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Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins delivers a speech at the Western Governors\u2019 Association annual meeting on June 23. Credit: Ellen Jaskol<\/p>\nTo see what Southern California looked like before millions of homes sprawled through the region, head to Cleveland National Forest. Nestled between Los Angeles and San Diego, the forest\u2019s three districts are a refuge for the region\u2019s wildlife and locals looking to escape the hustle and bustle of the state\u2019s two biggest cities.\u00a0<\/p>\n
From above, a sea of homes surrounds the Santa Ana mountains\u2014famous for the intense winds they generate\u2014but the national forest forms a clear band of undeveloped wildlands connecting the southernmost peaks of the state\u2019s Coast Ranges to the northern Mojave Desert.<\/p>\n
But a nearly 25-year-old federal rule protecting the area, along with portions of many other national forests across the country, may soon be rescinded, paving the way for more development and increasing wildfire risk in some of the nation\u2019s last remote woodlands and wilderness areas.<\/p>\n
In June, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins announced that the USDA, which oversees the U.S. Forest Service, planned to repeal the Roadless Rule that has prevented new roads from being cut into nearly 60 million acres of national forests. Rollins has called the 2001 rule a \u201cdisastrous\u201d policy that has created \u201cabsurd obstacles\u201d to management of public lands managed by the U.S. Forest Service, which has made communities more vulnerable to wildfires while restricting logging and development in rural areas of the West.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no doubt about it, we are continuing to be aggressive in our efforts to increase<\/p>\n
American timber production in line with President Trump\u2019s agenda,\u201d Rollins said during a speech at the Western Governors\u2019 Association conference on June 23, where she announced plans to rescind the Roadless Rule. \u201cThese actions are essential, not just to revive our struggling forestry industry, but to save lives [from wildfires].\u201d<\/p>\n
Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins delivers a speech at the Western Governors\u2019 Association annual meeting on June 23. Credit: Ellen Jaskol<\/p>\n
The science, however, shows otherwise, say critics of the USDA\u2019s planned rescission of the rule. Researchers have found that roads increase the likelihood of wildfires<\/a> in the areas they access. And while the Trump administration claims the Roadless Rule is in part to blame for the increase in the destruction from wildfires in the West, it makes no mention the growing number of communities sprawling into fire-prone landscapes, where they radically increase the number of ignitions and the amount of property vulnerable to the flames, or how global warming driven by burning fossil fuels is increasing the incidence of hot, dry and windy conditions<\/a> that set the stage for wildfires like the ones that tore through Los Angeles <\/a>early this year.<\/p>\n \u201cWe just have all of this evidence to show that if you put more roads in there, you\u2019re going to get more fires,\u201d said Krystian Lahage, a public policy officer with the Mojave Desert Land Trust, a California-based conservation group.\u00a0<\/p>\n While fires are a natural, and often beneficial, part of the forest\u2019s ecosystem, he said, their current magnitude is not. Climate change and human activity are driving an increase in bigger, more severe blazes. In 2003, what was then the biggest wildland fire on record in California broke out in the Cleveland National Forest after a hunter became lost and lit a small fire to signal for help. It quickly spread, eventually burning 273,246 acres and killing 15 people. Twenty-two years later, the fire, named the Cedar Fire, is just the tenth<\/a> largest in the state\u2019s history.<\/p>\n Passed in 2001 at the end of President Bill Clinton\u2019s second term, the Roadless Rule protected about a third of national forest lands across the country from logging and roadbuilding. The measure drew support from conservation, hunting, angling and other outdoor recreation groups.<\/p>\n If the roadless rule is repealed, conservation groups fear wildfires will increase in the once-protected areas, and the country\u2019s last intact landscapes will be developed and degraded with housing, logging and other resource-extraction operations. And, they note, the rescission of the Roadless Rule is just the latest in a series of actions from Republicans and the Trump administration to roll back protections for public lands in an effort to further open them up to extraction and development.<\/p>\n A Bird\u2019s-eye View<\/p>\n While growing up in Huntington Beach, Lahage\u2019s introduction to the outdoors was in the Cleveland National Forest. Twenty years later, on a small plane arranged by Ecoflight, a nonprofit that takes policymakers, environmental organizations, journalists and other stakeholders on aerial tours over significant landscapes to provide a birds-eye view of issues affecting the area, Lahage explained that \u201cwhatever your taste in nature, you can find it here.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Hunting is common in the Cleveland National Forest, anglers flock to Santiago Creek for trout fishing and there are miles of trails popular with hikers, mountain bikers and horseback riders, including the Pacific Crest Trail that runs from Canada to Mexico. Perhaps most important is the biodiversity of the Roadless Area, which provides habitat and critical migration corridors for mountain lions, coyotes, mule deer and even the occasional California condor. The roadless area also provides a buffer around the Wilderness Areas deeper in the national forest\u2014islands of pristine land where nature is front and center.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we go in here and log or if we go in here and develop the roads, that can\u2019t be undone,\u201d Lahage said. \u201cThe fractures to the environment can\u2019t be undone, and we lose out, not just on this resource for people, but it\u2019s another strike for the biodiversity crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n Cleveland National Forest lacks the old-growth timber suitable for logging found in other parts of the country. Instead, it\u2019s filled with chaparral and small oak trees, making it unlikely that any logging operations will utilize new roads cut into the forest. Instead, Lahage worries that overturning the Roadless Rule will allow the kind of access to the woods that will increase the number of wildfire ignitions in the area and the potential for big fires that could threaten the nearby communities. And new roads in the woods could pave the way for the privatization of portions of the forest.<\/p>\n Public Support for Roadless Forests<\/p>\n Americans across the country have spoken out in support of the Roadless Rule. An analysis by the Center for Western Priorities found that more than 99 percent of the 183,000 comments submitted during the public comment period for the proposal to rescind the rule opposed the action. The comment period ended September 19, with a draft environmental impact statement expected for March, and a final decision made later next year.\u00a0<\/p>\n This story is funded by readers like you.<\/p>\n Our nonprofit newsroom provides award-winning climate coverage free of charge and advertising. We rely on donations from readers like you to keep going. Please donate now to support our work.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/ClevelandNatlForestSanDiego750px.png\"\/)
<\/p>\n![\"Two](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/DSC_0334-1024x683.jpg\"\/)
Two bikers set off on a trail outside of a housing development in Corona, California, which borders the Cleveland National Forest. Just a couple of miles away is the forest\u2019s roadless area. Credit: Wyatt Myskow\/Inside Climate News<\/p>\n![\"Urban](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/2025_09_19_CA_Cleveland_NF_Roadless_4.jpg\"\/)
Urban development of Southern California surrounds the Cleveland National Forest, which contains some of the land intact landscapes found in the region. Credit: EcoFlight<\/p>\n
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