United StatesDepartment ofAgriculture

Forest Service

Pacific NorthwestResearch Station

General TechnicalReportPNW-GTR-484November 1999

Lake

Mendocino

Del Norte

Humboldt

Coos

Curry

Clallam

Jefferson

Grays Harbor

Glenn

Shasta

Siskiyou

Trinity

Benton

Clatsop

Douglas

Josephine

Lane

Lincoln

Tillamook

Pacific

Columbia

Jackson

Linn

Polk

Yamhill

Marion

Cowlitz

Lewis

Wahkiakum

Mason

Tehama

Clackamas

Klamath

Clark

Pierce

Whatcom

Skamania

Snohomish

Skagit

Deschutes

Hood River

Jefferson

Wasco

Kittitas

Klickitat

Crook

Chelan

OkanoganFerry Stevens

Pend Oreille

Northwest Forest Plan:Outcomes and LessonsLearned From the NorthwestEconomic AdjustmentInitiative

Technical Editors

HARRIET H. CHRISTENSEN is a research social scientist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture,Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station, 4043 Roosevelt Way NE, Seattle, WA 98105.

TERRY L. RAETTIG is an economist, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific North-west Research Station, stationed at Olympic National Forest, 1835 Black Lake Blvd. SW., Olympia,WA 98512.

PAUL SOMMERS is senior research fellow and executive director, Northwest Policy Center, DanielJ. Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington, Box 353060, Seattle, WA 98105-3060.

Papers were provided in camera-ready form for printing by technical editors, who are thereforeresponsible for the content and accuracy. Opinions expressed may not necessarily reflect theposition of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Any use of trade, firm, or corporation names in this publication is for the information and conve-nience of the reader. Such use does not constitute an official endorsement or approval by the U.S.Department of Agriculture of any product or service to the exclusion of others that may be suit-able.

i

Proceedings, Northwest Forest Plan: Outcomes and Lessons LearnedFrom the Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative

Portland, OregonJuly 29th through 30th, 1997

Harriet H. Christensen, Terry L. Raettig and Paul Sommers, Technical Editors

SPONSORS

Center for Urban Studies, Portland State University, Portland, OR.

USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station, Portland, OR.

USDA Forest Service, State and Private Forestry Regions 5 & 6, San Francisco, CA., and Portland, OR.

Northwest Policy Center, Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs, Seattle, WA.

University of Washington, Seattle, WA.

USDI Bureau of Land Management, Portland, OR.

USDA Rural Development, Washington, D.C., and Portland, OR.

Western Rural Development Center, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR.

U.S. Department of Commerce, Economic Development Administration, Portland, OR.

Published by:

U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest ServicePacific Northwest Research StationPortland, ORGeneral Technical Report PNW-GTR-484November 1999

In cooperation with: Northwest Policy Center, Institute for Public Policy and Management, Univer-sity of Washington, Seattle, WA

ii

ABSTRACT

Christensen, Harriet H.; Raettig, Terry L.; Sommers, Paul., tech. eds. 1999. Northwest Forest Plan: outcomes and lessons learned from the Northwest economic adjustment initiative: Proceedings of a forum; 1997 July 29-30; Portland, OR. Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-484. Portland, OR: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station. 103 p. In cooperation with: Northwest Policy Center, Institute for Public Policy and Management, University of Washington.

This monograph is an examination of the experience in the Pacific Northwest implementing the NorthwestForest Plan, Economic Adjustment Initiative (NWEAI). First, a brief description of the NWEAI back-ground and framework, and a socioeconomic overview of the region prior to the NWEAI provide thesetting. Next, accounts of the NWEAI experience in each of the three states in the region; a chapter on theNWEAI impact on people and communities’ and a review of field level efforts to implement business, localgovernment, and ecosystem management projects build a comprehensive picture of the NWEAI programsthrough the eyes of the managers and community development practitioners who conceived and imple-mented the site specific projects. A synthesis of NWEAI related research work begins the final section onwhat had been learned from the NWEAI experience and questions still remaining. This monograph endswith an overview of key community and economic development issues in the region that have been ad-dressed by the NWEAI and the potential of the innovative NWEAI model as a guide for other resourcerelated economic development and mitigation efforts.

Keywords: Northwest Forest Plan, Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative, Pacific Northwest, commu-nity development, economic development.

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CONTENTS

The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative: Background and Framework.................................p. 1Terry L. Raettig and Harriet H. Christensen

Socioeconomic Overview: The Situation in 1993..................................................................................p. 10Richard H. Phillips Jr.

The Washington Perspective...................................................................................................................p. 19Karin Berkholtz

The Oregon Perspective...........................................................................................................................p. 29Bill Campbell

The California Perspective......................................................................................................................p. 33Mark Stanley

People and Communities..........................................................................................................................p. 40Janet Anderson-Tyler and Elizabeth Ellis

Implementing the Initiative: On the Ground.........................................................................................p. 48Anne S. Berblinger, Karl Denison, and Elizabeth Ellis

The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative:Lessons Learned and Questions Remaining.........p. 59Ellen Donoghue, Harriet H. Christensen, and Ron Saranich

Research on the Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative: Outcomes and Process.......................p. 65Paul Sommers

What We Have Accomplished and Learned: What's Next?.................................................................p. 76Anne S. Berblinger

Extending the Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative to other Regions: Utilizing theInitiative and the Institutions...................................................................................................................p. 83Harriet H. Christensen and Terry L. Raettig

Appendix A: List of Forum Participants.................................................................................................p. 97

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FOREWORD

This monograph contains the invited papers andindividual and panel presentations, at a forumentitled "The Northwest Economic AdjustmentInitiative: Have the Hopes Been Realized?, whichwas held at Portland State University, Portland, OR,from July 29 through 30, 1997. The overall purposeof the forum was to: (a) describe the nature, extent,funding and history of the Northwest EconomicAdjustment Initiative (NWEAI), (b) describe thecurrent state of research and monitoring related tothe NWEAI, (c) share successful and innovativestrategies, techniques and projects in the implemen-tation of the NWEAI, and (d) identify a researchagenda to further knowledge in the area.

Many individuals participated in this forum to betterunderstand the NWEAI (see Appendix A.) Theparticipants included a broad array of agency andorganization managers, economic developmentspecialists, researchers, and community representa-tives directly responsible for administering theNWEAI as well as implementing the NWEAIeconomic and community development projects inthe field. Background was provided by those whohad been involved in the political processes thatconceived and formulated the Northwest EconomicAdjustment Initiative.

Many people are to be thanked for their contributionto this forum. The program steering committee, inparticular, provided the initial conceptualizing forthe forum. Members of the steering committeeincluded: Bob Rheiner, Mark Stanley, Janet Ander-son-Tyler, Scott Duff, Eric Herbst, Paul Sommers,Anne Berblinger, Chris Christensen, KarenBerkholz, and Dean Judd. Terry Raettig, of the U.S.Department of Agriculture Forest Service PacificNorthwest Research Station, organized and guideddevelopment of the forum as its overall coordinator.

We would also like to thank the organizers at theCenter for Urban Studies, Portland State University,and for the assistance we experienced at HarrisonHall. Most of all, we thank the special contributionsby the session presenters and moderators and wehope the following monograph captures the spiritand substance experienced at the forum.

Technical Editors.

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Chapter 1--The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative: Background and Framework

Terry L. Raettig

Harriet H. Christensen

AUTHORS

TERRY L. RAETTIG is an economist, Social and Economic Values Program, Pacific Northwest Re-search Station, stationed at Olympic National Forest, 1835 Black Lake Blvd. SW., Olympia, WA 98512.

HARRIET H. CHRISTENSEN is a research social scientist with the Social and Economic Values Pro-gram, Pacific Northwest Research Station, stationed at Seattle Forestry Sciences Lab, 4043 Roosevelt WayNE, Seattle, WA 98105.

1

ABSTRACT

The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative(NWEAI) is the economic development componentof the Northwest Forest Plan. This chapter de-scribes the Federal policy background that was thebasis for the creation of the NWEAI and the prin-ciples and objectives that guided the development ofthe NWEAI. A concise description of the agenciesand institutions that provide the operational frame-work of the NWEAI partnership is included. Thepurposes and objectives of the papers that follow inthis monograph are stated.

Keywords: Northwest Economic Adjustment Initia-tive, policy background, principles, objectives,institutions.

THE NORTHWEST ECONOMIC ADJUST-MENT INITIATIVE: BACKGROUND ANDFRAMEWORK

Court actions, policy changes and controversybrought the timber sale programs of the USDAForest Service and the USDI Bureau of LandManagement, the two largest Federal land manage-ment agencies in the Pacific Northwest, to a stand-still by 1991. The Northwest Forest Plan, releasedon July 1, 1993, was a response to this crisis inpublic land management in the Pacific Northwest(Christensen and others 1995, Clinton and Gore1993, USDA Forest Service and USDI Bureau ofLand Management 1994). The Northwest ForestPlan is a regional plan for implementation of eco-system management and addresses three primaryissues: forest management, economic developmentand agency coordination (Tuchmann and others1996).

The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative(NWEAI) is the economic development componentof the Northwest Forest Plan. The NWEAI wasdesigned to focus economic development andmitigation of impacts from reduced timber harvestin the region (western Oregon, western Washingtonand northwest California outside the major metro-politan areas), (see fig. 1) through four categories ofassistance: workers and families, business andindustry, communities and infrastructure, andecosystem investment. Federal funding for theNWEAI in the region would total 1.2 billion dollarsover a five year period.

By July 1997 almost four years of funding andimplementation of the NWEAI had been completed.The NWEAI (and the Northwest Forest Plan) havebeen designed with an emphasis on innovativepolicy and a feedback-learning loop, or “adaptivenagement” ( ROD 1994).

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Policy Background

The issue of management of Federal forest landsand old-growth had reached an impasse involvingthe Executive Branch, Congress and the FederalCourts by the time of the Forest Conference in 1993(Tuchmann and others 1996). The innovativeinstitutions and actions outlined in the NorthwestForest Plan and the NWEAI are largely administra-tive actions. Congressional approval and legislationis, however, required for agency and programfunding and certain other actions such as the repealof tax credits for raw log exports. The CabinetSecretaries and agency heads concerned with thetimber issue in the Pacific Northwest signed aninteragency memorandum of understanding (MOU1993) that would define responsibilities and coordi-nation between the Federal agencies. An additionalmemorandum of understanding (Federal-State MOU1993) was signed by the Governors of California,Oregon, and Washington, a representative of thelocal communities in each state and a Federalrepresentative to define the relationship between theFederal, tribal, state, and local entities.

To understand the innovative nature of the NWEAIas it has been conceived, designed and implementedin the Pacific Northwest, it is first necessary toexamine the operation of Federal, community,economic and employment development programsin the region before the emergence of the timberissue. As an indication of the complexity of thesituation prior to the timber crisis, specific authorityand missions for job retraining, community develop-ment, economic development, and ecosystemrestoration activities that were related to theNWEAI objectives were vested in a diverse array ofprograms in no less than eight Federal agencies and

five Cabinet Departments (see fig. 2).

Each agency and each program within an agency'sauthority had specific rules and requirements basedon legislative and administrative direction. Coop-eration between agencies occurred, particularlywithin a cabinet department, but was not the centraloperating tenet. Within the broad array of ruraldevelopment programs there was no common basisfor assembling and considering proposals fromclient communities and organizations or addressingbarriers to effective implementation. State RuralDevelopment Councils provided a mechanism ofcommunication between rural development practi-tioners but did not provide the operating frameworkultimately constructed for the NWEAI.

NWEAI Principles

The NWEAI was designed on a set of principles thatprovided part of the basis for innovative economicdevelopment policy (Tuchmann and others 1996).These principles are as follows:

• [the NWEAI] should have long-termfavorable effects and be implemented in afarsighted, strategic manner.

• be implemented quickly and in a mannerconsistent with national policy.

• be region-specific and tailor the assistance tomany different kinds of effects associated withforest policy changes.

• deliver assistance based on geographicrather than conventional programmatic criteria.

• incorporate a high degree of state and local

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participation and leadership in providing assistance.

NWEAI Objectives

The NWEAI objectives (Tuchmann and others1996) further define the innovative nature of theeconomic assistance initiative. These objectivesare:

• provide immediate relief for distressed timbercommunities and emphasize the need for immediateresponse.

• create an environment for long-term economicdevelopment consistent with and respectful of thecharacter of the communities and their naturalresources.

• develop new mechanisms for deliveringassistance.

• emphasize the equal partnership of the states andthe critical local governments.

• emphasize the use of performance-based funding(outcomes based on creating new opportunities andsustainable jobs) over traditional funding based onprogrammatic eligibility.

NWEAI Framework

The Northwest Forest Plan and the NWEAIrecognize that coordination between the variousFederal, tribal, state, and, local governments,agencies and entities is a significant issue. TheNWEAI addresses the coordination issue in a directand innovative manner. Coordination between theFederal funding agencies, and with other non-Federal partners in the region is achieved throughNWEAI Committees (Tuchmann and others 1996) (see fig. 3) that are designed in accordance with the

NWEAI principles and objectives. The NWEAIcommittees and their functions are as listed:

• the Multi-Agency Command (MAC) is aWashington, DC committee and includesrepresentatives from the Federal Agencies, CabinetDepartments and Presidential policy advisors. TheMAC provides policy and oversight for the NWEAI.

• the Regional Community EconomicRevitalization Team (RCERT) is based in thePacific Northwest and is made up of representativesof the Federal funding agencies as well as thosetribal, state, and local government entities involvedin implementing the NWEAI. The RCERT hasspecifically designated coordination andimplementation responsibilities including theassurance of equitable funding within the NWEAIregion, monitoring service delivery andaccomplishment, and providing for processimprovements.

• the State Community Economic RevitalizationTeam (SCERT) is based in each of the three statesin the Northwest Forest Plan Region. SCERTmembers include representatives of the Federalfunding agencies in each State, and tribal, state, andlocal government officials involved in the NWEAIprocess. Each state was permitted discretion in therepresentation on the SCERT and Oregon andWashington also chose to have members of thegeneral public on their SCERT. The SCERTscoordinate NWEAI activities within the respectivestate, communicate local issues to the RCERT andparticipate in monitoring and process improvementactivities.

The Community Economic Revitalization Teams(CERTs) do more than provide for coordinationbetween the various entities involved in theNWEAI. The CERTs also provide the basis forcommunity empowerment that is a key part of the

4

NWEAI strategy. Community-focused economicdevelopment enables the NWEAI to capture acommunity's flexibility and creativity, its ability torecognize its problems and concentrate on solutionsinstead of service delivery, and its commitment toits members (Osborne and Gaebler 1992).

The CERTs also anchor the focus of the NWEAI onoutcomes rather than inputs. By creating anorganization that maintains a vision of the resultsand outcomes the stage is also set for adaptivelearning. Adaptive management and learning is acritical part of the Northwest Forest Plan, anddepends on an extensive monitoring component.The NWEAI explicitly provides for learning fromsuccesses and correcting (and not repeating) policyand administrative failures through the CERTprocess.

The chapters that follow document the collaborativeexperience of those who have been most intimatelyinvolved in the NWEAI in the Pacific Northwest.Key background and contextual information, firstperson perspectives of the NWEAI experience at theregional, state, Tribal, and community level, anddocumented research-based learning are provided.The NWEAI is examined in terms of the potential ofthe model as a innovative basis for focusedeconomic and community development in the futurewithin and outside the region.

REFERENCES

Christensen, Harriet; Richardson, Catherine;Raettig, Terry; McGinnis, Wendy. 1995.Forest-based communities, economicrevitalization, and ecosystem management: thestory of experimental institutions andstrategies in the Pacific Northwest, U.S.A. In:Proceedings, forestry and rural development inindustrialized countries, IUFRO Working

Party, Section 6.11.02, International Union ofForestry Research Organizations XXth WorldCongress; 1995 August 6-12; Tampere,Finland: IUFRO.

Clinton, William J.; Gore, Albert. 1994. Theforest plan for a sustainable economy and asustainable environment. Washington, DC:Office of the President. 9 p.

[Federal-State MOU 1993] Federal-statememorandum of understanding for economicadjustment and community assistance. 1993.On file at USDA Forest Service Region 6. Stateand Private Forestry, 333 SW First Street,Portland, OR 97204.

[MOU 1993] Memorandum of understanding forforestry and economic development. 1993. Onfile at the Regional Ecosystem Office, 333 SWFirst Avenue, Portland, OR 97204.

Osborne, David; Gaebler, Ted. 1992. Reinventinggovernment: How the entrepreneurial spirit istransforming the public sector. Reading, Mass:Addison-Wesley Publishing. 405 p.

[ROD 1994] Record of decision for amendments toForest Service and Bureau of Land Managementplanning documents within the range of thenorthern spotted owl. 1994. Portland, OR: U.S.Department of Agriculture; U.S. Department ofthe Interior [and others].

Tuchmann, E. Thomas; Connaughton, Kent P.;Freedman, Lisa E.; Moriwaki, Clarence B.1996. The Northwest Forest Plan: A report to thePresident and Congress. Portland, OR: U.S.Department of Agriculture, Forest Service,Pacific Northwest Research Station. 253 p.

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USDA Forest Service; USDI Bureau of LandManagement. 1994a. Final supplementalenvironmental impact statement on managementof habitat for late-successional and old- growthrelated species within the range of the northernspotted owl. Portland, OR. 2 vols. 1 map.

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Figure 1. Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative region.

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Figure 2. Organization chart for Federal agencies in the Northwest Forest Plan.Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of Forestry and Economic Assistance.

Figure 3--Interagency cooperative structure for the Northwest Forest Plan.Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of Forestry and Economic Assistance

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Chapter 2--Socioeconomic Overview: The Situation in 1993

Richard H. Phillips Jr.

AUTHOR

RICHARD H. PHILLIPS JR. is regional economist, Pacific Northwest Region, U.S. Department ofAgriculture Forest Service, P.O. Box 3623, Portland, OR 97208-3623.

10

ABSTRACT

This chapter presents a summary of importantsocial, economic and natural resource variables inthe Pacific Northwest in the years leading up to the1993 Forest Conference. The setting is provided forthe Northwest Forest Plan and the Northwest Eco-nomic Adjustment Initiative. Information on popu-lation and population change, employment andemployment changes, timber harvest levels andchanges, and timber employment and changes isincluded.

Keywords: Social and economic conditions, timberharvest, timber employment, Forest Conference,Pacific Northwest.

INTRODUCTION

The date is April 1993 and President Clinton hasreturned to Portland to hold the Forest Conferenceand address the timber crisis in the Pacific North-west. The stage has been set, and we find a battlewaging between two formidable opponents. Thesesparring partners are symbolized either by thenorthern spotted owl (Strix occidentalis) or by thetimber worker (Peterson 1990). It is a fight to thedeath because the conflict is characterized as jobsversus the environment. This may be an exagger-ated description but it does cut directly to the heartand importance of the issue. Change is rampant inthe Pacific Northwest and the management ofFederal public land is both a gauge to measure thechange as well as a cause of the change.

This paper supplies a brief description about keyconditions in the Pacific Northwest to provide abackdrop of events that led up to the Forest Confer-ence, the President’s Plan, and the NorthwestEconomic Adjustment Initiative. It is a broad viewwith much of the information describing the entire

northern spotted owl region. However, it is impor-tant to note what is true at the scale of the entireregion is not necessarily true for smaller areas of theregion, communities, or individuals. Averagedconditions hide many important differences.

The northern spotted owl region (see fig. 1) includescounties in western Washington and Oregon andnorthwest California. Metropolitan andnonmetropolitan counties (Butler and Beale 1994)are also identified since much of the informationpresented is classified by these two groupings. Forthis analysis, two metropolitan counties, Shasta, CAand Benton, OR, are included in thenonmetropolitan category. This was done becauseof their important rural characteristics and to facili-tate data collection.

POPULATION AND POPULATION CHANGE

The population and how it has changed by metro-politan and nonmetropolitan counties are displayedin figure 2. Three quarters of region’s populationlives in metropolitan counties, but these countiescomprise only 23 percent of the owl region landarea shown in figure 1. The metropolitan popula-tion growth has averaged 2.4 percent annuallyduring the twenty-year period ending in 1993. Thenonmetropolitan component has averaged 1.9percent during the same time period. Although thenonmetropolitan population growth rate is less thanthe metropolitan rate in the owl region, it almostdoubles national population growth rates.

EMPLOYMENT AND EMPLOYMENTCHANGE

Eighty percent of the region’s workforce shown infigure 3 is employed in metropolitan counties.Average annual employment growth rates for themetropolitan and nonmetropolitan counties, be-tween 1988 and 1993, were 2.6 percent and 2.0

11

percent respectively. Similar to the population ratesof change, the nonmetropolitan counties doublenational rates for employment growth. It appearsthe owl region is doing quite well in relation to therest of the country.

The increase in people and jobs locally and nation-ally has in turn brought larger and more varieddemands on the region’s resources resulting inlarger impacts on these resources and greater con-flicts over their use. These changes have in turncaused significant social and political shifts in howthe Federal public lands are perceived and managed.Changes in Federal land management activities haveresulted in some people and communities receivingpositive benefits while others do not. Although theregion is doing quite well, the people and communi-ties closely tied to Federal lands and resources fortheir economic and/or cultural livelihoods are oftennegatively impacted. Those associated with loggingand wood products manufacturing were bearing adisproportionate share of the economic and socialcosts related to implementing existing laws, such asthe Endangered Species Act, and due to changes inFederal land management. The following discus-sion looks at why wood workers and communitieswith historic links to Federal lands may need addi-tional help to mitigate these impacts.

TIMBER HARVEST LEVELS AND CHANGE

The level of timber harvest in the owl region hasalways been variable. It follows national andregional economic trends, especially housing boomsand busts, and shifts in log availability. Figure 4displays two important periods affecting timberharvesting on all forest lands. Shown are marketslumps in the early 1980s, and the slump from 1989through the early 1990s. Timber harvest fromFederal lands during the early 1990s was alsoreduced because of new forest and district plans,court injunctions, and shifts Federal land manage-

ment policy.

It should be noted timber harvest has recentlydecreased on non-federal lands, and the magnitudeof the Federal timber harvest decrease in thenonmetropolitan area more than doubles the de-crease in the metropolitan area. In other words, logsupplies are lower, and the nonmetropolitan coun-ties are bearing the largest share of the decrease.

In figure 5, federal timber sales and volume undercontract are added to the information displayed infigure 4. The metropolitan and nonmetropolitanfederal timber harvest amounts are also aggregated.Volume under contract is federal timber that hasbeen sold and awarded but which remains in theforest. Federal timber sales and volume undercontract are included to show how the effects of keycourt injunctions and Federal land managementchanges in the region were masked.

From 1978 through 1988, Federal timber sales weresomewhat constant and averaged between 5.4 and6.3 billion board feet. The first major drop in 1989coincided with the first of Judge Dwyer’s regionaltimber sale injunctions. New federal spotted owlmanagement plans were also playing a role. In1990, the primary cause of the increase in Federaltimber sales was Section 318 passed by Congress toneutralize Judge Dwyer’s injunction. This lawrequired the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of LandManagement to sell enjoined timber sales. Thenorthern spotted owl was listed as a threatenedspecies also during this year. In 1991, Section 318was not reenacted. During this year, a new injunc-tion on auctioning or awarding timber sales wasestablished which remained in force until the North-west Forest Plan was finalized. The timber harveston non-federal lands was relatively constant andgenerally followed market conditions.Volume under contract grew dramatically in theearly 1980s as market conditions declined and

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purchasers held on to expensive Federal timberbought in the late 1970s. The large buildup re-mained in effect until buy-out legislation wasenacted in 1986 preventing widespread default onFederal timber sale contracts. With the exception of1990, timber sales have been less than timberharvest lowering the volume under contract to 2.5billion board feet by 1993.

The poor housing market and volume under contractreserves masked much of the immediate effects ofthe timber sale injunctions and changes in Federalforest management during the early 1990s. Therewas an adequate supply of timber in the region.However, some mills were closing due to localizedtimber supply conditions, changes in manufacturingtechnology, and poor market prices.

The depletion of the volume under contract reservesmade the effects of the reductions in Federal timbersupplies observable. In the communities wherehistoric harvesting and wood products manufactur-ing utilized proportionally greater amounts ofFederal timber, larger negative impacts from thereduced Federal timber supply were incurred.

