Timber harvesting on the Allegheny National Forest has resumed nearly one week after a federal government shutdown stopped logging on 150 national forests nationwide.

With Congress failing to approve appropriations funding for federal agencies like the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Forest Service, Forest Service workers were furloughed and Forest Service timber contracts — some worth millions of dollars — suspended in the absence of personnel to monitor them.

A total of 450 timber purchasers engaged in logging activities on national forest land were given seven days to clear out.

Dave Kiehl, owner of North East Hardwoods in Marienville, has been buying timber contracts on the Allegheny since 1980. He currently relies on the forest for up to 90 percent of the material he uses, with the remainder coming from the state forest, Pennsylvania Game Commission or privately-owned lands. 

Kiehl said the roughly one-week suspension of his operations cost him several thousand dollars in sales as well as untold opportunity costs. While Kiehl plans to submit an itemized list of his documented losses to the federal government for reimbursement he is skeptical the money will ever be recouped.

In addition, Kiehl said the saw mills, paper mills and manufacturers he supplies were hit with lowered product availability, adding, “it’s like a domino effect.”

Mark Conolly, president of Bradford Forest Products, began purchasing Allegheny timber 20 years ago and designed his business and manufacturing facility around a close proximity to the national forest. Conolly said the timber contract suspensions have caused some in the industry to question the future of the forest service timber partnerships.

“The less reliable the Forest Service becomes as a partner to us, the more at risk the raw material supply becomes,” Conolly said. 

While timber purchasers like Conolly said the timber contract suspensions did “real damage” to his business, he said the independent contractors he employs to harvest the timber and haul the raw material were the hardest hit.

For those cutters, skidders and truckers, Conolly said the logging suspension meant “someone went to bed hungry,” as most live “paycheck-to-paycheck.”

At least six companies holding timber contracts for the Allegheny had contracts suspended by the recent shutdown. Each of them uses a number of subcontractors in day-to-day operations.

For her part, Sue Swanson, executive director of the Allegheny Hardwood Utilization Group (AHUG), said the work stoppage came at a time of year when dry, brittle trees make harvesting easier and less damaging to forest land. It also comes as Pennsylvania loggers work to regain their footing following the housing collapse of 2008 that has them continuing to operate under smaller profit margins.

“I don’t think any of us were prepared for that or saw that coming,” Swanson said. “I don’t know that it makes a whole lot of sense, but when has politics ever made sense.” 

Claiming the suspensions violated their contracts, the timber industry filed a federal suit against the U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Bureau of Land Management demanding they be allowed to return to work. A federal judge in Oregon agreed, ruling in their favor and ordering loggers back to work immediately rather than waiting for federal paperwork lifting the contract suspensions to be processed.

The timber contract suspensions marked the first time ever that a government shutdown impacted logging on national forests, but maybe not the last.

The Oct. 16 deal to reopen the government only provides appropriations funding through Jan. 15, leaving many in the logging industry to question whether they could withstand another shutdown and logging ban.

But Kiehl hopes the federal court’s decision sets a legal precedent that in the event of another budget impasse “would sure weigh on people’s minds before they try to shut us down again.”