ESFPA E-News

Register to Attend 2025 ESFPA Regional Meetings

ESFPA is planning on hosting 6 Regional Meetings across NY State this fall. This year, we’re aiming for a more informal approach; our focus is on creating a relaxed, social atmosphere where we can connect with loggers and hear your thoughts. There will be no formal speakers, and most of the meetings will be held in more casual venues with more casual snack food. 

The schedule of Regional Meetings is as follows:

Meeting #1– Saranac Lake

• Date: Monday, September 8th
• Location: Mt. Pisgah Recreation Center — 92 Mt. Pisgah Lane, Saranac Lake, NY 12983
• Time: 5:30pm
• SIC Meeting will be held before the ESFPA Regional Meeting at 3:30pm
• Cost Per Person: $10

Meeting #2– Croghan

• Date: Tuesday, September 9th
• Location: Croghan Fire Hall — 6855 Fire Hall St, Croghan NY 13327
• Time: 5:30pm
• Cost Per Person: $10

Meeting #3– Virtual

• Date: Tuesday, September 16th
• ZOOM link will be sent to participants
• Time: 6:00pm
• Cost Per Person: free

Meeting #4– Cortland

• Date: Tuesday, September 30th
• Location: Gutchess Cortland—890 Mclean Rd, Cortland, NY 13045
• Time: 5:30pm
• Cost Per Person: $10

Meeting #5– Deposit

• Date: Wednesday, October 1st
• Location: Cannonsville Lumber— 199 Old Rte 10, Deposit, NY 13754
• Time: 5:30pm
• Cost Per Person: $10

Meeting #6– Lake George

• Date: Thursday, October 2nd 
• Location: Courtyard Marriott Lake George—365 Canada St, Lake George, NY 12845
• Time: 5:30pm
• Cost Per Person: $40

Registration for all meetings is required. To register, please call Dorian Johnson at (518) 463-1297 ext. 224.  NYLT continuing education credits will be awarded to participants.

If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to contact us at (518) 463-1297 or at gabriella@esfpa.org. We hope you can join us and are looking forward to seeing you this fall!

State Wildlife Action Plan

A wildlife action plan serves as a state's guiding document for managing and conserving species and habitats before they become too rare or costly to restore. Congress created the State Wildlife Grant funding program in 2002 to provide funding for the management of fish and wildlife diversity. To be eligible for funding, the states and territories must develop a State Wildlife Action Plan (SWAP). These plans must identify a Species of Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN) list, with the rest of the plan focused on identifying the habitats SGCN require, the threats that must be addressed to ensure the conservation of SGCN within the state, and recommended actions to address those threats. The New York Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy was completed in 2005 and revised into the New York State Wildlife Action Plan in 2015. These wildlife plans are updated every 10 years, and the 2025 draft update to New York’s SWAP is currently available for review. 

Given that 84% of New York land area is privately owned, and much of that forested, the role of private forest landowners on habitat and biodiversity is key. The review addresses managing deer to help forest regeneration, improving connectivity, and reducing habitat loss. Important to the ESFPA members, the plan encourages forest owners to manage for young growth for species dependent on that age class of forest. The Plan does note that "Agriculture and Forestry Effluents" were the most frequently cited threats to SGCNs, most of these were agriculture and not forestry. 

A key objective of the Plan is to "manage natural succession to maintain the diversity of vegetative systems and native forest types and age classes to support self-sustaining populations of the full array of native terrestrial wildlife."  Key actions for this objective involve active silviculture and include:

• Implement management to restore and maintain habitat for young forest dependent species on state lands.
• Encourage private forest owners to manage their forest lands for the benefit of SGCN dependent on young forests.
• Improve vertical structure of mature forest stands via silviculture to balance ground cover, understory, mid-story, and canopy.
• Support development of local markets for low-value forest products.
• Promote sustainable forestry on managed lands by working with consulting foresters to increase the acreage certified as managed for sustainable forestry.

The Plan also places strong emphasis on managing white-tailed deer populations to foster forest regeneration where regeneration is impacted by overabundant deer and on long-term strategies to control new occurrences of terrestrial invasive species.

The draft 2025 SWAP is now available for public review. All comments and input are due by September 20, 2025. ESFPA will be submitting comments and would welcome member input. You could also directly submit comments here. 

Whitney Park Conservation Easement Developments

In a recent article in the Adirondack Explorer, the potential buyer of the 36,000-acre Whitney Park has disclosed discussions with the Adirondack Land Trust and State of New York over a possible 32,000-acre conservation easement. 

An easement could help alleviate some concerns over the extant of development of Whitney Park, but it still has to pass appraisal standards of the State and is likely to generate some push back from environmental groups.  Protect the Adirondacks has already voiced its objections to anything less than fee simple acquisition and adding Whitney Park to the Forest Preserve.

Click the link below to read more:

EUDR Update

Last Thursday, the White House issued a Joint Statement announcing the US and EU have reached a Framework Agreement on Reciprocal, Fair, and Balanced Trade that “represents a concrete demonstration of our commitment to fair, balanced, and mutually beneficial trade and investment”.

The three-and-a-half-page document specifies that a 15 percent import tax will be imposed on roughly 70 percent of European products entering the U.S. market. The deal also includes a non-binding commitment for the EU to procure $750 billion in U.S.-produced energy and for EU companies to invest $600 billion in the U.S.

The European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) is specifically addressed in Section 10 of the Agreement – “Recognizing that production of the relevant commodities within the territory of the United States poses negligible risk to global deforestation, the European Union commits to work to address the concerns of U.S. producers and exporters regarding the EU Deforestation Regulation, with a view to avoiding undue impact on U.S.-EU trade.” 

USFS Invests in Working Forests

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins has announced the U.S. Forest Service is investing $106 million to support state and landowner efforts to conserve private working forestlands across the country. "Working forests are part of the backbone of rural America – providing jobs, timber, clean water, and places for families to hunt, fish, camp, hike, and make lifelong memories,” said Rollins.

Secretary Rollins was making reference to the 2025 Forest Legacy Program (FLP) which has funded forest acquisitions and working forests. Since its creation in 1990, FLP has conserved over 3 million acres of forest land and expanded across the country to 53 states and territories. These “working forests” protect water quality and provide wildlife habitat, forest products, opportunities for recreation and other public benefits.

This most recent round of funding will fund an acquisition in New York's Rensselaer Plateau. This fee acquisition of 640 acres will connect the Pittstown State Forest and Grafton Lakes State Park, which received over 311,000 visitors in 2024. The project expands public access for hunting, fishing, trapping, hiking and snowmobiling in a popular recreation area in NY's Capital Region, linking 9.5 miles of multiuse trails in the State Forest with 20 miles of trails in the State Park. It enables forest management that supports five sawmills and a firewood processor.

ESFPA sits on the New York FLP advisory Committee and this year we will also be considering funding for the Sabattis Scout Reservation in the Town of Colton, St. Lawrence County.  This project would add approximately 1,500 new acres to the Forest Preserve at a popular wilderness lake that offers multiple recreation opportunities (including camping, fishing, canoeing) by acquiring lands currently owned by Scouting America. 

New York's primary means of conservation under FLP has been conservation easements.  The State has, however, periodically used FLP for fee acquisitions, which is the case with the Sabattis Scout Reservation.