TIMBER EMPLOYMENT LEVELS ANDCHANGE

It was previously noted that 80 percent of theregion’s workforce was employed in metropolitancounties. Figure 6 shows more than one half of thewood products employment was in thenonmetropolitan counties indicating a high level ofspecialization in this sector for these counties.Between 1988 and 1993, nonmetropolitan timberemployment decreased by 28 percent and metropoli-tan timber employment decreased by 16 percent.The declines felt in the wood products industry weregreater in the nonmetropolitan counties, and the

effects of these declines were more strongly felt.Displaced workers in the nonmetropolitan countieshad fewer opportunities to change jobs and remainin the same community.

Several components of the wood products manufac-turing sector are displayed in figure 7. Within thissector, the top employers are logging and primarywood products manufacturing which include saw-mills and plywood mills. The majority of theemployment in these industries is also located innonmetropolitan counties. The decline in loggingand primary wood products manufacturing employ-ment between 1988 and 1993 was 27 percent inmetropolitan counties and 32 percent innonmetropolitan counties. Metropolitan countiesslightly gained in millwork employment whilenonmetropolitan counties declined. Secondarywood products manufacturing such as millwork wasnot offsetting losses in logging and solid woodproducts manufacturing especially in thenonmetropolitan counties.

CONCLUSION

The Pacific Northwest has a regional economy thatis doing very well especially when compared tonational average. The region shows better popula-tion, employment, and nonfarm labor incomegrowth rates. However, the timber industry onceconsidered the backbone of the Pacific Northwestand many forest-based communities is in transition.The industry, and the people and communitieslinked to it, are being negatively affected by changesin Federal land management activities. The ques-tion is whether targeted assistance with an economicadjustment initiative is able to mitigate these im-pacts on the people and communities.

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REFERENCES

Butler, Margaret A.; Beale, Calvin L. 1994.Rural-urban continuum codes for metropolitanand nonmetropolitan counties, 1993. Washing-ton, DC: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Eco-nomic Research Service. 43 p.

California State Department of Finance, CensusData Center. Sacramento. CA. [No furtherreference information available].

California State Employment DevelopmentDepartment, Labor Market InformationDivision. Sacramento, CA. [No further referenceinformation available].

Oregon State Center for Population Researchand Census. Portland State University, Port-land, OR. [No further reference informationavailable].

Oregon State Department of Forestry. Timberharvest report. Salem, OR. Various years.

Oregon State Employment Department,Workforce Analysis Section. Salem, OR. [Nofurther reference information available].

Peterson, Roger Tory. 1990. Western Birds. 3rded. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

p. 204.

U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of theCensus. 1992. Census of population and hous-ing, 1990: [Summary tape file 3A on machinereadable data files and technical documentationfiles (Oregon, Washington, California, Idaho)].Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Com-merce, Bureau of the Census.

U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Eco-nomic Analysis. 1995. Regional economicinformation system 1969-1995. [Machinereadable data files and technical documentationfiles]. Washington, DC: U.S. Department ofCommerce, Economics and Statistics Adminis-tration, Bureau of Economic Analysis, RegionalEconomic Information System.

Washington State Department of Natural Re-sources. Timber harvest report. Olympia, WA.Various years. [No further referenceinformationavailable].

Washington State Office of Financial Manage-ment, Estimation and Forecasting Unit.Olympia, WA. [No further reference informa-tion available].

Washington State Employment and SecurityDepartment, Labor Market and EconomicAnalysis Branch. Olympia, WA. [No furtherreference information available.

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Chapter 3-The Washington Perspective

Karin Berkholtz

AUTHOR

KARIN BERKHOLTZ is the WACERT Manager with the Washington Department of Community,Trade, and Economic Development, P.O. Box 4300, Olympia, WA 98504-8300.

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ABSTRACT

The Washington Community Economic Revitaliza-tion Team (WACERT) is the Washington compo-nent of the NWEAI (Northwest Economic Adjust-ment Initiative). The WACERT developed eligibil-ity criteria that defined its service area withinWashington. WACERT has developed projectproposal forms, offered training agency staff andcommunities, made improvements in the projectdevelopment process and created a lead agencyapproach that contribute to a one governmentapproach. Further challenges and opportunitiesremain for WACERT in the continued implementa-tion of the NWEAI.

Keywords: Washington Community EconomicRevitalization Team, eligibility criteria, projectproposals, lead agency.

INTRODUCTION

The forests of the Pacific Northwest and northernCalifornia form a region providing a wide range ofresources and services valued across the UnitedStates. In the late 1980s and early 1990s tensionbetween the demands for timber harvests andincreased environmental protection mounted. Theseconflicting mandates came to a head in 1991 and1992; an injunction prevented the U.S. ForestService (USFS) and the Bureau of Land Manage-ment (BLM) from proceeding with any new timbersales in the range of the northern spotted owl.

These legal actions crashed through the rural,natural resources areas of Washington state. Thepoverty rate in rural areas rose to 50 percent higherthan the urban regions. Over 20,000 direct andindirect jobs were lost. In Skamania county, the jobloss represented a 31.9 percent reduction of the

labor force.In 1991, the Washington state legislature enacted acomprehensive set of state programs geared towardsproviding assistance to dislocated workers, im-pacted communities and businesses. That effortcontinues to this day, coordinated by the Governor’sTimber Team, now the Governor’s Rural Commu-nity Assistance Team (GRCAT). Principles of theeffort include the following:

• targeting activities and dollars to thosecommunities and individuals in need (see fig. 1).

• utilizing a participatory process to guideactivities and dollars according to locally determinedpriorities.

• maximizing the impact of the state presenceand leveraging other state, federal and privateresources through collaboration and coordination.

• utilizing strategic problem-solving approachesto find the best solutions to problems.

In 1992, the Team was a new way of doing businessin state government – a new model. In 1993, theClinton Administration grasped the concepts as amodel for delivery of federal assistance, theNorthwest Economic Adjustment Initiative(NWEAI.)

WACERT

The Washington Community EconomicRevitalization Team (WACERT) is a component ofthe NWEAI. The goals of WACERT are to:

1) respond to locally defined needs with a systemthat is flexible and innovative, and 2) enableaffected workers and families, businesses,communities and tribes which have depended on

20

forest products based economies to regain orimprove their economic and social well being. Thefirst WACERT meeting took place in December1993. WACERT acted to adopt eligibility criteriadeveloped by the Governor’s Timber Team.

GRCAT Eligibility Criteria 1

The GRCAT eligibility criteria are as follows:

PopulationPoverty RateUnemployment RateLumber and Wood ProductsLocation QuotientFinfish location quotient2

The application of these criteria meant thatWACERT determined its service area (see fig. 1)was greater than the spotted owl region defined inthe record of decision for the Forest Plan. TheWACERT took this action to promote consistencyin service delivery between state and federalprograms and to promote the bottom-up projectplanning and implementation advocated in theNWEAI.

The WACERT communicated this information inwriting and through six community forums. Later inthe year WACERT conducted a video conferencewith down links to each of the 20 designatedeligible counties. While the perception was thatWACERTS were doing a good job atcommunicating to constituents, the lesson learnedwas that communication is the largest and mostelusive task facing an administrator. By the end ofthe year WACERT was sending monthly updates tocongressional representatives and periodic mailingsto all eligible jurisdictions.

Through the GRCAT Economic DevelopmentSubcommittee, WACERT pioneered a two page

project proposal form. The project proposal is thefirst step towards a one government approach toservice delivery and is the decision aiding tool forthe WACERT. The project proposal helps theWACERT learn about an economic diversificationstrategy and the project or projects designed to helpachieve that strategy. It helps the WACERT gaugewhat planning efforts, feasibility, design andengineering work are complete, and what fundraising efforts have taken place to date for a project.The project proposal provides information on shortand long term benefits of the project to thejurisdiction and surrounding area. The projectproponent identifies local measures of success onthe project proposal, as well as specialcircumstances that make the project compelling.

WACERT Practices, Goals, and Lessons Learned

The first deadline for project proposals to theWACERT was February 1, 1994. Over 600proposals were submitted from eligible jurisdictionsacross the state. The WACERT utilized the leadagency approach defined in the implementation planof the NWEAI. At the end of the fiscal year, theWACERT received feedback that this approach didnot result in funding of high priority local projectsand that the process used was unclear. The lessonlearned was to be more precise in definingmethodology.

___________________________________1GRCAT criteria reviewed each biennium; for Federal fiscalyear 1994, Chelan and Yakima counties were eligible. Yakimawas removed from eligibility in 1995 while rural Clark countywas added to the list of Rural Natural Resource Areas. In 1997,Clark county was rendered ineligible.2 Added as GRCAT eligibility criteria in 1995 due to closure ofcoastal salmon fishing season.

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For the 1995 Federal fiscal year, WACERTchanged its practices. It developed a method ofoperation that details principles and policies ofWACERT in a manner consistent with theNorthwest Forest Plan. It deviated from thestandards of the implementation plan by developingthe WACERT process (see fig. 2) for projectdevelopment. This includes numeric prioritizationof projects and assigning scoping agents to projectsrather than scoping agencies. This served topersonalize the NWEAI and build accountabilityinto the process. The outcomes of theseimprovements were that more projects receivedbetter technical assistance and support. Anotheroutcome is that assistance was given to high priorityprojects that were ready to go.

The WACERT continued these methods through the1996 Federal fiscal year and offered training to stateand federal staff in project scoping and tocommunities in project development. This sameyear WACERT began using technical teams toprovide assistance to complex projects requiringmultiple agency participation and solutions.

At the same time, improvements to the projectdevelopment process were taking place, policyinitiatives between federal agencies were underway.In 1996, the USDA Rural Development, ForestService and the Economic DevelopmentAdministration laid the groundwork for the nextphase of partnerships. The agencies signed aninteragency agreement that allows, on jointly fundedprojects, for one agency to take lead agency status.This means the following:

• Partner agencies transfer project funds to thelead agency, creating one project funding pool.

• The three agencies adopt and/or develop oneset of project conditions.

• The three agencies agree that the leadagency will oversee project implementation,establish implementation requirements, and beresponsible for fiscal oversight.

• The three agencies agree up front to one setof rules and regulations.

• The local client submits one report to thelead agency.

• The local client submits reimbursementrequests to one agency.

• The lead agency takes the responsibility ofcommunicating with and disseminating projectinformation to the partner agencies.

If problems arise, the lead agency is responsible forcoordination with partneragencies.

The end result is a more streamlined, lessburdensome process. This creates a onegovernment approach, and allows for a seamlessdelivery system of partnering with localcommunities to meet and address local priorityneeds (see fig. 3).

In Federal fiscal year 1997, the WACERTrecognized that the really hard work was about tobegin. Jurisdictions with the greatest capacity tostructure good projects were the ones that receivedassistance during the first era of the NWEAI. TheWACERT recognized that the time had come towork harder to ensure that the most ruralcommunities were given the tools to develop andimplement projects. To that end, WACERTdesignated seven special emphasis areas. Theseareas would be the targets of technical assistance inFederal fiscal year 1998. The lesson learnedthrough this exercise was that the job of

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restructuring rural natural resource economies takesas many years to accomplish as it took to createthose economies.

Given that one of the goals of the NWEAI is themarrying of economic development with ecosystemconsiderations, WACERT attempted various waysof bringing the two sides together. One way was todesignate WACERT liaisons to the province teams.The success of this venture was mixed, in part dueto changes to the WACERT member roster, and inpart to insufficient communications between theprovince teams and the WACERT. The WACERTalso held meetings in the adaptive managementareas. This was valuable for information sharing,but working together has yet to be achieved. Thelesson learned is: Never give up. In Federal fiscalyear 1999, WACERT plans on holding jointmeetings with the province teams.

Another lesson learned is that there are other waysof achieving the marriage between ecosystemenhancement and economic development. Oneexample of this is the Forestry Training Center inForks, Washington. Another example is thepartnership between the federal Jobs in the Woodsprograms and the Washington state Jobs for theEnvironment Program. Through this collaboration,state and federal agencies were able to partneracross watersheds, cluster contracts to offer longerterm employment and achieve goals for habitatrestoration. A final example of a successfulpartnership between the two components of theNorthwest Forest Plan is the Watershed Restoration/Resource Joint Apprenticeship Program. Thisprogram is a state Labor and Industries approvedapprenticeship program. To date, five workers haveachieved the competency standards for thisclassification. This classification is an example ofthe “Eco-worker” envisioned by the ClintonAdministration.

The Future

Challenges and opportunities remain for the comingyears. Examples are as follows:

Work in terms of workers and families-- Timberimpact areas ranging from Grays Harbor toOkanogan County continue to experience economicdislocations. These workers need assistance withretraining and job placement. The WorkFirstprogram and welfare reform carry majorimplications for rural areas in Washington state.The WACERT, through its monthly meetings inrural areas and its ties to other policy arenas in stategovernment, can help identify issues and needs aswell as a framework for discussion and resolution ofsome future challenges.

Work in terms of communities andinfrastructure -- Many infrastructure investments,such as upgrades to the wastewater treatmentfacility in Ilwaco are enough to bring communitiesinto compliance with current regulations. Enablingcommunities to pursue strategies for economicdevelopment and job creation requires additionalinfrastructure investments. The WACERT needs towork with regulatory and funding agencies to ensurealignment of resources from the project planningphase through project implementation.

Work in terms of business and industry-- The goalin many rural areas is the retention of existingcommercial and industrial businesses. Key issuesinclude: business assistance,access to capital, identifying and capturing tradeleads, and Internet access. WACERT has providedsome support to business and industry projects.Given that business growth in rural areas lagsbehind that in urban areas, WACERT should be aninformation forum to ensure that rural businesseshave a voice in setting policies that affect them.

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Work in terms of habitat -- Successfulimplementation of the Northwest Forest Planrequires a high level of coordination andcooperation among agencies to conserve fish,wildlife, and plants, including those federally listedor endangered species by preserving and restoringthe forest ecosystems on which they depend. Givenpotential listings of salmonid species, and eastsideecosystem issues, work in this area has just begun.It is the hope of WACERT that the Lockeadministration coordinates emerging initiatives withongoing and successful efforts of the NorthwestForest Plan ecosystem projects.

The challenge to the Federal government and thestate of Washington is to renew its commitment tothe principles of the NWEAI, and to pursue its goalswith vigor.

GENERAL INFORMATION ABOUT WACERT

Website: Http://www.wa.gov/governor/wacert

Service Area: 20 counties, tribal governments andother eligible jurisdictions located therein.

Membership: 10 Federal and 3 state agencies; 4county and 4 city representatives, 2 economicdevelopment council representatives, 1 public portrepresentative, 5 tribal government representatives,3 not-for-profits, organized labor, and 1 privatelender.

Partnerships: 12 Federal and 5 state agencies; alleligible counties, cities, tribes, economicdevelopment councils, public ports, and not-for-profit entities.

Special Features: Training sessions for staff andcommunities, goals and performance measurementsystem implementation, the WACERT Awards,

special emphasis areas.

Publications: Annual Reports (94 to 97); County bycounty project updates (94 to 97); Success storiesfor Federal fiscal year 1994 and Federal fiscal year1995.

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Figure 1: GRACT eligible counties in Washington

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Figure 2: -The WACERT Process

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Figure 3: WACERT policies resulted in increased partnership between Federal and state fundingprograms, a primary objective of the NWEAI, as demonstrated by the number of projects with multiplefunding sources. In Federal fiscal year 1994, eight projects were funded with multiple sources. InFederal fiscal year 1995, that figure increased to 15. In Federal fiscal year 1996 multiple fundingsources made 23 projects possible. Federal fiscal year 1997 saw multiple funding sources on 29projects.

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Figure 3 continued. Notes on and descriptions of various projects up for NWEAI fundingin Washington state.

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Chapter 4 The Oregon Perspective

Bill Campbell

AUTHOR

BILL CAMPBELL is Manager, Rural Development Office with the Oregon Economic DevelopmentDepartment, 775 Summer St. NE, Salem, OR 97310.

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ABSTRACT

The Oregon Community Economic RevitalizationTeam for the Northwest Economic AdjustmentInitiative (NWEAI) is patterned on the OregonRural Development Council that preceded theNorthwest Forest Plan. The team and the councilmeet jointly in Oregon rural communities and are inthe third year of alignment, at the time of thisforum. The team and the council are part of thestatewide effort to optimize assistance to Oregoncommunities experiencing distress.

Keywords: Oregon Rural Development Council,Oregon Community Economic Revitalization Team,economic assistance.

THE OREGON PERSPECTIVE

Similar Goals, Different Approaches

The formation and implementation of the OregonRural Development Council (ORDC) preceded theimplementation of the Northwest Economic Adjust-ment Initiative (NWEAI), the economic recoveryelement of the Northwest Forest Plan, and theformation of the State Community EconomicRevitalization Team (CERT) by three years. Bothinitiatives are a collaborative effort with the state ofOregon as memorialized within existing Memoran-dums of Understanding.

The CERT patterned its approach and implementa-tion of the NWEAI upon the operational modeldeveloped earlier by the Council. During the firsttwo years of the NWEAI both organizations con-ducted meetings throughout rural Oregon. Many ofthe participating partners were different, but themajority of Federal and state partners were thesame. The meetings were convened within ruralcommunities throughout the state and were focused

upon locally identified needs and issues. Thisapproach provided a focus upon rural communities;the ORDC had statewide focus, while the CERTfocus was principally upon those communitieswithin the western and central areas of the stateindicated as distressed due to a decline in timberharvests, mill closures, and job losses.

In implementing the strategic measures of theNWEAI, the CERT developed a consensus-basedproject prioritization process that was focused uponspecific funding needs to alleviate conditions ofeconomic distress in four key areas: Workers andFamilies; Business and Industry, Community andInfrastructure, and Ecosystem Investment. Theresources of the collaborating Federal partners werefocused on these activity areas. However, theORDC is not focused upon projects or projectfunding but on the identification and resolution ofbarriers and impediments to the overall health andwell being of rural communities.

Collaboration and Cooperation

In 1994, a series of information discussions wereheld regarding the possible alignment of integrationof the two organizations. In 1995 scheduling ofconcurrent meetings around the state began. Duringthat year a series of five forums were held jointlyby the ORDC and the CERT to identify and discussalignment related issues to further the twoorganization’s cooperative and collaborative efforts.This process identified the following reasons foralignment:

1) The ORDC and CERT represent Presidentialinitiatives at work in Oregon through formal agree-ments between the Federal government and thestate.

2) The ORDC and CERT meet with communi-ties throughout the state to identify issues, needs,

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and opportunities in order to assist with resolutionof impediments to community health and economicwell-being.

3) The dialogue with Oregon communities,networking with locally based communityorganizations, a cooperative approach to provideconsistency in the provision of technical assistance,and project funding focused upon locallydetermined priorities represents a building block inOregon’s future economic foundation.

4) Neither the ORDC or CERT administerspublic funds, but enhances coordination of problemsolvingactivities between Federal, state, Tribal,cities, counties, and private sector partners.

5) The ORDC and CERT are committed toproviding assistance to rural communitiesexperiencing distress in the identification of localneeds and opportunities, the development ofstrategic plans for economic recovery, the nurturingof local response teams and action committees, theremoval of barriers impeding success, and theencouragement of each community to implement itsplan for community health, economic sustenance,and planned growth management.

6) The ORDC, by consensus of the partnership,will be the enduring organization.

A Partnership Develops

The outcome of this combined effort resulted in thedevelopment of an aligned strategic plan to focusthe activities of the ORDC and the CERT during1996. Beginning in January 1996 the organizationsbegan convening monthly meetings using acoordinated agenda, and a total of four regionalforums were convened throughout the state. Theregional forums shifted focus from the project andbarriers orientation of the CERT, to the broader

At the time of this forum, the ORDC and the CERTare engaged in the third year of alignment andcontinue to meet jointly with rural communitiesthroughout the state. We continue to carefully listento our local partners, to gain greater understandingand insights into their issues and challenges, and tocontinue to evolve responsive techniques thatemphasize sound community planning andoutcomes. The Governor’s office, through theCommunity Solutions Team (comprised of thedirectors of the departments of Land Conservationand Development, Transportation, EnvironmentalQuality, Housing and Community Services, andEconomic Development) have developed qualitydevelopment objectives for Oregon communities.The objectives provide guidance in the developmentof healthy and sustainable communities. Oregon’spresent focus, as directed by the Oregon legislatureand the Governor’s office, is to optimize assistanceto Oregon’s rural communities, with an emphasisupon assistance to those communities experiencingdistress. The ORDC and the CERT are engaged inthis statewide effort and will continue to workwithin the Principles of Partnership established in1995 through a joint effort of the Governor’s Office,partnership agencies, and local governments.

The alignment of the Oregon Rural DevelopmentCouncil and the State Community EconomicRevitalization Team is one aspect of the joint effortsof collaborating agencies to improve and change

needs and issues identification of the ORDC. Theprocess embraced the emerging Healthy Communityconcept being introduced through GovernorKitzaber’s Community Solutions Team. The teamproject notification process, based upon theprioritization of projects through a locally focusedconsensus model, was expanded to include allcounties and communities within the state. Theprocess enables funding partners to focus scarceresources on locally identified, high priority needs.

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the way that the business of Government isconducted. The two organizations continue tofocus efforts on problem solving rather thanprogram management. The effort and partnershipcontinues...

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Chapter 5--The California Perspective

Mark Stanley

AUTHOR

MARK STANLEY is California Community Economic Revitalization Team Chair and is with the CaliforniaDepartment of Forestry, 2840 Mt. Danaher Rd., Camino, CA 95709.

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INTRODUCTION

California is not the same as Oregon andWashington. What most people think they hear isthat we in California are “different”. That is notwhat we are saying. We just have a differentperspective on the President’s Forest Plan inCalifornia than that of the other two states for anumber of reasons.

CALIFORNIA’S DIFFERENCES

One of those reasons is people. We have over 30million people in California and the overwhelmingmajority of those people live in areas not directlyimpacted by the Forest Plan. The geography ofCalifornia is different from the geography of Oregonand Washington. Although Oregon and Washingtonhave large population centers in Portland andSeattle, neither San Francisco nor Los Angeles areeven close to the impacted areas. Only nine of

California’s 58 counties were designated as beingdirectly impacted by the plan. They are all in thenorthwestern part of the state, away from thepopulation centers and voters. The closest mostpeople in California get to the timber industry isgoing to the local Home Depot to buy a two by four,but most people don’t realize where that two by fouroriginates. The basic economies of the three statesare also different as was pointed out in the ForestEcosystem Management Assessment Team(FEMAT) document. In California less that fivepercent of the economy is comprised of timbersectors. Tourism, high tech, entertainment, andmany other sectors overshadow the timber industry.The timber industry is an important component ofthe economy but it gets lost in everything else. It isnot dispersed throughout the state as is the timberindustry in Washington and Oregon. For themajority of California’s residents, forests are whatyou see on television or drive to for recreation.However, in those nine impacted counties timberwas and still is the mainstay of the economy.Finally, the politics are different in California thanin Oregon and Washington. I am not talking abouthow liberal or conservative California is. What Iam talking about is that the administration that is inplace in California is Republican, while PresidentClinton, whose administration developed the ForestPlan, is a Democrat. This made the climate forimplementing the plan quite different in Californiathan in either of the other two states.

IN THE BEGINNING

While the CERT’s started officially in December of1993, the foundation for the California CERTstarted long before. In April, 1993 a number ofcounty supervisors got together and enlisted theinvolvement of all of the eight (and later nine)county supervisors from the affected counties. Theystarted meeting together with Terry Gorton,Assistant Secretary of the California Resources

California is different from both Oregon andWashington in that California’s population centersare located far away from the impacted part of theState. The formation, operation and linkages of theCalifornia Community Economic RevitalizationTeam (CERT) are documented in this paper. TheCERT’s role in California has been to provide staffsupport and Coordination between the counties, andthe Federal and State agencies for the 1364 proposalsthat have been submitted. Future plans for the CERTand research needs related to the NWEAI are alsoincluded in this paper.

Keywords: California Community EconomicRevitalization Team, Northwest Forest Plan, projects,research needs.

ABSTRACT

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Agency for Forestry and Rural EconomicDevelopment. Terry was the first chair of theCERT, and I worked for Terry beginning in August,1993 on the CERT and other forestry relatedmatters. The County Supervisors have always andstill are the backbone of our CERT. Both Oregonand Washington have some local representation ontheir CERT but we have a county supervisor fromeach county on our CERT team. We all believe thatthey represent the people and communities that havebeen directly impacted and they were elected torepresent home constituents. The CountySupervisors should have a say in what direction theCERT should take to try to get relief to the impactedpeople and communities.

