NEPA Process and Specific Requirements - Environmental Impact Analysis: Process and Methods - page 67

r Which alternative was selected and why
r Which is the environmentally preferred alternative, why, and if not
selected why not
r A listing of adverse impacts and all mitigation measures to address
each adverse impact
r A statement of which mitigation measures were adopted and why
the others were not adopted
Brevity and definitive statements are the key to a useful ROD. To achieve
brevity, the explanation of alternatives, selection process, and mitigation
should be accomplished in the final EIS and the ROD should reference the
document. However, the ROD must be definitive. Both the draft and final EIS
state impacts and actions as future possibilities such as, “the new U.S. Navy
base could increase the school age population by up to 1,000 students which
could exceed the existing municipal education capacity.” These are stated as
could because it would happen only if the particular alternative under con-
sideration was implemented by the Navy. In contrast, ROD uses would and
shall language because the agency has made the decision to go forward and
fully expects the predicted impacts to reach fruition.
If monitoring or other commitments are included in the selected action,
they must be included in the ROD, and this commitment is illustrated by the
U.S. Air Force's development of the over-the-horizon radar system. This sys-
tem consisted of eight proposed radar complexes that provided coverage and
detection of potential security threats from aircraft, ships, and missiles up to
5500 km offshore of the continental United States. These facilities were stra-
tegically located around the continent in Maine, North Dakota, Minnesota,
California, Oregon, and Alaska to provide full surveillance coverage of the
U.S. borders. They were also very large (up to 1000 hectares each) in order to
achieve the transmission and receiving capacity for the extensive areal cov-
erage of the radars. As one might expect, construction on such a large scale
had the potential for significant impact on the natural and built environmen-
tal resources and EISs were prepared for each system.
The final EIS and ROD for the radar system in northern California's Modoc
National Forest identified the general location for the facilities and acknowl-
edged potential impact on Native American cultural resources and migra-
tory large mammals (prong horn antelope and mule deer). In response to
comments from the California Department of Fish and Game and the U.S.
Forest Service, the U.S. Air Force committed in the ROD to monitor and miti-
gate cultural and large mammal impacts during design and finalization of
the specific layout of each radar. They fulfilled this commitment by working
closely with the two commenting agencies to design and implement an exten-
sive monitoring system prior to final design (see Chapter 5 on existing condi-
tions for a detailed description of monitoring). The monitoring was a very
large effort that exceeded in scope and duration all of the other biological and