[Senate Hearing 109-506]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 109-506
IMPLEMENTATION OF THE HEALTHY FORESTS RESTORATION ACT
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON
PUBLIC LANDS AND FORESTS
of the
COMMITTEE ON
ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
on
THE IMPLEMENTATION OF PUBLIC LAW 108-148 (THE HEALTHY FORESTS
RESTORATION ACT)
__________
JULY 19, 2006
Printed for the use of the
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
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COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico, Chairman
LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho JEFF BINGAMAN, New Mexico
CRAIG THOMAS, Wyoming DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii
LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota
LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska RON WYDEN, Oregon
RICHARD BURR, North Carolina TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota
MEL MARTINEZ, Florida MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana
JAMES M. TALENT, Missouri DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California
CONRAD BURNS, Montana MARIA CANTWELL, Washington
GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia KEN SALAZAR, Colorado
GORDON SMITH, Oregon ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey
JIM BUNNING, Kentucky
Bruce M. Evans, Staff Director
Judith K. Pensabene, Chief Counsel
Robert M. Simon, Democratic Staff Director
Sam E. Fowler, Democratic Chief Counsel
------
Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests
LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho, Chairman
CONRAD BURNS, Montana, Vice Chairman
CRAIG THOMAS, Wyoming RON WYDEN, Oregon
JAMES M. TALENT, Missouri DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii
GORDON SMITH, Oregon BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota
LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota
LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana
GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California
MARIA CANTWELL, Washington
Pete V. Domenici and Jeff Bingaman are Ex Officio Members of the
Subcommittee
Frank Gladics, Professional Staff Member
Scott Miller, Democratic Counsel
C O N T E N T S
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STATEMENTS
Page
Bingaman, Hon. Jeff, U.S. Senator from New Mexico................ 2
Bosworth, Dale, Chief, U.S. Forest Service, accompanied by Gail
Kimbell, Regional Forester, Missoula, MT....................... 18
Burns, Hon. Conrad, U.S. Senator from Montana.................... 3
Craig, Hon. Larry E., U.S. Senator from Idaho.................... 1
DeIaco, Rick, Director of Forestry, Village of Ruidoso, Lincoln
County, NM..................................................... 40
Domenici, Hon. Pete V., U.S. Senator from New Mexico............. 11
Feinstein, Hon. Dianne, U.S. Senator from California............. 6
Hatfield, Nina Rose, Deputy Assistant Secretary, Policy,
Management and Budget, Department of the Interior.............. 12
Jensen, Jay, Executive Director, Council of Western State
Foresters, Lakewood, CO........................................ 71
Johnson, Hon. Tim, U.S. Senator from South Dakota................ 4
Koehler, Matthew, Executive Director, WildWest Institute,
Missoula, MT................................................... 47
MacLeod, Colleen, Commissioner, Union County, OR, on behalf of
the National Association of Counties........................... 66
Murkowski, Hon. Lisa, U.S. Senator from Alaska................... 8
Salazar, Hon. Ken, U.S. Senator from Colorado.................... 9
Smith, Hon. Gordon, U.S. Senator from Oregon..................... 5
Wyden, Hon. Ron, U.S. Senator from Oregon........................ 3
APPENDIXES
Appendix I
Responses to additional questions................................ 81
Appendix II
Additional material submitted for the record..................... 89
IMPLEMENTATION OF THE HEALTHY FORESTS RESTORATION ACT
----------
WEDNESDAY, JULY 19, 2006
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests,
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:04 a.m.,
Dirksen Senate Office Building, Senator Larry E. Craig
presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. LARRY E. CRAIG, U.S. SENATOR FROM
IDAHO
Senator Craig. Good morning everyone. The Subcommittee on
Public Lands and Forests will convene. Let me thank you all for
being here this morning. I am reading from the National
Incident Information Center's report as of yesterday morning.
Year to date total, four million two hundred eighty-one
thousand eight hundred and twenty-five acres burned. That's
nearly double the 2000 fire season and the 10-year average. I
think it's important that that be noted as we begin a
discussion this morning and take testimony on the
implementation of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act of 2003. I
guess my point is that the situation that we have on our
forested public lands of the Nation has not improved, in fact
it may appear to have worsened if you look at those numbers.
And I certainly want to welcome you Chief Dale Bosworth, thank
you for being here. Nina Rose Hatfield, from the Department of
the Interior, thank you. In addition, I would like to welcome
our four public witnesses for testimony today, Rick DeIaco who
is the village forester for the village of Ruidoso, New Mexico.
The Honorable Colleen MacLeod, commissioner, from Union County,
Oregon. Matt Koehler, executive director of WildWest Institute,
Missoula, Montana and the executive director for the Council of
Western State Foresters, Jay Jensen.
Before I begin I want to take a moment to remember two
brave young men from Idaho who died 3 years ago this Saturday,
fighting the Cramer Fire. Jeff Allan of Salmon, Idaho, and
Shane Heath of Melba, Idaho lost there lives trying to save our
public lands from a catastrophic wildfire in the Salmon-Challis
National Forest. Both men were experienced fire fighters and
part of the Indianola Helitack Crew. This tragic loss of these
two men continues to be felt throughout there communities and
there selfless acts of true bravery will not be forgotten. I
commend the men and women who risk there lives every day and
that is what's going on out in California as we speak, to this
terribly dangerous job. But I also commend them for their
courage and their professionalism.
Thousands of young men and women are at the fronts of the
wildfires that are sweeping across the West as we speak. As we
enter mid fire season with the devastating heat that we are
currently experiencing, the West that I live in and that many
live in will increasingly worsen as the fire conditions
tragically improve. It is also about 3 years ago Congress
passed the Healthy Forest Restoration Act. We authorized the
treatment of twenty million acres in hopes of reducing fuels in
overstock stands that are too dangerous to be reintroduced to
prescribe fire. We also authorized the bill to address
hazardous fuels in the Wildland Urban Interface zones to
increase the safety of the people who live in the Wildland
Urban Interface and for fire fighters that are forced to defend
these critical areas. I have to tell you, initial
implementation progress is a disappointment to me. But I
recognize that the agency's accomplished 30 percent more thus
far this year than they did in fiscal year 2005 and I applaud
the effort. Even if the two agencies can manage to maintain a
30 percent increase above what was accomplished in previous
years it will be 2028 before we complete the 20 million acres
hoped for in the Healthy Forest Restoration Act. I'm not
convinced that our forest and firefighters can hold out that
long and may I say, nor can the Federal budget afford what we
are currently involved in. I hope that you will help us
understand what additional accountability performance measures
will help maintain and increase the progress we've accomplished
from 2005 to 2006. And I'm interested in learning how we can
move to get more fuel removed through mechanical treatments. If
that means you need additional congressional help or changes to
the existing authorities now is the time to let us know what
you think you need.
We will make both your written and oral testimonies as part
of our record of this hearing and we will keep the record open
for 10 days so that additional information can be submitted for
the record. And I want to thank all of you for coming out this
morning.
Someone I've worked closely with on these issues is my
colleague and ranking member, Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon. Ron
and I now struggle as part of an authorizing effort to find the
money to increasingly build the budgets of the Forest Service
and the Interior as it relates to fire fighting, and that money
is hard to come by, because as I mentioned today it's more than
four million acres burned thus far this year. And it's nearly
doubled the 10 year average. With that let me turn to my
colleague Senator Wyden, Ron.
[The prepared statements of Senators Bingaman and Burns
follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Jeff Bingaman, U.S. Senator From New Mexico
Thank you for holding this hearing, Mr. Chairman, I would like to
briefly say a few things.
First, I'd like to offer a special welcome to Rick DeIaco, who will
be testifying on the second panel today. Rick is the Village Forester
for Ruidoso, New Mexico, which is one of the most at-risk communities
in the nation. He is highly respected in the State and has a real on-
the-ground view of how things are working, so I look forward to his
testimony.
According to the material provided by the agencies for this
hearing, there really has been very little accomplished on the ground
under HFRA to date. Deputy Under Secretary Dave Tenny was quoted in the
papers just a few months ago as saying that HFRA had not ``come on-
line'' yet. There are probably a number of reasons for this--some
legitimate, some maybe not. But the simple fact is that the agency has
broad authorities to accomplish this work, and they continue to rely on
other authorities for the vast majority of it.
My main concern is not whether HFRA is the tool of choice to
implement projects, but whether the right work is getting done in the
right places. Instead of using that as the yardstick, the driving force
behind the fuels reduction program are the directives from the
Washington Office to continually increase the raw number of acres
treated. That in turn pushes managers to treat the easiest and cheapest
acres to meet their targets, instead of focusing on the highest
priority acres. We have heard about this problem from communities
around the country that are frustrated by the lack of focus on high-
priority acres and we have heard from independent panels that say it is
leading to the unnecessarily high costs of fire suppression. And we
will hear more about it at today's hearing.
Of course, one of the underlying reasons for this misplacement of
priorities is that there continues to be a lack of adequate funding to
get the work done--whether under HFRA or any other authority. This is,
without question, the primary impediment to getting this work done on
the ground. We have over a million acres of NEPA-ready fuels-reduction
projects in New Mexico, Arizona, and Colorado alone, most of which sit
idle because of a lack of resources.
HFRA came with the promise of significant additional resources for
this work--a promise that I don't think has been kept.
______
Prepared Statement of Hon. Conrad Burns, U.S. Senator From Montana
Mr. Chairman, thank you or holding today's hearing on the
implementation of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act.
Mr. Chairman your opening remarks were very complete, and I agree
with the points you raised. I do want to point out how timely this
hearing is. In Eastern Montana as of last night, July 18th we currently
have 12 active large wildfires, we have sketchy reports of a new fire
threatening structures near Drummond, MT that developed late yesterday.
At this time over 300 structures are threatened by these fires, and
sadly 7 structures including two homes have been lost to these fires.
With more timely fuels reduction work may be these tragic loses could
have been avoided.
To be effective we need good legislation providing direction and
effective tools to the land management agencies for fuels reduction. We
need an infra-structure/industry in place in the States to accomplish
the work on ground. We need strong communities engaged on the
management of the public lands that surround them. We need to support
these communities to help build and maintain an effective network of
first responders and fire fighters. Today we are talking specifically
about the legislation that provides the direction and tools to the land
management agencies. But we can not lose sight of how important the
other components are to be effective.
When all of these factors come together our rural communities will
be safer from the dangers of wildland fires. The work to make the
communities safe can be an economic benefit to the communities. We will
have indirectly helped lowered the upward spiraling cost of fire
suppression. The public land we are entrusted to manage will be less
susceptible to damaging wildfires.
I look forward to hearing from all the witnesses about how the
legislative direction and tools we have provided are being used.
STATEMENT OF HON. RON WYDEN, U.S. SENATOR
FROM OREGON
Senator Wyden. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I commend you for
an excellent statement and as always working with me in a
cooperative kind of fashion. I think we all remember that when
this legislation--Healthy Forest Legislation--came over from
the House it couldn't move here, it didn't have the votes to
move ahead but a number of colleagues I see Senator Feinstein
here, Senator Smith, you, a number of us went to work and we
produced 80 votes for that legislation, a historic--a historic
coalition that no one could have envisioned. You have said that
the implementation of the law concerns you that you're not
happy with the progress. I will say that this is light years,
the implementation this law is light years away from the U.S.
Senate view of what was to be done under the legislation. It
was envisioned for example that we where going to see work on
20 million acres in terms of hazardous reduction.
Since the passage of the legislation using the definitions
under the law only 77,368 acres have been treated. So that
means that only 1 percent of the 20 million acre goal has been
attained and by my calculations if you go to a back of the
envelope kind of calculation it's going to take the
administration more than 200 years to carry out the law. The
members of this committee wouldn't see this act carried out in
our lifetime. We'd be talking about centuries to get this law
carried out. I just consider that unacceptable. When you've got
big chunks of the West on fire we cannot afford foot dragging
on these key fuels reduction projects. So I'm very hopeful that
we can get it back on track.
Mr. Bosworth I will note that you and Mr. Rey said to me in
March 2004, March 2 specifically that this was going to get
done in 8 to 10 years. It says we'll be on a path to address
this problem in 8 to 10 years. So I just want as we begin this
hearing to note the extraordinary gap between what the law
calls for and what the administration's progress to date has
been with respect to implementing the law.
Mr. Chairman I thank you, and look forward to working with
you and I think that the fact that so many colleagues from the
subcommittee are here today is an indication that there is a
lot of work to do and this subcommittee wants to do it in a
bipartisan way.
[The prepared statement of Senator Wyden follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Ron Wyden, U.S. Senator From Oregon
Mr. Chairman, I wish to specifically note that many of the
provisions in the Healthy Forests Restoration Act have not been
implemented or have only been minimally implemented. Many of these
provisions, including Titles II, III, V and VI--which provide
assistance on issues of watersheds; biomass, healthy forest reserves,
and developing a system to monitor forest health--are set to expire in
2008, raising the very real potential that the provisions of the Act
will expire before any tangible benefits have been obtained. While I
commend the Forest Service for launching the Western Threat Assessment
Center in March 2005 in Prineville, Oregon to begin the study of forest
health threats, much more needs to be done to implement to various
provisions of these Titles before they expire in 2008. Many of these
efforts are vital to restoring the long term health of our forests.
