Abstract
This brief reports on a telephone survey conducted in fall 2014 as part of the ongoing Communities and Forests in Oregon (CAFOR) project. CAFOR focuses on seven counties in the Blue Mountains of northeast Oregon (Baker, Crook, Grant, Umatilla, Union, Wallowa, and Wheeler), where the landscape and local livelihoods are changing in interconnected ways. In an effort to inform policy development around natural resource management, the study seeks to understand how public perceptions of climate change and forest management intersect. Authors Angela Boag, Joel Hartter, Lawrence Hamilton, Forrest Stevens, Mark Ducey, Michael Palace, Nils Christoffersen, and Paul Oester report that 65 percent of those surveyed believe that forests are less healthy than they were twenty years ago. Approximately half of residents support increased user fees to improve forest health on federal land, and a majority believes that climate change is happening, although opinion is split between those who believe it is human-caused and those who believe it is caused by natural forces. The authors conclude that innovative economic and policy solutions are needed across the Inland West to help people and forests regain a strong and productive relationship that both supports livelihoods and sustains working landscapes.
Publication Date
Spring 4-21-2015
Series
National Issue Brief No. 81
Publisher
Durham, N.H. : Carsey School of Public Policy, University of New Hampshire
Document Type
Article
Recommended Citation
Boag, Angela E.; Hartter, Joel N.; Hamilton, Lawrence C.; Stevens, Forrest R.; Ducey, Mark J.; Palace, Michael W.; Christoffersen, Nils D.; and Oester, Paul T., "Forest Views: Shifting Attitudes Toward the Environment in Northeast Oregon" (2015). Carsey School of Public Policy. 238.
https://scholars.unh.edu/carsey/238
Rights
Copyright 2015. Carsey School of Public Policy. These materials may be used for the purposes of research, teaching, and private study. For all other uses, contact the copyright holder.
DOI
https://dx.doi.org/10.34051/p/2020.230