Illustration: American Forest Management real estate

KEWEENAW COUNTY — Amidst public outcry, based on rampant rumors in reference to logging in several areas of Keweenaw County, Eric Stier, regional manager of American Forest Management (AFM) said there are a couple of topics that need to be cleared up for public understanding.

“First off, AFM does not own this land,” he said, “and that’s what seems to be out there. We’re a real estate agent in this transaction — that’s it.”

TRG, he said still owns the land. TRG Management LP , also known as The Rohatyn Group, has owned forest property throughout Keweenaw County for the past 15 years, and the group has been seeking to sell it.

Stier said he does not know how the rumor that AFM owns the land started, but said it is perhaps because AFM Real Estate is the local presence and therefore is easy to yell at.

Another rumor Stier wants to quell is that the forest properties are going to be clear cut before selling the property.

Stier said there are several silvicultural reasons for the type of logging currently happening in Keweenaw County. While the properties are all incredibly beautiful and pristine, he said, from a timber harvest standpoint, they are not high quality.

“In some of the places there’s been cutting,” said Stier, “there is no veneer coming out. As far as the forest up there, it’s really not very good quality.”

Stier mentioned the practice of silviculture. Silviculture is the art and science of controlling the establishment, growth, composition, health, and quality of forests and woodlands to meet the diverse needs and values of landowners and society such as wildlife habitat, timber, water resources, restoration, and recreation on a sustainable basis. This is accomplished by applying different types of silvicultural treatments such as thinning, harvesting, planting, pruning, among other strategies.

A silvicultural prescription is a document which has a planned series of treatments designed to change current stand structure and composition of a stand to one that meets management goals, states the U.S. Forest Service. The prescription normally considers ecological, economic, and societal objectives and constraints. In the Forest Service, silvicultural prescriptions are prepared or reviewed by a certified silviculturist prior to implementing the project or treatment.Treatments (including thinning) are designed to enhance growth, quality, vigor, and composition of the stand after establishment or regeneration and prior to final harvest. Regeneration treatments (harvesting) are applied to mature stands in order to establish a new age class of trees.

“People like the word ‘clear-cut,’, but that’s not what’s happening here,” he said.

Stier, who has been spearheading attempts to get the Michigan Department of Natural Resources to swap some of the TRG Keweenaw County lands for state-owned land in Houghton County, gave a presentation to the Keweenaw County Board of Commissioners at its August, 2018 monthly meeting.

Houghton County’s Hancock City Council approved a resolution at its Dec. 2018 regular meeting supporting the TGR-DNR land swap. City of Hancock Resolution No. 18-23 states in part that the land swap would stabilize the existing recreational trail system by keeping it on state-owned land and the proposed land swap has the support of the Keweenaw ATV Club, the Keweenaw Convention and Visitors Bureau and other local government and economic development groups.

“I would love nothing more than the state to still buy this,” said Stier, who like many, have a stake in Keweenaw County; he is currently having a home built in one of the areas scheduled for timber harvest.

Stier said that at no time, or on no level, has he possessed the authority to place the land in question on the market, because AFM does not own it; TRG owns it, and that group made the decision to sell their Keweenaw County holdings long before now.

“Right now, the real estate market is strong, and they’re telling me ‘don’t miss out on an opportunity,” he said, but at the same time, TRG does understand the situations of Keweenaw County, and is still attempting to support it.

For example, TRG properties within the county are separated into four large blocks: “The Point,” comprising approximately 10,080 acres: Harbor View, with approximately 5,749 acres; Keweenaw Alpine, plus or minus 9,769 acres; and Little Betsy Shoreline, with 7,063 acres. TRG or AFM will not parcel those blocks into smaller units for private purchase.

Stier said his phone has been ringing off the hook with people asking if they can purchase smaller parcels before the blocks were even put on the market.

“That’s the kind kind of interest that’s out there,” he said, “and we’re not going to do that. We’re not doing it.”

At the same time, Stier said, the land may not sell; there is no way to predict something like that.

“If that’s the case, we’ll go back to normal, whatever normal means,” he said, “but then, we’ll start talking to people about selling 40s, 80s, — there’s people out there saying, ‘I want to buy a section (160 acres) out there, and I don’t care what the price is.’ And again — that’s exactly what I don’t want to happen.”

In an interview with Keweenaw County Board of Commissioners Chairman Don Piche earlier this week, he said one of the board’s biggest fears is conservancies purchasing properties, something the board, and many county residents have opposed for years.

Stier said he understands the board’s position, because conservancies, being non-profit, can remove large parcels of lands from the tax rolls, while at the same time restricting or forbidding public use of those lands.

Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part series addressing the controversies and misinformation concerning the commercial forest land and timber harvest in Keweenaw County.