The U.S. Forest Service issued a final rule on October 9, 2026, amending its Project-Level Predecisional Administrative Review Process regulations. The rule sets the minimum public comment period at 15 days for environmental assessments and 30 days for environmental impact statements.

Objections are limited to 15 pages for decisions involving an environmental assessment and 30 pages for decisions involving an environmental impact statement. The final rule consolidates objection review authority and modernizes notification practices to rely on web-based postings rather than newspapers. It is effective 30 days after its publication in the Federal Register.

The existing comment and objection processes previously added at least 120 to 150 days for review of an environmental assessment and 135 to 165 days for review of an environmental impact statement. The Forest Service received approximately 2,270 comments during the public comment period for the rule, with approximately half being unique. One hundred twenty-nine organizations, eight Tribal governments and sixteen State governments provided comments.

What's New

The Forest Service's objection process has been in place since 2013. Since then, Congress has made statutory changes to the process, and new NEPA procedures have created inconsistencies with the objection process regulations. The 2012 Consolidated Appropriations Act (Pub. L. 112-74) expanded the scope of predecisional administrative review to include projects under the National Forest Management Act, not just those under the Healthy Forests Restoration Act. In 2014, Congress formally repealed the Appeals Reform Act through the Farm Bill (Pub. L. 113-79), replacing it with the Healthy Forests Restoration Act’s predecisional administrative review process for certain projects. Primary sources: federalregister.gov, fs.usda.gov