"The members of the Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians live and work in the communities designated as potential beneficiaries in two federal forest land management proposals currently under review in the U.S. House of Representatives. HR 4019 introduced by Rep. Hastings and a discussion draft circulated by Reps. DeFazio, Schrader and Walden both are intended by their sponsors to empower counties, including Coos County, to exercise greater control over the management of revenue-producing federal timber lands. Both proposals open the door to the possibility that counties might partner with entrepreneurs, including, potentially, Indian tribes, to produce a greater revenue from federal lands.

Readers of recent articles in The World might erroneously have inferred that one or both of the proposals would require Coos County to contract with a federally mandated specific tribe for the management of the Coos Bay Wagon Road lands. Not true."

Get the Story:
Bob Garcia: Tribe, U.S. partner on management (The Coos Bay World 3/5)

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