HOW IT WORKS IN CALIFORNIA

State CERTs work (as indicated by both Bill Scottof the Oregon CERT and Karin Berkholtz of theWashington CERT) because of the flexibility wehave and, most importantly, because of the people.The people are the ones that make the CERT work.Most of the Federal and state representatives on theCERT have a one person shop. When we firstcalled for proposals in November for 1993, we didnot expect the large volume that we received thefollowing month. We received nearly 600 proposalsthat first month. Each agency reviewed eachproposal. You can imagine the agency folks havingto review each and every CERT proposal for its'potential, as well as continuing to do their previousworkload for the remainder of their territory (whichin many cases was the entire state). This took agreat deal of time and commitment from our Federaland state partners. This is where the flexibilitycame in. While the Ecosystem side of the plan wasgetting advice form the Provincial AdvisoryCommittees (PACs), which are Federal AdvisoryCommittee Act (FACA) chartered committees, theCERTs are not. State CERTs cannot advise the

Federal members what to do. The CERTs areinformation sharing, networking and coordinationbodies only. But that also enables us to makechanges in how we do things quickly. We talked toOregon and Washington to find out how they weredoing the evaluations and tracking and incorporatedsome of their techniques into our CERT. Each stateCERT operates a little differently but there are moresimilarities than differences. In both Oregon andWashington the CERTS have much more of a statefinancial commitment for staff and resources than inCalifornia. In California two people from theResources Agency operate the CERT. Thecoordinator, Janel Tarczy, and myself are the staff.Her salary and operating expenses are now providedthrough a grant from the Forest Service (initiallyfunds were provided by a U.S. Department ofCommerce, Economic Development Administrationgrant). In my case I also have another full time jobwith the Department of Forestry. I don’t think thisis the case in either Oregon or Washington. Oregonand Washington also had a Rural DevelopmentCouncil in place when the Northwest Forest Planstarted.

OTHER CONNECTIONS

Another difference between the California CERTand the Oregon and Washington CERTs isconnection to the ecosystem side of the Plan. At thebeginning of this process we all felt that we neededto keep the economic and ecosystem sides separate.We in California were not in agreement with theNorthwest Forest Plan and therefore did want adirect link to implementing it on Federal lands. Butit became very obvious that there needed to be alink to the resource side in order to help thecommunities that had been impacted. The idea wasto put displaced workers back to work in the woodsdoing restoration. Since all that funding wascontrolled through the U.S. Forest Service andBureau of Land Management, and that was going to

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be directed by the Provincial Advisory Committees(PACs), we saw a need for a link between the CERTand the three PACs in California. First, we tried tomake sure that the county supervisors from theCERT applied for seats on the PACs. Secondly, weproposed to each one of the PACs that they form asubcommittee of five people to work with asubcommittee from the CERT to give the PACssome advice on the economic concerns of thecounties and to better coordinate between the twogroups. Also, myself and Mark Weetley from theCalifornia Resources Agency, occupy the singlestate seat on each one of the PAC’s. I also representthe Governor’s office on the IntergovernmentalAdvisory Committee (IAC). Figure one is adiagram of the organizational structure that wedeveloped and each PAC and the California CERTagreed to. This link has worked but not as well aswe had hoped in the beginning. We are continuingto try to make better connections between the twogroups.

THE STATE’S ROLE IN THE CERT

You have heard from both Oregon and Washingtonrepresentatives as to what their involvement androle is in their respective CERTs. As I said before,we have not had the fiscal resources to bring to thetable in California that either of the other two stateshave had. Our role in California had been toprovide staff support and to help provide bettercommunication and coordination between thecounties and the agencies, both state and Federal.We are the ones that call the meetings, staff themeetings, do the minutes, track the projects andtroubleshoot the problems. We have had very littleturnover at the state level. Terry Gorton, who leftstate service, was there since the beginning; I havealso been there since the beginning (prior to theformation of the CERT) and will continue till theend. We have had several coordinators that haveplayed a key role in this CERT organization

working in the Resources Agency but the directionhas come from Terry and myself. The CaliforniaResources Agency has also been one of the links toaccessing additional resources. Early on it wasobvious that there was a lack of humaninfrastructure at the county-level, and there was noone person present to help people with the proposalprocess. The Governor committed one milliondollars from his discretionary funds to fund acommunity coordinator in each of the nine counties.This came at a time when we had a number of majordefense base closures but the Governor wasconvinced that this was a high priority. Thecommunity coordinators have proven to be anextremely valuable resource to both the CERT and,more importantly, to the counties where they work.

Delivery of the funding to the impactedcommunities has been very important in trying todiversify those impacted counties, communities, andpeople but the process that we all have gone throughhas also proven to be very valuable. As indicatedbefore we asked the counties to submit projectproposals on a short three page proposal form calleda concept proposal. This proposal would give thepotential funds, an idea of what the project was, theamount needed, and the number of people thatwould be employed. From these concept proposalsthe agencies would then ask for more detailedapplications if the proposal was a project that theycould, or in conjunction with another agency, fund.

There was tremendous diversity in the first 600proposals received in December, 1993. We hadproposals ranging from very complete and detailedprojects that were already on the drawing board andwere ready to go, to very primitive concepts. One ofthe proposals received was hand written and wentsomething like this: “We have a great idea toemploy lots of people and make lots of money. Weneed 13 million dollars for the project. We can’ttell you what the project is because it is a secret.

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Just send us the money and trust us.” I do notbelieve that this proposal got funded.

We did change the process using ideas from theother states, and probably the best change was theaddition of the community coordinators to workwith people submitting proposals. Some of thechanges worked and some did not but we continueto refine the process to provide better service for thecommunities we are trying to assist. Thecommunity coordinators put on workshops with therepresentatives from the funding agencies andhelped to develop projects that were more realisticand had a better chance of getting funded. Since theapproximately 600 proposals submitted the firstmonth we have received another 760 for a total of1,364 proposals. The new proposals are better thanthe first proposals and some of those first ones havebeen rewritten or developed to make them betterproposals. We have much better communicationsbetween the agencies and the counties. The CERThas assisted in delivering over $78,000,000 fromCERT-funded projects and an additional$140,000,000 in CERT counties from non-CERTprojects.

The process is, in the long term, as important as thefunding of individual projects since the process willoutlive the Northwest Forest Plan dollars fundedthrough the CERT . The proportion of the projectproposals that has been funded has increased overtime (see fig. 2). The community coordinators andleaders in the communities have been working hardto learn the process and what makes a project that islikely to be funded. This is in large part, due to theability of the coordinators knowing the requirementsof the programs that could potentially fund projects.This will also carry over to projects after the specialCERT funding is no longer available.

FUTURE ACTIONS

Because everyone who has been involved with theCERT process feels that it has been very beneficial,we want to, and have been working since thebeginning, to putting things in place that will outlivethe CERT. The CERT was originally set up forthree years and has been extended to five years. Wein California have always been planning to go out ofbusiness as a CERT. But we have also beenplanning to continue those things that weredeveloped as a function of the CERT that need tocontinue. The communications and networkingbetween agencies and the link to the counties inneed of assistance are CERT processes we don’twant to loose.

We have benefited from increased communicationand started using a communications system calledTeam California Online (TCO). This is anelectronic network through the California Trade andCommerce Agency that connects all economicdevelopment people in the state, not just those in thenine CERT counties. While we have our ownforum to discuss privately CERT issues, we are alsoconnected to the rest of the Economic Developmentcommunity. TCO was not funded by the CERT andis therefore not dependent on the CERT for itscontinued existence.

We saw a need to train present and futurecommunity leaders in leadership skills to provideleadership in their own communities. We had aleadership-training workshop in 1995 where eachcounty brought 30 members of the county who willhelp lead their communities into the future. At theworkshop, we had speakers from around the countryand gave each participant a workbook of tools tohelp them in their leadership role. The workshopalso gave the county teams a place to start workingon a county plan for the future. We are committedto find ways for the counties and the agencies to

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continue to meet together even if there is no officialCERT to orchestrate that interaction.

WHAT WE NEED FROM THE RESEARCHCOMMUNITY

There are a number of things that we need theresearch community to step up and do. One of thepurposes of this forum is to stimulate researchers tofind out how well the CERT process has works. Weneed to find out:

Were the economic impact predictions in theNorthwest Forest Plan correct? This Forest Plan andthe planning process may serve as a model of howthings will be done in the future. We must know ifthe projects were based on predictors that werecorrect. If we do not test to see if the rationale wascorrect then we cannot modify the process to moreaccurately predict impacts next time this type ofmodel is used.

What were the actual economic impacts? Were theygreater than expected or less? Was the type ofimpact that was expected actually realized? Thesehave to be quantified at the local level, not at thestate or county level. Many of the counties have oneor two population centers that skew the statisticsthat are gathered on a county or state level. Whilethose statistics may show that the county isrecovering in fact it might only be the populationcenter that is recovering and not those communitiesthat experienced devastating economic effects andthe real impact of the changing forest managementpolicies.

Which economic diversification tactics worked andwhich ones did not work? This is a very importantquestion that needs to be answered. We want toreplicate those things that did work and modifythose that did not. The last thing that I would wish

on the next group that tries to do a similar task is tomake the same mistakes that we did if there isinformation out there to keep from making thosetactical errors. The intent in these initiatives to getthe assistance to the affected people as soon aspossible and each wrong road you go down uses notonly precious energy but also time.

Our group and following groups need to know whatfactors to track from the beginning to see if we aregoing down the right road. We have all said weshould have started measuring the effectivenessfrom the beginning to see how things were working.One reason we didn’t measure effectiveness wasthat we were all too busy helping, and secondly, wedid not know what, how and what scale to measureit in. We need your help in determining thosefactors.

Importantly, we need quick research results andyour creativity in looking at nontraditional factors tomonitor. We need approximate results early on, tosee if what we are doing is working or not. Wedon’t have three to five years to wait to see if whatwe are doing is effective. By that time it will be toolate for the people and communities that we aretrying to help. We need to know early on ifsomething is not working, with the understandingthat the level of accuracy of the information is low.We need indicators that show if we are on the righttrack or if we need to change to another path.

Finally we need your creativity to get out of the boxof “this is the way we have always done it ormeasured it.” We need to look at new ways ofevaluating what we are doing including the scale ofinformation that we are going to track. These needto be collected starting now so that there will bebaseline information for the next community hit bychanging forest management policies or some otherevent that impacts a community.

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Figure 1--Northwest Forest Plan Community Economic Revitalization Team (CERT)and Provincial Advisory Committee (PAC) interaction and coordination in California.

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Figure 2--Percent of project proposals submitted to the California CERT that werefunded, by year

Chapter 6 People and Communities

Janet Anderson-Tyler

Elizabeth Ellis

AUTHORS

JANET ANDERSON-TYLER is located at the USDA Forest Service, Fire and Aviation Program, 201 14th Street SW at Independence Ave SW, Washington, D.C., 20250.

ELIZABETH ELLIS is a Social Science Associate, USDA Forest Service, Olympic National ForestHeadquarters, Social and Economic Values Program, 1835 Black Lake Blvd., Olympia, Washington.98512.

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ABSTRACT

A variety of successful Northwest Economic Adjust-ment Initiative (NWEAI) projects from four coun-ties in three states are examined and explained indetail. How communities were able to implementthese projects is investigated, including addressingthe key organizations, players and relationships.Possible room for improvement within the NWEAIprocess is discussed, as are concerns for the futureof many communities.

Keywords: Siskiyou County, Linn County, ClallamCounty, Pacific County, economic diversification,Fairchild Medical Center, rural communities, SweetHome Economic Development Group, OregonJamboree, Coastal Resource Science Center, Natu-ral Biopolymer, infrastructure development, MakahIndian Reservation, Neah Harbor, Oregon NativeAmerican and Entrepreneurial Network.

SISKIYOU COUNTY, CA.

Overview: Background and History

Located about 70 miles north of Redding and about70 miles south of Medford, Oregon, Siskiyou countyis the northernmost county in the state of California.Small communities that are not easily accessiblecharacterize the county; most are not near InterstateFive and are difficult to provide services to.

The size of Siskiyou county is approximately 6,300square miles and two thirds of this is publiclyowned land. The population is approximately44,000 citizens.

Since 1990 Siskiyou county has been suffering from

a lack of timber and work. The lowest unemploy-ment rate the county has experienced is 11 percent.The highest unemployment rate, normally experi-enced during the winter months, is 16 percent.

Of the nine California counties eligible for theNorthwest Economic Adjustment Initiative(NWEAI) Program, Siskiyou county has beenrecognized as one of the most successful counties inregards to utilizing the NWEAI programs. Severalfactors in the county expedited the NorthwestEconomic Adjustment Initiative.

The Siskiyou County Economic DevelopmentCouncil and county business leaders conducted acountywide economic assessment five years prior tothe NWEAI. This assessment showed that timberharvest, production and employment would notcontinue to support Siskiyou county as the majorindustry. The end result was a plan of potentialeconomic projects that supported economic devel-opment and diversification compatible with thecounty’s existing timber and agricultural industries.

When the NWEAI went into effect, it could easilybe implemented because the necessary interagencyrelationships had already been formed. Facilitatedby this interagency representation, numerousprojects were developed and submitted. One suchproject involves the south Weed interchange area.

Community of Weed

The community of Weed, California consists ofapproximately 3,000 citizens. Weed is located inthe middle of Siskiyou county, near the InterstateFive Corridor. This area had developable land, butno water capacity or sewer capacity.

Great Northern, a community based organization,had already been working on developing Weed

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when the NWEAI was passed. The community ofWeed was well prepared for handling the NWEAIprocess, resulting in the installation of water andsewer.

Five new businesses have since entered the commu-nity of Weed and two original businesses haveexpanded. A total of 169 people are now employeddue to this project. A second project in this samecommunity will allow for the Crystal Geyser waterbottling plant to move into the south Weed area.This will create an additional 150 jobs.

The median annual income in the community ofWeed, at the time of this forum, was $40,000. Thiswas an improvement when compared with the millworkers wages of $7.50 to $8.00 an hour. The stateof California has ranked the community of Weedthird on its list of developable property off ofInterstate Five.

The success outlined here was made possible finan-cially through grant and loan packages funded bythe state of California Office of Rural Develop-ment, U.S. Economic Development Administration,and the U.S. Forest Service.

The Fairchild Medical Center

Siskiyou county successfully used the NWEAI toassist in building a new hospital in thetown of Eureka. The county had only two hospitalsto serve its 6,300 square miles; one of these hospi-tals was built in 1926 and asbestos had been de-tected in the building. The community responded tothe economic opportunity offered through theNWEAI by organizing several local fund-raisers.The community succeeded in securing a $2 millionchallenge grant from the McConnell Foundation, alocal foundation covering both Shasta and Siskiyoucounties.

The community went to the state of CaliforniaOffice of Rural Development for assistance, but thefunds were not available. Instead of giving up onthe project, the Office of Rural Development con-tacted its counterpart offices in Washington andOregon, asking for unobligated funds. Washingtonand Oregon granted a total of $8.5 million dollarsfor this project.

The hospital opened in the summer of 1997 as a 30-bed, state of the art facility, focusing on outpatientservices. It can be seen as an example of coordina-tion and collaboration among the agencies involvedin the NWEAI process.

Common Ground and Future Issues

The participants in the planning process have seentheir experience as a positive one.Not only was Siskiyou county well prepared for itsinvolvement in the NWEAI process, the participantssaw the value in meeting with state and federalpartners to discuss common issues and search forintegrated support.

Siskiyou county realized that in addition to stronginteragency relationships and community resources,a large amount of time and efficient coordinationwere also necessary to build local capacity.Siskiyou county is still behind schedule in establish-ing effective economic opportunities for many of itsmore remote communities and tribes, with only oneyear left to the NWEAI process, at the time of thisforum. Concerns over assistance for the future,funding for technical assistance, and funding forcapacity building are strong in Siskiyou county.

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LINN COUNTY, OREGON

Overview

The town of Sweet Home, Oregon is located 30miles to the south, southeast of Albany. The popu-lation is approximately 7500 citizens. The economyof Sweet Home has always relied primarily on thetimber industry. Sweet Home experienced a majorrecession in the 1980s and by the late 1980s theeconomy still had not fully recovered. When thecontroversy over the northern spotted owl began andregulations started taking effect, Sweet Home andLinn county felt the effects. By 1993, mill employ-ment in Linn county was down to 3,600 jobs com-pared to 5,840 jobs in 1979.

Strategic Planning

The decline in the timber economy stimulated theOregon Economic Development Department andOregon communities to work together on develop-ing a strategic plan to help prepare for the majorshifts ahead. Sweet Home formed the Sweet HomeEconomic Development Group (SHEDG) in orderto deal with diversifying the economy and help theircommunity handle the changes. The Rural Devel-opment Initiative funded and implemented a RuralFutures Forum to help develop leadership in statetimber communities in Oregon.

The northern spotted owl--The listing of thenorthern spotted owl was the test for many of theseprograms and their plans. Following the listing ofthe northern spotted owl, many communities experi-enced despair, job loss, and saw a population reduc-tion of approximately 4,000 as families left Linncounty. Linn county had approximately an 80-85percent reduction in public timber, following thelisting of the owl. It was time to test the strategic

planning the numerous groups had worked onearlier. As part of theNWEAI, a statewide Community Economic Revital-ization Team (CERT) was established.

Projects for Recovery

The Oregon jamboree--The Sweet Home Eco-nomic Development Group, with the assistance ofthe Oregon Economic Development Departmentand the Rural Development Initiative, has for sixyears been sponsoring the Oregon jamboree. Thisthree-day event draws up to 10,000 people per day,offering country music, showcases, and varioustalents.

Encouraging economic diversification--The SweetHome Economic Development Group, workingthrough the NWEAI, has assisted in putting in awater line to the eastern portion of the city limits,which in turn resulted in the establishment of aKOA campground, owned and run by two ex-timberfamilies. Other projects include assisting economicdiversity by attracting different businesses to thearea, such as Invest-a-Cast, a manufacturer oftitanium golf clubs, and Smurfit, a manufacturer ofbuilding materials and newsprint.

The Sweet Home Economic Development Grouphas also encouraged the Federallyfunded Jobs in the Woods program, which is work-ing on watershed restoration and flood damagerepair in the Sweet Home community area. TheSHEDG also works with local contractors in em-ploying graduates from the Jobs in the Woodsprogram.

The NWEAI Process

What worked--One of the greatest benefits of theNWEAI process was the requirement that grantproposals come from a community supported

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strategic plan. This planning process broughttogether diverse elements of the community; as agroup they sorted out community goals, objectives,projects, and priorities. Another strength in theNWEAI process was the consultation and commit-ment provided by the program managers for theNWEAI in all state, Federal and local agencies.Whether it was the Oregon Economic DevelopmentDepartment or the Linn county Business Develop-ment Center, the assistance and encouragement waspresent. Finally, of utmost importance was theassistance provided to rural communities, not justurban and metro areas.

Room for improvement--The NWEAI Processcould have been improved in the areas of communi-cation, estimation of impacted counties, projectranking, and expected funding. Communicationdifficulties were experienced on the local level inregards to grants programs. Grant managers fromdifferent agencies often had difficulty establishingground rules when brought into one program. On thefederal level, Linn county felt it was possible toimprove communication on the part of the MultiAgency Command (MAC). The procedure forestimating the number of impacted counties inOregon could have been improved. The initialcount was four and was later expanded to seven, andfinally to include all western Oregon counties.Eastern Oregon was not included and they are justnow beginning to feel the impacts of a decliningtimber industry.

Many communities found a loophole when submit-ting projects for priority ranking. Some communi-ties submitted projects to the CERT, going throughthe ranking process, while others submitted theirprojects directly to alternative agencies for funding,bypassing the ranking process. Linn county seesroom for improvement in this area. Another fundingissue is based upon the difference between what wasexpected for new funding and what was actually

allocated.

The Future

The future for Linn county involves more than justthe NWEAI process. The future involves a changein thinking. For example, Linn County has relied onthe U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of LandManagement to handle many of its traditionaloutdoor heavy labor work, such as tree planting androad restoration. Now, with Jobs in the Woods,Linn county needs to support its dislocated timberworkers by switching to private contractors tohandle this resource work.

Linn county will continue to need outside leadershipto assist in providing expertise, support, opportuni-ties, and training; this assistance will be essential inkeeping community spirit and momentum goingduring this recovery process. Support from localwatershed councils is seen as a potential link whichwill need to be formed in Linn county, as it willbring communities, the private work force andnatural resources management together to addresswatershed management while generating jobs. Thefinal concern for Linn county is funding for thefuture, including funding and incentives for privateland restoration.

PACIFIC COUNTY, WASHINGTON

Overview

Pacific county is located in the southwest portion ofWashington State. The county has relied primarilyon timber, agriculture, and fishing for most of itsexistence. The Pacific county economy saw areduction in both its commercial and charter fishingindustries in the 1970s. In 1994, salmon restrictionsresulted in the closure of most of Pacific county’ssalmon fishing areas, with the exception of Willapa

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Bay. In 1996, two seafood processors shut downand 150 jobs went with them.

Pacific county saw reductions in the timbereconomy, as well. The county once had 50 mills; bythe late 1980s two mills remained in the city ofRaymond. Pacific county had lost 60 percent of itsworkforce in the wood products industry.

Taking Action

Pacific county had not had a lot of positive experi-ences with state and Federal agencies. Pacificcounty officials were therefore very skeptical aboutthe NWEAI; they assumed some type of regulationswould be associated.

Pacific county officials were impressed and sur-prised when Federal and state representatives didnot force regulations upon the county, but insteadwere willing to sit and listen to the proposedprojects the county had in mind. Instead of tellingPacific county how they should implement theprojects, they explained how they could help imple-ment the projects. One of the projects was a com-munity assessment project. With the assistance ofthe U.S. Forest Service, funding was obtained. Thisfunding allowed forhiring of professionals who helped the countyidentify assets, liabilities, and potential directionsfor the community to take.

Projects

The boatyard--The City of Ilwaco had a boatyard atthe port that was the only positive economic part ofthe port left. The boatyard’s discharge permit wasup for renewal. One of the requirements, whichneeded to be met before the Washington StateDepartment of Ecology would allow for renewal,was installation of a water collection system in thearea where the boats are pressure washed. The U.S.

Forest Service, Office of Rural Development as-sisted in financing the water collection system. Thepermit was renewed and business has continued.

The coastal resource science center--An earlierproject was the Coastal Resource Science Center.It was realized by the citizens of Pacific county inthe 1980s the salmon fishing industry would not lastforever. One idea that would benefit all would be away to coordinate all natural resource industries inthe area, to use valid scientific methods to find waysnatural resource industries can work together.Included in this idea would be the establishment ofa database of information about the natural re-sources in the Pacific county area, even outside thearea. The Coastal Resource Science Center willprovide information to the public about the naturalresources available in this area. The idea for theCoastal Resource Science Center was born early,but only recently has it started to become realitywith help from the Washington State Department ofEcology, the Pacific County Economic Develop-ment Council, and the U. S. Forest Service.

City of Raymond

The city of Raymond in Pacific county is a naturalresources-based town. The reductions in timber andfishing industries have contributed to reducingpopulation size from 55,000 to 3,000 citizens.Numerous mills once existed in Raymond, nowthere are two. The community of Raymond reactedwith frustration to their predicament, but soonrealized economic diversification was necessary forthe community to survive. After going through aperiod of focusing on what the community did nothave, the community of Raymond switched gearsand started to realize what it did have. Raymondrecognized their location as being in one of the mostnaturally productive and pristine areas in the world.The community decided to sell this concept, andworking with various eco-trusts and The Nature

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Conservancy, formed the Willapa Alliance.

Portions of downtown Raymond once had an aban-doned, industrial appearance. The city is nowworking to install a public waterfront, maritimemuseum, public market, a theater,parking, and artwork to make the city more attrac-tive. The city of Raymond has also had continuingproblems with their sewage plant, built in 1983.The NWEAI process encouraged the creation of theNorth Pacific county infrastructure planning com-mittee, as well as gave them the financial opportu-nity to investigate new ways of managing theirwastewater and solid waste issues.

Natural biopolymer---Kitasen is a by-product ofcrab and shrimp shells. It is found in various dietarysupplements, products for rheumatoid arthritis, andshampoos. It is manufactured in Raymond by theparent company, Natural Biopolymer. As of July1997, there were 36 employees; production haddoubled and demand still could not be met. Thecompany received a $175,000 Community Eco-nomic Revitalization Board grant to help fund a newbuilding in order to expand facilities.

Another company is interested in Kitasen. Thiscompany is also located in Raymond and currentlyspecializes in producing cleaning supplies for poolsand spas. The company is also interested in gettinginto the production of Kitasen. As both companiesexpand, their wastewater needs will increase. Thatbrings the north Pacific county infrastructure com-mittee back into the picture. Work has been con-tinuing on this issue, with all parties involved.

