The benefits to privatizing Elliot State Forest are numerous. To begin with, selling the land to the Lone Rock Timber Management company, which has partnered with several local native tribe,s would give back some say in the land that was taken from them. The company would also incorporate 40 new full and part-time jobs for the logging of trees. This logging would be done sustainably because one they know how the land works since they have lived on it for thousands of years, and two, they want to have a constant source of trees to log for revenue so they’re not just going to clear cut the whole forest and call it a day. Now that we’re through the common concerns some have with privatization, I want to mention that just the simple selling of the land would profit the Oregon government $220.8 million. In addition, the Lone Rock would bolster the revenue generated from the forest, which has been losing the state of Oregon money since 2012 (net revenue loss). The issue over the protection of the northern spotted owl but as I mentioned above, this deal is in partnership with Native American tribes that understand how the land works and would work to protect the owls livelihood. This brings me to my final point that the privatization of the Elliot State Forest would bring a balance between economic profit and ecological safety of the land.

The tribes in association with Lone Rock: “Joining Lone Rock as an investment partner in the proposal are The Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Tribe of Indians. The Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians, with assistance from The Conservation Fund, a national conservation group… (Lone Rock Resources).”

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Sources: Theen, Robert. “Elliot State Forest meeting pushed back until May.” Oregon Live. The Oregonian. Accessed March 14 2017. <http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2017/03/elliott_state_forest_meeting_p.html>

Lone Rock Resources. “Elliot State Forest.” Accessed June 4, 2017. <http://lonerockresources.com/elliott/>