Senator Craig. Ron, thank you very much and I'll turn to
our colleagues in the order in which they arrived, Senator
Johnson.
STATEMENT OF HON. TIM JOHNSON, U.S. SENATOR FROM SOUTH DAKOTA
Senator Johnson. Well thank you Mr. Chairman for working
with members on both sides of the aisle to schedule this
important oversight hearing on the implementation of the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act. I'm particularly eager to hear
from the Forest Service and State and local land managers how
the authorities provided by the Congress are reducing the
threat of catastrophic forest fire. I hope that Chief Bosworth
or Deputy Assistant Secretary Hatfield will also provide
information explaining whether the Forest Service and other
Federal land management agencies had the necessary resources to
implement the Healthy Forest Initiative. In 2002, a central
argument driving enactment of the legislation was a threat
posed to communities from hazardous fuels in the Wildland Urban
Interface. In my State of South Dakota with a patchwork of
private and public ownership in the Black Hills National
Forest, effectively treating lands near communities is one of
my key priorities. Accordingly, I'd like the Forest Service to
specifically address how the Healthy Forest Initiative has
tackled that public threat and explain the success and set
backs in treating the Wildland Urban Interface in carrying out
the intent of the legislation. In South Dakota to date the
Black Hills National Forest has implemented only one project--
The Bugtown Gulch Project--using the Healthy Forest Restoration
Act authorities.
The Bugtown Gulch project which is located northwest of
Custer was designed to respond to a portion of the mountain
pine beetle epidemic that currently exists in the Black Hills
National Forest. The success in quickly treating this effected
area hopefully will provide momentum for the Forest Service to
continue additional projects now in the planning stage. Using
Healthy Forest, authorities on the Bugtown Gulch Project
allowed the Forest Service to plan, decide, and initiate
implementation faster than would have otherwise been possible.
The initial news release regarding the Bugtown Gulch Project
was in November of 2004. The record of decision was signed on
February 8, 2006 and authorized approximately 11,000 acres of
thinning. Live timber sales that where authorized by the
decision where advertised the next day on February 9, 2006,
with about 25 percent of the acreage in the sales designated as
being in urgent need of harvest before the new flight of
mountain pine beetles spread to other trees, and a promising
sign for future projects successful harvest of those acres was
completed before the bugs took flight. Another factor to
successful completion of this project was the pre-decisional
administrative review process embedded in the Healthy Forests
Initiative. The use of the pre-decisional administrative review
process helped assure that the areas in urgent need of removal
could be harvested prior to the 2006 flight of mountain pine
beetles and thereby reducing the further spread of mountain
pine beetles.
Mr. Chairman, I am eager to hear from the Chief if the
experiences in implementing these important public safety
projects are shared throughout other forests and regions and
how public land managers are using these authorities to improve
forest health. I apologize that conflicting committee
obligations will necessitate my leaving earlier than I'd like,
but my staff is here and I will closely review today's
testimony. I yield back.
Senator Craig. Tim, thank you very much. Let me turn to
Senator Smith. Gordon, any opening comments?
STATEMENT OF HON. GORDON SMITH, U.S. SENATOR
FROM OREGON
Senator Smith. Thank you Mr. Chairman, Senator Wyden.
Chiefs good to have you here. I'm going to abbreviate my
opening statement but I think we hopefully can in this hearing
keep our eye on the ball. Which is: Are our forests better off?
I recently was in northeastern Oregon with Mark Rey and we held
a town hall in my hometown. North eastern Oregon has been known
as the Eastern Triangle for the last 15 years, 14 mills have
closed in the corner of my State. Remaining mills need roughly
500 million board feet a year from Federal land to keep people
at work, yet the national forests are only producing 96 million
board feet. So in a State where 79 percent of our Forest
Service land is on a high risk of catastrophic wildfire my hope
is we can produce more than that and the reason is not just for
jobs but it is to keep this remaining info structure in place
so that the purpose is the Healthy Forest Initiative can be
realized. And I think that that is something that is a real
question in that we have got to keep some mills going and we
have to keep the people employed so that we can keep our
forests thinned in a way that protects the public from
catastrophic wildfires. But I do want to commend Forest Service
Chief Bosworth because at least in Oregon, and I can't speak to
other States, the Forest Service have done a fairly good job in
pursuing mechanical treatment versus prescribed burning. Nearly
twice the acres have been treated mechanically than have been
historically, and I encourage the agency to pursue that trend.
I also note that in the first three quarters of this year
the Forest Service has exceeded last years figure for numbers
treated using the Healthy Forest Initiative authority I believe
that departs from a national trend and I, I thank you at least
for doing that in Oregon and obviously my colleagues will
encourage you to do that in their States as well.
Thank you Mr. Chairman.
Senator Craig. Gordon, thank you very much. As I turn to
Senator Feinstein I'm going to caveat by saying as I flew from
Phoenix into Fresno on Friday, across your State in a commuter
jet, the pilot came on and said, ``we've had permission to lift
up another ten thousand feet to avoid the smoke plume'' that
was coming out of the San Bernardino at which time I now
understand, a 110 square miles and about 77,000 acres burned.
It was a rather dramatic experience as all of us looked out the
windows of the aircraft down over this absence of terrain
because it was not a weather pattern it was in fact a smoke
cloud.
Senator Feinstein.
STATEMENT OF HON. DIANNE FEINSTEIN, U.S. SENATOR
FROM CALIFORNIA
Senator Feinstein. Well thank you very much Mr. Chairman
and I thank the ranking member for holding this hearing and to
you and Senator Wyden and from all of us who worked with, we
all worked together on the Healthy Families Act. What's
happening in southern California is really very serious. We
came very close to having a half a million acres of bark beetle
infested pine go up in these fires. There where fires last year
as well, it's a very serious situation and I worry a great deal
about it.
I'm concerned that the new authorities that our bill
provided have not really been used adequately by the Forest
Service. And I'd like to talk about that in my questions and
there are some aspects of the implementation that are deeply
troubling. One, of course as Senator Wyden mentioned is the
issue of funding, we can't do these treatments without adequate
resources. And what's happening is that they are going to areas
that don't need mechanical thinning because it's cheaper to do.
So if your forests need mechanical thinning they sort of get,
in my view, second shrift. The Forest Services preliminary
budget for 2006 provided just 16 percent of the needed fuel
reduction funding for California's four forests, southern
California forests. $7.5 million as compared to $46.4 million.
While the San Bernardino National Forest received a one
time funding boost of $10 million last December because I went
to the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee who
happened to be from that area, we where able to get that $10
million. This one time funding shortfall really doesn't address
the hazard that's out there. The Forest Service, the
authorities we provided where used to treat only 1 percent of
acres treated in California in 2005. And so far in 2006, of
total areas treated under Healthy Forests, under the
authorities provided, during this time only 3 percent of those
acres are in California. Of total Forest Service and BLM fuels
reduction work over the last 2 years only 3\1/2\ percent have
been in California. In contrast, and I note most of us are
Western or near Western States, in contrast 40 percent was in
the Southeast which has less than 7 percent of total National
Forest system lands. California alone has 20 million of the
Forest Services 193 million acres, or 10 percent of the total.
And many of our forests are at higher risk. So what I want to
know from this hearing is: What are they doing? And, you know,
if more money is needed it'd be nice if somebody came and said
look we really believe you have peril, we need more money and
we're willing to help you to get it. But it's a very passive
situation out there and that bothers me greatly. And I hope,
you know we can, to use a bad pun set a fire under the agencies
through this hearing to work with us to get more funding to
really look at the priorities and see if they are meeting the
need. Thank You.
Senator Craig. Senator, thank you. Now let me turn to
Senator Murkowski.
Senator Feinstein. Oh before Senator Murkowski if I might
be indulged in, for a point, a personal privilege. If you look
at the Senator from Alaska, you will see a very slight, very
feminine form. And yet this slight and feminine form was able
to catch a 65 pound king salmon.
[Laughter.]
Senator Feinstein. I could not help but note that some of
the male comments where, ``She puffed up the size of the fish,
she needed a man to set the hook.'' But every photo that I've
seen is the Senator quite unaided by any male counterpart.
[Laughter.]
Senator Feinstein. Handling this salmon really quite well
and I would just like to issue a word of commendation to the
Senator from Alaska for her fishing prowess. I believe to date
it is unchallenged by any male member of the U.S. Senate.
[Laughter.]
Senator Craig. Well before I turn over to Lisa. Senator
Feinstein I want you to know that I was in the same fishing
tournament.
[Laughter.]
Senator Feinstein. What?
Senator Craig. I was in the same fishing tournament with
Senator Murkowski, not only did she out fish me but the top
three fish caught in a two day period in that tournament where
all caught by woman.
Senator Feinstein. Oh.
Senator Craig. Oh.
[Laughter.]
Senator Feinstein. For you that's very sobering.
[Laughter.]
Senator Feinstein. Thank you again.
[Laughter.]
Senator Wyden. So the moral of the story is put Senator
Murkowski in charge of fighting the fires.
[Laughter.]
Senator Craig. No, put her in charge of catching more fish.
Anyway, Senator now that you've been properly billed the floor
is yours.
STATEMENT OF HON. LISA MURKOWSKI, U.S. SENATOR
FROM ALASKA
Senator Murkowski. Well, thank you Senator Feinstein I
appreciate your words of support. I think you recognize when
you saw those fish there was no photo shopping, there was no
assistance, I did do it on my own but I do have to keep
repeating that because people just still quite don't believe
it. It is true. Thank you for that acknowledgment and that
recognition. I'll also point out that the area that we where
fishing down there on the Kenai Peninsula, and I will bring
this back to the hearing at hand.
Bringing the fish story, the big fish story back to to the
hearing at hand. We where down on the Kenai Peninsula where
from the concerns expressed by Alaskans in terms of our
greatest fire threat. So much of what we worry about is down on
the Kenai Peninsula because of the damage that's been inflicted
by the spruce bark beetle. So, there is some tie into the fish
story and our hearing here this afternoon. But in addition to
thanking Senator Feinstein for her comments and yours about my
wonderful fish, I do want to thank you Mr. Chairman and ranking
member Wyden for having this hearing. I think it is
exceptionally timely as we look at what is happening in
California. We're feeling rather blessed this season in Alaska
because we've only had one fire so far this year that has made
Fox News or CNN. Typically by this time of the year it's pretty
tough up north and our history has shown, or certainly our
recent past has shown that we have great reason to be concerned
about our fire season. This may be considered a normal year up
in Alaska but when you look back to 2004 and 2005 they where
the worst years in our States history for fire. It was in 2005
we had an area burn that was the size of the State of
Connecticut and Rhode Island combined. And you talk about
acreage that's one thing, you talk about something that people
can relate to that's another.
In 2004 the amount of acreage that we burned in this State
was equivalent to the size of the State of Vermont. So, we look
at what is happening with the Healthy Forest Restoration Act.
You know when that was passed, I was a big supporter of it
because I thought that this sent a signal that our Nation was
really gonna to get serious about reducing the loss of life,
reducing the loss of property associated with the wildfires in
the populated areas. And also, the terrible quality of life
that our constituents have to endure when we've got this smoke
billowing into our communities during our short summer season.
I have had, on numerous occasions, an opportunity to speak
about the health and air quality issues that are associated
with the wildfire smoke. Up in the state of Alaska it's
traveling hundreds of miles, and this is not just an annoyance
where you can smell the smoke. The smoke is so bad that our
children can't go outside to play for a week at a time. If you
have any upper respiratory ailments you are told to stay
inside. There are days where you can't see down the next block,
because of the thickness of the smoke. So it is very real, it's
not just something that is an annoyance. So when we look to
what we can do to reduce the hazardous fuels, it's not only
about the health and safety of those that are around it. It's
certainly about the margin of safety for our wildland fire
fighters.
Now, I'm assuming that the point of this hearing is to
determine whether or not the Healthy Forest Restoration Act is
living up to it's billing. I've mentioned the Spruce Bark
Beetle on the Kenai Peninsula, we've got about three million
acres of damage in the State of Alaska about 1.1 million acres
is situated there on the Kenai Peninsula alone. So we have
great concern about that. I want to know that we're doing all
that we possibly can to reduce the hazardous fuels on the Kenai
Peninsula as well as around the State.
I am encouraged about the efforts to formulate the
Community Wildfire Protection Plans. We've got some success in
Alaska that I'm proud to sight, to the Kenai Peninsula, the
Fairbanks North Star Borough, Glennallen in eastern Alaska, and
then the Native village of Tanacross. These have been pointed
to as national success stories in the community wildfire
planning. There where also some pretty ambitious intentions
about turning the fuels into energy, and I should mention that
there's a great deal of interest throughout Alaska into turning
the biomass and the small diameter material into fuel so we can
reduce our reliance on diesel for power generation in so many
of our communities. Whether you're down in southeast or all the
way up into the interior, folks are asking the question whether
there's sufficient grant funds available to turn these ideas
into a reality. So I look forward to the comments from the
Chief and from Miss Hatfield. And thank you again for the
hearing.
