Comments closed July 31
Stop Forest Service from cutting public comment rights
Forest Service · National Forest System
- What
- The Forest Service wants to reduce your legal right to weigh in on how national forests are managed.
- Where
- National Forest System
- How much
- Public notice and comment requirements that let citizens, tribes, and conservation groups influence forest management rules are being scaled back.
- Decided
- Comments closed July 31, 2026. No decision document is on file yet.Date from Federal Register ↗, read July 1, 2026.
Where these four lines come from
- WhatOur plain-English read of the Federal Register 2026-13281 ↗. Check it against the agency’s own words under Case.
- WhereThe places and states the notice names, as PLAN read them.
- How muchThe first sentence of our What’s at risk read of the notice; the whole read is under Case.
- DecidedJuly 31, 2026, from Federal Register, the document’s comment close date (federalregister.gov) ↗. Read July 1, 2026. The decision document is the one on file in PLAN’s record.
- Read from PLAN’s record October 15, 2026.
Michael Boren
Under Secretary, Natural Resources and Environment
A person signed this, not an agency. The window has closed and the signature stands, which is exactly when accountability matters.
Short is better. You are asking Under Secretary Boren to answer for a decision their office made.
My name is [your name] and I'm calling from [your city and state]. Michael Boren, Under Secretary, Natural Resources and Environment, signed the decision on Stop Forest Service from cutting public comment rights. I'm asking that office to answer for it publicly. Please record that I called and tell me what the office intends to do.
Official channels only, about this decision. No personal phone numbers, no home addresses, no personal social accounts, and nothing abusive. The point is to make the office answer, and an abusive call is the one thing that lets it off the hook.
What the proposal said, and what the decision did
No figure from the proposal has been checked against the decision on this fight yet. What the record does hold is the issues ledger below.
No decision document is on PLAN’s record for this fight yet. When the agency’s decision lands, what it answered goes here.
PLAN's read: high threat
The Forest Service wants to reduce your legal right to weigh in on how national forests are managed.
What’s at risk
If this goes through
Our plain-English read of the official notice ↗. Check it against the agency’s own words below.
In the agency’s own words
The United States Department of Agriculture (Department) is proposing to amend regulations governing the Directive System for the United States Forest Service (Forest Service or Agency); the scope of notice and comment requirements for the formulation of standards, criteria, and guidelines applicable to Forest Service programs; and associated agency procedures. These amendments enhance Agency employees' discretion to allow innovation in program implementation to account for the unique ecological conditions of affected landscapes and changing social and economic needs.
Who signs it
Michael Boren
Under Secretary, Natural Resources and Environment
Where the notice says so
The ground
The window has closed, so there’s no watch to set on it here.
The photograph on this page: Rain over mixed-grass prairie, Badlands country, South Dakota. More Than Just Parks.
Who holds the vote
PLAN’s record doesn’t tie a member of Congress to this fight yet. The scorecard grades the votes and bills that decide public lands; nothing joins a vote or a bill to this decision, so there’s no member to name here without guessing.
See how your members vote ↗Know an open comment period we are missing, or spotted a wrong deadline? .
More fights that need you
Go deeper, free
See how your members of Congress vote on public lands
Every representative, graded on the votes that decide the fate of parks, forests, and refuges.
Open ↗The mapSee the places under active threat
A live map of the parks, monuments, and wild country in the crosshairs right now.
Open ↗A wrong fact, a dead link, a form that wouldn’t take your letter: one tap and it comes to the people who build PLAN, with this fight attached.