Reflections and The Future

The partnerships which evolved from the NWEAIexperience were beneficial for the city of Raymond,and Pacific county as a whole. The process was seenas flexible and educational. Some concerns cen-

tered around the Federal Jobs in the Woods and thestate funded Jobs for the Environment program.Both are watershed/environmental restorationprograms that hire dislocated natural resourceworkers. The question was asked as to whetherworkers are being set up for failure in these pro-grams. That is, are jobs available after the training?

CLALLAM COUNTY, WASHINGTON

Overview: Makah Indian Reservation

Clallam county is located on the tip of the OlympicPeninsula in Washington state, just below the Straitof Juan de Fuca. The Makah Indian Reservation islocated on the northwest tip of Clallam county,where Neah Bay and Cape Flattery are found. NeahBay is located at the northwestern tip of the conti-nental United States.

The Makah Indians have relied heavily on thefishing industry, primarily salmon, to support theireconomy. The timber industry has played a second-ary role, but has been an important factor in theMakah Indian economy. The Makah Indian Reser-vation has seen both a steady decline in the supplyof salmon and increasing regulations surrounding itstimber harvesting methods due to the northernspotted owl and the marbled murrelet. Both of thesefactors have hit the Makah economy hard.

As of July 1997, unemployment on the MakahIndian reservation is about 50 percent during fishingseasons. During the off season, it can hit nearly 60percent.

As of July 1997, the population living on the MakahIndian Reservation is estimated at 1,800 but theoverall enrollment is approximately 50,000+ resi-dents.

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The Makah Indian Reservation realized they neededto establish economic goals. These goals includedeconomic development, maximization of resources,preservation of culture and improved quality of life.One way to meet these goals was to create jobs forthe future that provided economic self-sufficiency.This meant economic diversification.

Makah Marina

Neah Bay is subject to severe winter storms, due toits location on the northwestern tip of the UnitedStates. Up to six fishing boats a year are damagedin this area. For many years, the Makah TribalCouncil had asked the U.S. Army Corps of Engi-neers to assist in developing a safe harbor and amarina for winter protection. In 1991, the ArmyCorps of Engineers finally agreed to assist in shar-ing some of the costs.

The breakwater facility--The first project wasconstruction of a breakwater facility, a barrier toprotect harbors from the impact of waves. TheMakah Tribe needed to raise 20 percent of the costsfor this 4 million dollar facility. By constructing thebreakwater facility themselves, the Makah Tribewould save over 1 million dollars.

The Makah Tribal Council introduced the projectinto the Washington County Economic Revitaliza-tion Team (WACERT) process and by June 1995had over 11 different state and Federal sourcesforming a funding package. This funding includedhelp in both the planning and construction phases.The breakwater facility was completed by Decem-ber 1995 and the marina completed by May 1997.This was the realization of a 30 year dream. Be-cause of the safety provided by the breakwaterfacility, the fishing vessel fleet has expanded fromseven to 150 vessels and two fish processing plantsare now able to operate year round.

One of the economic development goals was im-proved quality of life, that can be met by providingyear round employment found in economic diversi-fication. Spin-off businesses have taken hold on themarina, such as vessel repair and supplies, tourism,charters, restaurants and shore-side services. Thecommunity has felt the rejuvenation of the economyand there has been a great sense of optimism for thefuture.

ONABEN

The Makah Tribal Council and the Makah SmallBusiness Development Program signed a memoran-dum of agreement with the Oregon Native Ameri-can Business and Entrepreneurial Network(ONABEN). The purpose of ONABEN is to assisttribal members begin successful businesses on theirreservations by helping them develop businessideas, find start up capital, and create viable busi-ness plans. ONABEN’s work with the Makah andother Washington tribes is funded in part throughgrants obtained through the Washington CERTprocess with NWEAI dollars.

Education and entrepreneurs--ONABEN hasopened up an office on the Reservation and offers tothe Makah community the Native EmploymentWorks Program (NEW). The NEW Program pro-vides information on how to obtain and complete aGED and college courses at the nearby NorthwestIndian College. The NEW Program also providesthe opportunity to enter The Basics Program, whichhelps with skill and career assessment, and/ordevelopment of a business idea. One goal behindONABEN is to keep money circulating within thereservation by encouraging the development oflocally owned businesses. ONABEN has noticedmany continued needs within the Makah IndianReservation and by working closely with the MakahTribal Council and the community, hopes to gettheir program off the ground.

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Chapter 7 Implementing the Initiative: On the Ground

Anne S. Berblinger

Karl Denison

Elizabeth Ellis

AUTHORS

ANNE S. BERBLINGER is an Economic Development Representative, Economic DevelopmentAdministration, U.S. Department of Commerce, One World Trade Center, Portland, Oregon, 97204.

KARL DENISON is the Washington State Rural Assistance Coordinator, USDA Forest Service, OlympicNational Forest Headquarters, 1835 Black Lake Blvd. SW, Olympia, WA. 98512.

ELIZABETH ELLIS is a Social Science Associate, USDA Forest Service, Olympic National ForestHeadquarters, Social and Economic Values Program, 1835 Black Lake Blvd., Olympia, Washington.98512.

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ABSTRACT

This paper documents a variety of ways the North-west Economic Adjustment Initiative (NWEAI)provided assistance. The NWEAI worked with localgovernments and businesses, creating ways toimplement community projects, create jobs, andretrain dislocated workers. For communities, theNWEAI provided both encouragement, resourcesfor economic, community development planning,and infrastructure. Business aide provided entrepre-neurs access to management assistance, valuableinformation and capital. This chapter examinesprograms that provided these types of assistance, orwere formed with NWEAI assistance, including theUSDA Rural Development Administration, theOregon Native American Business and EntrepreneurNetwork, and the Coos, Curry, and Douglas Coun-ties Business Development Corporation.

This chapter also provides information on programswhich directed NWEAI funds towards ecosysteminvestment and/or workers and their families. Oneof the unique programs developed through theNWEAI was the Federally-funded Jobs in theWoods, an effort to retrain dislocated timber andmill workers in the skills needed to perform ecosys-tem restoration. Washington state's Jobs for theEnvironment program and Oregon's Rogue ValleyEcosystem Workforce are discussed. The establish-ment of the Siskiyou Training and EmploymentProgram (STEP) and the Forks Forestry TrainingProgram are provided. STEP and Forks ForestryTraining programs provide different types of train-ing related to forest management. It is explainedhow the programs work, including curriculum,benefits to communities, and employment opportu-nities for program graduates.

Keywords: ONABEN, Grand Ronde, WarmSprings, Klamath, SBA, Native American, entrepre-neurs, RDA, Rural Enterprise, Roseburg, commer-

cial lenders, marketing, CCD, strategic planningprocess, One Stop Process, Coos County BusinessIncubator, Skamainia, technical assistance. Jobs ForThe Environment, Jobs in the Woods, Columbia-Pacific Resource Conservation and Development,Rogue Institute for Ecology and Economy, restora-tion, sustainability, STEP, JTPA, ecosystem man-agement, Siskiyou County, commercial thinning,silvicultural training

BUSINESS ASSISTANCE

Business Assistance: ONABEN

Creation--The Oregon Native American Businessand Entrepreneur Network (ONABEN) was createdin 1992 when representatives from four Oregontribes realized that the Native American rate ofparticipation in private ownership was well belowthe norm. In the state of Oregon, the rate for allraces was around sixty whereas for Native Ameri-cans it was around nine. These four Oregon tribes,the Klamath, Warm Springs, Siletz and GrandRonde, saw no connection being made between theNative American Community and the Small Busi-ness Development Center Network, which helpscommunities in Oregon create small businesses.The result was a lack of access to technical knowl-edge, of actual market accessibility, and of accessto credit for existing and potential Indian busi-nesses. These are major impediments to any entre-preneur. ONABEN is a solution to this problem,designed as an integrated program to help NativeAmericans create new businesses. A two classprogram was created; the first class lasts ten weeks,teaching students how to create a bankable businessplan. After successful completion, the second class,the capitol access program, provides access to amicro-lending fund. The student may apply forloans through the Small Business Administrations

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7A Program and/or a SeaFirst Bank’s umbrellautilization program, classified as preferred lendingstatus.

Guiding vision--The guiding vision for ONABENhas been to create quality service oriented busi-nesses within the Native American communitiesthat can compete with those outside the communi-ties. Dollars brought into the communities willremain and recirculate within the Native American community.ONABEN believes that by creating successfulbusinesses within the Native American community,successful role models are being provided for theIndian children. Children will see success as anexpectation in life, not just an aspiration.

Track record--In the first year of operation,ONABEN worked with approximately 100 entrepre-neurs and assisted in starting 25 businesses. In thesecond year of operation, ONABEN worked with 90businesses, again starting 25 businesses. ONABENanticipates helping to start 75 businesses in its thirdyear of operation (1997) and projects to have helpedstart a total of 300 businesses by the end of 1998.

Location and assistance--The headquarters forONABEN are located in the state of Oregon, withprimary sites in Grand Ronde, Warm Springs, andKlamath. The Small Business Administration hasbeen the primary underwriter for these sites, and theRural Business Cooperative Service, located both inSiletz and Umatilla. The individual sites are calledbusiness information centers and have providedcounseling, access to capital and marketing re-sources, and business information.

ONABEN has expanded out of Oregon, lendingassistance to tribes in Washington state, such as theMakah, Colville and Yakama and has planned toexpand to California state to assist the Hoopa tribe.There are 20 different sites in North Dakota, South

Dakota, Montana and within the Navaho Nation,which have been created based upon the experi-ences of ONABEN.

Business Assistance: USDA Rural DevelopmentAdministration

Challenge of resentment--The Rural DevelopmentAdministration (RDA), formerly the Farmer’s HomeAdministration, was met with numerous challengeswhen the NWEAI was first announced. One chal-lenge was explaining to those not directly involvedin the NWEAI effort why so much funding wasbeing directed to three states. Many career peoplein Washington, DC expressed resentment and orconfusion, resenting the NWEAI process because itmeant less funding for their areas to utilize.

Challenge of proposals--Another challenge washandling and prioritizing proposals. One RDA officereceived about 600 proposals during the first weekon the job, and with only five to six staff to handleall that paperwork, it was demanding. Someprojects were easily funded, such as water and wasteprojects. These projects improve infrastructure andtake about two to three years to implement, oftenbecause of environmental processes. Rural Busi-ness Grant Enterprise proposals were those whereeconomic planning teams had formed years earlier,and projects had already been envisioned in thecontext of a community plan. These proposals werealso funded easily. Because not all counties hadplanned in advance, funds were not distributedequally in all areas. The RDA has been working ongetting other communities to catch up. Otherprojects were in gray areas, others were very cre-ative and visionary. When told a project was notgoing to be funded, an unfortunate response oftenreceived from the community was that they had theidea everything was to be funded. This miscommu-nication is something that needs to be improved forthe future.

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Challenge of state politics--Politics between thestates created further challenges for the RDA. TheCommunity Economic Revitalization Team (CERT)process in California was different from Oregon andWashington, and agencies that had never workedclosely had to learn to build relationships in order tomake the NWEAI work effectively among states.Paper trails were created in agencies in each of thethree different states for one project receivingfunding from all three states. This was not the mostefficient way to handle paperwork, and is one of theproblems which needs to be dealt with to improvethe process.

Future challenges--Challenges remain for thefuture. The timber funds will disappear and ashortage of funding will occur in the RDA. RuralBusiness Enterprise Grants will decrease in avail-ability. For grant and infrastructure programs, ifthere is to be funding at the level experienced withthe NWEAI, it will have to come from Congress.For the loan funds created through the IntermediaryRe-lending Program (IRP), there is a way to replen-ish funds without waiting for the loans to be repaid.IRP borrowers can explore utilizing secondarymarkets to sell off revolving loans, thereby creatingadditional revolving loan funds in an area. Thispotential should be investigated. The GuaranteedBusiness and Industry Program has not been fullyutilized for funding, with the first step being out-reach to lenders. Native American Tribes should befully able to utilize business loan programs, andchecks should be done to make sure the communitycoordinators are in place and funded. Finally, theimportance of maintaining relationships and con-tinually creating new relationships cannot bestressed enough.

Business Assistance: The Small Business Devel-opment Center

First stop project--The Small Business Develop-ment Center predates the NWEAI. The NWEAIassisted the Small Business Development Center byfunding a project called the First Stop Project.Funding came from the Small Business Administra-tion, the Oregon Economic Development Depart-ment, USDA Rural Development, and the OldGrowth Fund. Although over fourteen centers in thestate of Oregon participated in the First StopProject, the following perspective is that of just onein the city of Roseburg, Oregon.

Making connections--The First Stop Project foundthat established businesses were of higher priorityfor funding than start up businesses in the Roseburgarea. They chose established businesses as thetarget, although start up businesses were also as-sisted. The First Stop Project helped businesses findthe program through commercial lenders by creatinga pad of referral forms, which were handed out forfree to numerous lenders throughout the county.Another way to make connections between thebusinesses and resources providers was setting up ameeting. Early during the project, a successfullunch meeting was set up between professionals andbusiness resource providers, where 50 participantsattended. Community corporations, business devel-opment corporations, attorneys, accountants andbankers throughout the county were invited to thismeeting.

Jobs in the Woods--The state network office inEugene noticed interest in the Federally-funded Jobsin the Woods program. Questions were being askedabout how to access workers from the program andif the workers were successfully starting their ownbusinesses after completing the program. The FirstStop Project noted this interest and placed ads innewspapers advertising free business assistance for

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individuals planning to enter woods related businessor expand on existing woods related business.There was zero response to this ad, which the FirstStop Project believes was due to timing. The adswere placed in early 1996 and the appropriate timefor this type of advertisement may have been 1992to 1993.

Success on a small budget--For the First StopProject in Roseburg, Oregon, a budget of only$25,000.00 for two years assisted 337 businesses.These businesses were able to land approximately$2.5 million in loans. Feedback from the clients ofthe First Stop Project supported the planning pro-cess chosen, and the ultimate summation wasnothing would change if the First Stop Project wereto be implemented again.

COMMUNITIES AND INFRASTRUCTURE

Communities and Infrastructure: Coos, Curry,and Douglas Counties Business DevelopmentCorporation

Barriers to getting started--The media generatedby the NWEAI created many unrealistic expecta-tions. The coastal programs for Coos, Curry, andDouglas Counties Business Development Corpora-tion (CCD) received numerous applications fromprivate businesses, many assuming everyone wasgoing to receive grant funds from this NWEAI.Assistance from the Small Business Administrationwas necessary to sort through all the applications inorder to find truly eligible projects.

Other barriers the CCD faced included a lack ofknowledge about the state and Federal programsinvolved in the NWEAI process and a lack ofstrategic planning on the part of Coos, Curry, andDouglas counties. This lack of strategic planningoften resulted in projects that had no clear defini-

tion, unrealistic timelines, and little budget informa-tion. It was also difficult for the counties to setpriorities for their projects. The county planners didnot give a lot of direction in this area and when theCERT process was established. Consequently, thepeople that the County Commissioners chose forlocal CERT teams felt overwhelmed.

Overcoming the barriers--State and Federalrepresentatives came to the area and hosted acountywide forum in each county. The response wasvery positive. Counties learned how to establishpriorities and develop long term strategies. Coun-ties learned that the projects arise from a strategicplan, which helps the applicants reach agreementabout the community’s and county’s priorities. TheCCD learned about criteria for the priority settingprocess, which it passed on to the county, anddifficulties in priority setting were minimized.

Other lessons learned included the need to maintaina level playing field. This meant no special treat-ment for any district, community, or port and con-duct the establishment of priorities publicly to avoidperceptions of secrecy and possible suspicion.

Long-term outcomes--Many of these new skillswill stay with the CCD and with others involved inthe NWEAI process after it ends. Strong partner-ships have been created between state, Federal, andlocal agencies that will remain long into the future.These agencies have also designed new ways ofdoing business, one that includes collaborativetechniques.

Communities understand the importance of main-taining strategic plans for the future. The CCD hasbeen able to obtain assistance through its fundingpartners and the Rural Development Administrationto help the Coos, Curry, and Douglas countiesannually update their strategic plans. The CCD hastaken many of the important lessons from the CERT

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process and transferred them into a regional strate-gies program. For example, the program mandatescounty projects come from a strategic plan, and thatthe regional strategies board must use an evaluationworksheet to help establish project funding.

Success stories--The importance of what CCD haslearned from the NWEAI process is evident in manyof its success stories. One such story is that of Coosand Curry counties finally being able to overcomethe lack of flexible, affordable space for emergingsmall businesses. This had been an ongoing prob-lem, but after four and a half years, the Coos CountyBusiness Incubator was created. The first result was22,000 sq.ft. of space for lease to small businessesat affordable prices. The Port of Brookings harborhad added nearly 10,000 sq.ft. of retail space to theirarea, and the city of North Bend has been workingto add 43 acres to their airport business park.

Other successful projects include the city ofCoquielle, which lost over 300 jobs after the closureof a Georgia-Pacific mill in 1990. One project hasfocused on turning the mill site into a business park.The city of Myrtle Point is another example. Afterthe closure of a Georgia-Pacific mill, the city almostbecame a ghost town. However, funding to create anew main street has given existing businesses alongthe street the incentive to improve their appearance,also helping improve the quality of life in the area.

Communities and Infrastructure: Port ofSkamania, Skamania County, WA

Skamania county--Skamania county, Washington,is composed almost entirely of rugged, mountainousareas, 80 percent of which are the Gifford PinchotNational Forest. Another eight percent is comprisedof public, state and federal ownership and theremaining 12 percent is private, of which only 1.7percent is taxed at full value. The entire populationof Skamania county is 10,000; nearly all live along

the Columbia River, near the Cascades. The largesturban area has a population of 1,200 citizens.

Skamania county has been continually experiencingvarious forest management practices and environ-mental regulations, and in 1986, 15 percent of thecounty became the Columbia River Gorge NationalScenic Area with land use restrictions placed uponthe only occupied lands within the entire county.Next came timber harvest restrictions from 1992 to1993. Timber jobs, numbering nearly 1,000 in theearly 1980s, were less than 200 in 1997. Service-oriented jobs, on the other hand, rose from 100 inthe late 1980s to over 700 in 1997. The averagecost of a home in the city of Stevenson, however,rose from $73,000 in the late 1980s to $175,000 in1997.

Skamania county protested these impacts andformed the Community Action Team, a 42 membercommittee made up of various public entities andcounty citizens.

Feedback on four goals

Four goals had been mentioned earlier in the sympo-sium in regards to communities: 1) allow communi-ties to manage their own destinies; 2) providetechnical assistance; 3) cut red tape; 4) provideaccess to the dollars. Skamania county, one of thetwo hardest hit counties in Washington state, hadfeedback on these four goals.

Managing destinies and providing technicalassistance--Overall, Skamania county saw thatwhen it came to providing community assistance,the CERT program was successful in implementingthese four goals. There were concerns about provid-ing technical assistance to communities. Do thecommunities have the tools to continue buildinghealthy economies once the technical assistance isgone? The importance of continuing technical

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assistance within the county and communities afterthe NWEAI ends is emphasized.

Skamania county has seen the importance in allow-ing communities to choose their own destiny.Sustainability is generally seen as good but may notbe the appropriate goal for some rural communities.Each individual community should be able toaddress any rising conflicts between the ruralquality of life and fear of change due to economicimpacts.

Cutting red tape and providing access to dollars--After developing a comprehensive plan of goals andobjective, the CERT process gave Skamania countyand the Community Action Team the avenues toimplement necessary projects. The CERT processhad definitely cut through red tape, created partner-ships, helped establish mutual understanding andcommunication in Skamania county. The CERTprocess was able to provide avenues for implemen-tation of many projects, which brought in neededdollars into various communities. But communitiesof Skamania county asks if this was enough? Didthe money go to the right projects? What willhappen once the money is gone and the NWEAIends? Skamania county’s rural communities do nothave the same options as many metropolitan areaswhen economic challenges such as this arise. Theserural communities are natural resource dependent;they have never had to conduct a long term capitalfacilities plan or a marketing plan for economicdevelopment. It was never necessary in the past andnow it is necessary. Cost/Benefit analyses, long-term budget planning, long term comprehensiveplanning, wide range public involvement processes:these are seen as the kinds of tools necessary for allcommunities if they are going to survive after theNWEAI ends.

ECOSYSTEM INVESTMENT &WORKERS AND FAMILIES

Ecosystem Investment: Columbia-Pacific Re-source Conservation & Development

Background--The Columbia-Pacific ResourceConservation and Development Organization(Columbia-Pacific RC&D), located on the OlympicPeninsula in southwest Washington state, providestechnical assistance in the form of project planning,implementation, and administration to communitygroups involved in the Northwest Economic Adjust-ment Initiative (NWEAI). Examples include settingup a revolving loan fund for high risk businessesand managing habitat restoration projects. Themain goal of the program is to provide communitieswith projects with encourage sustainable economicdevelopment.

History- -Columbia-Pacific Resource Conservation& Development began its involvement in 1990,when it sponsored the Pacific Coastal EconomicRecovery Conference. Four Washington statecounties participated: Mason, Grays Harbor, Pacific,and Wahkiakum. Many ideas were formulatedduring this conference and one idea stressed theneed for a workforce to restore salmon habitat. Thishelped lead Columbia-Pacific RC&D to begin itsrole in researching the Jobs in the Woods Programand eventually implementing the Washington statefunded program, Jobs for the Environment.

Ecosystem Investment: Jobs for the Environment

Creation--In 1992, with support from variousWashington state timber companies, lumber mills,timberland owners, and the International Wood-workers of America, Columbia-Pacific RC&Dsuccessfully lobbied their state legislature for anappropriation of $15 million for a program nowknown as Jobs for the Environment. The ultimate

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goal for Columbia-Pacific RC&D was to create anew environmental restoration industry, usingFederal, state and private funding.

Private industry--The creation of such an employ-ment industry would provide the availability of aworker who is skilled in multiple jobs. Columbia-Pacific RC&D was servicing private industries,timber companies, conservation districts and publicworks departments in over five Washington Statecounties. Ninety percent of the work had been doneon private land.

Training- -The employee is trained in a variety ofskills, including habitat restoration, watershedrestoration, road decommissioning, commercial andpre-commercial thinning, ecosystem management,culvert removal, bioengineering, erosion protection,road maintenance, tree planting, stream bank pro-tection and monitoring. Columbia-Pacific RC&Dhas in place an apprenticeship program which is4,000 hours long, only 562 of which is classroomtime. There is also an additional 2,000-hour add-onrequirement forheavy equipment operation.

The Future

Columbia-Pacific RC&D created the first organizedlabor restoration nonprofit group in the nation.They will continue to build confidence within theprivate and public sectors, providing workers whoare multi-skilled to handle an increasing variety ofrestoration projects. To assist in the continuingsuccess of this program and others related to theNorthwest Economic Adjustment Initiative, Colum-bia-Pacific RC&D sees a need for greater involve-ment on the part of the Congress and President’sAdministration.

Ecosystem Investment: The Rogue Institute forEcology and the Economy

Background--The Rogue Institute for Ecology andEconomy was founded in 1989 by a group of con-cerned citizens searching for a better way to dealwith issues related to the economy and the environ-ment, particularly with the effects of the decliningnorthwest timber industry on Oregon communities.

In collaboration with other organizations, the RogueValley Ecosystem Workforce training partnershipwas created. As of 1997, the Rogue Institute is inits third year. In 1997 the training program had 16first year students and four second year apprentices.Enrollees from the program find work experienceon Federal lands with the assistance of the OregonEconomic Development Department.

Concerns

Funding--The training programs provided at theRogue Institute are similar to those provided at theColumbia-Pacific Resource Conservation andDevelopment program but the emphasis is oncatering to the USDA Forest Service and the Bureauof Land Management as the primary contractors.The Rogue Institute has had concerns about itsability to continue negotiating partnership agree-ments with Federal agencies. Oregon state does nothave a matching nonfederal funds like the Washing-ton state Jobs for the Environment program. TheRogue Institute suggests that any savings in costsbetween a for-profit contractor and a nonprofittraining organization should be allowed credit as amatch.

The Future

A Sustainable economy and reinvestment--TheRogue Institute for Ecology and The Economy

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strives to assist in helping communities createsustainable ecosystems and economies, particularlyin rural areas. A primary focus for the Rogue Insti-tute is linking people back to the land. Through theLittle Applegate Landscape Design program, theRogue Institute is striving to break down the wallbetween the economic and ecosystem sides of theNorthwest Forest Plan. The Little Applegate Land-scape Design effort shows communities how theycan create a reinvestment mechanism and benefitfrom natural resource management. This willensure reinvestment of dollars created from timberharvesting, dollars that will benefit local communi-ties. The program also involves the agency in everystep of the planning process in order to make surethey understand the reinvestment they have createdthrough landscape restoration.