Senator Craig. Lisa, thank you very much. Now we turn to
Senator Salazar.
STATEMENT OF HON. KEN SALAZAR, U.S. SENATOR
FROM COLORADO
Senator Salazar. Thank you very much Chairman Craig and
Senator Wyden for holding this important hearing. For us and
Colorado Lake, the other Senators that are on this committee we
have great concerns about the forest fire danger that we
currently are facing in especially most of our States share the
problem that where facing with the bark beetle infestations. In
my State alone we have about 1\1/2\ million acres of bark
beetle infested forest lands that are essentially a tinder box.
And when you look across all of the western slope of my State
of Colorado it's expected that probably 90 percent of those
lands are going to be infested by the bark beetle in upcoming
years. I have a longer statement that I'll submit for the
record but I'm interested in two things as we move forward in
the hearing. One is the status of the implementation of the
Healthy Forest Act with respect to dealing with these
challenges a part of that legislation was intended to deal with
bark beetle infestation problems. Two, what the level of
resource needs are to address this particular problem so that
we can say it, we've set about to deal with a challenge in that
we've been able to deal with it effectively. Third, following
up on Senator Murkowski's point. I think there was a great deal
of interest as we worked on energy issues in the country to see
how we can move forward with biomass, and I believe it was
title II of the Healthy Forest Act that said that we where
moving forward with a biomass research program as well a grant
program within the Forest Service. I think there's a yearning
from communities to move forward with that project and I would
like an update on that.
And finally I just look forward to working with the Forest
Service in my State as we move forward and try to deal with
this very important issue. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Senator Salazar follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Ken Salazar, U.S. Senator From Colorado
Thank you Chairman Craig and Senator Wyden. As always, I appreciate
the opportunity to attend this Subcommittee's hearings on subjects that
are critical to Colorado.
There is no issue as critical to Colorado as the ongoing beetle
infestations that are plaguing our national forests, as well as state
and private lands. Just last week we heard the first summer reports of
beetles emerging throughout our forests searching out the live trees
that will incubate next summer's beetles. Those trees will then die,
turning red, and adding to the already elevated hazardous fuel loads.
These dangerous conditions and the corresponding fire risk have
Colorado on edge. This situation threatens local communities in the
wildland-urban interface and carries with it the real potential to
negatively impact downstream states from Colorado should a catastrophic
fire occur in a major Colorado watershed.
The depth of my constituents' concerns was plain last week when I,
along with Senator Allard, hosted a Colorado Congressional Delegation
meeting concerning bark beetles with officials of local communities
that are threatened by these dangerous conditions. At that meeting the
Colorado delegation committed to work together with the communities and
other local stakeholders to address this situation in the short and
long term--including by identifying administrative action items that
may help the situation on the ground.
Chief Bosworth and Assistant Secretary Hatfield, when those items
are identified and communicated, the delegation expects that the USDA/
USFS and the DOI will give them timely and full consideration. We are
in the midst of a crisis, the threat is readily apparent, and we need
the Administration's attention and help.
Thank you.
Senator Craig. Ken, thank you very much. Now let me turn to
the chairman of the full committee. Mr. Chairman, we're not
saving time this morning because I thought it was very
important for both Dale and Nina to hear the passion of my
colleagues as it relates to the situation going on in their
states, their continued belief in the Healthy Forest Act, and
more importantly the concern that it isn't moving as quickly as
it should in a variety of areas for a variety of reasons. But
let me turn to you for comments you would like to make Senator
Domenici and then we'll get to our key witnesses.
Senator Domenici.
STATEMENT OF HON. PETE V. DOMENICI, U.S. SENATOR
FROM NEW MEXICO
The Chairman. And I might be both lengthily and passionate?
Senator Craig. Well----
[Laughter.]
Unidentified Voice. Sounds like a law firm.
Senator Craig. Yes, it does sound like a law firm. We'll
let you choose that, but time is important and you can use
reasonable discretion.
The Chairman. Don't worry, it'll be----
Senator Craig. Just don't get into a fish story like
Senator Feinstein and Lisa did.
The Chairman. It'll be neither.
Senator Craig. All right.
The Chairman. Passionate nor long this morning for some
reason. In any event I do want to say that I'm happy that both
you and Nina and Dale are here today. And I also want to
welcome Mr. Rick DeIaco from Ruidoso, New Mexico who is here to
testify. We look forward to hearing your testimony. I'm not
sure that I will be here personally, when that occurs sir, but
I think you understand this is a subcommittee and I'm not in
charge of this subcommittee and I have another committee that I
have to work on in getting ready for a case on the floor.
In any event, let me move on to the data that you bring
before us, shows a grand total of 1,720 acres of Healthy Forest
Restoration Act work completed, from the beginning of fiscal
year 2005 until now in the entire State of California. That
data also shows that you have accomplished another 212,000
acres of healthy forest work through other authorities.
Chief, you need to understand that I have dozens of
communities in New Mexico that face similar risks and while I
am a Senator, you are the regional Forester and each of your
forest Supervisors need to understand that there will be hell
to pay if one of our communities burn, and we find that they
haven't moved heaven and earth to get this fuel work done, or
haven't used the Healthy Forest Restoration Act authority to
get it done.
While I'm impressed that your reporting additional acreage
above and beyond the database you recently provided the
committee, I, like others here today would like to see more
acreage accomplished and more quickly. That seems to me to be
everybody's wish and obviously you're here today to tell us how
you do what you do and that it's the best it can be. And, we
will listen attentively. Thank you very much Mr. Chairman.
Senator Craig. Pete, thank you very much for that
testimony. Now let me turn to our first panel. I've introduced
them once, Nina Hatfield, Deputy Assistant Secretary, Policy,
Management and Budget, Department of the Interior, Dale
Bosworth, Chief, U.S. Forest Service, Department of
Agriculture.
Ladies first, Nina.
STATEMENT OF NINA ROSE HATFIELD, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY,
POLICY, MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET, DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Ms. Hatfield. Thank you very much Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, I appreciate
the opportunity to testify on Interior's implementation of the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act. And let me assure you that we
too have, with you a passion about our efforts to reduce the
risk of wildland fire to communities across the United States.
And our key focus is to treat those high priority acres that
have been identified through collaboration with States, tribes,
local governments, and other partners and to do so as
expeditiously as is possible. And as we move from identifying
the highest priority acres to implementing fuel reduction
projects we use the NEPA and analytic compliance requirements.
Now HFRA provides that tools that compliment other
administrative and statutory authorities that our land managers
may use to achieve our goal of accomplishing on the ground
reductions in hazardous fuels.
HFRA's encouragement to State and local governments to
complete Community Wildfire Protection Plans or CWPP's is
vastly improving our ability to make sure that we do identify
those high priority acres that we want to treat. Using all of
our authorities in close coordination with State, local and
tribal interests, Interior's agencies have treated 7 million
acres since fiscal year 2002, which includes approximately 5.9
million acres through the hazardous fuels reduction program and
approximately 1.1 million acres of landscape restoration
accomplished through other land management programs. And in
fiscal year 2006, 94 percent of the total billion acres that we
plan to treat are in condition classes two and three.
Now we believe that this work has lessened threat of fire
to people, communities, and natural resources across the
country. Our successes where fuels treatments have modified
fire behavior and provided for safer and more effective fire
fighting are growing. And with respect to the treatment method
the process of selecting whether to use a mechanical prescribed
fire or another technique is part of a collaborative effort.
The factors to be considered range from the fuel lows to
societal determinations of valued landscapes. And the ultimate
decision on the treatment method depends upon multiple factors,
including the on the ground conditions, the agency mission, the
usefulness in accomplishing other land management objectives
and costs.
Mechanical treatments already receive priority in project
selections. In this year, fiscal year 2006, 51 percent of BLM's
hazardous fuel treatments have been done using mechanical means
and that's grown from the 42 percent of mechanical treatments
that we did in fiscal year 2005. And yet we recognize that
balance in the use of those tools remains critical. For DOI
lands outside the wildland/urban interface we estimate that the
direct cost of mechanical treatment is approximately four times
that of prescribed fire treatment. But we believe that the new
knowledge, techniques, tools, understanding, and collaborative
efforts like the CWPP's continue to inform and improve our
efforts to reduce wildland fire risk. New performance measures
are emerging from an extensive 18 month collaborative review of
the 10 year comprehensive strategies implementation plan that
was initiated by the Wildland Fire Leadership Council and the
Western Governors Association and that reflects our growing
knowledge and skill base in terms of the appropriate
performance measures by which we will gauge our progress.
In fiscal year 2002, the agencies are using both HFI and
HFRA tools to meet there NEPA requirements on nearly 80 percent
of all new fuels treatment projects. We appreciate the on going
oversight by the subcommittee on our activities to reduce
hazardous fuels on the public lands. We believe that using the
range of tools that we have with HFI, stewardship contracting,
Tribal Forest Protection Act, and HFRA that we are expediting
projects to treat hazardous fuel, restoring fire adapted
ecosystem, restoring healthy conditions to public forest and
range lands, introducing the threat of catastrophic wildfire to
at risk communities. We will continue to partner with other
Federal agencies as well as State, local and Tribal governments
to accomplish additional fuels reduction and restoration
projects, and I look forward to responding to your questions.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Hatfield follows:]
Prepared Statement of Nina Rose Hatfield, Deputy Assistant Secretary,
Policy, Management and Budget, Department of the Interior
Thank you for the opportunity to testify on the U.S. Department of
the Interior's (Interior) implementation of the Healthy Forests
Restoration Act (HFRA) [P.L. 108-148] and our agencies' activities to
reduce hazardous fuels and improve forest and rangeland health on the
public lands.
Four years ago, wildland fires swept across portions of the western
United States, burning millions of acres. In southwestern Oregon, the
Biscuit Fire burned almost 500,000 acres in 2002 and cost more than
$150 million to suppress. In response to this and other large wildland
fires, the President and the Congress acted in rapid succession in 2002
and 2003 to authorize Federal land management agencies to expedite
action to reduce the amount of hazardous fuels on Federal lands, reduce
the threat of wildland fire, and restore the health of our public
forests and rangelands.
The land management agencies of the Department of the Interior and
the U.S. Forest Service have moved aggressively to implement these new
administrative and statutory authorities. These include streamlined
authorities to meet the requirements of the National Environmental
Policy Act (NEPA) provided by HFRA and the President's Healthy Forests
Initiative (HFI). The BLM and the Forest Service use the stewardship
contracting authority provided by the 2003 Omnibus Appropriations Act
(Section 323 of Public Law 108-7) to reduce hazardous fuels while
providing economic benefits to local communities. HFRA has encouraged
local communities to work with Federal agencies to prepare Community
Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPP), and each of the Interior agencies is
actively involved in assisting States and local governments. All these
tools emphasize the importance of partnerships in reducing the risk of
wildland fire.
Using all of our authorities in close coordination with State,
local, and Tribal interests, Interior's agencies have treated 7 million
acres since Fiscal Year 2002, which includes approximately 5.9 million
acres through the hazardous fuels reduction program and approximately
1.1 million acres of landscape restoration accomplished through other
land management activities. For three consecutive years, Interior has
exceeded program targets for both total acres treated and for treating
acres within the wildland-urban interface (WUI). We have tripled the
amount of WUI acres treated since FY 2001--treating 543,000 acres in FY
2005 compared to 164,000 acres in FY 2001--and increased the WUI share
of total program acreage from 22 percent in FY 2001 to 44 percent
planned for FY 2006.
A brief description of Interior agencies' use of these new
authorities follows.
healthy forests initiative (hfi)
On August 22, 2002, the President announced his Healthy Forests
Initiative. The HFI directed the Secretaries of the Interior and of
Agriculture, together with the Chairman of the Council on Environmental
Quality, to improve regulatory processes in order to reduce the risk of
catastrophic wildland fires by restoring forest health.
In response, the agencies developed administrative procedures to
expedite needed actions, including two new categorical exclusions (CX)
under NEPA that allow the agencies to proceed with high-priority
hazardous fuels treatments (prescribed fire and thinning) and
rehabilitation of areas previously burned without further analysis if a
collaboratively selected treatment meets specific criteria related to
size, location, and method. The HFI also resulted in streamlined
consultation procedures on threatened and endangered species with the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service
for National Fire Plan projects.
Interior agencies have used the HFI categorical exclusions
extensively because a hazardous fuels reduction project that meets the
CX criteria can be implemented rapidly. This tool is especially
valuable, for example, in treating areas of a WUI that could be rapidly
thinned to reduce the risk of wildfire, or to accomplish on post-fire
reseeding or erosion control measures before a rainy season begins. In
FY 2004, Interior's bureaus used the HFI tools to treat approximately
40,000 acres. In FY 2005, HFI tools were used to treat approximately
190,000 acres. This fiscal year, we plan to use these tools on over
1,000 treatments to reduce hazardous fuels on approximately 200,000
acres.
For example, in the Castle Rock area near Vale, Oregon, the BLM
used the CX authority to implement treatments that both reduce existing
fire hazard and improve forest health. This area contains one of the
few remaining stands of old growth Ponderosa pine and Douglas fir left
in the area. By 2003, large quantities of dead, woody debris had
dramatically increased the stand's susceptibility to disease and insect
infestation, and significantly raised the potential for catastrophic
stand replacement fire. The BLM sought input from local ranchers and
the Paiute Indian Tribe in planning a fuels reduction program.
