A Bush administration proposal to sell some national forest land is the latest twist in a century-long effort to preserve America's wild lands without hurting rural communities.

The proposal involves relatively few acres nationwide -- and may not mean much in Southwest Virginia -- but it still has generated outcry at a time when more Americans are looking to public lands not for timber but for recreation, clean water, fresh air and a sense of solitude beyond their crowded cities and suburbs.

In Virginia, 5,717 acres -- or three-tenths of 1 percent -- of the 1.8 million acres in the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests could be sold under the proposal.

Most of that land is in far Southwest Virginia, a collection of remote, steep tracts that have little natural, historical, cultural or timber harvesting value, the U.S. Forest Service says. The agency regularly earmarks land more suitable for trade or sale than public management, land that often is isolated and in areas where the Forest Service is unlikely to buy more.

The isolated parcels' boundaries are cumbersome to keep marked, taking away resources that could be better spent on more ecologically and economically valuable parts of the forest, said Wayne Johnson, an engineering and lands staff officer with the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests.

Some land that could be sold is in Roanoke, Botetourt and Montgomery counties, three fast-growing areas where buildable land is at a premium, but the sites may be better suited for billy goats, bushwhacking or solitary log cabins than a high-priced subdivision.

The Bush administration says its proposal to sell 309,000 acres of public lands nationwide will generate more than $1 billion over five years for rural communities hurt by logging cutbacks and will encourage them to diversify their economies.

But conservationists and some lawmakers say the short-term gains would be offset by the permanent loss of public lands, which supply drinking water, clean air, wildlife and plant habitat, recreation and other benefits.

Rather than privatizing public land for short-term cash, the government should be buying more acreage and prohibiting logging, drilling and other commercial uses of the national forests, especially in the South where the population and demand for outdoor recreation are growing, conservationists say.

"Selling off America's natural heritage is not the way to fund government services," said David Carr, public lands director for the Southern Environmental Law Center. "This move would set a dangerous precedent for years to come."

Under the Bush proposal, 390 acres west of Eagle Rock would be sold out of Botetourt County's 81,000 national forest acres. In Craig County, 28 acres near the Camp Easter Seal would be sold out of the county's 116,000 national forest acres.

In Roanoke County, 121 acres along Virginia 311 near the Dragon's Tooth trail parking lot would be sold out of the county's 3,140 national forest acres. In Montgomery County, 390 acres -- 202 on Brush Mountain near the Craig County line and 188 near Norris Run -- would be sold out of the county's 19,454 acres of national forest.

The Bush proposal would be the largest sale of forest land in decades. The administration expects to sell only about 200,000 of the 309,000 acres to meet the $800 million they say is needed over five years to fund schools and roads in rural counties hurt by logging cutbacks on federal land. The earmarked parcels make up less than half of 1 percent of the national forest system.

The proposal is meant to give rural communities more time to diversify their economies, such as attracting outdoor recreationists who will spend dollars in local shops, restaurants and hotels after visiting the national forest.

The land-sale proposal, which is far from final, will be published in the Federal Register later this month, when all the parcels will be posted on the Forest Service's Web site. The public has until late March to comment before the measure is considered by Congress, which has rejected similar proposals in recent years to sell public lands.

Impact on localities

The land-sale proposal would affect counties differently depending on how much national forest is within their boundaries and how much would be sold, said JoBeth Brown, spokeswoman for the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests.

In Craig County, where the national forest makes up 53 percent of the county, Richard Flora, county administrator, said putting public land in private hands would mean more tax revenue for the county, but other changes in the federal forest policy might reduce the overall amount to the county. Craig County got $186,334 from the national forest in 2005. The county government payroll, excluding schools, was $247,472.

Diane Hyatt, Roanoke County's chief financial officer, said the policy change would not have a big effect there. In 2005, Roanoke County, with a budget of $147 million, got $11,096 from the national forest.

U.S. Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Roanoke, is co-sponsoring the reauthorization of the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act, which would be partially funded by the land sale. The policy, scheduled to expire this fall, gives localities a steadier stream of federal forestland funding. In a statement, Goodlatte said Congress should "thoroughly examine the impact of this potential sale."

U.S. Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Abingdon, said the land-sale proposal would lead to further sales of public lands. He is co-sponsoring a bill to continue the rural funding program without selling land. The program draws its money from the federal government's general fund.

In the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests, the parcels that would be sold are part of the Forest Service's land exchange program, in which isolated tracts are swapped for privately owned land known as in-holdings within the national forest.

Public interest

Many Western national forests have smooth, contiguous borders, but Eastern national forests resemble jigsaw puzzles because they were created through the buying of one piece of private land at a time long after America was settled.

The Forest Service in Roanoke has received dozens of calls about the land-sale proposal -- a few complaints and compliments, but most from potential buyers wanting to know where the parcels are located.

One prospective buyer, Jane Henderson of Craig County, said she is looking for more backwoods trails to ride her horses, not a place to build a subdivision or cut down trees.

Rupert Cutler, a Roanoke city councilman and a Virginia Outdoors Foundation trustee, said the Forest Service should be creating more large, unbroken tracts to protect wildlife, streams, viewscapes and recreation, not selling off its outlying pieces.

Michael Mortimer, an assistant forestry professor at Virginia Tech and the Virginia chairman-elect of the Society of American Foresters, said the proposal is prudent if the national forest is safeguarding its most sensitive lands.

"There's no need to shudder in horror," he said. "This notion that all public land should remain public is ideological and ignores other demands, as well as the fact that not every acre is desirable from a public management perspective."