Workers & Families: STEP

Background--The Siskiyou Training and Employ-ment Program (STEP) of California was developedin 1996 as a way to provide dislocated timberworkers with training similar to that found in Feder-ally-funded Jobs in the Woods Programs sponsoredin Oregon and Washington. A demonstration grantwas provided by the US Department of Labor,which provided funding for ecosystem managementtraining programs in 16 northern California coun-ties. Siskiyou county, a small county of about40,000 citizens, has effectively created partnershipswith numerous public agencies. The Job TrainingPartnership Agency of Siskiyou county used thisfunding and its close partnerships with the Eco-nomic Development Council, the local communitycollege, and the US Forest Service offices to imple-ment STEP.

The community coordinator, involved in the Cali-fornia CERT process and present on the EconomicDevelopment Council, provided resource assistance.The community college provided classrooms and

curriculum development assistance. The U.S. ForestService provided the training projects necessary forthe curriculum and technical assistance. STEPbegan recruitment assessment and enrollment oftrainees.

The Program

Training provided --Although ecosystem manage-ment was the main focus of the curriculum, STEPsaw the need for other classes. Basic survivaltraining skills were taught, such as first aid andCPR. Safety classes teaching the operation of toolssuch as chainsaws were included. The basics inwildfire fighting were part of the curriculum. Asboth men and women were working together, STEPincluded sexual harassment prevention training.

The individuals were also trained in ecosystemmanagement, which included watershed restoration,manual release, planting, thinning, and native plantpropagation. Projects students are trained on in-clude thinning, planting, and manual releaseprojects for the U.S. Forest Service. For privatelandowners, clearing land for irrigation use andinstalling draining pipes. For the Shasta Commu-nity Forest, a greenhouse, which hadn’t been usedfor over two years, was rebuilt for native plantpropagation.

Changes made in 1997--STEP was only one of twoCalifornia counties to continue offering training in1997. Some changes were made in the programstructure. The screening process was modified totarget individuals who were interested in a learningexperience versus a temporary job. Transportationwas provided, as work sites were often two to threehours away from a student’s home. This also allowsfor fewer vehicles, and less damage, on any roadstraveled. A debriefing time was added at the end ofeach day to gather positive and negative feedbackabout the day’s experiences. Classroom training

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days were rescheduled from Fridays to Mondaysfollowed by fieldwork Tuesday through Friday,giving the students a better mindset.

Enrollees and success--STEP was not intended toprovide jobs; this was a training program with pay.Out of the initial 20 applicants, six dropped outduring the six to seven month training period,possibly because they thought they were going to beprovided with employment similar to the Jobs in theWoods Program.

Out of the remaining 14 who graduated, all wereoffered job search and placement assistance fromSTEP. All graduates found work. Five foundtemporary work conducting public land watershedrestoration. Four applicants found employment withprivate resource management agencies. Two appli-cants went to work for STEP; two went to work forthe U.S. Forest Service. One graduate is workingpart time and is also a full time student in naturalresource studies.

Future--STEP hoped to continue offering its assis-tance as long as possible. One goal is to aim to-wards a more technical oriented curriculum, withthe assistance of the U. S. Forest Service. STEPwill continue to look for ways to provide servicesfor the community, private landowners, and publicagencies.

Workers & Families: Forks Forestry TrainingCenter

History --The Forks Forestry Technology TrainingCenter of Forks, Washington state, is the only centerof its kind in the United States. Noticing that moreand more young people who entered the industrylacked traditional forestry labor skills, local loggingcompanies and landowners established the nonprofitcenter to address this problem, using funding pro-vided by the CERT process. The Forks Forestry

Training Center established an executive committeeof 21 people and decided the mission of the centerwould be to provide world class leaders in voca-tional forest worker and development trainingthroughout United States and Canada.

Purpose and training--The purpose of the ForksForestry Training Center is to provide operatortraining and equipment testing for new and develop-ing equipment design to make forest operationsmore efficient, bridging the gap between technologyand jobs. Services provided include regular trainingprograms, contract training, and practical research.While students attend a training program, they arealso taught technical forestry skills such as silvicul-tural skills, landscape design, soils, and wildlifehabitat management. There were two regulartraining programs: a 13 week machine operatorprogram and a six week hand falling for cablethinning program. In the machine operator pro-gram, students were taught how to operate both aharvesting machine and a forwarder, doublingchances for employment. There was a significantneed for well trained cut-to-length machine opera-tors; many landowners were suffering stand damagedue to ill-trained machine operators.

The hand falling for cable thinning program incor-porated techniques that minimize wildlife habitatand stand damage while are cost-effective. Somehelicopter logging has been used and expansion toinclude yarders is being investigated.

The Public

Relations--The Forks Forestry Technology TrainingCenter encouraged public education and relations bygiving tours. From local high school classes tovisiting teachers from Utah, over 45 tours to 175people were given in 1996. The president ofSimpson Timber Company was among one of themany tourists.

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Obstacles

Struggles and recommendations--The ForksForestry Technology Training Center was created tomeet a need. That need was a well trained loggerwho could implement necessary silvicultural pre-scriptions. The labor force did not realize that needand the center has not been able to provide enoughstudents to meet the job demand. Another obstaclewas the timeframe. With less than one year tobecome self-supportive, difficulties were encoun-tered in obtaining staff and instructors. The finalobstacle was available land base for the center touse for its training. For-profit local contract loggerscompeting for the same land created this obstacle.Recommendations given by the center on how todeal with these obstacles included educating em-ployers, workers and developing a strategy, whichsets a given timeline for projects. The Forks For-estry Training Center did not recommend establish-ing numerous training centers throughout the UnitedStates. Although there is a demand, it is a limiteddemand. Too many centers would weakeneveryone’s chances of being effective.

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Chapter 8--The Northwest Economic Initiative: Lessons Learned and Questions Remaining

Ellen M. Donoghue

Harriet H. Christensen

Ron Saranich

AUTHORS

ELLEN M. DONOGHUE is a research social scientist with the Social and Economic Values Program,Pacific Northwest Research Program, Portland Forestry Sciences Lab, P.O. Box 3890, Portland, OR. 97208

HARRIET H. CHRISTENSEN is a research social scientist and team leader with the Social and Eco-nomic Values Program, Pacific Northwest Research Program, Seattle Forestry Sciences Lab, 4043Roosevelt Way NE., Seattle, WA. 98105

RON SARANICH is a community development coordinator with the Cooperative Forestry Program,USDA Forest Service, P.O. Box 3623, Portland, OR. 97208

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ABSTRACT

Panelists at the forum entitled “Northwest Eco-nomic Adjustment Initiative: Have the Hopes BeenRealized?” presented lessons learned and questionsremaining about the NWEAI process. The lessonsrevealed that attention to process, particularly withrespect to barrier removal, communication, andbuilding trust, was important to successful imple-mentation of the NWEAI. The lessons also rein-forced the many challenges of community andregional economic development. Most communitieshad multiple needs, ranging from basic infrastruc-ture to employment. Although sizeable, the amountof NWEAI funds had not met all needs, andprioritization was an important process. The lessonslearned and unanswered questions discussed duringthis panel will be useful not only to NWEAI admin-istrators and researchers, but also to administratorsand participants of other regional and communityeconomic development strategies.

Keywords: Northwest Economic AdjustmentInitiative, lessons learned, research questions,development opportunities, community capacity,administrative processes, regional economic devel-opment.

INTRODUCTION

This chapter summarizes the major points made bya panel of speakers during the forum entitled “TheNorthwest Economic Adjustment Initiative: Havethe Hopes Been Realized?” The objective of thepanel was to provide a diverse group of presentersan opportunity to highlight key lessons learned andquestions remaining about the implementation andimpacts of the Northwest Economic Adjustment

Initiative (NWEAI), while at the same time allowfor audience interaction and contribution. Panelistswere affiliated with governmental and non-govern-mental community development organizations,Native American Tribes, the US Forest Service, andthe Washington State Community Economic Revi-talization Team (WACERT). This session wasdesigned to assist NWEAI program administratorsand researchers in identifying key areas for programmodification, evaluation, and study.

The topic of the panel complemented the projectand outcome specific information presented byNWEAI funding recipients, program administrators,and rural development specialists in previous panels(see for example, chapters 6 and 7). The ideas andcomments from the panelists and audience aresummarized below in two sections: lessons learnedand questions remaining. Additional lessons andresearch considerations are discussed throughoutthis proceedings (see for example, chapters 9, 10,and 11).

LESSONS LEARNED

An economic development assistance program aslarge and innovative as the NWEAI will produce anumber of lessons arising from unintended conse-quences, outcomes, and oversights. Communitymembers, program administrators, rural develop-ment specialists, and other participants in theNWEAI have valuable insights that are useful forunderstanding the NWEAI process and for develop-ing future regional development strategies. Beloware some key lessons about the NWEAI process asidentified by a panel of NWEAI participants.

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Emphasize Community Interests and Needs

The CERT process was designed to facilitate acommunity-based approach. Communities, incollaboration with the state CERTs, identifiedproblem areas and potential development opportuni-ties, rather than have Federal agencies prescribedevelopment projects. This structure proved to beimportant not only becuase it forced agencies toexamine previously existing barriers to interagnecycollaboration, but also becuase it generatedopportunties for community empowerment. Ex-panded and improved mechanisms were developedto assist government agencies in responding to localinitiatives.

Balancing Long-term Economic DevelopmentObjectives with Short-term Needs is Difficult

The experience of the NWEAI demonstrates thateven extensive development strategies, with largebudgets and broad scope, have difficulty achieving abalanced, holistic approach to meeting short- andlong-term needs. In many resource-based communi-ties in the Pacific Northwest, a host of short-termimmediate needs, such as unemployment, emergedout the period of declining timber harvests. How-ever, asizeable portion of the NWEAI money was allocatedfor large-scale projects, such as wastewater anddrinking water projects. These projects will im-prove the distribution of services and quality of lifein rural communities. Large infrastructure projectsare also important for attracting new businesses intoan area. However, except for some constructionjobs and employment at the new facilities, largeinfrastructure projects did not provide immediaterelief for the economic hardships faced by peopleformerly employed in the timber or wood productsindustries. More work is needed to balance short-and long-term needs and objectives.

Communities Have Varying Abilities to Respondto Economic Development Opportunities

Although the CERT process was designed to evenout the playing field and reduce some of the barriersthat may inhibit rural communities from applyingfor development assistance funds, communities inthe region had differing experiences participating inthe NWEAI process. Communities had varyinglevels of prior experience acquiring grants and loansfor community projects. The existence of a grantwriter on a community’s administrative staff wasnot a prerequisite for success in obtaining NWEAIfunds. The NWEAI was designed so that a leadagency would assign staff to assist communitieswith technical matters pertaining to the applicationprocess. Nonetheless, the process went moresmoothly for communities that had more experi-ence. Communities that had been through a strate-gic planning process were better equipped to priori-tize projects. As one panelist suggested, participa-tion in the program required that “...communityleaders master three Ps: patience, perseverence, andpaperwork.”

The NWEAI experience reinforced the importanceof developing a community’s capacity to identifyand prioritize its needs and seek out opportunitiesfor funding and technical assistance. Also, becauseout-migration often results from declining economicopportunities, communities were faced with thechallenge of keeping talented leaders and businesspeople in the community.

Need to Reach out to Highly Impacted Communi-ties

More personnel resources and an improved strategymay be needed to reach out to highly impactedcommunities that do not have sufficient capacity todevelop project proposals and are not well informedabout development opportunities. Larger communi-

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ties located along transportation corridors or withprevious experience with community projects werebetter equipped to participate and, in general,received more funding relative to the more isolated,less prepared communities.

Need for Reinvestment of Local Profits andAttention to Scale

One element for building stronger, more flexiblecommunities is to reinvest the profits from bothresource-based and non-resource based industriesback into the local community. Historically, timbersales and economic development projects have hadinherent biases toward “bigness” in terms of scale,scope, and objectives. Also, investment in capital ortechnology is more likely than investment in labor.Smaller scale commodity extraction may be anappropriate and desirable scale for some communi-ties. However under the current timber contractingsystem, small scale bids may not be competitive.The current system does not emphasize small scalecommodity extraction and yet the smaller scale mayprovide communities with the flexibility they needto adjust to changing ecosystem managementpractices.

Importance of the Job Retraining Process

Many hard lessons were learned by timber-basedcommunities about the potential drawbacks ofbasing the local economy on a single industry.Unemployment impacts were substantial in someareas in the Pacific Northwest. Education, training,and job-retraining programs that are designed to beflexible to changing employment needs and oppor-tunities will better serve job seekers, employers, andeconomic development objectives. Without a strongcorrelation between retraining programs and em-ployment opportunities, displaced workers and

employers will not be well-served. Jobs in theWoods and other retraining efforts have providedsome important lessons along these lines.

Building Trust and Good Communication Be-tween Federal Agencies and Communities

The process of building trust takes time and must besensitive to the history of experiences that NativeAmerican Tribes and rural communities have hadwith government agencies. Some communities hadstrong relationships with Federal programs oremployees, while other communities were reluctantto work closely with Federal agencies. The degreeof clarity of the information about the state CERTprocess was one factor that affected communityengagement in the NWEAI process. As projectswere developed, continual communication betweenagencies and communities about the status of theproject was important in building communityconfidence and providing feedback to agencyofficials.

Need for On-Going Monitoring and Evaluation ofAssistance

Like many public projects, the NWEAI was notdesigned with a mechanism (fiscal or administra-tive) to monitor and evaluate the implementationand outcomes of the NWEAI. While the NWEAIwas designed to be flexible and innovative at anadministrative and policy level, it did not include amechanism to allow for a comprehensive evaluationof the program. An initiative-wide accountingsystem would have contributed to this, as wouldbetter accounting of socioeconomic indicators at thecommunity level prior to the implementation of theNWEAI. For instance, while it was predictable thata common post-NWEAI question would be “Did thecommunities most in need benefit from the

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NWEAI?,” little attention or resources were put tocreating a mechanism to answer this type of ques-tion.

QUESTIONS REMAINING

Panelists and audience members provided a range ofquestions about the implementation, impacts, andprocesses of the NWEAI. The following is a compi-lation of these questions.

1. To what extent did financial and technicalresources reach those communities mostimpacted by the declines in timber harvests?What are the constraints and opportunities for futureassistance?

2. In what ways can the NWEAI beimplemented more efficiently? Can the applicationprocess be shortened even further? Is there a way tomake the procedures and processes better reflect thesize of a project, given that bigger projects mayrequire a lengthier more detailed process?

3. Did the State CERT process work for allpotential recipients? What additional institutionalbarriers can be removed? Is there an opportunity forTribes to work directly with Federal agencies ratherthan go through the state CERT process?

4. What are the opportunities and constraintsfor building new collaborative relationshipsbetween federal land managers and communitiesadjacent to federal lands?

5. How are the benefits and costs associatedwith federal land management actions distributed?

6. To what extent does the prioritization ofwood commodity projects reflect the need for value-

added, high skilled, and high paying jobs?

7. How can the Forest Service, Bureau of LandManagement, and other federal agencies mesh theirannual programs of work with the strategic actionplans of rural communities? What are theconstraints and opportunities for this?

8. How can communities build more effectivelinkages to organizations that provide economicdevelopment assistance?

9. There is a need for more evaluation of thetype and extent of jobs that were created withassistance from the NWEAI. What type of jobswere created? How were the jobs categorized andmeasured? What was the placement process, andwhat are workers perceptions about that process?

10. How much economic diversification at thecommunity level is enough? What are thebenchmarks of progress in economicdiversification?

11. What are the constraints and opportunitiesfor bringing together researchers and communitymembers to develop a research agenda? How arethese efforts funded?

CONCLUSION

Continued dialogue that includes diverseperspectives is important for understanding andaddressing the range of intended and unintendedoutcomes of the NWEAI. The above lessonsrevealed that attention to process, particularly withrespect to barrier removal, communication, andbuilding trust, was important to successfulimplementation of the NWEAI. The lessons also

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reinforced the many challenges of community andregional economic development. Communities varyin their abilities to respond to economicdevelopment opportunities. Agencies have limitedresources and personnel to provide technicalassistance to rural communities. Even withmultiagency cooperation, collaboration, and processsimplification, it takes time for the effects ofeconomic development assistance to be felt at thecommunity level. Once an economic impact occurs,such as what resulted from the decline in timberharvests, people begin reacting and unansweredquestions discussed during this panel will be usefulnot only to NWEAI administrators and researchers,but also to administrators and participants of otherregional and community economic developmentstrategies.

Panel members were:

Karen Berkholtz, Washington SCERT Chair

Sue Burcell, Karuk Community Development Corporation Executive Director

Chris Gannon, Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Soil Scientist

Lynn Jungwirth, The Hayfork Watershed Research and Training Center Director

Darrel Kenops, Willamette National Forest Supervisor

Dan Leinan, Forks, WA. City Clerk-Treasurer and Forks Economic Development Steering CommitteeChairperson

Charles Spencer, Labor Education Research Center Coordinator

Jim Zelenka, Lane County Council of Governments Economic Development Coordinator

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Chapter 9 Research on the Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative: Outcomes and Process

Paul Sommers

AUTHOR

PAUL SOMMERS is senior research fellow at the Northwest Policy Center, Institute for Public Policy andManagement, Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington, Box 353060, Seattle,WA 98105-3060

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ABSTRACT

Several presentations at the Northwest EconomicAdjustment Initiative (NWEAI) conference dis-cussed ongoing or completed research on the im-pacts of the NWEAI. These research efforts can bedivided into two general groupings: 1) research onthe outcomes for workers and communities, and 2)work on the changes in Federal and state fundingprocesses and perceptions at the local level of theimportance of these changes. New forms of col-laboration have emerged among Federal and stateagencies, enabling many communities to implementlocally designed projects easier. This innovation inagency decision-making with respect to infrastruc-ture funding programs seems to be the most success-ful outcome associated with the NWEAI. In addi-tion, successful programs have been created to teachecosystem management skills to natural resourceworkers, but weak demand for such skills amongpublic agencies and private landowners is inhibitingthe application of these skills and the emergence ofa new high skill/high wage profession.

Keywords: Collaboration, infrastructure, economicdevelopment, ecosystem management, workforceskills

INTRODUCTION

This chapter summarizes major points made byspeakers who conducted research on the implemen-tation and impacts of the Northwest EconomicAdjustment Initiative (NWEAI). These studies fallinto two major categories: studies of worker retrain-ing programs, and observations of the implementa-tion and impacts of infrastructure funding programs.These studies are summarized below, after whichsome comments are offered on the major findings

and their policy implications.

OUTCOMES FOR WORKERS AND COMMU-NITIES

One of the important aspects of the NWEAI was tomake funds available to retrain dislocated timberworkers. All of the affected states made specialefforts to connect dislocated workers with trainingprograms to ease their transition into new careersand new sources of employment. Two presentationsexamined the impacts of these retraining efforts.

Margaret Hallock, director of the Labor EducationResearch Center and member of the Oregon Com-munity Economic Revitalization Team (CERT),discussed ongoing work on the impacts of theFederally-funded Jobs in the Woods program inOregon. Jobs in the Woods was an effort to defineand implement a high skill/high wage strategydesigned to achieve overall goals of the NWEAI tonot only restore the health of watersheds but to alsohelp communities, businesses, and workers moveinto a field called ecosystem management. Thegoals of Jobs in the Woods were to train people forecosystem restoration work in forests, and to workon policy changes to ensure that there would bedemand for these trainees as they graduated. Also,graduates would earn sufficiently high wages sothey could remain in rural towns they resided inbefore the entire forest economy transition began, atabout the time of the owl listings. The high skill/high wage strategy was meant to overcome a levelof compensation for forest restoration work thathovered around $5,000 a year prior to this project.Training programs were accompanied by efforts tobuild partnerships with a variety of state and Federalagencies, including JTPA, the U.S. Forest Service,U.S. Bureau of Land Management, and the stateDepartment of Forestry. Other partners includedunions, community based organizations, and rural

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development organizations. Calling this a “sand-wich approach,” Margaret Hallock indicated thatneither top-down mandates, nor bottom-up organiz-ing efforts alone can change the labor marketoutcomes. Change takes place only when traininginstitutions and public agencies coordinate theirprograms with workers and communities.

Three kinds of outcomes needed to be tracked to seeif the training and policy changes made any differ-ence:

1) workforce outcomes, such as skill levels, employment, and wages;

2) forest ecosystem management practices, and community health, such as involvement in (3);

3) forest planning and community benefits from forest management activities.

Eight separate demonstration projects were fundedin Oregon to train workers, and complementaryactivities were funded in the states of Californiaand Washington. Through these demonstrations,forest ecosystem restoration activities were carriedout on U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of LandManagement lands, and some very limited activitieson private lands. Each demonstration projectinvolves steering committees with representationfrom Federal and state agencies, community-basedorganizations, work crews, and sometimes unions.Oregon State University developed a curriculum,and a new state approved apprenticeship has beenapproved based on this curriculum. The steeringcommittees and projects have been active for threeto four years.

While it is too early to report on final outcomes,preliminary findings can be summarized. Thedemonstrations prove that there are workers inter-

ested in doing restoration work, a point that someskeptics had disputed initially. Skill developmenthas certainly taken place, including among Latinoworkers who went through a special Spanish lan-guage version of the curriculum. Job quality hasimproved relative to the kinds of forest restorationjobs that existed prior to these projects; wages arehigher, and the jobs are of longer duration. How-ever, there are not very many of these jobs; perhapsonly two percent of the in-the-woods jobs availableare ecosystem restoration jobs. The commitment tonew ways of managing forests is not very wide-spread within the land management agencies. Theprogram has had limited impacts with respect to thesecond criterion, land management practices. Acurrent strategy for trying to increase the supply ofjobs for these high skill ecosystem restorationworkers is to create a tool kit for watershed coun-cils and communities on how to take control ofecosystem management. On the third criterion,community health, the local steering committeesthat had been created seem likely to become perma-nent institutions; one project evaluator said thatthey are “...a real intellectual infrastructure that willlive beyond these projects.”

Looking back on the experience, Margaret Hallockindicated that building partnerships is very timeconsuming but essential. Moving these new prac-tices into the private sector will be an additionalchallenge. Research continues with support fromseveral foundations to track outcomes more com-pletely.

Corrine Gobeli from Oregon State Universitydiscussed her research on two dislocated workertraining programs, Jobs in the Woods, and Choicesand Options, an Oregon state program funded in1991. Her research was carried out with amultidisciplinary team composed of two foresters, arural sociologist, and an adult education specialist.The research project was based on interviews with

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persons who went through these two training pro-grams. Tracking them down months or years later,and getting them to cooperate in the research pro-cess was the first challenge. To achieve a finalsample of 69 former dislocated timber workersrequired contacting all Jobs in the Wood partici-pants, of whom 19 agreed to be interviewed, andchoosing a random sample of the 586 Linn andBenton county Choices and Options participantsfrom February 1992 to December 1994, of whom 30were eventually located and agreed to participate ininterviews. Choices and Options participants wereinterviewed one to four years after they participatedin a two week workshop. Jobs in the Woods partici-pants from 1994 were interviewed one year afterthey completed the program, while the 1995 partici-pants were interviewed just after they completed thetraining in October and again the next spring as theywere moving into the workforce and searching forjobs. The nature of the research process indicatesthat the findings are necessarily qualitative andexploratory.

The dislocated timber workers who participated inthese programs were typically Caucasian, male,non-veterans, ages 30-54, and had completed highschool. Most live in rural communities where jobopportunities are few, and their job skills often donot match the available openings. Of the 49interviewees, 30 had worked previously in woodproducts mills, 11 had been loggers, and 8 had beenforest technicians.

While these demographic profiles indicate a com-mon type of dislocated worker, the interviewsrevealed a great deal of diversity within thesegroups of workers. While many of them came fromfamilies that had long worked in the timber industry,others went into forest or mill jobs simply becausethat was the only employment available in the area.Workers made comments such as “It was never mydream, but what else was I to do?” Loggers tended

to be proud of the skills they had learned in thewoods and liked the independence these jobs hadoffered. Forest technicians also frequently men-tioned the skills they had acquired on their formerjobs. Some of the former mill workers reported thatthe was work comfortable and predictable, but forsome it was perceived as monotonous and boring.

The layoff experience disrupted these individuals'lives in many ways, and while alternative careerchoices were perceived, no choice was costless.The need for these dislocated workers to go backinto some form of training or schooling had to bebalanced against their children's educational needs.Many of them had depleted financial resources andwere afraid of going back to school or concernedabout age discrimination.

