest species. The numbers of bird species can be quite high, especially in the southern forest area. A high percentage of these species, especially the forest Neotropical species (which nest here and winter in the tropics) have traditionally received very little funding for research and conservation. Yet they outnumber the combined total of game species, raptors, threatened and endangered species - all of which are well funded. Some of our most familiar birds are in this large class of underfunded and underprotected species: scarlet tanager, red-eyed vireo, northern or Baltimore oriole, and our warblers, vireos, flycatchers; in short, better than half of our breeding species, both in the state and in the Pines. The Pinelands Commission has an obligation to protect species communities such as this as well as endangered species. Conservation of habitat, not just single species, is what works.

Mining operations contribute to forest fragmentation and deforestation. The proposal to restrict mining in the sensitive areas is reasonable, especially in view of the large number of species requiring these habitats. Designating conservation areas is proactive. In some Forest Areas a large percentage of the species community requires a large forest interior to be successful. Species richness and diversity of wildlife are in part a function of habitat size. Species such as tanagers, vireos, ovenbirds and other warblers begin to decline when these areas get too small. When large sections of habitat are stripped, the entire species community is lost. In the postmining condition of the habitat, the formerly large species communities cannot live. So there is wisdom in making some areas off limits to mining. Tinkering with a former mine will not recreate what existed on the site before mining. The effect of the proposed new regulation is to preserve biodiversity.

This is a measured proposal, not an extreme one. It is a result of compromise. The prohibitions extend to new mining only. The restrictions in the least disturbed areas permit existing operations to continue. Mining is permitted outside of these restricted areas. Since viable use of these lands remains and since the proposal serves the public interest, we would urge you to adopt the regulation in its present form. The public interest is local, regional and hemispheric: water quality, protection of ecosystems, prevention of erosion, conservation of species. Perhaps it is a significant measure of the local public interest that sixteen towns do not permit mining. Adoption of this proposal will conserve seven thousand acres of an important resource and fills an important gap in the implementation of the Pinelands Comprehensive Plan.

A lesson from another regulatory body is instructive here. The Hackensack Meadowlands Commission regulates 22,000 acres in the Meadowlands. In 1968, when the commission began, the wetlands were one third developed. Since the commission was constituted, another third has been developed. They still talk of balance. Now the plan is to develop only 14 percent of what remains. If, when the players change every ten years or so, they take only 14 percent, it won't be long before the wetlands disappear. So too with forests, the one who forgets to remember is doomed to repeat.

At the Pinelands Commission meeting of 7 May 1993, the commissioners present (11) voted to prohibit new mining operations in the Forest Area of the Pinelands. The commission will also be required to reevaluate the mining issue during the next Plan Review, five years from now. This step represents a strengthening of the Comprehensive Management Plan (CMP), in which the Forest Area had not received the protection it needed. But unfortunately, the commission did not vote to prevent extension of existing mines into the least disturbed subbasins in the Preservation and Forest Areas. This means that these sensitive areas remain at risk.

Richard Kane
Director of Conservation