In the spring of 2004, the CX was approved and fuels reduction
activities were implemented on-the-ground. A total of 850 acres of
Ponderosa pine stands are being treated using a combination of under-
story thinning, hand piling, and prescribed fire. In FY 2005, 200 acres
of pine were treated. Approximately 350 acres of North Slope Douglas
fir will be considered for fuels reduction activities in the near
future. Early analysis suggests that commercial thinning in conjunction
with fuels reduction activities would significantly reduce the existing
fire hazard and improve forest health. Fuels reduction costs may be
mitigated as a result of a stewardship contract.
stewardship contracting
Congress authorized the BLM and extended the Forest Service to use
stewardship contracts, which are intended to provide economic benefits
to local communities, to reduce hazardous fuels and restore forest and
rangeland health, in the FY 2003 Omnibus Appropriations Act (Section
323 of Public Law 108-7).
BLM has progressively increased the use of stewardship contracting
from 2 contracts on 300 acres in FY 2003, to 22 contracts on 6100 acres
in FY 2004, and 58 contracts covering 15,700 acres in FY 2005. By the
end of FY 2006, the BLM will have used stewardship contracting
authority, cumulatively over three years, for over 100 projects to
restore forest health and treat fuels on over 35,000 acres of public
lands. These projects are located across all of the States that BLM
manages in the west, including Alaska.
An example of a successful stewardship project is the 10-year
Gerber Stewardship project which began in FY 2004 in south central
Oregon. When completed, it will have treated 10,000 acres to improve
forest and woodland health, improve rangeland health, reduce hazardous
fuels in the WUI, improve wildlife and fisheries habitat, and riparian
enhancements. It is now in its third year, with 1500 acres under
contract, and has sold 750 MBF and 15,000 tons of biomass for energy
development.
Another example is underway in Canon City, Colorado, where the BLM
awarded two stewardship contracts to treat 300 acres per year. The
contracts will reduce fuels in the WUI and foster forest health
improvement and wildlife habitat enhancement. Additionally, the
contracts will produce 3,000 tons of biomass and 235,000 board feet of
saw timber, providing woody biomass to Aquila Power and logs to local
sawmills. In 2004, the Aquila plant generated 730 megawatts of
electricity using woody biomass, and may expand their use of biomass
under a state law requiring a green energy portfolio of 10 percent by
2015. In FY 2006, the BLM is soliciting a longer-term stewardship
contract for multi-year treatments. The saw timber and biomass by-
products of this contract will help provide stability and long-term
supplies of biomass for energy production.
healthy forests restoration act (hfra)
Through the HFRA, signed into law in December of 2003, Congress
provided statutory authorities that complement or expand upon the HFI
tools already in use by the agencies. Certain authorities in the HFRA
are available to both the BLM and the Forest Service (Titles I and II),
while other titles apply exclusively to the Forest Service.
Title I of HFRA authorizes the collaborative development and
expedited environmental analysis of hazardous fuels reduction projects
on public lands that are: (1) at risk of catastrophic wildland fire;
and (2) meet one of the following four criteria. The projects are:
located in wildland-urban interface (WUI) areas;
identified as condition class 2 and 3 (at moderate to high
risk of catastrophic fire) where there are at-risk municipal
water supplies;
in watersheds that provide habitat for threatened and
endangered species where catastrophic wildfire threatens the
survival of the species and fuels treatments can reduce the
risk of wildfire; and
where windthrow, insect infestation, or disease epidemics
threaten forest or rangeland resources.
HFRA authorizes the agencies to streamline environmental
assessments to fulfill NEPA requirements, complementing the categorical
exclusion authority in HFI. In FY 2005, the BLM used HFRA authorities
to treat approximately 9,968 acres in 52 treatments. In FY 2006, the
BLM identified 66 HFRA projects covering 28,000 acres. For example:
In the area near La Pine, Oregon, the BLM used the HFRA Title I
authority to plan a treatment of 7,000 acres to be implemented in FY
2006. The goals of this WUI project include fuels reduction, creation
of defensible space, forest and rangeland health, and protection of a
municipal watershed. The project will also yield biomass.
The BLM also has used the Title I authority to plan projects in
non-WUI areas of Nevada and Utah. Near Winnemucca, NV, a 1,000-acre
fuels reduction and rangeland health project will be implemented in FY
2006. Near Price, UT, Title I authority was used to plan a 500-acre WUI
treatment to accomplish defensible space, fuels reduction, and
ecosystem restoration.
The Department is committed to utilizing the tools Congress
provided through the HFRA. To that end, we will continue to work to
improve our performance in implementing the Act and to ensure oversight
at both the field and headquarters levels.
Typically bureaus perform NEPA work one or more fiscal years prior
to the fiscal year when the on-the-ground treatments are accomplished.
Treatments done in fiscal years 2004-2006 often had their NEPA analysis
performed before HFI or HFRA authorities were available. As those
treatments are completed, the number of HFI/HFRA supported treatments
is increasing as is the share of new NEPA work performed using these
tools.
The growth in acres treated via HFI/HFRA tools has been dramatic,
from over 40,000 acres in FY 2004 to approximately 200,000 acres in FY
2005, with an estimated 230,000 acres to be treated this fiscal year.
Evidencing our commitment to using these important authorities, in
FY 2006 the agencies are using HFU/HFRA tools to meet their NEPA
requirements on nearly 80 percent of all new fuels treatment projects.
community wildfire protection plans
A key provision in HFRA encourages local communities to work with
Federal agencies to develop Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPP).
These plans build on community and resource protection activities
carried out under the National Fire Plan, and assist local communities,
as well as State, Federal, and Tribal cooperators, to clarify and
refine priorities, roles and responsibilities in the protection of
life, property, and critical infrastructure in the wildland-urban
interface.
State and Federal land management agencies and local communities
can use CWPPs to determine hazardous fuels treatments in the wildland-
urban interface. As of March 1, 2006, nationwide 650 CWPPs covering
2,700 communities at risk have been completed and 600 are in
preparation. To date in FY 2006, the BLM and the Bureau of Indian
Affairs have assisted in 55 separate WUI communities with mitigation,
fire management, or risk assessment plans.
In Idaho, for example, all counties have completed CWPPs that
include prioritized fuels treatments for all of Idaho's priority
wildland-urban interface areas.
Idaho County is an example of one county that revised their CWPP to
ensure their highest hazard areas are included, and now has a plan that
meets all the requirements of HFRA--such as WUI definitions or
boundaries, prioritized fuels/community assistance project lists, and
agreement by local government, local fire departments, and the State of
Idaho on the contents of the plan. As a result, BLM is currently
working with several other local and state entities to conduct fuels
treatments in Elk City--one of Idaho's highest priority communities.
The BLM is able to tier its hazardous fuels project planning to
completed CWPP's. One such example is in central Oregon where the
combination of increased fuel and ignition sources have resulted in
more acres burned in wildfires over the past five years than burned in
the previous century. To address these issues and to identify treatment
priorities, a multi jurisdictional group of agencies, organizations,
and individuals gathered to create a series of community wildfire
protection plans.
As of September 2005, five community wildfire protection plans have
been completed and three others are nearing completion, covering the
majority of Crook, Northern Klamath, Jefferson and Deschutes Counties.
Using a risk-assessment model, planning committee members identified
top priorities to mitigate wildfire. These priorities include risk
potential for a fire to occur; hazard potential for a wildfire to
spread once ignited; values at risk, such as identification of key
infrastructure and ecological and cultural values; structural
vulnerability elements of a structure that affect the likelihood of it
burning; and protection capability to prepare for, respond to and
suppress wildfire. General recommendations included developing year
round water sources, continuing to reduce fuels on private lands,
improving defensible space, and developing or improving emergency
evacuation routes.
One of the greatest concerns identified in the CWPPs is the fuels
buildup on Federal lands adjacent to communities. Consequently, the
Prineville District BLM and the Deschutes and Ochoco National Forests
will be working together to reduce the potential for catastrophic
wildfire around the communities at risk. As part of the five-year plan,
forests and rangelands in the WUI in central Oregon will receive a
variety of treatments, including thinning, mowing, chipping, and
burning. While not designed to eliminate fire, the goal of these
treatments is to modify the vegetation to the point that ground fire is
the norm, not the exception.
Title II of HFRA provides statutory authorization for the agencies
to increase the utilization of biomass. Interior is currently expanding
its capacity to encourage community-based enterprises that help achieve
forest and rangeland health objectives. Fuels projects and post-fire
recovery can produce significant amounts of small diameter woody
materials (biomass is predominantly the by-product of hazardous fuels
removal projects that reduce the risk of wildland fire and improve
forest health). Many small communities have lost conventional sawmills
and other utilization infrastructure. Better coordinated technical
support, investment and incentives can enhance development of
infrastructure and help commercialize new technologies that make
profitable use of forest and rangeland resources made available through
emergency salvage and recovery projects.
The strategy for increasing biomass utilization from BLM-managed
lands draws on the authorities provided in the HFI, the National Fire
Plan, HFRA, and stewardship contracting under the FY 2003 Omnibus
Appropriations Act (Section 323 of Public Law 108-7). In FY 2004 (the
first full fiscal year in which the BLM had this authority), the BLM
offered nearly 30,000 tons of biomass, mostly through stewardship
contracts that also benefited local communities. In FY 2005, 71,000
tons of wood by-products were offered through contracts by the BLM. The
target for FY 2006 is to offer 60,000 tons of biomass through contracts
or agreements. When treating areas for hazardous fuels reduction, the
BLM's goal for FY 2006 is to offer biomass in 10 percent of the BLM's
mechanical treatment projects in forests and woodlands, increasing to
50 percent by FY 2008.
In addition, the BLM has undertaken six biomass demonstration
projects--in Alaska, California, Colorado, Idaho, and two projects in
Oregon--in which local field offices are working with nearby
communities to develop strategies for using biomass to generate energy.
In Emmett, Idaho, the BLM together with other Federal and State
land management agencies and private interests is working to secure a
sustainable supply for a new 19 megawatt biomass plant. By-products
from hazardous fuels reduction efforts as well as rangeland and forest
health projects on BLM managed lands in southeast Idaho will contribute
to the supply for this plant. A co-generation lumber mill is also being
developed to further take advantage of available biomass material.
Also, the BLM continues to support opportunities for biomass
utilization in central Idaho including Bennett Forest Industries'
establishment of a woody biofuels energy generation plant at the
company's new lumber mill in Grangeville, Idaho.
In the Prineville, Oregon demonstration project, with the execution
of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Confederated Tribes of
Warm Springs (Tribes), the BLM and Forest Service in central Oregon
agreed to offer 80,000 bone dry tons (8,000 acres) of woody biomass
material annually. This long-term commitment to provide biomass to the
mill at Warm Springs will provide a stable supply of biomass to enlarge
the market for biomass energy. With the increased supply of renewable
energy, the Tribes can market energy to power homes, or direct that
energy to new businesses. Thus, woody debris that used to go up in
smoke or clog landfills will now be converted to heat, light, and
economic development. Based on this MOU, the Tribes are seeking a power
purchase agreement and bank financing to develop a 15.5 megawatt
cogeneration plant.
The Department of the Interior also has adopted a standard contract
provision, for use by all Interior agencies, which allows for the
removal of biomass as part of all forest and rangeland thinning
projects or any other contracts that cut vegetation. To help increase
the market for materials made of small wood and wood biomass, the
agency has added a factor to their procurement solicitations to
encourage the purchase of bio-based materials. In addition, Section 210
of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 authorizes Federal grants for biomass
use.
tribal forest protection act
The Tribal Forest Protection Act (Public Law 108-278) [TFPA] was
passed in July 2004 in response to devastating wildfires that crossed
from Federal lands onto Tribal lands. The TFPA provides a tool for
Tribes to propose work and enter into contracts and agreements with the
Forest Service or BLM to reduce threats on Federal lands adjacent to
Indian trust land and Indian communities.
The TFPA focuses on BLM or Forest Service lands that 1) border or
are adjacent to Tribal lands; and 2) pose a fire, disease, or other
threat to the Indian trust land or community or are in need of
restoration. An excellent example of Tribes partnering with the Federal
agencies under the auspices of the TFPA includes a recently signed
Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the Confederated Tribes of
the Warm Springs Indian Reservation in Oregon and the BLM and U.S.
Forest Service.
As mentioned in our discussion of biomass utilization, under this
MOU the BLM and Forest Service in central Oregon agreed to offer to the
Tribes 80,000 bone dry tons (8,000 acres) of woody biomass material
annually as the Tribes conduct hazardous fuels reduction projects on
Federal lands adjacent to the Warm Springs reservation.
The MOU addresses the key components of HFRA and TFPA by focusing
efforts on treating hazardous fuels and restoring the health of forests
to minimize large catastrophic wildfires. This partnership recognizes
that over the past decade, central Oregon and the inland West have
experienced unnaturally large wildfires that have put many values at
risk, including people's lives and homes, sensitive or protected fish
and wildlife habitat, culturally and Tribally significant resources,
critical infrastructure, soil productivity, aesthetics, clean air and
other valued components of forests and communities.
challenges we face
We thank the Congress for the authority provided through the HFRA.
