16 U.S.C. § 535
Section 535 · Forest development roads; acquisition, construction, and maintenance; maximum economy; methods of financing; cost arrangements for construction standards; transfer of unused effective purchaser credit for road construction
Amended 2 times on record
Applied in 13 court decisions — leading case Otteson v. United States (1980)
Most recently applied in 343 F. Supp. 2d 687 - Shawnee Trail Conservancy v. Nicholas (June 2004)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
The Secretary is authorized to provide for the acquisition, construction, and maintenance of forest development roads within and near the national forests and other lands administered by the Forest Service in locations and according to specifications which will permit maximum economy in harvesting timber from such lands tributary to such roads and at the same time meet the requirements for protection, development, and management thereof, and for utilization of the other resources thereof. Financing of such roads may be accomplished (1) by the Secretary utilizing appropriated funds, (2) by requirements on purchasers of national forest timber and other products, including provisions for amortization of road costs in contracts, (3) by cooperative financing with other public agencies and with private agencies or persons, or (4) by a combination of these methods: Provided, That where roads of a higher standard than that needed in the harvesting and removal of the timber and other products covered by the particular sale are to be constructed, the purchaser of the national forest timber and other products shall not be required to bear that part of the costs necessary to meet such higher standard, and the Secretary is authorized to make such arrangements to this end as may be appropriate. The Secretary is authorized, under such rules and regulations as he shall prescribe, to permit the transfer of unused effective purchaser credit for road construction earned after December 16, 1975, from one timber sale to a purchaser to another timber sale to the same purchaser within the same National Forest.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Amendments
1975—Pub. L. 94–154 authorized the Secretary to permit the transfer of unused effective purchaser credit for road construction earned after Dec. 16, 1975, from one timber sale to a purchaser to another timber sale to the same purchaser within the same National Forest.
Transfer of Functions
For transfer of certain enforcement functions of Secretary or other official in Department of Agriculture under sections 532 to 538 of this title to Federal Inspector, Office of Federal Inspector for Alaska Natural Gas Transportation System, and subsequent transfer to Secretary of Energy, see Transfer of Functions note set out under section 533 of this title.
Financing of Forest Development Roads
Financing of forest development roads authorized by cl. (2) of this section deemed “budget authority” and “budget outlays” as defined in section 621(a) of Title 2, The Congress, and effective for purpose specified in section 651(a) of Title 2, see section 1608 of this title.