CLINTON PROPOSES FOREST MEASURE; PROTECTION SOUGHT FOR ROADLESS AREAS.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer

More than 400,000 acres crossed now only by animal tracks and hiking trails in the Los Padres National Forest would be protected from new roads under a proposal by President Clinton.

How much effect the new Clinton policy - which also would ban logging and mining in those areas - will have on the local forest is uncertain: There is only occasional logging of downed or diseased trees and no plans to build roads, officials said.

``There definitely is a difference between the forests we have here and the forests we have in the Pacific Northwest,'' where commercial logging is common and controversial, said Edie Gilliss, California Field Organizer with the Heritage Forest Campaign.

Clinton's proposal is to protect roadless areas 5,000 acres or larger in national forests across the United States from logging, mining, road building and similar activities.

Environmental groups applauded Clinton's move.

``This is truly an historic moment in conservation and American history,'' said Gilliss. Her group pushed the Clinton Administration for more protection for roadless areas as small as 1,000 acres.

The proposed new regulations would not hinder people from using the forest, just limit commercial operations, she said.

``Stopping road building isn't going to change the access that people have,'' Gilliss said. ``This isn't going to restrict access to anybody.''

Forest officials said last week they haven't yet seen the proposed regulations. They expect to take comments from the public on the proposed regulations next spring, and to have them adopted in final form in the fall.

``Until we see the maps and know precisely what lands we're talking about and have a chance to learn more about the proposal, it's difficult to project what the impacts will be,'' said Los Padres spokeswoman Kathy Good.

In the Los Padres, the new regulations could apply to 400,000 to 600,000 acres, according to various calculations, forest officials say. The 1.75 million-acre Los Padres itself stretches 250 miles, from Lake Piru in eastern Ventura County to north of Big Sur.

Already about 40 percent of the Los Padres is designated wilderness, in 10 areas - the largest the Sespe Wilderness around the California condor habitat north of Piru and Fillmore.

Of the other roadless areas to be protected under Clinton's plan, the largest is the 94,637-acre area adjoining the Sespe Wilderness, in the Sespe Peak-Frazier Park area, documents show.

Los Padres officials say they haven't built a road for probably 20 years and have no plans for new ones.

``We aren't in the road-building business in the Los Padres,'' Good said.

There is no large-scale commercial logging, though felling of diseased or dead trees is sometimes permitted, and there are oil and gas fields in the Sespe area, as well as mines and quarries elsewhere in the forest.