The controversial logging of Erie County's forests will end soon if the County Legislature follows the direction of its Energy and Environment Committee.

After a hearing Wednesday, the committee informed the contractor doing the work it will ask the Legislature to end his contract in two weeks.

Environmentalists, who took turns criticizing both the process that led to timber harvesting on county land and the logging itself, said the move will protect the county's interest.

"I'm very pleased," said Larry Beahan, forestry chairman of the Niagara Group of the Sierra Club. "I think the people of Erie County will be very well served."

The committee's chairman, Thomas A. Loughran, D-Amherst, said his committee heard enough about problems with the logging in the towns of Holland and Sardinia to decide it had to stop.

"We have concerns about the accountability of the logging . . . that they're being properly monitored," he said.

Those concerns mirror some of the concerns Erie County Comptroller Mark C. Poloncarz raised in a report on the operations he released in August.

Poloncarz questioned why the request for bids on the operations wasn't more widely circulated and said it didn't appear that timber sales would generate nearly the amount of money the county budgeted to receive from them.

Under the terms of the contract with Hillview Logging, the county could terminate the pact by giving two weeks notice.

Hillview Logging owner Jim Ellis, who defended his operations during the hearing, said he could be out of the forest in that time.

Environmentalists and committee members grilled county forester Brian Grassia and his boss, county Parks Commissioner Angelo J. Sedita, about the operation.

They said the first phase of the logging should have been subjected to review under the state Environmental Quality Review Act.

A full environmental review was circumvented by a declaration that there would be no significant adverse impact from the logging operations.

Committee members said any additional logging would be subject to a full environmental review, and both Sedita and Grassia agreed to do so.

So far, the sale of county timber has generated about $213,000, well short of the $490,000 the county anticipated it would get from the sales.

But a number of environmentalists argued the trees are worth more standing.

"We believe the economic, health and ecological benefits of the standing Erie County forest far outvalues whatever quick turn in profit can be made from cutting it down," said Margaret Woost, of Buffalo Niagara Riverkeeper.