In addition, as note above, we utilize appropriate administrative
authorities in planning and conducting certain fuels treatment and
post-catastrophic event activities. Despite these ongoing efforts,
challenges abound. Certain post-fire situations require a rapid,
coordinated response in order to assure effectiveness of recovery and
restoration efforts. Moreover, the environmental threats typically do
not stop at ownership boundaries. Treatments limited to one side of a
jurisdictional boundary may be less effective than actions coordinated
within a broader ecosystem. Current authorities and procedures make
coordinated decision making among Federal, State, and local land
managers difficult. For example, the BLM missed an opportunity to
coordinate salvage and restoration activities with an adjacent
landowner in the area burned by the Timbered Rock Fire in 2002 in
Oregon. The adjacent landowner moved ahead immediately with salvaging
and replanting the burned area, and within one year salvaged and
replanted all 9,000 acres of his burned lands. By comparison, because
of the procedural requirements to salvage and re-plant on Federal
lands, most of the BLM portion of the burned area is not yet fully
treated. In such cases, coordination among Federal, State, and local
land managers would increase the likelihood of effective restoration on
a landscape or watershed basis.
conclusion
We greatly appreciate the ongoing support that the Chairman and
Members of the Subcommittee have provided for our use of the
authorities of HFI, stewardship contracting, and HFRA to reduce
hazardous fuels and restore the health of the public lands. Using these
authorities, the Interior agencies are expediting projects to treat
hazardous fuels, restore fire-adapted ecosystems, restore healthy
conditions to public forests and rangelands, and reduce the threat of
catastrophic wildland fire to at-risk communities. We will continue to
partner with other Federal agencies, as well as State, local, and
Tribal governments, to accomplish additional fuels reduction and
restoration projects.
Thank you again for the opportunity to testify at this hearing. I
would be glad to answer any questions.
Senator Craig. Nina, thank you very much. Now let us turn
to the Chief. Dale, when you and I started in this business a
good number of years ago your hair was dark and I had hair.
[Laughter.]
Senator Craig. So I don't know whether the stress of the
job or the time we've been at it. But it's been awhile. Please
proceed.
STATEMENT OF DALE BOSWORTH, CHIEF, U.S. FOREST SERVICE,
ACCOMPANIED BY GAIL KIMBELL, REGIONAL FORESTER, MISSOULA, MT
Mr. Bosworth. Thank you very much Mr. Chairman, and I do
appreciate the opportunity to review with you our performance
in implementing the Healthy Forest Restoration Act, the Healthy
Forest Initiate, and our overall fuels treatment program. I'd
like to briefly summarize my written statement and there's just
a few key high lights I'd like to say.
First I'd like for everybody to understand that every year
since 2003 the Forest Service has met or exceeded our funded
fuels treatment targets. And we having said that we really
appreciate your recognition of the importance of this program,
the importance of fuels reduction, and forest health
restoration, and learning the risks of severe wildfires and I
can't express how much we appreciate the tools that both the
administration and Congress have developed together to enhance
our authority to treat these public lands, and to reduce these
threats of fuels. When HFRA was signed by the President in
December 2003, Forest Service Leadership happened to be meeting
here in Washington, D.C. We had a lot of discussions regarding
this new legislation, and I'd advised our regional foresters
and others at that time that the American Public as well as
Congress would be expecting some great progress from us in
reducing the risk of severe wildfire. Now I've brought with me
Gail Kimbell, whose our regional forester from Missoula, and
she would be happy to attest to that understanding that we have
of our responsibility.
Senator Craig. Gail, we're pleased to have you before the
committee today. Thank you for being here.
Mr. Bosworth. You know we noted at the time that the
problems that we have, have been decades in the making, and
that they wouldn't be resolved overnight. We've had the Healthy
Forest Restoration Act authority in place now for one and half
field seasons and we're increasingly making use of the
expedited processes that it provides for us. Along with those
of the administrative regulations that we developed under the
Healthy Forest Initiative. Frankly I'm proud of the progress
that's been made in this effort by Forest Service employees,
along with our partners in the Interior Department and the
countless partners at the State, local, and tribal levels. As I
said, having met our targets for the last 3 years and we're
going to continue to do that.
I also realize that we need to continue to push ourselves
further and at a faster rate to increase the rate of treatment
so that we can quicken our pace at addressing this serious
risk. We know that we can't let up or we'll just lose ground in
the effort if we do. And I don't foresee that the Forest
Service in the field letting up any time soon and frankly, I
don't see the communities letting us let up, until this threat
is addressed.
From 2003 to the present time, using all of the available
authorities that we have, the Forest Service has conducted
fuels reduction treatment on about 8.5 million acres, and that
includes about 5.5 million acres in the Wildland Urban
Interface. So as I mentioned we're continuously increasing our
utilization of the expedited processes and HFRA to get our
fuels work done. In 2005, we treated 23,000 acres using those
procedures. In 2006, we're projecting treating an addition
177,000 acres including about 115,000 acres in response to the
hurricanes in the gulf States.
One of the critical features of HFRA is an increase
expectation of community participation in the development of
these projects. We've always provided, I believe ample
opportunity for public involvement through NFMA and NEPA
processes, but the collaborative spirit that's envisioned in
HFRA I think is a significant change from the old model of
agency scoping, internal decision making, followed by formal
adversarial appeal processes. We've had to build a capacity for
using these new procedures both within the agency as well as
within the communities. And while it takes some time for our
folks and for the public at large to come to understand the new
way of doing things, we believe that the investment of
developing this understanding is well worth the investment. We
believe that by starting this increased collaboration
carefully, we'll be able to show success, and I think that
success will breed further success in other communities. And
that will expand our use of the HFRA authorities.
And Gail Kimbell again, would be able to provide you with
some first hand examples of her experiences with these efforts
in the Northern Region.
So Mr. Chairman you and other members have kept me aware of
your continuing interest in our efforts to reduce hazardous
fuels and there's certainly a corresponding interest on the
part of the departments and the administration. I've conducted
regular conference calls with Regional Foresters generally once
a month, to share information, to report progress, and to find
out what barriers and hurdles they have so that we can remove
those barriers and hurdles and to discuss other aspects of our
implementation of HFI and HFRA. We've assembled a team, to
review implementation at the regional and the field level. To
help us further understand where we're having success and what
kind of difficulties people are faced with in the field, in
terms of implementing these projects. And now as we get the
results from that review, I'd be very happy to share the
information with the committee so that we can continue to work
together and address this challenge.
And so again thank you for the opportunity to be here and
I'd be happy to answer any questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bosworth follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dale Bosworth, Chief, U.S. Forest Service,
Department of Agriculture
introduction
Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the opportunity to testify on the
Administration's progress in implementing the Healthy Forests
Initiative (HFI) which includes the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of
2003 (HFRA). The Act is a significant piece of legislation that earned
bipartisan support in both houses of Congress and was signed into law
by President Bush on December 3, 2003. HFRA recognizes that timely
implementation of fuels treatment and forest and rangeland restoration
projects is critical if we are to reduce the risk from severe wildland
fire to rural communities and critical ecological resources.
the healthy forests initiative
The HFI includes both administrative reforms and HFRA authorities
that give federal managers additional tools to expedite hazardous fuel
treatments and ecological restoration projects on federal land. These
tools are being used to implement a wide range of treatment activities.
Beginning in 2003, through the second quarter of this year, using
all available authorities, the Forest Service has treated about 8.5
million acres, including treatment of 6 million acres for hazardous
fuels reduction and nearly 2.5 million acres for landscape restoration
accomplished through other land management activities. Of the total,
about 5.5 million acres were treated in the Wildland Urban Interface
(WUI). This represents about 65% of the total hazardous fuels
treatments in that time period.
So far, in FY 2006 the agency has treated about 1.6 million acres
of which 1.1 million acres are in WUI. For FY 2006 nearly $600 million
have been allocated for activities that will enable the Forest Service
to continue our efforts to prevent the risk of catastrophic wildfires
and restore forest and rangeland health. A more complete accounting of
accomplishments can be found in the Healthy Forests Report located on
the internet at www.healthyforests.gov.
The Forest Service has utilized the administrative tools provided
under the Healthy Forests Initiative, for example:
In FY 2005, HFI tools were used to treat approximately
100,000 acres. This fiscal year, we plan to use these tools for
about 800 treatments to reduce hazardous fuels on approximately
208,000 acres.
Categorical exclusions (CEs) have been used to meet National
Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) requirements and facilitate
implementation of 669 hazardous fuels treatment projects from
FY 2005 through the third quarter of FY 2006. CEs may also be
applicable to another 481 hazardous fuels treatment projects
that remain in various planning stages.
The counterpart regulations concerning consultation on
certain National Fire Plan (NFP) projects under Section 7 of
the Endangered Species Act have been issued by the Fish and
Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service.
These regulations streamline Section 7 consultations on many
projects. The Forest Service has entered into an Alternative
Consultation Agreement with the Services. The Agreement called
for development of a training and certification process for
making determinations under Section 7 which has now been in
place for two years. More than 830 Forest Service employees
have been trained and are currently certified under that
process, and over 100 NFP projects have used the Counterpart
Regulations.
Another important and related action is the authority provided by
Congress to extend the use of stewardship contracting by the Forest
Service (FS) and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) under the
Consolidated Appropriations Resolution, 2003 (P.L. 108-7, division F,
section 323). Beginning in FY 2003 through May of this year the Forest
Service awarded 198 stewardship contracts. We anticipate another 20
contracts this year and around 80 next year. We have just awarded the
first contract under the Tribal Forest Protection Act to the Mescalero
Apache tribe and continue to receive proposals to treat agency lands
adjacent to tribal lands.
progress made on implementing hfra
In the time since HFRA was enacted, the Forest Service has taken a
number of actions to implement the various titles of the Act.
Title I--Hazardous Fuels Reduction on Federal Lands
The Administration is encouraged by implementation of Title I of
HFRA. While Title I treatment acres currently represent a small
percentage of the total, the number of new projects entering planning
is increasing as managers develop experience using these tools. In FY
2005, the Forest Service used the authority under title I of HFRA to
treat approximately 23,000 acres in 71 treatments. In preparation for
FY 2006, the agency planned to use the authority under title I of HFRA
to treat about 62,000 acres in 138 treatments. Following the widespread
damage caused by Hurricane Katrina national forest managers in
Mississippi determined that the best tool available for removing
hazardous fuels and restoring the forests was the authority under Title
I of HFRA. This massive undertaking which began in December, 2005 and
is nearing completion has resulted in about 115,000 acres treated
beyond what was initially planned for the year and over 300 million
board feet of downed timber sold and removed.
Title I of HFRA authorizes the Secretary to streamline
environmental assessments and environmental impact statements of
authorized hazardous fuel reduction projects to fulfill NEPA
requirements. Key provisions of title I include the collaborative
development and expedited environmental analysis of authorized
hazardous fuel reduction projects and a pre-decisional administrative
review process. Title I focuses attention on several land types:
federal land in wildland-urban interface areas that include areas
within or adjacent to at-risk communities; certain federal lands with
at-risk municipal water supplies; federal lands that contain threatened
and endangered species or their habitats where fuels treatment will
provide enhanced protection from wildfire; and federal land where
windthrow or blowdown, ice storm damage, or insect or disease epidemics
threaten an ecosystem component or forest or rangeland resources.
The Act encourages the development of Community Wildfire Protection
Plans (CWPPs) to identify and prioritize areas for fuels treatment and
to recommend types and methods of treatments in and around the WUI. The
Act requires the Secretary to give priority to Forest Service project
proposals that provide protection of at-risk communities or that
implement the CWPPs. A recent survey of all states to determine
progress in developing CWPPs found that states are reporting 654
completed CWPPs covering almost 2,700 communities, and approximately
600 additional CWPPs progress. It is important to note that a one-to-
one ratio of plans to communities is not required as a single CWPP may
include multiple communities.
We have observed that this collaboration between communities and
local Forest Service offices has resulted in some very innovative
hazardous fuels reduction projects. The Hurricane Katrina recovery
project is one example of cooperation between communities and the
Forest Service. Another outstanding example is the White Mountain
Stewardship Project involving the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest and
the communities of Navaho, Apache and Coconino counties in Arizona.
This project integrates elements of stewardship contracting, Title I
project development and the biomass grant program under Title II
Section 202.
The White Mountains Stewardship Contract was awarded in August 2004
as the first 10-year stewardship contract under section 323 of Public
Law 108-7. This stewardship contract is designed to restore forest
health, reduce the risk of fire to communities, reduce the cost of
forest thinning to taxpayers, support local economies and encourage new
wood product industries and uses for the thinned wood fiber. Forest
Service collaboration with citizens and conservation groups has been
critical and ongoing and originally resulted in 70,500 acres of NEPA
analysis completed, using tools under HFRA title I, with only one
objection filed and no lawsuits. A second HFRA EA was completed in May
of this year with no objections received. This decision will add
another 25,000 acres to the contract.
