Forest exchange involves Sisters land

A proposed land exchange of nearly 100,000 acres between the Forest Service and Crown Pacific, Ltd., will include thousands of acres in the Sisters Ranger District, some even within the Sisters city limits.

Most of the exchange occurs on the southern portion of the Deschutes National Forest, the northwestern portion of the Fremont National Forest and the northern portion of the Winema National Forest.

The exchange would consolidate properties of over 50,000 acres of National Forest lands and 50,000 acres of Crown Pacific lands.

The exchange is expected to "reduce administrative costs, and allow the application of state-of- the- art silvicultural prescriptions to large blocks of land, increasing timber production potential and efficiency of management," according to a Forest Service press release.

On the Sisters Ranger District, the Forest Service will gain approximately 9,200 acres of Crown Pacific land. Of this, 2,060 acres are north of Sisters on the southeast side of Little Squaw Back. The remaining acres are south of Sisters in the Bull Flat Tree Farm, east of Three Creeks Road.

Two Federal parcels totaling 74 acres are proposed to be exchanged to Crown. One parcel is six miles south of Sisters and the other is 16.2 acres on the west end of Sisters.

The 57.8 acre parcel would be sold by Crown to Stosh Thompson, who owns an adjacent ranch. The 16.2 acre parcel would be sold by Crown to Bill Reed, owner with his wife Jan of the adjacent Ponderosa Lodge.

Thompson is in Mexico and could not be reached for comment.

Reed said he planned to use the property to add additional units and a larger meeting room to the motel.

"The meeting room we have now is not large enough. We would like to add a larger room capable of being divided into small rooms with movable partitions," Reed said.

The larger meeting room would allow the facility to host corporate clients and weddings, said Reed.

Ted Young, Administrative Forester with Crown Pacific, confirmed that the plan was to sell the two parcels to Thompson and Reed.

Young said that these smaller land exchanges were "side issues the Forest Service already had going with these other entities. They came to us asking if they could tack these on to the exchange we were doing."

Young said that Crown Pacific has no position for or against these other exchanges.

The land exchange is still in the proposal stage and before an environmental analysis can be completed, the Forest Service must determine the issues and concerns.

The environmental assessment must also determine what the effects of the exchange are on the local environment as well as the local citizens.

The Forest Service, is seeking comments from the public regarding concerns or issues about the land exchange. For more information, call Jeff Sims at 5497706.