Westerners tour "Down Under"

ESTERNERS traditionally want to know what's new. what's happening and how to do things better, so it wasn't surprising to find that half the men on a recent trade development conference visiting Australia, New ZeaIand, Tahiti and Fiji were from the West.

The 25-day swing was under the aegis of the National Lumber and Building Material Dealers Assn. with Terry Mullin, Mullin Lumber Co., 'farzana, Ca., as a major organizer. Tour leader was Wayne Gardner, exec. v.p., Lumber Asso-

Story at a Glance

Retailer-wholesaler group on a fact finding mission that included Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti and Fiji .... sponsored by NLBMDA, half of the trade group was comprised of Westerners.

ciation of Southern Other Westerners Thomson, Inland

California. included Fred Lumber Co.,

Colton, Ca.; Don Brown, Mullin Lumber Co.; Gene Ward, Consolidated Lumber Co., Spokane, Wa.; Sam Hauert, Grant Road Lumber Co., Tucson, Az.; and Roger Conrad, Conrad Lumber Co., Coos Bay, Or. The other seven men were from all over the U.S., the balance of the contingent being wives.

Despite the temptation to sighisee, the group mostly maintained a busy schedule of plant tours, seminars, conferences with various merchants' associations and a variety of facilities inspections.

First Of Two Parts

This excerpt from a speech by Portland attorney Leonard B. Netzorg entitLed "The National EnuironmentaL PoLicy Act," was originally presented at the third annuaL Current lssues Cont'erence organized by Dr. Stuart U. Rich, Uniuersity of Oregon, in the interest of the timber industry.

The basic thrust of the speech deaLs with the requirement of the NationaL Enuironmental Policy Act (NEPA) that gouernment agencies must thoroughly consider and proue they haue thought through uarious courses of action before issuing draft NEPA statements that put forward their uiew of how to handLe a giuen situation. As you wiLl see, Netzorg tahes opart the Forest Seruice in no uncertain terms for what he sees os their failure to perform to euen an adequate standard.

Copies of the entire proceeding of the conference will be auailable this summer at $6 the copy, chechs payabLe to Uniuersity of Oregon. Write: Dr. Stuart U. Rich, director, Forest Industries Management Center, College of Business Administration, Uniuersity of Oregon, Eugene, 97403.

rn HE draft NEPA statements

I issued by the Forest Service, if there really is such an entity, suffer hugely from the inability of many segments of the agency to escape from their peculiar history. Many of us whose activities take us into the area of the formulation of governmental policy have recognized that until about 10 years ago, three federal agencies were untouchable - the FBI, the Corps of Engineers and the Forest Service. It was a rare and bold member of the Congress who would publicly question any decision made by those dedicated, expert, selfless guardians of our magnificent National Forest System. For anybody who dared to ruffie the gleaming fur of Smokey the Bear, base motives were hinted.