The 10-year guaranteed supply of wood fiber enables wood product
businesses to invest in equipment designed specifically to treat and
mill small diameter wood. Prior to the stewardship contract, forest
restoration costs were as much as $1,100 per acre. That cost now ranges
from $350 to $550 per acre.
Title II--Biomass
Title II provides authority to help overcome barriers to the
production and use of woody biomass material produced on fuels
reduction and forest restoration projects.
Section 201 amends the Biomass Research and Development Act of 2000
(Title III of P.L. 106-224) to provide for research on woody biomass
production and treatment. Working with the Department of Energy, USDA
added specific language to the 2004 Request for Funding Proposal (RFP)
to conduct this research and two research proposals were funded at $1
million each. The two projects were designed to increase the
utilization of woody biomass from the wildland urban interface
throughout the Southeast.
Section 202 authorizes the chief, in consultation with the State
and Private Forestry Marketing Unit at the Forest Service Forest
Products Laboratory to carry out programs to accelerate adoption of
biomass technologies and to create community-based enterprises through
market activities. In FY2005, 20 grants were awarded for $4.4 million.
In FY 2006, 18 applications, totaling almost $4.2 million were
selected. Applications came in from all parts of the country with a
significant number coming in from the West because of the preponderance
of national forest lands, as well as significant amounts of fire class
condition 3 lands.
Six of the USDA Forest Products Laboratory grants have been awarded
to White Mountain Stewardship Contract-based businesses over the last
two years. These grants are a vital source of ``seed-money'' to
purchase equipment and technologies to utilize and manufacture value-
added products from small-diameter wood. There are 13 businesses
harvesting and utilizing wood from the stewardship contract that
support 450 full-time jobs in Arizona, and 318 of these new jobs are in
the local area. These 13 businesses spent over $12 million for goods
and services in the local White Mountain region in the first year.
Title III--Watershed Forestry Assistance
Title III authorizes the Forest Service to provide technical,
financial and related assistance to state foresters or equivalent state
officials or cooperative extension officials aimed at expanding their
forest stewardship capacities and to address watershed issues on non-
federal forested land and potentially forested land. Title III also
directs the Secretary to provide technical, financial and related
assistance to Indian tribes to expand tribal stewardship capabilities
to address watershed issues.
The Forest Service, working with state forestry agency personnel
and tribal members, has developed separate draft guidelines to
implement the State and Tribal Watershed Forestry Assistance programs.
Title IV--Insect Infestations and Related Diseases
Title IV directs the Forest Service and U.S. Geological Survey to
establish an accelerated program to plan, conduct, and promote
systematic information gathering on forest damaging insect pests, and
the diseases associated with them; to assist land managers in the
development of treatments and strategies to improve forest health; and
to disseminate the results of such information. Title IV directs the
Secretary to carry out the program in cooperation with scientists from
colleges and universities, governmental agencies and private and
industrial landowners.
The Secretaries of Agriculture and the Interior announced in the
summer of 2004 the formation of a series of partnerships to help
implement HFRA in the southern United States. Since then, two
landscape-scale applied Title IV silvicultural assessments on the
Ozark-St. Francis National Forest were developed to address
infestations of the southern pine beetle and red oak borer, which
threaten forest health in the region. Another applied silvicultural
assessment for maintaining habitat diversity and reducing the risk of
mortality from gypsy moth and oak decline is underway on the Daniel
Boone National Forest. Another assessment on the effects of
silvicultural treatments for gypsy moth control is taking place on the
Monongahela and Wayne National Forests. The Forest Service also has two
assessments concerning hemlock woolly adelgid agency lands in western
North Carolina and on the Allegheny National Forest in Pennsylvania.
Title V--The Healthy Forest Reserve Program (HFRP)
HFRP is a voluntary program established to restore and enhance
forest ecosystems to: 1) promote the recovery of threatened and
endangered species; 2) improve biodiversity; and 3) enhance carbon
sequestration.
The program is authorized through 2008. Restoring and protecting
forests contributes positively to the economy of our Nation, provides
biodiversity of plant and animal populations, and improves
environmental quality. HRFP includes a safe harbor provision for
landowners who enroll and agree, for a specified period, to restore or
improve their land for threatened or endangered species habitat. In
exchange, they avoid future regulatory restrictions on the use of that
land protected under the Endangered Species Act.
On May 18, 2006, Under Secretary of Agriculture, Mark Rey announced
the availability of $2.3 million for the HFRP in selected forest
ecosystems. In FY 2006, HFRP will focus on habitat recovery for the
endangered red-cockaded woodpecker in the Lower Ouachita River Flatwood
region of Arkansas, the Canada lynx in the northern boreal forest of
Maine, and the gopher tortoise in the longleaf pine ecosystem along the
Gulf Coast in Mississippi. The work in the Lower Ouachita River area
will also benefit the very rare Ivory-billed woodpecker. Signup for
this program began June 19 and ended July 7, 2006.
Title VI--Forest Inventory/Monitoring and Early Warning Systems
Title VI directs the Secretary of Agriculture to carry out a
program to monitor forest stands on some National Forest System lands
and private lands to improve detection of and response to environmental
threats.
The Forest Service announced in October 2004 a national strategy to
prevent and control the threat of invasive species and non-native
plants on 193 million acres of the National Forest System and to guide
research and technical and financial assistance. The strategy focuses
on four key elements: preventing invasive species from entering the
country; finding new infestations before they spread; containing and
reducing existing infestations and restoring native habitats and
ecosystems. The strategy is relying on ``The Early Warning System for
Forest Health Threats in the United States,'' developed as part of
HFRA, which describes for the first time, in one place, the nation's
system for identifying and responding to forest health threats, and
includes web sites to obtain further information.
The Forest Service is proactively identifying potential threats and
treating pathways of entry that may bring invasives to the United
States. For example, we are conducting surveys of ports in the Russian
Far East for activity and infestations of the Asian variety of gypsy
moth in cooperation with the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service
(APHIS) and the nation of Russia. In 1992 alone, it cost USDA $32
million to eradicate an infestation of Asian gypsy moth in the United
States, so our early detection efforts could save millions of dollars
in eradication costs.
To facilitate the direction in Title VI, the Forest Service has
established two threat assessment centers to evaluate, on a broad scale
with our federal, state and local partners, the impacts of invasive
species and diseases and other threats to the health of ecosystems. The
Western Threat Assessment Center established in March 2005, in
Prineville, Oregon, shares facilities with the Ochoco National Forest,
and employs six permanent scientific and administrative staff and a
visiting scientist. The Eastern Threat Assessment Center was
established in October 20004 in Asheville, North Carolina. The center
is housed with the Southern Forest Research Station and plans to employ
five permanent staff and five visiting scientists.
The centers are developing user oriented technology and cutting
edge research on invasive species. Additionally, the Centers have
initiated a major cooperative venture with NASA's Stennis Space Center
to identify promising remote sensing and geospatial technologies for
early detection of environmental hazards and response or susceptibility
of forests to multiple stresses. This technology will be incorporated
within an early warning system that will use combinations of low and
high-resolution imagery with information gathered in field samples to
alert managers of developing threats.
outlook for future implementation of hfra
The Administration is committed to using the authorities of the
HFRA. We are encouraged by the innovative applications of the HFI and
HFRA authorities which truly are helping to restore healthy forest and
rangeland ecosystems. I also want to assure the American people that we
are doing everything we can to efficiently reduce hazardous fuels,
restore healthy forests and collaborate to protect communities. In June
I ordered the agency to begin an expedited review of our use of the
Healthy Forests tools which includes analyzing exiting data bases,
interviewing our employees, partners and stakeholders, and making field
visits to selected forests. We will use this information to identify
what is working well and what is not, and use this knowledge to improve
the overall performance and oversight of the HFI/HFRA authorities in
the hazardous fuels reduction program.
We know there is much work ahead of us. For example, small diameter
woody material makes up a considerable amount of hazardous fuels but is
extremely costly to remove and currently has little commercial value.
We will continue working with our partners exploring opportunities to
improve utilization of this material and reduce the cost of removing
these hazardous fuels. We will also continue working closely with
community organizations to increase public understanding of the need to
reduce hazardous fuels, and to increase public awareness that the
removal of some merchantable trees is a financially responsible and
ecologically appropriate part of that work. We know that in the end
what is important is that we are leaving a healthier, more resilient
forest on the landscape for future generations.
conclusion
Mr. Chairman, the HFI and HFRA authorities are proving to be very
helpful in our efforts to make significant improvements to the health
of this country's forests and rangelands. I would say that we also have
the need for similar tools to help us recover and restore areas after
natural events which are catastrophic in nature such as wildfires, wind
events, ice storms and insect and disease infestations. I have
testified for the administration in strong support of H.R. 4200, which
we believe provides the tools to allow us to expedite recovery and
restoration of lands following catastrophic events.
I would be happy to answer any questions the committee members may
have.
Senator Craig. Again, Chief and Nina we thank you for being
with us. Your report and your candidness I noted Chief when you
opened your testimony you used a key phrase. ``We've
accomplished that which has been funded'', the question that
won't get asked today but I'll put it on the record and that
is: How many acres you wished would have been funded that OMB
wouldn't allow you to fund? I think that's important to
understand because it is significant and it is an issue that I
think we're going to continue to struggle with here. And that
is not to suggest that OMB is totally wrong in how we shape our
priorities. But also the fact that we started well behind the
curve as related to the health of our forests and our ability
to deal with them in a timely fashion. I hear the frustration
of Senator Feinstein, I know that California got, you know $40
million over a 3 year period at a cost of about $8,000 per acre
and that's the reality of a problem we face in certain areas of
the Nation where commercial logging was long ago opposed and
largely stopped building any kind of infrastructure to deal
with it and to deal with the reality of mechanical thinning is
even more costly than in areas where there remains some
remanence of an industry that can cope with or handle or has
the talent to cooperate with the Forest Service on these
issues. It is a struggle but while we are critical it is
obvious progress is being made.
Chief, I'm pleased that Gail is here and that you've
introduced her, and I know that there are some projects being
delayed in region 1. It's possible Gail if you would come to
the table you could respond to and help us understand some of
the examples of the problem, what's happening on the ground,
why the delays, and what it means to get to these treatments
and get them completed.
One of the examples that has frustrated me is Mica Creek in
the northend in the Panhandle, Bonners Ferry Municipal
watershed. I mean this ought to be something that everybody's
concerned about. Here's a watershed that has burned twice in
the last 4 years and after restoration got wiped out by a cloud
burst, because obviously it didn't have the ability to sustain
itself post fire. And yet we've experienced considerable
delays, that ought to be an example of something the committee
would want to hear about, if you could react to it and any of
those other kinds of problems that deal with primarily urban
wildland interface.
Ms. Kimbell. Thank you, Senator. The Mica Creek project
that you speak of is a pretty unique project in that after the
recent fires in 2003 it was the chairman of the Tribe who got
together with the county commissioner and the mayor of Bonners
Ferry to meet with the district ranger to talk about what kind
of opportunities there might be for the community to work
together to plan something for the watershed, to be able to
anticipate future fire events, to improve the health and
condition of the city's watershed.
The watershed is just upstream from the reservation and in
the event of a catastrophic event--a further catastrophic event
all those who live on the reservation are just outside the
forest boundary were certainly at risk, their homes where at
risk. This collaborative effort has been working now for
several years. There was a tremendous effort made to include
all the diverse interests in the community and it has had a lot
of activity. I have visited the ranger district and visited
with the folks who established the collaborative. Just as they
thought they where able to--as they thought they were arriving
at a consensus there were actually some outside groups, some
folks from outside the community who chose to take issue with
the long ongoing collaborative effort and the consensus
decision and have really disrupted the process. Still even with
that we hope to have a decision come out of that effort
sometime this summer. But it has been long in coming.
Senator Craig. Thank you very much. Chief I know your staff
has worked to make the point with my staff that the Forest
Service's effort in Healthy Forest are just beginning to ramp
up. When we look at the 77,000 acres accomplished to date and
then we draw the conclusion as it relates to the 20 million
acres, it's going to take a couple hundred years here. The
optimist would look at the rate of increase in accomplishments
between fiscal 2005 and July of this year and believe that the
two agencies will complete 20 million acres in less time. The
visionary would look at this data and the over emphasis on the
use of fire in the Southeast and develop a strategy for change.
He or she would speed up the date when we could complete the 20
million acres, with most of that occurring in the overstock
forest stands in the West, where we have the most significant
problems. Can you provide the vision, the work plan, or the
outline of such a plan for the committee today?
I mean, where do you see us going in the next 3 years, 5
years as it relates to funding? What you've learned Nina you
can certainly chime in on this. I know there's a learning curve
here in part as we bring these agencies together in
collaborative ways, along with communities that the law
required. And at the same time use the tools of the act in a
way that doesn't find the agencies in court that bring interest
groups together in a way that's much more productive than in
part we've been.