Those workers who had experienced mill shutdownsand layoffs in the past were better prepared to copewith these situations. A typical comment from theseworkers was, “Hey, I have been through two millclosures, I’ve made it before, and I’m going to makeit again.” Workers who applied for the Jobs in theWoods program went through a competitive processto enter the program and tended to be more thought-ful about their options and more committed to a newcareer in the forests.

After leaving these programs, the paths of theseworkers diverged further. At the time of the inter-views, 26 of the 49 workers were working in fulltime, permanent positions. Two were unemployed,three had semiretired, six were still in school, andsix were working in part-time or seasonal jobs. Ofthe 33 working full- or part time, 26 had moved outof the timber industry and seven had taken ecosys-tem restoration jobs.

There were also impacts of the training programs interms of coping with dislocation, finding out how tofind a job, acquiring new skills, and finding work

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that they enjoyed doing. However, the intervieweesreported very diverse outcomes on these issues. Theresearch team classified six people as “survivors,”or people who had nothing positive to say about thedislocation experience, and were worse off finan-cially. About 20 workers had adjusted relativelywell, achieving a measure of financial security innew jobs. Four people had made significantchanges, achieving goals they had never consideredreachable.

Based on this exploratory research, Gobeli offeredseveral suggestions for reemployment programs.One point was that no program can make careertransition simple or painless, and the diversity ofpeople and their approaches to changes in their livesmust be accommodated. Positive outcomes maytake a long time and cannot be measured simply interms of wages or job placement.

STATE INFRASTRUCTURE FUNDING:CASE STUDIES

In this group of studies, the focus was on infrastruc-ture funding processes. Researchers were attempt-ing to describe and characterize what went on ineach state that participated in the NWEAI in termsof reshaping the funding processes through whichlocal areas access state and Federal programs forassistance in funding local infrastructure such aswater and sewer systems, or community facilities.

The opening presentation was made by Jan Bargen,a graduate student in Texas who previously workedwith both the Oregon and California CommunityEconomic Revitalization Teams (CERTs) and theirfunding processes. The focus of the CERTs was noton dislocated workers, but on restructuring the localeconomies disrupted by the cessation of harvestingon many public forests and the closure of manymills that had been the economic mainstay of a

number of small towns. Restructuring these econo-mies meant that various infrastructure investmentswere needed to prepare these areas for new employ-ers, who would not even examine potential sitesuntil the infrastructure was in place. The CERTprocess was used to funnel available federal pro-gram dollars into infrastructure projects developedby local areas. Reflecting on the process in Califor-nia, Bargen and a student colleague examined howwell the process worked from the state agency’spoint of view.

The report by Bargen and her colleague ShawnGarvey noted that while harvest volumes fell after1990, stumpage values increased so dramaticallythat around 1994 or 1995 the total value of timberharvested in northern California actually increasedfrom about $400 million to $600 million. At thesame time the affected counties grew by about16,000 in population, only two of them growing at aslower rate than the state as a whole. Lumber andwood product jobs went up by 600, and unemploy-ment was at a six year low when the report waspublished in 1996. Due to the stumpage valueincreases, Federal and state payments to timbercounties rose by more than $1.5 million. Their were691 new businesses from 1993 to 1996, and a 6.4percent increase in taxable sales. The region re-mained below the state level of per capita income,although the gap narrowed slightly during this timeperiod, and the increase in the number of foodstamp and general relief program clients slowed.

Associated with this economic activity was animpressive amount of investment by U.S. Depart-ment of Agriculture in infrastructure, which wasfunneled through the CERT process. A total of 64projects were funded, tripling the investment levelreached in the previous three year period.

The Bargen/Garvey report examined four casestudies to get a better feel for how well the funding

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process worked. These cases suggest the CERTprocess contributed to new partnerships and rela-tionships among local, state, and Federal govern-ment officials. These relationships paid off in anumber of ways, making it possible for multipleagencies to work together, something they had notdone in the past, and making it possible for someoneto identify a problem and get it resolved. For thefirst time, funders came out to the communitiesrather than forcing community representatives tocome to Sacramento. Another key aspect in suc-cessful projects was leadership, often just onepersistent person who made a difference. Readinesswas also important. When the CERT programstarted, communities that were ready with a planboth received earlier funds and more total fundscompared to communities that had to get organizedand do community level planning before approach-ing the CERT.

Scott Duff, past director of USDA Rural Develop-ment in Oregon, and Terry Raettig of the USDAForest Service described the Rural Developmentprograms that were administered through the CERTprocess in Oregon. Funds from six programs be-came a significant part of the Northwest EconomicAdjustment Initiative, as listed below:

• drinking water loans and grants

• wastewater loans and grants

• community facility loans and grants

• rural business enterprise grants

• inner urban re-lending programs

• business and industry loan guarantees

Evaluating the impacts of these very differentprograms collectively as they were delivered

through the CERT process is a complicatedundertaking. Duff and Raettig attempted thisevaluation task using three different approaches, asfollows:

1) description of the nature and extent of eachprogram in Oregon,

2) assessments of the socioeconomic policy,

3) assessments of specific programs to determine ifparticipants thought the programs had made adifference

The Duff/Raettig evaluation examined 63 projects,all projects funded in 1994 and 1995 in Oregon.First, program files and other secondary data such ascensus data were examined in the descriptive part ofthe work. Next, a questionnaire was sent out to 181people to gather information on service deliveryissues and program impacts. Finally, intensive on-site examinations were conducted to as part of thethird research approach.

The following tabulation shows the roughmagnitude of the 1994-95 RDA projects:

No. Total RDAYear of projects funding Contribution

1994 28 $33 million $27 million

1995 35 $72 million $65 million

A report is available describing job impacts indetail. Looking across all 63 projects, a total of over2,000 jobs were created, with rural businessenterprise grants and intermediary re-lendingprograms accounting for most of the job impacts.

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The 63 projects were quite diverse, including suchprojects as:

• a tribal administration center that hadconsolidated offices spread all over thecommunity.

• hospital project that had been in the planningstages before NWEAI. Because of the CERTprocess, the project was restructured and wasable to secure community developmentblock grant funds that were not previouslyaccessible due to organizational problems.

• a water project that increased fire projection,transmission, and distribution capacity.

• a business re-lending project that allowedthe merger of six different loan programs,enhancing a local area’s ability to leveragefederal dollars with funds from othersources.

The administrative process was streamlined by theCERT, making it possible for Duff to administerthese programs with a significant growth in programvolume at the same time that he was reorganizinghis agency and reducing overall staffing levels from130 to 87 persons. From a loan applicant point ofview, the time required to develop a project andsecure funding went down, another significantimpact.

Mary McBride, Rural Development director inWashington state, summarized her efforts toevaluate the effectiveness of the NWEAI inWashington, focusing on what happened in threecase study communities. Sultan, in the eastern partof Snohomish county, is within proximity of a majorurban area and was in danger of becoming abedroom community for commuters, which was not

consistent with the community’s vision of itself.Their water treatment facility was at capacity andthere was a moratorium on new development. Thecommunity decided that new infrastructure shouldbe developed so that new businesses could getstarted and more local jobs would be available. Upto 100 jobs may result from this investment. InLewis county, a $1.9 million loan was provided forre-lending throughout Lewis and Cowlitz counties,leveraging private investment of nearly $2 millionand resulting in 111 new jobs at an average annualwage of over $23,000. In the northwestern corner ofthe Olympic Peninsula, the Makah tribe used fundsfrom this program to develop a marina to serve theirown and visiting vessels working the offshorefisheries.

The assessment process suggested a number oflessons that can be carried forward into future work,as listed:

• more technical assistance funding is neededbecause there are not enough resources forplanning and feasibility studies. The U.S.Forest Service and the EconomicDevelopment Administration have helped inthis area.

• the CERT process brought people to thetable that had not been a part of thediscussion in the past.

• the funding process was significantlystreamlined and many barriers to gettingfunding have been removed by the CERTprocess.

• Federal agencies should build partnershipswith state and local government, allowingeach agency to handle the part of a projectthat is its unique capability, breaking

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projects into manageable pieces that eachagency can deal with effectively.

McBride concluded that there was a great deal ofvalue in the innovations of the CERT process andthat ways should be found to preserve and build onthese new ways of doing business.

CHANGES IN FUNDING PROCESSES

The final group of research studies focused on howthe NWEAI and the CERTs have changed thefunding processes as perceived by localgovernments and non-profits.

Bill Campbell of the Oregon EconomicDevelopment Department was involved inevaluation the process and impacts of the NWEAI inOregon from 1993 to 1995. Several researchmethodologies were used including surveys ofcontact people listed on project applications,interviews with key people involved inimplementing projects, surveys of communityleaders in impacted areas, and review of publicdocuments. Cooperation with the research processwas very good; 203 of 245 identified local contactsparticipated in the necessary interviews. Theprocess covered some 677 projects in the worksfrom 1993 to 1995.

About two-thirds of the interviewees were familiarwith the federal funding process prior to theinitiative. Half of them said there was insufficientmoney available prior to NWEAI, and 65 percentsaid that the scarcity of funding prevented projectsfrom going forward. However, those projects thatdid receive funding met community objectives.

The NWEAI attempted to meet local communities’objectives rather than imposing program objectivesfrom the Federal level. However, the majority of

survey responses indicated that local prioritizationwas not completely effective as a way ofestablishing project priorities; Federal objectiveswould have aided the decision makers.

Local leaders perceive the initiative as aiding locallevel communication, and helping to create bettercommunity unity as well as providing newinfrastructure, jobs, and businesses. One reasonthese multiple impacts were possible is that the stateof Oregon convened various agencies so thatinfrastructure, family issues, business development,and ecosystem needs could all be consideredsimultaneously. The mechanism led to new kinds ofadjustment and flexibility among the agencies.Campbell concluded that the keys to the success ofthe initiative are “communication, cooperation, andcollaboration.” An example of the outcomes is awastewater project in Cave Junction in which fourFederal agencies had some jurisdiction orinvolvement. Usually it takes four separateenvironmental assessments if four agencies areinvolved, but in this case, a single assessment wasagreed on and carried out.

A key problem Oregon faces is that, as thoseinvolved may say, “We’re building a pipeline ofprojects some ten feet high. And we’re able to fundor finance the upper six inches.” The capacity isjust not there in Federal and state programs toaddress all of the needs out there. If one looksoutside the official impact zone for the NWEAI tosome of the counties on the east side of the state,there are many communities that meet NWEAIassistance criteria that are not able to access fundsbecause they are not included under the umbrella ofNWEAI. The state is attempting to extend theCERT process to these communities.

The last presentation was by Jan Bargen, concerningthe views of California participants towards theCERT process. Survey instruments were sent to 142

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people, essentially all key players in the projects inCalifornia. A total of 44 percent responded to thesurvey, resulting in coverage of 76 percent of theprojects USDA Forest Service funded. In thissurvey the awareness results were intriguing.Essentially all respondents were aware that dollarswere coming from USDA Forest Service, butrelatively few knew what the NWEAI was.Whether this is good or bad is debatable; if localdecision making is a goal then perhaps it is goodthat the process was not identified separately fromthe agencies since it is the agency people that areseen in communities. While respondents weresatisfied with the procedures and outcomes, but theywere not specific or definitive in their responses tohow much difference in outcomes can be attributedto the initiative. Respondents did perceive less redtape, and more collaboration among state andFederal agencies, but they were not able to say thatdue to the initiative things are better in theirparticular communities.

CONCLUDING COMMENTS

These presentations, while diverse in scope andmethodology, suggest two broad impacts of theNWEAI:

1) Improved interagency and intergovernmentalcollaboration and,

2) Promising workforce training intiatives butlimited demand for program graduates.

Agency Collaboration

The NWEAI funding process inspired an entirelynew level of collaboration among and betweenFederal and state agencies. Many communitiesreport that for the first time agencies are workingtogether to help communities achieve their goals,

rather than making separate decisions and paying noattention to the projects that fell between the cracksbecause they needed several different forms ofassistance to succeed. Many new relationshipsemerged among agency representatives that had notworked together in the past. A general feeling fromseveral of the studies was that these newrelationships would be useful in meeting local areafunding needs in the future.

Specialization among agencies--Collaborationamong agencies allowed each agency to specialize abit, offering its special competency or resource toimprove outcomes for the local areas. This aspectof coordination was particularly helpful in moving anumber of projects forward.

Funding: Planning and Problems

Prior planning --Planning ahead helped communityprojects get early funding. Communities that hadengaged in serious planning efforts prior to theNWEAI knew what they wanted and were betterable to secure funding than those who had to cometogether to plan before preparing acceptableproposals.

Funding insufficiencies--A common complaintfrom the communities is that funds are insufficientto solve all of the infrastructure problems that areinhibiting economic development. Whilecollaboration among agencies greatly improved theallocation of the available funds, the overall level offunding is inhibiting the resolution of problems thathold these regions back.

Worker Training and Workforce Development

Ecosystem management training is promising--Ecosystem management training was a success in

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the sense that workers acquired new skills andobtained significantly higher wages. However fewnew ecosystem management jobs seem to beopening up, raising questions about the overallsuccess of the Job in the Woods efforts in Oregonand Washington. Even within the Federal agencies,demand for these newly trained workers is weak,and private demand is almost nonexistent. The longterm survival of these efforts to make ecosystemmanagement a reality, and to raise incomepossibilities for people who work in the forests, isnot clear at this point.

Workforce development/economic restructuringcoordination--Essentially, there has not been anycoordination between the workforce retrainingprograms and the economic restructuring funding.The workforce retraining provided new skills inmanaging forests on the ground through the Jobs inthe Woods programs, and other individuals wereable to correct basic education deficiencies oracquire specific vocational skills at communitycollege programs. However, these efforts wereunrelated to the funding for economic restructuring,most of which has gone into infrastructureinvestment so as to permit new firms to establishthemselves within the impacted region. Individualcommunities are pursuing new firms throughindustrial recruiting efforts but few communities aretargeting forest management firms that could utilizethe ecosystem workers. Other firms explicitlyfocus on the skills displaced forest workers haveacquired through the retraining programs. Thisappears to be a lost opportunity to maximize impactof the federal funds, but it should be noted thateconomic development efforts tend to produceoutcomes over long periods of time, and it is notobvious at the present what kinds of firms willlocate in these communities. For the majority of thedisplaced workers, there is no way to predict theexact vocational skills that may be demanded intheir community in 3-5 years. For many, the

retraining is part of a process of preparation to leavethe area for larger communities with better jobprospects. Missed opportunities, such as takingsteps to create more ecosystem management jobs ortargeting certain kinds of firms and focusingtraining efforts on the needs of those firms, mayhave required new program authority. Afundamental aspect of the NWEAI strategy was tomake do with existing programs. We are left in atrap, knowing that better outcomes could have beenachieved but with no feasible strategy for moving inthose directions.

Continuation of Agency Relationships

Since the strongest aspect of the NWEAI seems tobe the new forms of interagency cooperation, it isimportant to consider how these relationships can bepreserved and extended. As the Pacific Northwestencounters new challenges similar in some ways tothe coastal forest region issues, particularly withrespect to endangered or threatened salmon runs, thesame cooperative model may help othercommunities in responding to some challenges totheir economic vitality. In addition, other parts ofthe country might be able to learn from successfulpractices in the Pacific Northwest. In this context,the fragility of the successful practices in this regionshould be noted. The new forms of interagencycooperation are not institutionalized in laws oragency rules. The cooperation can continue if: 1)the individuals who participated stay in their currentpositions and remain committed to continuing thesemodes of operation, and 2) state and Federal policymakers do not create new policies that inhibitcooperation, and 3) program authorization andfunding remain available.

None of these conditions are guaranteed, and itwould be preferable to develop mechanisms toinstitutionalize some aspects of the new cooperativemode of operation. Rather than legislation that may

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end up inhibiting further innovation, Memorandumof Understandings between agencies could be auseful option to consider to preserve the jointdecisionmaking and specialization of agency rolesthat have emerged. Occasional forums could beconvened among agency leaders to considermechanisms to improve current processes, and toencourage other regions to adopt some bestmanagement practices.

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Chapter 10 What We Have Done, What We Have Learned, and What’s Next

Anne S. Berblinger

AUTHOR

ANNE S. BERBLINGER is Economic Development Representative, Economic Development Adminis-tration, U.S. Department of Commerce, One World Trade Center, Portland, Oregon, 97204.

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ABSTRACT

The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative(NWEAI) has helped many forest dependent com-munities improve infrastructure, support economicdiversification, offer job training to dislocatedworkers, begin to restore forest ecosystems, andeven realize long held dreams. The people involvedat every level in the NWEAI have learned lessons aswell. This experience has taught us how important itis to provide clear information and make sure it isunderstood, to take full responsibility for ensuringthat all the communities impacted by an economicdislocation have access to the funds and resourcesprovided for recovery, to honor and empower thevolunteers and paid staff who make a program likethis work, to solve problems rather than just runprograms, and to break down the barriers whichprevent resources from being invested in as effec-tive a way as possible.

Beyond the NWEAI, what do communities need inorder to continue to adjust and thrive? There areunfinished items to be addressed before the NWEAIcan be considered complete.

The labor intensive process which brought eco-nomic improvement to many communities hasdepended on local staff, many of whom were paidwith NWEAI funds. This funding will no longer beavailable when the NWEAI is over. Will there belocal funding to take up the slack?

Can we institutionalize the best practices of the Jobsin the Woods program?

Can we maintain spirit and momentum of the teamof agencies serving rural communities through theNWEAI?

What about other forest communities in the North-west which got started later, received less from

NWEAI funding, and are not yet well advanced inthe process of economic adjustment?

Can the community spirit, hard work, and commit-ment of so many at the local level be maintainedand supported until the job is done?

Keywords: NWEAI, Skamania county, city ofRaymond, Pacific county, Linn county, Clallamcounty, Makah Indian Reservation, infrastructure,investment, job training, Jobs in the Woods, Jobs forthe Environment, Rogue Valley EcosystemWorkforce, Siskiyou Training and EmploymentProgram, STEP, Siskiyou County, USDA RuralDevelopment, US Forest Service, Economic Devel-opment Administration, loopholes, priority ranking,commitment, collaboration, barriers, momentum.

NWEAI ACCOMPLISHMENTS

The mission of the NWEAI has been “...to develop,stabilize, and augment the capacity of individuals,families, businesses, communities, and tribes toadjust and thrive in the face of declining timberharvests.” This conference highlighted some of theways we have done this.

Investment in Communities

The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative hasprovided many impacted communities with theopportunity to resolve long standing communitycapacity and infrastructure problems.

Skamania county was one of the two hardest hitcounties in Washington state. Populated with iso-lated communities amidst rugged terrain, thisnatural resource dependent county has had littleexperience with practices like strategic planning,capital facilities planning, and cost/benefit analyses.

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These are the tools a community needs under anycircumstances to be successful. The NWEAIhelped economic development practitioners learnhow to use these and other tools and rewarded themwith project grants and loans when they were usedeffectively. Skills like these will be a lasting benefitfor the Skamania county and many other communi-ties.

The city of Raymond in Pacific county, Washingtonhad wastewater and solid waste problems whichneeded to be solved before they could realisticallyundertake any job creation strategy. Pacific countyofficials were at first skeptical of the entire NWEAIprocess because of prior negative experience withstate and Federal agencies. When the agenciesinvolved in the NWEAI gave this city and countythe necessary encouragement, worked with thenewly created county infrastructure committeethrough the project development process, andcooperated in financial packages, skepticism wasreplaced with trust and a constructive workingrelationship. The needed infrastructure was fundedand built, and Raymond has created new jobs.

Scores of communities can tell similar stories tothese two.

Business Development and Economic Diversifica-tion

In contrast to some early expectations, the NWEAIdid not provide free money to implement good ideasand turn them into thriving businesses overnight.However, meaningful business development re-sources were provided across the region. Oregonstate First Stop program, as described by TerrySwagerty, Director of the Small Business Develop-ment Center at Umpqua Community College inRoseburg, provided a resource to help people withbusiness ideas turn them into realistic businessplans. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Inter-

mediary Re-lending Program has put millions ofdollars in the hands of locally controlled organiza-tions, which have made scores of loans for busi-nesses start-ups and expansions, creating loan fundsthat are permanent resources for business develop-ment in the region.

New Opportunities for Dislocated Workers andEcosystem Investment

The NWEAI process has provided funds for trainingprograms which have given dislocated timberworkers new careers. Jobs for the Environment wascreated by the Columbia-Pacific Resource Conser-vation & Development Council in southwest Wash-ington State. They successfully lobbied the statelegislature for an appropriation of $15 million tobegin the program. The goal was to create a newenvironmental restoration industry to provideservices to Federal, state and private landowners.Workers become skilled in a variety of jobs, includ-ing habitat and watershed restoration, road decom-missioning, commercial and pre-commercial thin-ning, road maintenance, and ecosystem manage-ment. The NWEAI partnered with the Washingtonstate program to create many more jobs and trainmany more workers.

The Rogue Valley Ecosystem Workforce, one ofmany Jobs in the Woods pilot program partnershipsin Oregon, was created by the Rogue Institute forEcology and Economy, whose leadership waslooking for a better way of dealing environmentalissues. The Rogue Institute’s programs are providedprimarily through contracts with Federal and stateagencies, which “bundled” needed work within eachwatershed to provide long term employment andmaximum benefit to the ecosystem. Trainingprograms are similar for workers to those providedby Jobs for the Environment.

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Siskiyou county, California, had created STEP, orthe Siskiyou Training and Employment Program.STEP was funded by a demonstration grant pro-vided by the US Department of Labor. TheSiskiyou County Job Training Partnership Agencyutilized its close partnerships with the local Eco-nomic Development Council, the communitycollege and the US Forest Service to begin a trainingprogram. All 14 enrollees who graduated during thefirst year of STEP's existence (1996) found work inthe field. Training provided includes ecosystemmanagement, basic wildfire fighting, preventingsexual harassment, survival skills, CPR, and firstaid.

Besides these well publicized Jobs in the Woodsprogram, the NWEAI helped fund programs to traindislocated timber workers for many other jobs. Avery high percentage of training program partici-pants now hold jobs outside the declining timberindustry.

Community Dreams Realized

The NWEAI has provided financial resources forthe implementation of projects long planned for, butseemingly out of reach. The Makah Indian Reserva-tion is located in an area subject to severe storms,Clallam county, Washington state, on the northwestcorner of the Olympic Peninsula. A safe harbor andmarina to protect the fishing fleet and transientrecreational vessels has long been needed. Foryears, the Makah Tribe had been asking the U.S.Army Corps of Engineers for assistance in buildinga breakwater.

In 1991, the Army Corps of Engineers finallyagreed, provided the Makah Tribe could raise 20percent of the cost. The Makah Tribal Councilintroduced the project into the Washington Commu-nity Economic Revitalization Team (WACERT)process and was successful in obtaining funding

from 11 different state and Federal sources for thebreakwater matching share and for construction ofthe marina. The breakwater was completed inDecember 1995 and the marina in May 1997. Thiswas the realization of a 30-year dream. The safeharbor created by the breakwater has allowed for anexpansion in the fishing fleet and two fish process-ing plants can now operate year round.

LESSONS WE HAVE LEARNED

Advice to Others Undertaking Major EconomicAdjustment Initiatives

Be understandable and realistic in announcingand promoting the program-- Make sure informa-tion is clear and well understood by the communi-ties intended to benefit from the NWEAI. DaveSchmidt of Linn county, Oregon (who also repre-sents the Association of Oregon Counties), told usthat elected officials and their constituents werefrustrated and confused when new funding for theNWEAI didn't match what they expected. Althoughrepresentatives of the Clinton administration whopromoted the program never said that the NWEAIwould offer free money to any person, business orcommunity with a good idea, many people in theimpacted communities had that expectation. Thenthey were disappointed to learn that most of the newmoney for communities and businesses came in theform of loans, that the limited grant funding was notdirectly available to businesses, and that all thefunding came with obligations and local sharerequirements.

