February 20, 2012

Buchele Returns to Illinois to Protect Shawnee National Forest

PEAC attorney Tom Buchele helped his clients win a landmark injunction preventing logging and drilling in the Shawnee National Forest in Illinois in 1996. Last week he returned to argue for keeping the injunction in place until the US Forest Service provides an adequate management plan.

PEAC attorney Tom Buchele helped his clients win a landmark injunction preventing logging and drilling in the Shawnee National Forest in Illinois in 1996. Last week, exactly 16 years later to the day, he returned to argue for keeping the injunction in place until the US Forest Service provides an adequate environmental impact statement. Representing the Regional Association of Concerned Environmentalists and the Audubon Council of Illinois, Buchele argued that the Forest Service has not yet fully complied with the original court order.

Buchele reports that he spent the next day hiking in areas of forest that have not been logged because of the injunction, including critical migratory bird habitat. PEAC student Ryan Talbott assisted with the case. The judge’s decision is expected in two to three months.

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