Barbara and Stewart Hoyt

Barbara and Stewart Hoyt

...

To

Craig Butt

District Forest Manager

Murchison

1st December 2014

Dear ...

RE: Reply to your letter of 18 November 2014 in response to our letter of 22 October 2014 objecting to proposed forest practices (road construction, forest harvesting and reforestation) at Broxhams Road, Lapoinya.

We appreciate that it has taken you 27 days to respond due to investigations. We request that any further correspondence to us also be sent via Email to expedite matters as we have done so with you.

We have taken under consideration your responses to our questions and wish to comment further on those we deem inadequate or unanswered.

Most importantly, you state that firm harvest dates are still to be confirmed as the FP Plan is still in development. You do not mention the road construction date of commencement being any other than the intended 12 January 2015, only SIX WEEKS FROM NOW!

REQUEST: Immediate assurances by Email and in writing that road construction will not commence on the intended dates as given in your letter dated 1st October 2014 headed “Notice of Intent to conduct forest practices under the Forest Practices Act 1985”

We view the time frame in place as intimidating.

In answer to our question about who oversights contractors, you state that contractors are fully aware of their obligations and that operations are audited by Forestry Tasmania and the FPA.

We are not re-assured by your assurances that contractors will abide as they have not in recent clear-felling operations in our area and that your FT and FPA auditing procedures may be flawed, ineffectual or too late.

You mention Certification of the FP Plan.

QUESTION: When will you attempt “Certification”

Again, unknown time frames at present are a cause for uncertainty and some anxiety in this community

.

In regards to the location of fauna nesting and den sites, that is a matter this Community takes seriously. In addition to a Freshwater Lobster survey, we will shortly be taking a more thorough ground search for dens. We will of course advise you of any finds.

We notice in your Biodiversity Report that there was an aboriginal artifact found within 100 meters of Maynes Road (artifact 4951).

QUESTION: Has your Cultural Heritage Manager contacted anyone else in regards to this find? We find it reprehensible and demeaning that studies might be made after the site has been irreparable damaged and degraded by Forest Harvesting Practices as is stated will happen in the Biodiversity Report.

A single Wildlife Habitat Clump of .6 hectares is not enough in a coup of such diversity. I agree six clumps of .1 hectares is ludicrous and impossible to protect during and after forest harvesting and burning.

Prescriptions of this nature as well as Aboriginal artifact finds and contractor oversight has alerted us to the antiquity of the procedures you act under.

QUESTION: As District Forest Manager are you empowered to increase the number and placement of viable Wildlife Habitat Clumps and initiate a more detailed study of Aboriginal finds?

Lastly and most importantly:

You discuss in your letter that your planning looks at specific areas and the “larger landscape context”. How is it that from a Google Maps perspective that the area in question is surrounded by plantation, clear-felled coups and agricultural land? You state that there is reserved land on the south of Broxhams road and much is in Long Term Retention. This reserve is known breeding ground of the Giant Lobster. You intimate that this reserve is where the animals can go after clear-felling the coup. You also state that after the local community has had the amenity of the forest over the years, that we can go somewhere else too!

Enough is enough ...!

Our consultations to date have been predicated on “if the community asks then we will respond” and nowhere in your documentation does it state any other objective than “harvesting will have an impact”

Our Argument:

We have argued on the basis of the unusual biodiversity of the area. That it is the upper reach of the watershed of the Maynes, Hebe and Flowerdale rivers, that unusual species of eucalypts are present, that there are resident threatened fauna, that there are unusual numbers of communities of rare and healthy birdlife, and that Todd Walsh, an authority of Freshwater Lobster breeding areas has studied this area and has stated this coup should not be logged.

We have argued on the basis that this Forest is significant to its Community of residents. We are nurses and teachers, carers of the aged and disabled, electoral office workers, tourist accommodation operators and agricultural workers and farmers and retirees. We have lived here for generations. It is used every day as the reserve road is the only accessible public area to ride horses, walk the dogs, bushwalk, and show the bush to both the visitors and the tourists. It is a place of wonder, beauty and contemplation for all of us. Unlike some of us, it is still young and has a sustainable future.

We have argued on the basis of economic sustainability. That to manage this juvenile coup, prepare plans, build roads, bridges and culverts, and landings as well as to pay contractors to fell, haul and transport the chippers, peeler log and saw log, as well as to pay for the helicopters and burning and reseeding etc., the cost, using FC figures will be over $500,000. The revenue from the Production Zone using FC figures, will be a bit over $400,000. Net loss is $100.000 payable by the Tasmanian taxpayer! As well, the cost to the local Council of Waratah/Wynyard will be lost rates as the value of the coop is reduced to ZERO after logging and the cost of repairing the Lapoinya road, and the Myalla road after contractors have finished hauling.

We Believe:

That the coup and the rest of the Forest Production Zone south of Maynes Creek should NEVER HAVE BEEN SEVERED from the Reserve in the first place. The existence of the track known as Broxhams road does not make the habitat on the North side any LESS valuable than the South side. It is gully country and filled with creeks, intermittent streams and under bed waterways. It is a vital and contiguous part of the reserve and its destruction would degrade and exacerbated the water quality of both the reserve and downstream to the Flowerdale River.

It is not rocket science to look at your planning map of the proposed clear-felling coup to see the dozen fingers of a watershed systems that contractors theoretically have to work around, never mind the bridges (at what cost to the taxpayer) required to ford them. This is a very marginal coup and a loss of $100,000 to be paid from State Treasury by the Tasmanian taxpayer is patently unsustainable in an era of job cuts to teachers and other public servants.

So our final

QUESTION: TO YOU ...

A s the District Forest Manager of Murchison are you empowered to terminate the process of clear-felling Coup FD053A and remove it and the adjacent land south of Maynes creek from the forest production zone?

AND IF YOU ARE NOT EMPOWERED

Who is empowered to do so?

Yours very sincerely

Stewart M Hoyt Barbara L Hoyt