Honor existing local plans--Many communities andtribes were well prepared for the NWEAI, havingearlier conducted strategic economic planning.Siskiyou county is one example. The county at-tributes its success in getting NWEAI resources

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invested in its communities, particularly those alongthe Interstate Five corridor, to a previouscountywide economic assessment and the resultingeconomic planning. When the NWEAI started, localleadership had agreed on priorities, formed localinteragency partnerships, and were ready to submitprojects for funding. Chuck Clendenin of theUSDA Rural Development, California, on July 30th1997: "…Rural Business Grant Enterprise proposalswhich were funded easily were those where eco-nomic planning teams had formed years earlier, andprojects had already been envisioned in the contexton a community plan…"

Support local planning where it is not well devel-oped, and understand that it can be a time consum-ing process. Other communities had not conductedeconomic assessments or economic developmentplanning prior to the NWEAI and found themselvesat a disadvantage. It takes time to understand anddevelop trust in a process like the NWEAI, time toestablish the partnerships, time to achieve commu-nity consensus on a vision, goals and priorities, andtime to develop and implement projects. Unpre-pared communities, often the smallest and mostisolated, did receive money and technical assistancefor planning and project development, from theEconomic Development Administration (EDA) andthe U.S. Forest Service. Many of them were readyfor grant and loan funding to implement their plansseveral years into the NWEAI.

Ensure that all communities have access to thebenefits even if local planning and implementationcapacity is limited. NWEAI funds were granted bythe EDA to councils of government, economicdevelopment districts, and Native American Tribesto augment existing staff and resources and espe-cially to provide staff support to small an unincorpo-rated communities. CERT meetings and agencyoutreach promulgated the ethic of nurturingeconommic adjustment and community develop-

best possible job also produced burn out, expressedin an attitude of “waiting for the NWEAI to be over,so things could get back to normal,” or “declarevictory and go home,” which may mean a return tobusiness as usual and abandonment of new andbetter ways of doing business.

ment in all of the impacted communities, especiallythe most rural and isolate communities.Nikki Whitty of the Coos, Curry, and DouglasCounties Business Development Corporation whostaffed the CERT process for Coos, Curry, andDouglas counties in Oregon described how chal-lenging it was for local leaders to engage in theprocess. One problem was the unrealistic expecta-tions of the NWEAI described above. Another wasa general lack of knowledge about state and Federalprograms involved in the NWEAI process. A thirdwas a lack of clear direction on the part of thecounty planners when it became necessary to setpriorities for projects. Persistence and commitmenton the part of leaders and staff overcame theseproblems, and now the process is working smoothlyand credibly in Coos, Curry, and Douglas counties.

Provide adequate staff--Provide enough staff andother resources at the field level to the agenciesresponsible for implementing the NWEAI. TheNWEAI took place in the context of majordownsizing of most of the Federal agencies involvedin the NWEAI, and the northwest region was notspared in this process. The administration heardfrom local people that spending resources on a bigbureaucracy would not be acceptable. They madethe decision, based on that input, to do the job withexisting staff, and then existing staff was downsizedas part of another administration initiative. And insome agencies there were yet other initiatives whichcompeted for staff time and resources. WhileFederal staff did rise to the occasion and accom-plished many of the goals of the NWEAI, the goalof speeding project review and decision-making wasnot achieved. The lack of adequate staff to do the

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The states of Oregon and Washington staffed theirSCERTs (State and Community Economic Revital-ization Teams) with state employees and got off to arunning start. The Regional CERT had assignedstaff only in the beginning. The California CERTdid not have a staff person until the ResourcesAgency received an EDA grant for that purposeabout a year into the NWEAI. Lack of CERT staffwas a real problem in these two cases.

State and Federal agencies can work togethereffectively. The NWEAI produced two innovationswhich helped agencies work together and helpedcommunities gain access to the financial assistance,as follows:

• a single short project notification form thatall participating agencies can use to becomefamiliar with potential projects.

• a single list of projects from each Tribe orcounty (prioritized in Oregon andWashington, but mostly not in California),used by all agencies to inform theirinvestments.

These tools provided a basis for collaboration onprojects and for cooperation in responding tocommunities in a seamless way. Pacific county,Washington, is a good example of howcollaboration and cooperation helped the county getpast its preconceived suspicions of state and Federalagencies. For Linn county, the consultationprovided by the managers and staff of state, Federal,and regional agencies was one of the strong pointsof the entire NWEAI process. If a unified process ofpriority setting is adopted, as in Washington andOregon (where all the agencies pay attention to thesame list of priorities), watch out for loopholes inthe process. Dave Schmidt, Linn county, Oregon,pointed out that some communities were submittingtheir projects directly to agencies for funding,

bypassing the ranking process.

We realize now that we should have started theNWEAI with more integration and communicationbetween the ecosystem management and economicadjustment programs. We have made progress inmaking these connections, but there is still a longway to go.

Break down the barriers--An increasedunderstanding of how proactive and responsiveprograms can become has led to a lower toleranceof barriers, by which we mean laws, regulations, oragency policy and practices that prevent programsfrom responding effectively to community needsand priorities. Barriers identified by local or agencystaff were raised to SCERTs, the Regional CERT,and the Multiagency Command (MAC), and manywere resolved.

Probably the most important barrier that was brokenwas the grantsmanship syndrome. We shifted awayfrom staging competitions in which the winnerswere those who could prepare good applicationsresponsive to top down agency criteria, and towardfunding those projects identified by thecommunities as most important to them. Thischange often includes hands on help with paperworkby agency staff to some of the less sophisticatedapplicants, and hands on help with projectmanagement after the projects are approved.

Other barriers, such as duplicative paperwork onprojects where more than one agency is involved,have not been thoroughly resolved.

THE JOB OF ECONOMIC ADJUSTMENT ISNOT COMPLETE

The NWEAI has been a particularly satisfyingexperience because the substantial additional

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has enabled many communities to actually finish theprocess of economic adjustment, or at least to haveinfrastructure and economic development resourcesin place to continue the process without muchadditional outside help. But there are manycommunities which are just at the beginning of theprocess. Mill closings are still happening, creatingmore dislocated workers. We have only scratchedthe surface in ecosystem investment.

Where do funds for projects to finish the adjustmenteffort come from? Siskiyou county, despite itssuccess utilizing the NWEAI program, is stillbehind in establishing effective economicopportunities for many of its remote communitiesand Tribes at the time of this presentation. Therepresentatives of this county and others areconcerned that assistance is ending just as they arein a position to take advantage of it.

Dave Schmidt of Linn county, Oregon, points outthat eastern Oregon, eastern Washington and theSierras communities in California, were notincluded in the NWEAI are suffering the impacts oftimber industry decline. What about these counties/communities?

Anita Gahimer, Port Director for Skamania county,Washington, asks, "Did the money go to the rightprojects?" This is a natural concern. Communitiesand agencies were willing to take risks in theNWEAI process. What if some of the projects don'twork out for the communities? Are the resourcesout there to support a second chance?

Once the NWEAI funding runs out, will there beenough local resources to keep staff in place for thislabor intensive process?

This is a demanding job for agency staff. As newinitiatives appear and agency downsizing continues,will staff continue to devote time and energy to the

The Jobs in the Woods program is the prototype fora new relationship between public lands and thepeople who have depended on them: a high skill,family wage strategy for high quality landmanagement work done by people who live incommunities adjoining or within the forest. Thisprogram should become a permanent result of theNWEAI. It would be a valued asset to eastsidecounties feeling the impact of a declining timberindustry, and to forest communities around thecountry. Continuation of the Jobs in the Woodsprogram will also mean a continued investment inbuilding the capacity of contractors, workers, andland managers. Mr. Jim Lowery of the PacificCounty Economic Development Council,Washington, expressed concern over the ending ofJobs in the Woods/Jobs for the Environment,wondering if workers and contractors were being setup for failure. We can’t let that happen.

Severely impacted communities who are makingprogress need to continue working at it, andagencies need to keep providing technical and moralsupport. Linn county wants continued outsideleadership to keep community spirit and momentumgoing during the recovery process after the NWEAIends.

All of us, local leaders and staff, agency staff,elected officials, dislocated workers, businesspeople, and those in Sacramento, Salem, Olympia,and Washington, D.C., who have supported thiseffort. We have achieved great and meaningfulprogress in helping communities, workers andbusinesses adjust to and thrive in the face ofreduced timber harvests. We have learned so muchin the process that we can share with othersundergoing similar economic crises. We are notdone. Many of us will keep on.

NWEAI process?

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Chapter 11--Extending the Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative to other Regions:

Utilizing the Initiative and the Institutions

Harriet H. Christensen

Terry L. Raettig

AUTHORS

HARRIET H. CHRISTENSEN is a team leader and research social scientist with the Social and Eco-nomic Values Program, Pacific Northwest Research Station, stationed at the Seattle Forestry Sciences Lab,4043 Roosevelt Way NE, Seattle, WA. 98105

TERRY L. RAETTIG is an economist, Social and Economic Values Program, Olympic National ForestHeadquarters, 1835 Black Lake Blvd., Olympia, WA. 98512

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ABSTRACT

The Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative(NWEAI) was conceived and designed to provide aninnovative approach to respond to a regional eco-nomic and social crisis. This paper specificallydescribes the innovative nature of the NWEAI, howit is used as a model for economic and communitydevelopment, and how it is continuing throughapplication elsewhere. There are a number ofbroader implications of the NWEAI experience.Several critical issues remain to be addressed in theregion.

Keywords: Northwest Economic Adjustment Initia-tive, institutions, community and economic develop-ment.

UTILIZING THE INITIATIVE AND THEINSTITUTIONS

"The Northwest Forest Plan is producing aradical and massive change in

federal agency culture."

- - James Pipkin,The Northwest Forest Plan Revisited, 1998

The NWEAI was conceived and designed to providean innovative approach to respond on a regionalbasis to an economic crisis caused by dramaticchanges in forest management objectives andpolicies (ROD 1994, Tuchmann and others 1996).When compared with the existing approaches toeconomic and community development that havebeen used elsewhere, the NWEAI coordination,policies and institutions are indeed an innovativemodel (Raettig and others 1998). The NWEAI isbuilt on a base of existing Federally funded eco-

nomic assistance and development programs and isthe institutional framework of coordination andservice delivery that is a model for implementing ageographically targeted assistance initiative. Theinnovative nature of the NWEAI model has beenasserted through these mechanisms:

• A systematic basis for providing coordinationbetween the various Federal, state and local entitiesinvolved in economic and community developmentwithin the NWEAI region. This coordination wasdesigned to be accomplished through theCommunity Economic Revitalization Team(s)(CERT)s and Multi-Agency Command (MAC)without creating a new bureaucratic organization.

• A process for focusing on service delivery andremoving perceived barriers to effective andefficient provision of the economic and communitydevelopment programs.

• The provision of a “seamless delivery”environment.

• An economic and community developmentinitiative that is based on outcomes and resultsrather than programmatic and bureaucratic inputs.

• Community-focused development.

• A process for providing a dynamic initiative thatresponds to changing conditions as the NWEAI isimplemented.

• Linkages to the ecosystem managementinstitutions and activities that are concurrently beingimplemented as part of the Northwest Forest Plan.

The success of the NWEAI and its utility as amodel for economic and community developmentwill, in part, be measured by the continuingapplication of the NWEAI policies and institutions

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economic and community development efforts inother regions.

The continuation of the NWEAI institutions andpolicies within the NWEAI region has been insuredby the extension of the NWEAI for an additionaltwo years. The extended NWEAI will not continueto receive and manage enhanced levels of economicand community development money from theFederal funding agencies as was the case for theoriginal five years of the NWEAI, but will utilizethe NWEAI processes, institutions, and coordinationto manage the normal levels of agency funding inthe region. This extension was supported by thethree states and effected through the signing of arevised Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) bythe original Federal agencies participating in theNWEAI. In the words of Regional CommunityEconomic Revitalization Team (RCERT) co-chair,Bob Rheiner “The NWEAI process and [experiencewith] collaboration will not allow agencies to goback and do business the way we used to.” TheFederal, Tribal, state, local government and non-government NWEAI partners will continue toexpect to be involved early in the decision processand on a continuing basis as economic andcommunity development programs areimplemented.

Further use of the NWEAI created institutions mayalso occur in the Pacific Northwest outside theNWEAI region. Both Oregon and Washington areconsidering asking the Federal government to usetheir respective State CERT to manage economicdevelopment efforts in conjunction with the InteriorColumbia Basin Ecosystem Management Project(ICBEMP). So far, the only enhanced economicdevelopment funding associated with the ICBEMPis 20 million dollars in fiscal year 1999 for planningpurposes.

Even without additional economic development andassistance funding the NWEAI model may provideuseful strategies for implementing ecosystemmanagement and associated economic developmentactivities in the Columbia Basin. The process ofsystematically assembling and consideringeconomic development proposals through a state orregional community economic revitalization teammay prove useful. Also the explicit involvement ofpractitioners and managers from all of the fundingagencies in the process and the emphasis on“seamless” delivery of economic assistance mayenhance the level of service in the basin.

There are also indications that some of the essentialelements of the NWEAI processes, policies andinstitutions are being considered for use in otherregions facing severe economic dislocations becauseof changes in natural resource policies and changesin resource dependent industries. The southeasternpart of Alaska is experiencing mill closures, largereductions in timber harvest on Federal lands, anddecreases in lumber and wood productsemployment. The Federal agencies with economicand community development programs in the areaand their state and local partners are in the processof creating a “Southeast Alaska CommunityEconomic Revitilzation Team” (SEA-CERT). TheSEA-CERT is based on the NWEAI model. Federalprogram managers dealing with the collapse of theGeorge’s Bank fishery in the North Atlantic Oceanand resource policy changes in the Evergladesregion of Florida have also expressed interest in thepotential use of NWEAI approaches in theirrespective regions.

The effects of the NWEAI on the region, ruralcommunities, and people will extend far beyond thefive years of the NWEAI that had already beenfunded. Economic and community developmentprograms provide a capacity base for futuredevelopments, improvements, and social andeconomic well-being. Many NWEAI projects have

within the region. Another measure of the utility ofthe NWEAI model is the potential use by other

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provided training and development to enhanceleadership, business management, and technicalplanning and community development skills in localcommunities. The empowerment of people in theserural communities is a potential lasting legacy of theNWEAI. Communities and groups withincommunities may have differing perspectives on thevalue, usefulness, and desirability of the social andeconomic changes and the success of the NWEAI.

Other economic and community developmentprojects that have been part of the NWEAI are, bytheir very nature, long term investments that willcontinue to provide positive long term economicimpacts. For example, the initial investment ininfrastructure such as water systems and industrialparks will continue to attract new and expandingbusinesses to recipient communities until the addedcapacity is fully utilized. Intermediary relendingprojects will provide capital in future cycles ofrelending as the original loans are repaid. Even forthose projects that are already providing directpositive economic impacts, secondary and inducedimpacts will be generated as respending of theoriginal income occurs within the community.

The NWEAI programs and projects represent broadscale funding decisions. While strategic communityplans played an important role in the projectgeneration and prioritizing process, actual projectfunding represents availability of funding as muchas a systematic response to documented orperceived needs. The actual mix of funded projectsin a specific community may not necessarilyrepresent a coherent program of communitydevelopment. On a positive side, multi-agencyfunding and leveraging of scarce resources allowedfor the completion of community projects thatwould not have been funded under previousinstitutional arrangements.

There are a number of broader implications of theNWEAI experience:

• There is no assurance that rural communitieswill not face economic dislocations in the futureeven if the NWEAI is successful in diversifying theeconomies of rural communities. Outside forcessuch as global economic conditions, intra-regionmigration, and national social and cultural changeswill continue to affect rural, natural resource-dependent communities.

• Local efforts to create sustainablecommunities may force resident’s to make difficultchoices between short-term prosperity and long-term objectives.

• Changes in natural resource managementmay have significant costs to rural communitiessuch as workforce retraining, relocation and loss ofestablished community leadership. These costs arenot shared equitably by various groups within thecommunity.

• There is a question as to what extentNWEAI community and economic developmentprograms will be sufficient to achieve desiredcommunity goals. The cumulative impact ofreductions in timber industry employment andincome and reductions in land management agencybudgets and personnel for natural resourcemanagement activities can be very large in certaincommunities.

A number of critically important issues remain to beaddressed. As Sommers (Chapter 8) noted: “thenew forms of inter-agency cooperation are notinstitutionalized in laws or agency rules.” Continuedcollaboration will depend on commitment by keyindividuals to continue and in absence of policiesthat would roll back the innovative gains that theNWEAI has made. Berlinger and others (Chapter 7)said, “communities in the region have not yetcompleted the process of economic adjustment andstill have concerns for the future.” Berblinger inChapter 10 also noted, “Can we maintain spirit and

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momentum of the team of agencies serving ruralcommunities through the Initiative? And, can thecommunity spirit, hard work, and commitment of somany at the local level be maintained and supporteduntil the job is done?”

Research and Assessment-based Responses toRCERT and OFEA Issues

The RCERT and the Office of Forestry andEconomic Assistance (OFEA) staff have maintaineda focus throughout the NWEAI on utilizing researchand evaluative information as the basis forevolutionary change in the Initiative. An indicationof this commitment to adaptive learning is thedevelopment of a list of key research andassessment questions that were to be answered asthe NWEAI was implemented. These questions canlogically be grouped into 3 categories:

• Initiative process issues.• Initiative capacity issues.• Initiative outcomes and

accomplishments.

The questions are important as they represent thecollective view by those most intimately associatedwith the NWEAI of critical research and monitoringissues and concerns that are the basis for theadaptive learning process for the NWEAI. Asynopsis of how these research and assessmentquestions have been addressed by reseach andstudies reported in this forum and other effortsprovides a suitable benchmark of the NWEAI. Anexplicit review of how each question has beenaddressed by category follows:

Process-Related Questions

Ten of the questions deal with process issues. Welist the number of the question from the original listand discuss findings from the research studies and

discuss findings from the research studies andassessments:

1. Did participants in the Initiative improve theFederal delivery system? Improving the Federaldelivery system in the course of implementing theNWEAI has been a key consideration sincetheinception of the Northwest Forest Plan and theNWEAI (Multi Agency Command 1993,Tuchmannand others 1996). Every one of the studiesreferenced in this synopsis attempted to determinehow successful the implementation of the NWEAIhad been in improving the Federal service deliverysystem. In general, assessments of the NWEAI haveconcluded that there have been importantimprovements in the Federal delivery system(Bargen 1997, Raettig and Christensen 1994,Tuchmann and others 1996). The studies alsorecognize that improving the delivery system is aprocess that continues throughout theimplementation of the NWEAI, and that some of theefforts at specific improvements in service deliveryhave not been successful. A variety of suggestedimprovements in the service delivery processes and institutions are included in many of the reports.

2. What actions were taken to accomplish theabove? Across the entire NWEAI, the emphasis oncollaboration and partnerships, and the process toaddress barriers and impediments (Tuchmann andothers 1996) are cited as actions that havecontributed to improvements in the federal deliverysystem. Individual Federal agencies have also takenactions to directly improve the delivery of specificNWEAI programs (Raettig and Christensen 1994,Raettig and others 1996, Reyna and others 1996).Another action the RCERT, SCERTs, MAC and theagencies have taken to effect improvements in thedelivery system is through the support of assessmentactivities. The development of the 26 questions byOFEA and RCERT, the support of the array ofresearch reports and studies including thismanuscript are examples of such actions that

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ultimately contribute to delivery improvements.

3. How satisfied were the participants, etc. withthe actions of the agencies and the effects of theimprovements? A number of the studies haveattempted to measure participant satisfaction withthe Federal agencies’ NWEAI-related processes in general and specifically attempts to improve theprocess. Raettig and others(1998), Raettig andothers (1994), Pacific Rim Associates (1995),Bargen (1997), and Tuchmann and others (1996) allhave addressed the satisfaction issue. These studiesportray a general climate of participant satisfactionwith improvements in the delivery systems but alsocite dissatisfaction concerning specificimprovements remaining to be addressed orcompleted. The collaboration of the Federal agencies to reduce redundancy in the applicationprocess and speed the funding process up, andtechnical assistance from the funding agencies arepositive examples that participants noted (Raettigand Christensen 1994, Raettig and others 1996,Bargen 1996). Dissatisfactions noted include thefailure of available resources to meet expectations,ineffective or absent communications with localproponents, and excessive bureaucratic rules(Bargen 1997, Pacific Rim Associates 1995, Raettigand Christensen 1994). This is not surprising giventhe innovative and dynamic nature of NWEAI as itis being implemented.

4. What barriers were removed? Did theyapply to the Initiative or program? Temporary orpermanent? Specific examples of Initiative-levelbarriers that have been removed and their impacthave been cited (Raettig and Christensen 1994,Pacific Rim Associates 1995, Tuchmann and others1996, Bargen 1997). A notable example of a barrierthat was removed is the development of “first stopshop--seamless delivery” concepts to make theNWEAI--CERTprocess more accessible to projectproponents. Other examples of program specificbarriers have been noted in many of the agency

reports as well as program specific studies andinclude the decentralization of Business andIndustry Guaranteed Loan program decisionauthority, and the changes in the Departments ofAgriculture and Interior contractingrequirements tofavor local participants in the Jobs in the Woodsprogram (Raettig and others 1996, Reyna and others1996, Tuchmann and others 1996).

Our interpretation is that given the collaborativenature of the NWEAI and multi-agency natureof many of the specific projects, the distinctionbetween Initiative level barriers and programlevel barriers may not be particularly meaningful.Barriers that have been removed have addressedissues ranging from the conception, planning,consideration and funding of proposals to on-the-ground implementation. The permanence of theremoval of these barriers can only be assessed in thefuture as implementation of the NWEAI projectsproceeds.

7. What did the participants do to ensure thatprograms were accessible and easy to use?Given the magnitude of the NWEAI, thegeographically dispersed region, and the immediatenature of the needed assistance, it is inevitable thataccessability to clients has been a major issue.Since the NWEAI is really a collection of existingauthorized and funded agency programs with anexisting complement of application, participation,implementation and reporting requirements, this hasbeen a formidable task. Early in the NWEAIprocess concepts of “seamless delivery” and “theone stop shop” were proposed as major ways toenable clients to focus on responding toopportunities for assistance rather than thecomplexities of the application process (Raettig andChristensen 1994, Washington State CommunityEconomic Revitalization Team 1994, Raettig andothers 1996). Other efforts to improve ease of useof NWEAI programs have focused on reducing

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Raettig and others (1998) document the successesof some of these efforts as well as somedissatisfaction over perceived complexities andbarriers to easy access to NWEAI programs.

9. How well did other efforts described above work? In general other efforts to make the NWEAIprocesses accessible and easy to use such as the“one-stop shop” and simplifications in theapplication documentation produced positive results(Tuchmann 1996,Bargen 1997, WashingtonCommunity Economic Revitalization Team 1994).Raettig and others (1998) reference a number of thesuccesses as well improvements that could still bemade. There is evidence that some of thedifficulties in terms of ease of use and accessibilitynoted in earlier studies had been resolved by thetime later studies were completed.

8. Was the “lead agency” approach effective inmaking programs more accessible and easy to use?The detailed process of implementing the NWEAIhas varied in each of the three states. Each state hashad a version of the “lead agency” or “lead agent”concept as a part of the SCERT process that hascontributed positively to NWEAI implementation(Tuchmann and others 1996), but there have beendifferences in what the concept was, how it hasbeen appliedand the results. In Oregon the leadagency concept has been an explicit part of theprocess. In Washington the “lead scoping agent”has successfully been a single contact point to linkapplicants and the NWEAI institutions(Washington Community Economic RevitalizationTeam 1996). The “lead agency’ concept has beenapplied in Oregon as an integral part of theapplication process. Participant satisfaction withthe process has generally been good in Oregon butthere have been perceived deficiencies in

understanding,outreach and the effectiveness of theapplication process (Pacific Rim Associates 1995).The California SCERT applied the “lead agency”concept in a process that forwarded applications to alead agency on the judgementof an individualCERT coordinator (as opposed to the committeedecisions used in Oregon). This could result inincreased efficiency at the expense of collaborationbetween CERT participants (Bargen 1997).

13. What did CERT do to coordinate forestmanagement and economic development? and14. What were successes and frustrationsresulting from these efforts?The RCERT and three state CERTs have directlysupported the coordination of forest managementand economic development through their support ofthe ecosystem investment parts of the Initiative(Washington Community Economic RevitalizationTeam 1994, Tuchmann and others 1996). Tuchmannand others (1996) also noted the complexities of theprogram that has two potentially conflictingobjectives: the remaining disagreements over theintent of the program, and problems funding all ofthe ecosystem management components ofthe Initiative. A review of the 1994 Jobs in theWoods Program (Tarnow 1995) pointed out thatmajor problems were the unrealistically highexpectations among potential workers resultingfrom agency promotion efforts and difficultiesarising from agency contracting and procurementpractices. The CERTs have also had a direct butless obvious impact on coordinating forestmanagement and economic development throughthe funding and implementation of projects thatsupport existing and emerging businesses dealingwith forest products including special forestproducts and expanded secondary manufacturing oflocally produced timber (Raettig and others 1996,

redundancy in the application process, simplifyingprogram requirements, and public contact byNWEAI managers.

