National Forest Sale Would Be Buyers’ Boon

KANSAS CITY, Mo. _ Picture this: Peace and quiet amid timber, rolling hills, scattered grassland, maybe even a stream or two.

It could all be yours, for a price, under President’s Bush’s plan to sell an estimated 175,000 acres of National Forest land in Missouri and 34 other states to sustain a fund for rural schools and roads.

The idea has drawn the wrath of everyone from conservationists to Missouri Republican members of Congress who say the state would get a paltry return for the sale. But the proposal promises to be hugely popular with one particular group _ buyers.

Rural property is in high demand in states such as Missouri, where up to 21,566 acres of Mark Twain National Forest could be put on the block. Real estate agents and landowners said the forest land would go quickly _ and for a high price.

“Land is just snapped up in a heartbeat around here unless they’ve got an incredible price on it,” said Clete Baxter, a real estate agent who recently quickly sold 10 acres for $5,499 an acre near one of the Mark Twain parcels southeast of Columbia that could be for sale.

U.S. Forest Service officials said they have heard from people who want the land _ commonly in 40-acre parcels or more _ for hunting, farming, residential or investment purposes. Adjoining landowners also want it, they said.

The price of rural land jumped about 10 percent in 2005 and nearly that much in 2004 in the seven states within the jurisdiction of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, according to its data.

In areas around Columbia, Mo., the increase has been sharper, said people familiar with recent sales.

“There are doctors and lawyers and professors all over Columbia waiting for opportunities like this _ to get a spot of heaven, to get away from the rat race,” said John Lindsey, who lives next door to a hilly, wooded Mark Twain parcel that could be sold.

In the Rolla area, where numerous parcels of Mark Twain land could be sold, rural land is also in high demand, real estate agent Kate Howell said.

“It’s very hard to get good land,” Howell said. “Local people want pasture land; city people want land for recreation.”

Lindsey said he can’t blame people for wanting to buy the forested land, but he is waging an organized effort to see that it doesn’t happen. More than 150 people attended a recent meeting of landowners who are fighting the sale, he said. They have written state and federal officials.

The Forest Service is in the midst of a public-comment period, which ends Thursday, and has posted maps of land for sale on its Web site. Congress must approve the sale before land would be advertised and bids sought. It represents less than two-tenths of 1 percent of all National Forest land.

The selected sites are seen as difficult for the Forest Service to manage and oversee. The land near Lindsey’s, for example, is hilly and thickly wooded. Often, the parcels are surrounded by private property, which would require the new owners to get access easements.

Nonetheless, people want such land, often for hunting because private landowners are increasingly unwilling to allow it, said Jim Hendren, a Columbia real estate broker and appraiser. “Recreational land has definitely gone up (in price) dramatically for that reason,” he said.

Opponents of the sale say it would set a bad precedent and that land could be misused. Lindsey said it could fall into the hands of someone who won’t treasure it for its beauty and solitude.

“My fear is they will put in a dirt bike track, a shooting range, a landfill, God only knows,” he said. Lindsey, a labor-union officer, bought his land and house 28 years ago, raised two sons there and considers it a great spot.

Adjoining landowners have inquired about buying the land to keep it within their control, said Carol Trokey, a forester for the Forest Service office in Fulton, Mo.

Bush’s plan is to sell National Forest land to raise $800 million to maintain funding of the Secure Rural School and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000, which directs proceeds from National Forest timber sales to mostly fund rural school districts.

With timber sale revenue dwindling, the administration came up with the idea of the forest sale to raise $800 million over the next five years. Counties would be asked to find other money after that source of revenue stops.

Counties that have National Forest land have been getting the federal funds because their property-tax bases are hurt by the large amount of nontaxable federal land within their boundaries. Sale of forest land is intended to make up for waning timber revenue.

In all, about 300,000 acres have been marked for sale across the country, but the Forest Service thinks it can reach its $800 million goal by selling about 175,000 acres.

Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt and several Missouri members of Congress have denounced the plan, partly because the state could give up 7 percent of the land nationwide but get only one-third of 1 percent of the proceeds _ or about $2.7 million. The fund distribution is based on current allotment of timber sales revenue, which has no correlation to how much each state would get from the land sale.

“This formula is grossly inadequate, and we will continue to fight for an alternate solution to fund our rural schools,” said U.S. Sens. Kit Bond and Jim Talent and U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson in a March 17 letter to Mark Rey, undersecretary for natural resources and environment in the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Rey said in a conference call with reporters last week that criticism is understandable but that National Forests are just that _ national. Rey said alternatives were explored but were not plausible.

“This issue we are trying to address is a national issue,” Rey said. “Inevitably, when we try to address an issue nationally, you’re going to create some differences among the states.”

Because of the criticism, the secretary of agriculture put some flexibility in the bill submitted to Congress on March 16. It allows for some “regional equity” in the land sales, but Congress would have to agree to the formula in what could be a political tug of war.

Jim Scheff of the nonprofit Missouri Forest Alliance said he fears that congressional opposition to the land sale is focused on financial inequity, not on real concerns about giving up the land, and that the proposal may pass eventually.

“It’s really a bad precedent to begin with,” Scheff said. “It says that it’s OK for a short-term gap in the budget process to sell off public land. It’s a total Band-Aid approach.”

Some landowners adjacent to the sale parcels are concerned that it could be subdivided, sold and built upon.

“I wouldn’t want to see it developed,” said Russell Landrum, who has land next to one of the tracts near Columbia. “Once it’s gone, it’s gone.”

___

U.S. Forest Service Web site: http://www.fs.fed.us/land/staff/rural-pdf.shtml

___

(c) 2006, The Kansas City Star.

Visit The Star Web edition on the World Wide Web at http://www.kcstar.com/

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.

_____

PHOTO (from KRT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): ENV-FORESTSALE

For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com. 1028595