Mr. Bosworth. There's a couple of things I'd like to say
first. There's been a couple comments regarding an over
emphasis in the South. And I'd like to sort of give my view of
that. Many acres--we've accomplished many acres through burning
in the South that's true. We probably pay some--it probably
costs us somewhere in the neighborhood of $25 to $30 an acre to
do that burning. Some of that is maintenance burning, the
problem if we didn't do that in the South it would take about 3
to 5 years, the rate the vegetation grows there and we'd be in
the same situation there that we are in many of the other areas
in the West. So it's very important I believe that we maintain
what we've accomplished. Especially when we can do it at a rate
of $25 to $30 an acre, as opposed to shifting all the dollars
to the West and then having to pay $100 or $200 or $300 an acre
to do the same thing in 5 or 6 years in the South. So to me the
issue is how do we increase the amount of work in the West, not
how do we decrease the amount of work in the South.
Now in terms of the--sort of vision you're asking about the
way I see it is, and the way that we need to be increasing the
amount of work that we get done is by reducing the cost per
acre over time. The way you reduce the cost per acre over time
is by getting an infrastructure in place, so that we can
utilize more of the material that's removed from the forest to
reduce the cost, so there's some value to that material. In
many of our real high costs areas we have some places that cost
a couple thousand dollars an acre and that's generally because
there's not much way to utilize that because the
infrastructures disappeared.
So we need to maintain the infrastructure where we have it.
We need to increase the infrastructure where we don't have it,
and over the next several years I think that as we develop
these collaborative approaches I think that would be very
helpful. I also think that there's some additional kinds of
authorities that we might want to discuss as time goes that
would be helpful in terms of helping to improve the
infrastructures. For example, some authorities for partnership
zones where we could establish some zones around communities
and be able to contract with some entity where we work together
in a collaborative way in a specific zone, and be able to
contract with an entity that would know that there going to
have the contract over the next several years so they'd be
willing to establish an infrastructure. I think that there's
some authorities along those lines that would be useful.
I also think some authorities along the lines of the Good
Neighbor Authority that we have in Colorado on a broader scale
would be something that we might want to have future discussion
on that would be helpful. I think that another thing that would
be helpful in helping us achieve our vision I think, would be
to take the objective process that we have in HFRA and be able
to apply that across the board in terms of projects in the
Forest Service. Right now our field people, every time they do
a project they have to say, okay now is this done under the
authorities of HFRA so that we have one appeal process, or no
wait a minute if it's done under another authority we've got a
different administrative review process. It's proven to be
very, very useful this process we have under HFRA. It'd be very
helpful to have that be more encompassing so that our folks
have one system that they're using and it's a good system like
the system that we have under HFRA.
So those are a few of the things that I would help us
achieve the vision of increasing significantly the amount of
acres that need to be done.
Senator Craig. Those are very thoughtful and helpful
proposals. Let me turn to my colleague Senator Wyden, Ron.
Senator Wyden. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chief I've been
trying to unpack essentially the arguments that you've been
making over the last couple of years. And they just simply, you
know don't add up. I mean we have heard now that the Forest
Service and the BLM have spent in the last two fiscal years 40
percent of there total fuels reduction work in the Southeast
United States. This is the area that contains less that 7
percent of the National Forest System, you know, lands. And
you've said that's because there's work that needs to be done
in the South, and we don't dispute that at all and we ought to
do it now and let's do it even at the expense of the West.
I mean it's sort of like pitting these two parts of the
country against each other which we have tried carefully not to
do. It doesn't make any sense, to me. But as we try to track
the numbers the central concern I have is that there is no
system for accountability.
Chairman Craig and I have been concerned that if you look
just under the Healthy Forest Reconstruction Act that's where
we're seeing the 77,368 acres treated out of the 20 million
target because we can measure it. But I know you would say that
much work is being done than that, I've heard that.
But then after you hear all the numbers rattled off in
these various accounts you can't get your arms around any clear
system to measure how this work is being accomplished. Is there
one place that you can give this subcommittee where we can see
the work done under the Healthy Forest Reconstruction Act, the
work done in the other areas, so that we could really unpack
these arguments that you're making?
Mr. Bosworth. Okay first I'd like to go back to the South
again for just a minute before I answer that question.
Because there's some number differences there. We've spent
about 17 percent of our dollars in the South.
Senator Wyden. We're talking about 40 percent of your total
fuels reduction work, that's the number that we have----
Mr. Bosworth. In terms of acres.
Senator Wyden. Right.
Mr. Bosworth. We've accomplished a lot more in the south
but that's because we do it at about $25 to $30 an acre.
Senator Wyden. We've heard that, we've heard that argument,
but you're still pitting the South against the West and much of
the West has been a blaze in the last you know few weeks. We're
not seeing that in other parts of the country, and that's why
we've got to respond to our constituents.
Mr. Bosworth. I don't believe that, we're not trying to pit
one part of the country against the next. What we're trying to
do is allocate the dollars out in an effective way. Seventeen
percent in the Southern region those 14, 15, or 16 States
doesn't seem it fits in with the, I think an appropriate
disaggregation of the dollars that we do get.
But when you can get the job done for much less cost, than
their going to achieve more acres with that. That seems
appropriate from my standpoint.
Ms. Hatfield. And if I might interrupt in terms of the
Department of the Interior in the South, we've spent about $28
million, $29 million as compared to $170 million in Oregon, and
$120 in California, $113 million in Idaho. So the vast majority
of the money that we have on hazardous fuels----
Senator Wyden. Let me see if I can get an answer to the
question. Is there one place where we can see all of these
accounts and actually add up what is being accomplished?
Because even under the Healthy Forest Reconstruction Act the
numbers are just all thrown together. There's not a list of the
projects and what we'd really like to see is the projects under
these various funding sources in one place, so that we can
really make an evaluation of whether the tax payers are getting
there monies worth and this work is getting done.
Mr. Bosworth. We can show you the acres that we accomplish
monthly, in terms of fuels treatment.
Senator Wyden. Projects. I'm talking about the projects and
how much is being spent on a project under the various funding
sources.
Mr. Bosworth. We don't necessarily keep it by funding
sources. We don't keep, you know, we keep a total of how many
acres we accomplish. If we accomplish fuels treatment in an
area, we can tell you the project, we can tell you the number
of acres, we can tell you whether it was in the wildland urban
interface or whether it wasn't, we can also tell whether we did
it with prescribed burning or whether we did it with mechanical
means.
Senator Wyden. Mr. Bosworth, when you came with Mr. Rey, in
March 2004 we expressed concern at that time that we weren't
making enough progress in terms of getting these projects off
the ground. Mr. Rey said and I'll quote here, ``Our goal is
over the next couple of years to double that to where we are
treating eight to nine million acres a year.'' So if you look
at what has been accomplished even in relation to what we where
told, it comes back to that fact that we are light years behind
what the Senate envisioned and I want to know what's going to
be done to change that.
Mr. Bosworth. In 2003, I believe that together we where at
about 2.5 million acres, 2.6 million acres somewhere in that
vicinity. For 2006 to date right now we're at about 4.5 million
acres. That's a significant increase from where we where I
think what Undersecretary Mark Rey said is being accomplished.
It's a significant increase over what we did 2 years ago.
Senator Wyden. Again if you use just the statute and that's
really all that we can look at in terms of trying to breakdown
where this money is going. Under title I, we're only seeing
77,368 acres, it's 1 percent of the 20 million acre goal. So,
I'd like to get beyond throwing figures back and forth at each
other, because I will tell you I cannot coherently track all
this mumbo jumbo. We've gotta see the specific accounts, and
see where the money is going for various projects.
Let me if I might ask you about one other comment that you
made Chief. You said that you were going to be able to in
effect, do more with less. You said, and I'll quote. ``By
coming up with new processes and new tools that allow us to be
able to spend more dollars on the ground, less dollars going
through processing paperwork, categorical exclusions, we can
work more effectively.'' That was essentially your argument.
What new processes, specifically have you been putting into
effect? Because I think Senator Feinstein made the point that a
lot of us are concerned that you don't seem to be using the
tools, even under the law, so again let's try to unpack what
you said in the past, and what new processes are you using so
that you can get more with less?
Mr. Bosworth. Well some of the kinds of things that we've
done under the healthy forest initiative, have been helpful.
Things like counterpart regulations with fish and wildlife
service in the north fisheries, to be able to improve the
ability to consult, and when we have threatened or endangered
species, to make that go faster. With some of the categorical
exclusions, that we've added to increase the speed with which
we can get some of the work done. And let me just give you an
example, if I may. In early June there was a tornado that
occurred in Idaho on the Payette National Forest, near the
small community of Bear. There was a--for that area, that was a
pretty significant amount of blow down. It was about a mile
wide, and about 13 or 14 miles long of trees all blown down.
Within 9 days, we had our first small timber sale to open up
some of the roads by the end of September, we will--using the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act authorities--we will have sold,
well made a decision and completed that, to move forward and
sell it. That's 4\1/2\ months, or 4 months. That's fairly quick
to be able to go after about 25 million board feet of blow down
and to deal with a significant fuels problem that's occurred
there.
Another example would be Hurricane Katrina, within 6 to 8
months after Hurricane Katrina, using the Healthy Forest
Restoration Act program--authorities, we treated 115,000 acres
and removed over 300 million board feet of timber. And we did
that with the environmental community, and the business
community side by side.
Those authorities work very well in certain areas. What I'm
telling our people is get the work done on the ground. I want
them to figure out which of the authorities is the best, I'm
not telling them to get the work done on the ground using the
HFRA authorities. I'm telling them to get the work done on the
ground, using the best authority available.
Senator Wyden. My time is up. We want to get the work done
on the ground as well Chief. But it is impossible with this
mumbo jumbo of facts and figures flowing from all these areas,
get a sense whether the taxpayers are getting their money--I
want to put into the record Mr. Chairman and analysis
indicating that a variety of the provisions in the Healthy
Forest Restoration Act, have either not been implemented or
have only minimally been implemented, it involves titles II and
III, watershed, insect and disease fighting, is something that
concerns Senator Salazar and I thank you for the time.
Senator Craig. Senator thank you.
Senator Smith.
Senator Smith. Thank you Mr. Chairman. I want to, before I
question our witnesses, welcome the Oregonians who are here,
three county commissioners, Anna Morrison from Lane County,
Steve Grasty from Harney County, and Colleen MacLeod from Union
County. And Colleen will be testifying on the next panel, so
welcome.
Chief Bosworth, 4 years ago, we had the Biscuit fire and
the Forest Service has won, 13 out of 13 lawsuits relative to
that fire, and salvage efforts that have been made, yet there
are only 640 acres of that salvage that remain before the Ninth
Circuit, this represents one/one thousand of the half a million
acres of that fire. One/one thousandth.
Unfortunately my State of Oregon has joined Green Peace and
others in seeking an injunction on that and I wonder if you can
give us any update on salvage on the Biscuit fire.
Mr. Bosworth. The Mikes Gulch timber sale, which is
currently one of the last of some of the projects there, we've
been through court a few times on that, we won the last time,
we have awarded that timber sale--that's for like 261 or 265
acres. It's in a roadless area, a roadless that's surrounded on
three sides by roads and that particular timber sale will use
only helicopters, so there would be no road construction. The
purchaser is free to----
Senator Smith. So, no roads are being built in the roadless
area?
Mr. Bosworth. There will be no roads, no landings, all logs
are being flown out to roaded areas. The purchaser can go in
whenever he wants. He's chosen to wait until after August 4,
due to some more legal issues, but the sale has been awarded
and we are expecting to move forward with that.
Senator Smith. When Mark Rey was in Pendleton, he made a
promise that the Wallowa-Whitman, the Umatilla and the Malheur
National Forest would be added to the Washington office review
of the Healthy Forest Initiative implementation. Can you give
me any update on whether they have been added to the review.
Mr. Bosworth. Yes, they have been added to the review. I
would like to point out that the review that we're doing--that
we're attempting to find out again what's working, what's not
working, what improvements could be made, and so there is a
number of ways that we're approaching that. One is to go out
and visit some of the forests and talk to both the Forest
Service folks who are working with it as well as our partners
that are trying to work with us.
Another approach is by sending some questionnaires out so
we can get to a lot more people and find out, again, and answer
some question. We'll evaluate the feedback that we get and then
figure out what kinds of adjustments that we need to make.
Whether it be additional training of our folks, whether it need
to be some adjustments to our approaches or whether we need to
come back to you and ask for some additional authorities.
Senator Smith. Chief, can you speak to the issue of--how
does a Forest Service evaluate maintaining milling and
infrastructure? In my opening comments I expressed concern
about losing it all, and if you lose anymore, the cost of the
Healthy Forest Initiative, your cost, grow exponentially and I
wonder if you factor that in, in terms of the overall Forest
Service program and specifically as it relates to the Healthy
Forest Initiative.
Mr. Bosworth. Well, there's several ways of looking at it.
There's sort of the national approach in what are we doing at a
national level and what's the overall infrastructure. But, most
effectively, it's each regional forest or a forest supervisor
understanding their area and where the infrastructure is within
their particular forest by working with the mill owners,
understanding how much volume they're going to need over time
in order to stay in business. And then also understanding what
the adjacent land owners and other agencies such as the Bureau
of Land Management might be able to provide and working
together, we should be able to keep providing the level that
they need. We don't always get that done. But we generally
understand, or have a pretty good understanding of what is
necessary in order to keep enough raw material supply so that
infrastructure can stay in place.