Washington State Community EconomicRevitalization Team 1994).

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Our interpretation is that the NWEAI supportedtraining activities such as the Forestry TrainingCenter at Forks, Washington that will impact bothforestry and economic development by creating ahighly skilled workforce for new forestry methods.

15. What did CERT participants learn fromefforts that may help future efforts to coordinateecosystem management & economic development?Among the most significant lessons learnedconcerning the coordination of ecosystemmanagement and economic development are thefollowing (USDA/USDI 1996, Tarnow 1995,USDA, Forest Service1996):

• The coordination of the often conflictingobjectives of ecosystem management andeconomic development is very complex,particularly as compared to other NWEAIprogram areas.

• Adequate funding is ultimately theprerequisite to accomplishing bothobjectives on a meaningful scale. This hasnot been realized in the NWEAI and thedemand for funding has exceeded availableresources.

• Existing agency contracting andprocurement processes can create realbarriers to accomplishing the desiredcoordination.

• An agreement on the vision and goals of acoordinated program is necessary, andextremely difficult to achieve.

Capacity-Related Questions

Six of the evaluation and monitoring questions dealwith capacity issues.

5. What did the Initiative do to provideassistance for local planning and decision making?The Forest Service, USDA Rural Development,

and the Economic Development Administrationin the Department of Commerce all have NWEAIprograms that provide assistance to support localplanning and decision making (Tuchmann andothers 1996, Raettig and others 1996). In somecases financial support goes directly to the localcommunity or planning entityfor specific planningproducts or processes while in other instancessupport has been given to organizations such asRural Development Initiatives Inc. in Oregon tosupport broad programs supporting local planningand decision-making. These NWEAI programsoften build on existing State economic developmentprograms supporting local and sub-State efforts(Tuchmann and others 1996). Some NWEAIprograms such as specific USDA RuralDevelopment loan and grant programs haveindirectly encouraged local planning anddecision-making by requiring completion of certainplanning processes and products such a strategicor comprehensive plan a prerequisite for receivingassistance.

6. Did the assistance improve the quality oflocal planning and decision making? It is reportedthat these programs for supporting local planningand decision making have made positivecontributions to the quality of local processes andrepresent one of the significant accomplishments ofthe NWEAI (Raettig and others 1996, Tuchmannand others 1996). One example of the kind ofimprovements in the local planning processsupported by NWEAI programs is theunincorporated community of Happy Camp,California (Bargen 1997). NWEAI programs andsupport enabled Happy Camp, a community that didnot have an existing plan, to begin a planningprocess, become an active partner in the NWEAIprocess, and undertake positive communitydevelopment projects. Other positive NWEAIcontributions to local planning activities aredocumented across the region.

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23. What was the existing base of communitycapacity prior to the Initiative? Although there isno base measurement of communitycapacity,NWEAI economic development efforts in the regionhave built on a foundationof existing capacity andlocal institutions. Federal programs such and thosein the Economic Development Administration andstate supported institutions such as RuralDevelopment Initiative Inc., the Oregon EconomicDevelopment Department and theWashingtonDepartment of Community Trade and EconomicDevelopment were actively supporting localeconomic development activities before theNorthwest Forest Plan. There is evidence, however,that local capacity for economic development waslacking or needed improvement in parts of theregion and in certain unincorporated communities(Bargen 1997, Raettig and others 1996).Infrastructure in many of the rural NWEAI areaswas either lacking or obsolete.

24. What did the CERTs do to improve localcapacity? The CERTS were able to improve localcapacity directly by funding projects aimedspecifically at improving local economicdevelopment capacity through either technicalassistance or supporting specific capacity improvingprojects (Bargen 1997, Raettig and others 1996,Tuchmann and others 1996,Washington CommunityEconomic Revitalization Team 1994). NWEAIprograms have also set the stage for local economicdevelopment by funding infrastructure projects suchas water and wastewater facilities that are essentialfor future development (Raettig and others 1996,Tuchmann 1996). Finally, the requirements forlocal planning and economic development productsand institutions as a precondition for participationin NWEAI programs has provided a powerfulincentive for local communities. The collaborationthat is the foundation of the NWEAI is one of theessential conditions for efficient and effectiveplanning for community development.

25. What changes in local capacity took place asa result of CERT efforts? It is perceived that CERTsupport of NWEAI projects to enhance localcapacity provided an increased capability incommunities across the region to undertakecommunity and economic development activities(Bargen 1997, Raettig and others 1996, Tuchmannand others 1996). Some of this capability wasrealized in an increased skill level among botheconomic development practitioners and thecommunity at large as a result of support for suchprojects as the Rural Development Initiatives Inc.business assistance team project and the LaneCommunity Collegefirst stop shop project. Otherenhanced capability has been in specific communitydevelopment plans, projects and capital facilitiessuch as the industrial park in the City of Oakridge,Oregon. Also, many communities have realized thebenefits of partnerships and collaboration to providea base for community development activities andthis model can be used by the communities in futuredevelopment activities using skills enhanced in theNWEAI process

26. How much were community plans advancedas a result of the Initiative? NWEAI financialsupport has provided for the completion of plansthat had already been started and enhanced thequality of plans in progress in the region (PacificRim Associates 1995, Raettig and others 1996,Tuchmann and others 1996). The NWEAI has alsoinitiated strategic planning activities in communitiesthat had not previously been involved in suchactivities (Bargen 1997). Practitioners haveindicated that these efforts have been a significantfactor in enhancing the level of community capacity(Tuchmann and others 1996).

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Outcome and Accomplishment Questions

Ten of the questions deal with outcomes andaccomplishments of the NWEAI.

10. What did the Initiative do to ease the short-term transition for workers? The Initiative programthat directly addresses the transition for dislocated workers is the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA)funded through the Department of Labor Secretary’sReserve. This program provides for workerretraining and, importantly, for temporary livingexpenses while the worker is in training. The initialminimum target level of funding for this NWEAIprogram was $12,000,000 and this level has beenexceeded in every year of the Initiative since 1995.Indirectly, the Northwest Forest Plan is providingassistance in that timber sales on Federal lands havebeen resumed and some workers will find or be ableto continue employment in harvesting andprocessing timber (Tuchmann and others 1996).

11. How many workers benefited from theseefforts? Did families benefit? What were thebenefits? The OFEA report noted that “Since theinitiative began, 4900 worker-training opportunitieshad been created in the region” (Tuchmann andothers 1996:176). It is not clear if this is a total forfiscal years 1994 through 1996 or a total for someshorter period of time. In fiscal year 1996, theRCERT reported that training opportunities for2433 workers were provided (Regional CommunityEconomic Revitalization Team 1996). Trainingfor family members was not reported separately ineither the OFEA report or RCERT annual reports.The 1996 RCERT annual report does indicate thattraining opportunities were extended to otherworkers in timber communities in addition toprimarily and secondarily-impacted forest productworkers.

12. JTPA questions: Workers served by JTPAand by other programs; the success rates; werefamily members served; and what were the results?JTPA training opportunities provided are noted inthe response to the previous question. Informationis not available on other programs or familymembers served. Tuchmann and others (1996)reported that 1006 workers had either completed orleft training programs by the end of fiscal year 1995and 817 of these workers had found jobs.

16. Were economic benefits enhanced throughthis coordination? Ecosystem benefits enhanced?How much? The NWEAI ecosystem investmentprograms across the region have generated animportant economic impact (Tuchmann and others1996). In fiscal year 1994, for instance, anestimated 2,200 jobs (equivalent to 600 full-timejobs) were created by the ecosystem managementprograms. In fiscal year 1995, the total number ofjobs created increased to almost 3,700. Anothermeasure of the economic impact of these jobs isindicated by the total wage and benefit value of$17.10 per hour for the fiscal year 1995 program(USDA/USDI 1996). While an accounting ofecosystem accomplishments is not available, avariety of needed watershed and ecosystemrestoration projects were completed including road,culvert, stream, and vegetation projects.

17. What have the CERTs done to create anetwork to coordinate training for dislocatedworkers with economic development efforts? Oneof the more visible efforts to coordinate training fordislocated workers and economic development hasbeen the ecosystem workforce demonstrationprojects in Oregon (Labor Education and ResearchCenter 1995, Tarnow 1995). The ecosystemworkforce demonstration projects have beenconceived to create a quality workforce (certifiedecosystem management workers) through trainingand experience on actual ecosystem managementprojects. An important element of the ecosystemmanagement workforce demonstration projects has

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been the payment to participants of wages andbenefits sufficient to provide support for the workerand family. Completing quality ecosystemmanagement projects was also an explicitconsideration in the ecosystem workforcedemonstration projects. Similar networks have beencreated in other states to provide the necessarytraining and experience to develop an ecosystemmanagement workforce. Notable efforts in otherstates include California projects in Eureka, Hayforkand Yreka and the Columbia Pacific RC&D projectin Washington. Yet another method that training,ecosystem management and economic developmenthave been coordinated through the support of theJobs in The Environment program in WashingtonState--an existing cooperative effort.

18. Did these efforts improve the success of jobtraining programs? One of the definingcharacteristics of the ecosystem workforcedemonstration program has been the emphasis onevaluating the program and projects on an ongoingbasis. Evaluation work has been undertakendirectly by the entities involved such as the LaborEducation and Research Center at the University ofOregon (Labor Education and Research Center1995), the Federal land management agencies(USDA/USDI 1996), the State CERTS (WashingtonCommunity Economic Revitalization Team 1996),and outside interest groups (Tarnow 1995). Theseevaluation efforts all documented successfulstrategies, techniques and projects that haveimproved the success of the training/ecosystemmanagement coordinated program but also pointedout the large measure of improvement that could bemade as implementation continued. On a regionallevel, funding and the extraordinary complex natureof implementing projects with such diverse andpotentially conflicting goals were identified asfactors that have complicated implementation(Tuchmann and others 1996).

19. What did the CERTs do to stimulate jobopportunities in forest-related economic activity?The CERTs stimulated job opportunities in forest-related sectors through the entire process ofmanaging the Jobs in the Woods program. Supportof innovative methods of contracting, packaging ofpotential projects and project administration directlytranslated ecosystem investments into jobs fordislocated timber workers (Tarnow 1995,Tuchmann and others 1996). Creative managementof the projects has meant that many of theecosystem management opportunities are accessibleto dislocated workers. Coordination of workforcetraining and ecosystem management enabled theprogram to create new employment opportunities inthe impacted rural communities. In addition, CERTsupport of other economic development projects hasenhanced job opportunities in the more traditionalforest products harvesting and processing industriesas well as secondary manufacturing components ofthe sector (Raettig and others 1996).

20. How successful were efforts to create forest-related jobs? Answers have already addressed themagnitude of employment opportunities created byecosystem management investments. It is importantto note that the program has done well in matchingjob opportunities and displaced timber workers. Of2,226 jobs that were reported as created by the 1995program, 45 percent went to dislocated imberworkers USDA/USDI 1996). Across the region theprogram’s efforts and success in meetingexpectations were limited by the lack of fullprogram funding (Tuchmann and others 1996).

21. What long-term strategic economicinvestments were made by Initiative participants?The NWEAI programs have made importantinvestments in long-term capital facilities in thetimber communities. Raettig and others documentthe magnitude of economic investments from aregional perspective. Notable examples ofinfrastructure investments include water and

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wastewater treatment facilities (Raettig and others1996, Reyna and others 1996, WashingtonCommunity Economic Revitalization Team 1994),community health facilities in Reedsport, Oregon(Raettig and others 1996), industrial parkimprovements in Oakridge, Oregon (Raettig andothers 1996), and marine facilities in Washington(Washington Community Economic RevitalizationTeam 1996). Other long-term strategic investmentshave been made in revolving loan funds funded byagencies such as USDA, Rural Development and theUS Department of Commerce, EconomicDevelopment Administration (Raettig and others1996, Reyna and others 1996) that will provide acrucial source of credit for emerging and expandingsmall businesses. A third way the NWEAI hasinvested in long-term economic development is inhuman capital. NWEAI projects like the businessassistance teams and first stop shops in Oregon(Raettig and others 1996), and a forestry trainingcenter in Washington (Washington CommunityEconomic Revitalization Team 1996) provideenhanced skills among individuals and groups thatare a base for future economic development.

The next series of questions all involve specificoutcome measures. A number of studies haveanswered some of these items for 1996 at the stateor regional level and results are discussed for eachspecific sub-question.. A comprehensivemonitoring system is not in place or planned toanswer these questions definitively in the future.

22 a. What private investments associated with thepublic investments had been made by 1996? By2003? Two information sources addressed thisquestion for portions of the NWEAI region. InWashington for fiscal years 1994 through 1996,non-federal sources accounted for 32 percent oftotal WACERT project funding. The 3.8 milliondollars of private investment accounted for 2.5percent of total project funding and 7.3 of the non-federal funding (Washington Community Economic

Revitalization Team 1994, 1995, 1996). A study ofUSDA Rural Development NWEAI programs forfiscal years 1994 and 1995 in Oregon (Raettig andothers 1996) indicated that non-Federal sourcesaccounted for 17.1 percent of total project value butdid not separately account for private sources.Private investments have been an important part ofNWEAI project funding but an exact accounting hasbeen precluded by the lack of a systematicaccounting system.

22 b. How many/what kinds of businesses werecreated, expanded, or located in affectedcommunities by 1996? By 2003? The mostcomprehensive source of information on businessimpacts of NWEAI programs is the USDA RuralDevelopment assessment for Oregon (Raettig andothers 1996). In 1994 and 1995 NWEAI projectsfunded by USDA Rural Development in Oregonimpacted 146 businesses. Information for thosebusiness impacts that were categorized indicates 11new businesses, 3 retained businesses and 32expanded businesses.

22 c. By 1996, how many dislocated workers werehired and how many other people? How manythreatened jobs were retained? How does thiscompare with the jobs lost in the forest productsindustry? Only a partial answer is possible for thisquestion. Tuchmann and others (1996) found thatof the 16,542 NWEAI “job effects” for fiscal year1996, 12 percent were jobs that were retained orfound by workers after retraining, 44 percent werejobs created during the fiscal year, and 44 percentwere jobs expected to be created in future years.One indication of the portion of these workers thatwere dislocated timber workers is that 45 percent ofthe workers receiving jobs through the Jobs in theWoods program in fiscal year 1995 were, in fact,dislocated timber workers. Jobs lost by the timberindustry are discussed in detail in Raettig and others(1998).

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22 d. By 2003, how many affected communitieshave adjusted to and thrived in the face of reducedtimber harvests? How many jobs in thosecommunities are associated with public investmentsmade by the Initiative? This question needs amonitoring and reportingsystem in place to beaddressed.

22 e. By 1996, which investments or combinationinvestments have had the most beneficial impact?By 2003? Capital investments in infrastructure thathave had construction activities begin or completeare candidates for immediate (1996) beneficialimpacts. Water and wastewater facilities, and othercommunity facilities are examples and havegenerated construction job impacts as well asprovidedservices as they have been completed(Raettig and others 1996, Reyna and others 1996).Another category of NWEAI projects that hasalready had a positive impact are business andindustry programs such as revolving loan funds andloan guarantees. In many case funds have alreadybeen loaned out and recipient businesses have hirednew employees. Investments in human capital andcapacity often have only just begun to generatebeneficial impacts.

The studies cited in response to the list of questionsand the continuing evaluation and monitoringefforts of those working on the NWEAI andNorthwest Forest Plan provides a comprehensive, ifnot complete, accounting of how successful theNWEAI has been in addressing community andeconomic development needs in the region. Weacknowledge the contributions by Bob Rheiner,CERT Co-Chair, and all participants at the Forum.

REFERENCES

Bargen, Jan. 1997. A Case Study in ReinventingGovernment: The Spotted Owl ControversyInspires Unprecedented Collaboration forCommunity Economic Assistance in the 1993Forest Plan. Master’s Thesis. The University ofTexas at Austin, Department of Public Affairs. 146p.

Multi Agency Command (MAC). 1993. Finalworking strategy for the Forest Plan EconomicAdjustment Initiative. November 30, 1993. 9 p.

Pacific Rim Associates, Inc. 1995. The NorthwestEconomic Adjustment Initiative and theOregonSCERT--A Work in Progress. An Evaluation ofthe Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiativeand the Oregon State Community EconomicRevitalization Team After Two Years ofOperation. Prepared by Pacific Rim Associates,Inc, In association with Lois Bronfman, JesusDizon, Anthony Rufolo. For: Oregon EconomicDevelopment Department.

Pipken James. 1998. The Northwest Forest Planrevisited. Prepared for the Interagency SteeringCommittee. On file with RCERT, P.O. Box 3890,Portland, OR 97208-3890.

Raettig, Terry L.; Christensen, Harriet H. 1994.Pacific Northwest Economic AdjustmentInitiative a pulse study: Exploring the range ofperceptions and experiences. Prepared forRegional Economic Revitalization Team. On fileat Pacific Northwest Research Station, 4043Roosevelt Way NE, Seattle, WA. 98105

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Raettig, Terry L.; Christensen, Harriet H.;Donoghue, Ellen. 1998. The Northwest economicadjustment initiative: an assessment. Reportprepared for the regional community economicrevitalization team. On file with RCERT, P.O.Box 3890, Portland, OR 97208-3890.

Raettig, Terry L.; Donoghue, Ellen; Christensen,Harriet H.; McGinnis, Wendy J. 1996.USDA Rural Development in Oregon: an analysis.Research Project Report for Rural Development,Oregon State. On file at USDA RuralDevelopment, 101 S.W. Main, Suite 1410.Portland, OR 97204-3222.

Tuchmann, Thomas E.; Connaughton, Kent P.;Freedman, Lisa E.; Moriwaki, Clarence B.1996. The northwest forest plan: a report to thePresident and Congress. Portland, OR: U.S.Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, PacificNorthwest Research Station. 253 p.

Tarnow, Karen. 1995. Analysis and recommenda-tions for the Federal Jobs in the Woods program.Eugene, OR: Pacific Rivers Council, Inc. 20 p.

USDA/USDI. 1996. Watershed restoration/Jobs inthe Woods: Summary report. May 15, 1996,unpublished report on file at Regional CommunityEconomic Revitalization Team, 333 SW 1st,Portland, OR: 97204.

U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service.1996. Watershed restoration/Jobs in the Woodsannual report, Fiscal year 1995 (preliminarypaper). U.S. Department of Agriculture, ForestService, Pacific Northwest Region (not paged).

Washington State Community Economic Revital-ization Team. 1995. The President’s EconomicAdjustment Initiative for the Pacific Northwestand Northern California. Implementation inWashington state Fiscal year 1995. WashingtonState Community Economic Revitalization Team(WACERT). (not paged).

Regional Community Economic RevitalizationTeam. 1996. Economic Adjustment Initiativeannual report for the Pacific Northwest andnorthern California under President Clinton’sForest Plan. Regional Community EconomicRevitalization Team (RCERT), 45 p.

Reyna, Michael M.; Garvey, Shawn, and Bargen,Jan. 1996. A report on the Northwest EconomicAdjustment Initiative in California. An evaluationand case study of projects funded by the USDARural Development 1994 - 96. Woodland, CA:USDA Rural Development.

[ROD 1994] Record of decision for amendments toForest Service and Bureau of Land Managementplanning documents within the range of thenorthern spotted owl. 1994. Portland, OR: U.S.Department of Agriculture; U.S. Department ofInterior [ and others ].

Washington State Community Economic Revital-ization Team. 1996. The President’s EconomicAdjustment Initiative for the Pacific Northwestand Northern California. Implementation inWashington state Fiscal year 1995. WashingtonState Community Economic Revitalization Team(WACERT). (not paged).

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APPENDIX A

List of participants at forum entitled "Northwest Economic Adjustment Initiative: Have the HopesBeen Realized,” July 1997, Portland, Oregon.

Name Agency City and StateRoger Ahlbrandt Portland State University Portland, ORAldred Ames U.S. Department of Commerce, Economic Dev. Ad. Boise, IDMerle Anderson Siskiyou County Economic Development Corporation Yreka, CARolf Anderson U.S. Forest Service, Willamette National Forest Sweet Home, ORJanet Anderson-TylerU.S. Forest Service, State and Private Forestry Portland, ORAl Angrignon Forks Forestry Training Center Forks, WAJan Bargen LBJ School of Public Affairs, Univ. of Texas Austin, TXJohn Benoit Willows, CAAnne Berblinger U.S. Department of Commerce, Economic Dev. Ad. Portland, ORKarin Berkholtz Governor’s Rural Assistance Team Olympia, WAPatrick Borunda OR Native American Business Entrepreneur Net. Portland, ORBob Buckingham Makah Tribal Center Neah BaySuzanne Burcell Karuk Community Development Corp. Happy Camp, CAJohn Butterworth Benton Bulletin Philomath, ORBill Campbell Oregon Economic Development Department Salem, ORRebecca Chaffey City of Raymond Raymond, WAScott Chapman Portland, ORHarriet H. Christensen U.S. Forest Service, PNW Research Station Seattle, WAChuck Clendenin USDA Rural Development Woodland, CABudd Denny Small Business Development ProgramEllen Donoghue U.S. Forest Service, PNW Research Station Portland, ORScott Duff USDA Rural Development Portland, ORAnita Gahimer Port of Skamainia County Stevenson, WAChris Gannon Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Warm Springs, ORCorrine Gobeli Oregon State University Corvallis, ORTerry Gribben U.S. Department of Labor Seattle, WAMagaret Hallock Labor Ed. Research Center, Univ. of Oregon Eugene, ORRichard Haynes U.S. Forest Service, PNW Research Station Portland, OREric Herst USDA Rural Development Portland, OROllie Jones U.S. Forest Service, Willamette National Forest Eugene, ORKim Judge State of Alaska Ketchikan, AKLynn Jungwirth Karuk Community Development Corp. Hayfork, CADarrel Kenops U.S. Forest Service, Willamette National Forest Eugene, ORJim Kimbrell Siskiyou county, CA Eureka, CALloyd Kirry U.S. Department of Commerce, Economic Dev. Ad. Seattle, WAJim Kraft Eastern Oregon University La Grande, ORJonathan Kusel Forest Community Research Taylorsville, CA

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Bert Larson Internat. Assoc. of Machinists, Woodworkers Gladston, ORDan Leinan City of Forks Forks, WACurt Loop Regional Ecosystem Office Portland, ORJames F. Lowery Economic Development Corporation South Bend, WAJerry Lucas Makah Tribal Council Neah Bay, WAMary E McBride USDA Rural Development Olympia, WAAl McKee Washington CERT Stevenson, WARenate Mengelberg Clackamas county, OR Oregon City, ORSusan Morrison Rural Human Service Crescent City, CACasandra Mosely Rogue Institute Ashland, ORBob Nash Superior CA Economic Development Dis. Redding, CAJim Neuva Port of Willapa Harbor Raymond, WAJennifer Nolton Makah Tribe Neah Bay, WARon Ochs U.S. Forest Service, State and Private Forestry Portland, ORRichard Phillips U.S. Forest Service, Region Six Portland, ORTerry L. Raettig U.S. Forest Service, PNW Research Station Olympia, WARobert Reiss Trinity county, CA Hyampom, CAWendy Reiss Trinity county, CA Hyampom, CABob Rheiner Bureau of Land Management (RCERT) Portland, ORDave Rux Internat. Assoc. of Machinists, Woodworkers Aberdeen, WARon Saranich U.S. Forest Service, State and Private Forestry Washington DCDave Schmidt Linn county, OR Albany, ORPhyllis Schrauger City of Hoquiam Hoquiam, WABill Scott Oregon Economic Development Department Salem, ORHeidi Sickert Sustainable Northwest Portland, ORSam Sirkin Oregon Economic Development Department Salem, ORPaul Sommers Northwest Policy Center, Univ. of WA Seattle, WACharles Spencer Labor Ed. Research Center, Univ. of Oregon Eugene, ORMark Stanley California Resources Agency Sacramento, CAJim Strathman Portland State University Portland ORFrancie Sullivan CEWAER Sacramento, CAJoanne Sutherland Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Warm springs, ORKathy Suvia Siskiyou Training and Development Weed, CATerry Swagerty Umpqua Community College Roseburg, ORJanel Tarczy California Resources Agency Sacramento, CASinclair Tedder British Columbia Ministry of Forests Victoria, BCTom Tuchmann USDA, Office of the Secretary Portland, ORVictor Vasquez USDA Rural Development Washington DCJim Walls Columbia Pacific Res. Conservation & Development Aberdeen, WANikki Whitty Coos, Curry, Douglas Council of Governments North Bend, ORJim Zelenka Lane County Council of Governments Eugene, ORJoyce Zwanziger Siskiyou County Economic Development Corporation Weed, CA

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