The arrests of a dozen activists this week have prompted a debate within the environmental community about tactics employed in an attempt to stop logging on the roadless area in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest.

Activist Laurel Sutherlin was arrested Tuesday morning after authorities found him standing on a platform swinging from the end of a log used to block the Eight Dollar Road bridge that provided access to the Mike's Gulch logging unit in the Illinois Valley Ranger District. The log had been illegally cut from a nearby botanical area.

Eleven protesters were arrested in front of the forest headquarters in Medford for blocking a street on Monday, the day logging started.

The Sierra Club doesn't condone illegal activities, stressed Tom Dimitre, chairman of the Rogue Group Sierra Club.

"But as far as general protests, you've got the Bush administration ramming these things (roadless logging) down people's throats," he said, noting that polls have shown overwhelming public support for preserving roadless areas. "It leaves folks with few options to keep their sanity. I think protesting is essential."

Williams resident Spencer Lennard, a former protest action organizer who attended Monday's demonstration in Medford, said protests are needed to get the media's attention. He said the media's focus on the fact the log was cut from a botanical area was petty.

"The fact they are cutting hundreds of acres of roadless forest is vastly more important," he said. "But the opposition loves to obfuscate. The folks doing the work on the ground didn't think how this was going to be taken by the spin doctors."

The sale, burned by the 2002 Biscuit fire, is the first roadless area logging project in the nation since the popular 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule was established by the Clinton administration. However, the Bush administration last year eased restrictions of those rules, allowing logging in roadless areas under some conditions.

"There is a fine line between being effective and being obnoxious," observed Matt Fisher, wildlands advocate for the Oregon Natural Resources Council based in Portland. "But with the roadless area, which so many people care about, it's understandable people are pretty mad about it.

"It's too bad when antics get in the way of the message," he added.

Ashland resident Andy Kerr, a senior counselor to the ONRC and one of the protesters against roadless-area logging in the Bald Mountain area in 1984, said protests are necessary.

"This tactic does get the media's attention," he said. "Does it turn more people on to the message than it turns off? There isn't any rule of thumb to judge that.

"During the Bald Mountain protest, as the ancient forest issue was developing, people sitting in trees caught the attention of assignment editors in New York," he said. "When they (reporters) came out here, they realized there was more to the story than just tree-sitters."

He observed that civil disobedience is an honored tradition in the nation's history.

"There is also a disconnect going on now that has frustrated people," he said. "Looking at the polls, a vast majority of Oregonians don't want the logging of old growth or in roadless areas. Yet that has not transferred into public policy. The venues of having your day in court didn't work."

It's currently not illegal to log old-growth timber in the roadless area, he said, although noting there are still four court cases pending that have yet to decide the issue.

During the Bald Mountain protests, the protesters were definitely not representing the majority of Oregonians on the issue, Kerr said.

"It's important to recognize here that much has changed in the last quarter of a century," he said. "It's the same issue of trees and the same roadless area, but the public attitude has changed. In the first case, the protesters were ahead of their time. In this case, the Forest Service and the forest industry are behind the times."

The southwestern Oregon protests and arrests have caught the attention of folks in Washington, D.C., said Jennifer Stephens, regional communications director for the Wilderness Society office in the District of Columbia.

"As an advocacy organization, we don't condone or support illegal activities," she stressed. "But this shows how passionate people are in regards to protecting roadless areas.

"People are talking about it here," she added.

No one should be surprised by the protests, Sutherlin said.

"We were driven to it — people have been pushed to be arrested for what they believe," said Sutherlin, an Applegate Valley resident. All other efforts to stop the logging had failed, he said.

"This is now a national issue," Sutherlin said. "But it would not have gone beyond the Rogue Valley if 100 people hadn't been arrested for protesting the Biscuit fire salvage (in the last two years). It wouldn't have gotten the attention of the national media."

But he took exception to media coverage, including by the Mail Tribune, that focused on the fact the 40-foot-long Douglas fir tree had allegedly been cut by protesters to block the bridge.

"All I can say about that is this roadless area logging is an issue of national significance — the log is a non-issue," he said.

No protests were reported Wednesday at the site. Forest officials, citing safety reasons, have closed the Eight Dollar Road to the public. The nearly 9 million-board-foot sale will be logged by helicopter and no roads built, according to the U.S. Forest Service.

Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at pfattig@mailtribune.com.