[quote=dcrzfitter]Cast this,

Are you telling us that timber companies pay the same taxes per acre as I do? for some reason I don't buy it!!!!

I have no problem with them selling their land. I don't think they should be able to keep the public from useing it for hunting and fishing or camping.

No, I am not telling you that, I am quoting what Rep. Blake stated. I think riverswild probably nailed it. Corporations, or individual land owners for that matter, can and do get significant reductions in taxes based on it's USE. Timberland and agricultural lands both get rates much lower than the residential.
I bought a 5 acre parcel about 13 years ago, part of small dairy farm which was parceled and sold. As long as it was land, I got taxed at the agricultural rate. When I built a house on it, the whole thing jumped to the residential rate. Just an example of how a change in use effects the tax rate.
If timber companies don't replant after a harvest, it will cause the rate to go up. If agricultural land does not yield some form of market product (milk from dairies, corn, hay, whatever), the rate changes.
Bottom line, it's their land, to open or close as they see fit. I would just like to think there is a more equitable way to do it than the manner they have chosen, so as not to have (more) overcrowding of public lands which will, in turn, lead to shorter seasons due to overharvest, etc., etc.