The article states: " Dr. Louise Fortmann has appeared at numerous timber industry conferences with variations on her theme of the endangered and maligned loggers greeted enthusiastically."
Correction: The speech discussed in Ms. Phoenix's article has been presented exactly once at the meeting of The Concern for Sustainable Forests in Sacramento, October 3, 1990. The Concern for Sustainable Forests is a consortium of environmental activists, timber industry representatives, forest landowners, natural resource agency personnel, and university faculty and students who tried to find common ground on the issue of forest management. The October 3 meeting was attended by staff of state and federal natural resource agencies, environmentalists, environmental consultants, one timber industry lobbyist and one logger. I have never presented this speech, in whole or in part, at a timber industry conference or timber industry gathering of any kind, formal or informal. The last time I spoke to a timber industry conference was in 1987.
The articles states that the so-called " Fortmann Report" "had no basis in scholarly research or fact"
Correction: The speech was based on results from scholarly research on community well-being which had been in progress for 18 months at the time of the speech. What the author called "The Fortmann Report" was clearly identified at the beginning of the text as a presentation to the Concern.
The article states: "Not one source was identified for its conclusions and no methodology of any type was indicated."
Correction: A brief description of the methodology , appropriate for the lay audience, was provided in the speech as follows:
This paper is based on field research in 9 counties spanning forest communities in the entire state. The work began in July, 1989 and is still in progress. We interviewed loggers, truck drivers, environmental activists, mill workers, timber industry executives, county and city officials, business people, and just about anyone else who would stand still. In the timber industry alone we interviewed at least 100 people.
Sources of quotes were not provided because protecting the confidentiality of interviews is a major ethical principle of sociological research. The University of California at Berkeley's Committee for the Protection of Human Subjects requires all researchers to specify how they will ensure that the names of their respondents will remain confidential. To have identified the sources of quotations would have been a gross violation of a basic tenet of sociological research ethics.
The article states that Northern California environmentalists were interviewed by people who did not identify themselves or their purpose and who did not keep any record of the interview.
Correction: In accordance with standard procedures all interviewers were carefully trained and directed to identify themselves to all respondents and to explain why they were conducting the interviews. Written notes or tapes were kept for all interviews.
The article states that interviews with Northern California environmentalists were "thrown away."
Correction: No interviews were discarded.
The article states: "Only interviews from the timber industry were included in the report ..."
Correction: The speech included views from a cross section of people including local environmentalists and environmental activists. The following are some examples of the views of environmentalists in the speech :
¥"Local environmentalists see themselves as stewards of the landÑpeople who plant trees, struggle to prevent their being cut, and bring poor forest practices to a halt."
¥"We met many environmentalists who worried about the potential loss of local jobs and the destruction of a way of life that had been sustained for generations. And most important, almost all local people on both sides of the struggle wanted the forest to remain as forest, not to be turned into condos or toxic waste dumps."
¥"Local people with environmental concerns also feel a lack of control. They feel that timber corporations are ruining the land and the towns where they have worked hard to establish a livelihood and home for their children. They also feel that environmental organizations like the Sierra Club are not responsive to their needs and often make things worse. They are upset when their town is invaded by Earth First activists who stir up resentment that they have to live with. They feel that the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection is answering only to the needs of the timber industry and that the process for dealing with the Department is difficult and usually futile. They are frustrated that their tax dollars are assisting in the destruction of their local environment..."
The article states that the views of timber industry respondents were "often given as fact rather than opinions."
Correction: The text clearly states that stories were being reported and why the use of stories was appropriate:
"A good way to understand any group is to look at the stories it tells. We saw polarization in the stories about violence that circulated on both sides."
The article then states: "For example, the report cites timber workers being harassed by wealthy and well-dressed outside agitators."
Correction: The exact text, which followed immediately after the two sentences on stories quoted above, is:
"Many loggers repeated stories about 'Earth Firsters', suddenly springing out of the woods, armed variously in different stories with stones, tire irons and baseball bats who had attacked loggers on a landing."
Later in the speech the following text appears:
"They see people who appear to be wealthy vandalizing their equipment, endangering their lives and trying to put them out of work."
The phrase "outside agitators" does not appear anywhere in the speech. Readers should note carefully that it has long since been observed that "things that are perceived to be real, are real in their consequences". The quotes above are what timber workers perceive to be real.
A final point: it is very important that not only the speech on which the article is based but that my work more generally (and the work of others working to protect the environment) be understood because it raises a vital issue which environmental activists in Africa, Latin America and Asia have long ago understood and acted upon. That is, if we are to protect and preserve our environment, we must also ensure the well-being of communities located in the areas we wish to protect. As communities slide into poverty and despair, the degradation and eventually destruction of the adjacent resources are very likely to follow. To perpetuate the idea that we can save the environment without saving the people is to imperil both.
Copyright Mendocino Environmental Center 2004
Permission granted to excerpt or use this article if source is cited