Senator Smith. So, it's a priority, it's important?
Mr. Bosworth. It is important. As you said, if we lose that
infrastructure, the costs go up significantly. Here we're
trying to get more infrastructure, it'd be crazy to lose what
we have and we don't want that to happen.
Senator Smith. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Craig. Thank you very much, Gordon.
Senator Feinstein.
Senator Feinstein. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Chief, let me ask you this question. What would you say, in
terms of frequency of big fires devastation, are the top five
States for this kind of fire?
Mr. Bosworth. California would probably be at the top of
the list. I think Arizona and New Mexico these days, are both
very high on the list. Colorado and Alaska is, from a number of
acre standpoint, in terms of numbers of communities or the
number of people in communities affected, Alaska wouldn't be as
high as say New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado and California,
but in terms of numbers of acres that get burned, it's huge.
Senator Feinstein. See, what I think we tried to do when we
crafted this bill was give you, sort of, new authorities to be
able to proceed and to better prioritize. I mean, I was
dumbstruck when they told me most of these monies have gone
into the Southeast where you don't have the frequency of big
devastating fire like we do in other places.
Mr. Bosworth. But, Senator, the money hasn't gone to the
South. Only 17 percent of the money has gone to the South. More
acres get accomplished in the South, but only 17 percent of the
dollars that we have, have gone to the South. I think that the
numbers that get----
Senator Feinstein. The big acreages are in the West.
Mr. Bosworth. And that's why the bulk of the money--that's
why 83 percent of the dollars are going to the West. Because we
have the huge acres. In the South, we have a lot of Wildland
Urban Interface, we have fewer acres of forest, we have--almost
every forest is involved with homes and communities around it.
But, again, that 17 percent is about an appropriate amount
that, I believe, should continue to the South. And I think that
the larger amount, you know, the 80 percent, 75 to 80 percent
that goes to the West is appropriate.
Senator Feinstein. Well, let me ask you this question, and
Mr. Chairman and ranking member, I wonder if it makes some
sense for us to do some special legislation for those States
that burn the most often, where the fires are the most
devastating, where the property loss is greatest, to begin to
get some special help in there. I think California, now, is
going to burn every year. Global warming is playing a role. I
mean, I have been just struck by the fact the repetition of
these southern Californian fires and they are huge. Now, this
is a lightning strike that started, I gather, that started this
last big fire. That maybe we need to set some priority where
these States that are really hit hard have some special help.
Senator Wyden. Well, the Senator is being way too logical
and heaven forbid that logic breakout over this, but that is
exactly what we want to do in the law and I want to follow up
with the Senator, I know the chairman does as well.
Senator Feinstein. It doesn't work out that way because, if
I just may for a moment more, because they get, can I put it
this way, more bang for the buck in terms of working in these
other areas. Therefore, I mean, if I were you, I'd probably do
the same thing, you want to accomplish something, therefore,
you go where it's the easiest to accomplish and not more
difficult and more expensive to accomplish. So, perhaps you
could reflect on that for a moment, Chief.
Mr. Bosworth. I believe that we're going to, generally, to
the highest priority areas. I will say that when we have years
like the last 2 years, we had excellent burning conditions, I
mean, for prescribed burning around the country. And we did a
higher percentage of our fuels treatment work when we had good
conditions to do prescribed burning we used--we took the
opportunity in those years to do more prescribed burning.
This year has not been a good year, from a weather
standpoint, to do prescribed burning, so we move more into
using mechanical. That's more expensive. You get fewer acres
done, but we still are working on the high priority acres.
I'd like to use the example of San Bernadino. We're working
very closely with MAST, the Mountain Area Safety Task Force.
Together we set the priorities, which presumably, based upon
the local people, believe that those are the highest priorities
and those are the places that we go to to do the treatments.
Senator Feinstein. Yes, let me just say one thing. I have
heard from residents who have been part of larger fires that
the treatment really does work. I've had people come to me and
say, you know, I didn't believe it in the beginning, but we had
this Community Protection Plan, we got together, we did it, we
cleared some brush and it saved my house when there was a fire.
So, we know it works. But the question is, how do we do more of
it? Because the acreage is so vast.
Mr. Bosworth. That's difficult for me to say, you know,
you're asking about which five States, for example. It's
difficult for me to say that our dollars all go to those five
States.
Senator Feinstein. I didn't say all----
Mr. Bosworth. No, no----
Senator Feinstein. I said a special----
Mr. Bosworth. The higher priority.
Senator Feinstein. Right.
Mr. Bosworth. We're looking, right now, we're working on a
process for prioritizing our fuels dollars. That, and we're
working together with the Department of the Interior and we're
taking into account the values at risk, the amount of fuel, in
other works, the level of fuel, the efficiency of each, you
know--the efficiency of the operation.
We're not trying to compare the South with the West, again
in terms of efficiency, we're looking at if--we're trying to
compare that efficiency on a, you know--with itself. In other
words, isn't San Bernadino getting better in terms of their
efficiency each year? That would give them some extra points.
We want to see people improving their efficiency by using the
tools. So, those are some of the criteria that we'd be using
for allocating the dollars in 2007, that would help get to the
highest priority areas because, again, if the values at risk
are the highest, then that's where more of the money will go.
I'd be happy to have our folks work with your staff and kind of
go over that system that we want to implement that--to get the
dollars to the highest priority areas.
Senator Feinstein. Well, if you do that, we'd like to work
with you and I'd appreciate that very much, thank you. Thanks
Mr. Chairman.
Senator Craig. Senator, thank you very much.
Senator Murkowski.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, and I want to follow up on
this issue of the prioritization so that I can understand it
better. Up north, we've got, within the Chugach National
Forest, we've got more than 5 million acres up there. It's the
second largest unit in the National Forest System. You've all
heard about the amount of spruce bark beetle kill and the
infestation into those lands as well as on the other Federal
lands there on the Kenai Peninsula. We've got population
centers in Kenai and Soldotna and Anchor Point and Homer. These
are not--this is not up north in the interior where every few
hundred miles, you might have a village. This is a Peninsula
that is populated and is infested and is part of your
management system.
What can you do to assure me that the prioritization for
the folks down on the Kenai Peninsula is up there, in other
words, it's getting its fare share of the hazardous fuel
reduction funding the activity there and perhaps, Gail, if you
can give me any specifics as to what exactly are we seeing on
the ground up there?
Mr. Bosworth. I do believe that the Kenai Peninsula for the
Forest Service in Alaska is a priority, so the dollars that we
get that go there are going to be going to the Kenai. One of
the difficulties on the Kenai is that so much of that is
private land, and of course, there's different pots of money,
but----
Senator Murkowski. No, not so much of it is private land,
as you know, we have less than 1 percent of private land in the
entire State. You've got pockets of it that do complicate it, I
will grant you that.
Mr. Bosworth. Yes, and in the Kenai, it does add that
complexity, and again, that makes these Community Wildfire
Protection Plans that much more critical. But, as we're
developing those Community Wildfire Protection Plans, those are
the places that we had the priority to in terms of identifying
those priorities.
Again, I'd be happy to visit about the priorities and to
visit about our approach in disaggregating the dollars out to
the regions, because, you know, there's several things that
would be effective in terms of the Kenai, there's high risk
there, because of the amount of fuel that's build up, because
of all the dead spruce that's there, so that adds to the, sort
of the importance of the Kenai.
Values at risk are associated with--more with communities
or with watersheds in terms of municipal water shed, and so for
places that don't have as many people, then they would be lower
in terms of the priority and then those that have bigger
communities and more communities would have--there are more
people at risk would raise it. We're using all those different
factors in determining where to get the dollars at.
Senator Murkowski. Well, what I want to understand, you
know, there used to be a time when Alaska burned during the
summer and because it was out in remote areas, the mindset was,
we just let it burn. If it's getting close to property or
villages or communities, then we intervene. But, for the most
part, it was a let it burn theory and I don't want that whole
State up there to be viewed on a map as, that's just one area
where we know we get 11 thunder strikes, a day, or excuse me,
lightning strikes a day and fires are just going to burn up
there. I want to know that when we've got an area like the
Chugach, like the Kenai Peninsula that that has a
prioritization because of the number of communities that we
have down there, the property at stake, and I guess what we do
need to do is sit down, so that I can fully understand what the
priority is, what we're seeing with the projects there to know
that this second largest unit in the national forest system is
getting some attention.
Mr. Bosworth. And again, I agree with you, the Chugach and
the Kenai needs to get just as much attention as any other
forest that's in the lower 48 that has communities that has----
Senator Murkowski. And has a high risk.
Mr. Bosworth. Insect and disease problems and it should and
I believe it does, but I'd be happy to go over that, have
someone go over that with your staff to show how that's
happening.
Senator Murkowski. Let me ask you a question, Ms. Hatfield,
and this came to my attention by some folks within the Kenai
Peninsula Borough. As you know, on the eastern side of the
Kenai Peninsula, you're bordered by the Chugach National
Forest, but the western portion, which is where we've got more
of the population there on the Kenai, this is bordered by the
Kenai National Wildlife Refuge and I understand that the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act does not require that the refuge
system participate in the hazardous fuels reduction effort and
there's some question as to whether or not the title I funding
can be used to address the risks in the refuge versus urban
interface there. So, the question that I've got to you is, as
we're looking to prevent the wildfires, as we're looking to
kind of reduce some of the risks, is this something where we
need to amend the act to allow for fuels reduction on refuge
areas?
Ms. Hatfield. Well, we do have the use of our hazardous
fuel reduction dollars in any of the areas that are related to
the interior land. Now, the issue about the HFRA would be the
specific tool of--some of the tools that are in the HFRA, but
there are other tools like the categorical exclusions,
stewardship contracting, other tools that would not prohibit us
from being able to treat areas around the refuge, even though--
--
Senator Murkowski. Around the refuge or in the refuge?
Ms. Hatfield. In the refuge or around the refuge--in the
refuge. We can still use the hazardous fuel dollars for the
refuge, just like we would with BLM lands.
Senator Murkowski. Okay.
Ms. Hatfield. The issue is really whether or not the HFRA
tools specifically would be used by the refuge and I'm saying
our suite of tools that the refuge can use a lot of other tools
that would allow them to do hazardous fuel reduction in Alaska,
just like the BLM might use the HFRA tool on some of its lands.
So, it's a matter of selection of tools in the entire tool box,
rather than the fact they can't do, they can certainly do
hazardous fuel reductions there too.
Senator Murkowski. Do they have the full array of the tools
then, is that what I'm understanding you say?
Ms. Hatfield. They have the full array of tools except for
HFRA. But they do have, like, they have the categorical
exclusions, they have the stewardship, now I'll take that back,
they don't have the stewardship contracting, but they can do
the NEPA, they can use the categorical exclusions they have
been able to do treatments and we can certainly share with you
what we were doing in particular on that refuge.
Senator Murkowski. I'd like to know the specifics on that.
I appreciate that, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Craig. Thank you very much, Lisa.
Senator Salazar.
Senator Salazar. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Chief
Bosworth, let me say, first to you and to Assistant Secretary
Hatfield, you have a very, very tough job and I think we all
recognize the enormity of the challenges that you face.
Let me say that in my State of Colorado, the way that I see
the bark beetle infestation and the one and a half million
acres that have been infected and the several more million
acres that we anticipate being infected, that I basically look
at Colorado as very similar to Katrina. I see it as a Katrina
of the West because just like in the case of Katrina, we could
see the hurricane coming up through the gulf coast, we
recognized probably 48 hours before landfall that it was going
to be a devastating hurricane, and yet the Government did not
do enough, in my view and I think in the judgment of all those
who have reviewed, it was a rather inept response on the part
of the Federal Government and other governments to deal with
the issue of Katrina and now we find ourselves paying billions
and billions of dollars for the reconstruction of the gulf
coast.
I see a lot of analogies to the problems that we face with
the fire in the West and in my State and frankly, as tough as
our job is, your job is, it just seems to me that we simply are
not doing enough. When I look at the funding, for example, that
we have set about for 2006, we're not providing the funding to
do the hazardous fuels treatment that we could be doing.
My numbers are that in Colorado, we have 240,000 acres of
lands that have been approved for treatment, they've already
gone through the whole NEPA process and they're simply waiting
for treatment. But that we only have enough money to basically
undertake the treatment for 25 percent of those acres, so that
75 percent gap there concerns me because we could be doing more
and we are not because of the funding issue. So, I would like
you to comment on that and how we might be able to get up to a
point where we are doing as much as we possibly can to address
the issue.
Mr. Bosworth. Over the last 2 years, and this isn't just on
the front range, but throughout Colorado, we've accomplished
about 200,000 acres of fuels treatment, somewhere in the
neighborhood of 200,000 acres. I just recently flew over some
of the insect infested areas in Colorado and there's no
question that it's a huge issue there.
Again, the long term approach has to be finding ways to be
able to utilize that material, getting the infrastructure in
place so that we can reduce the cost per acre. The Forest
Service is part of a couple of collaborative groups. The people
along the front are working very closely together to both
figure out where the highest priority areas are that we should
be treating and those are the areas that we're going after and
we're looking at, together with the private land owners in the
State and everyone, so that we're treating the acres, not just
because it's our national forest, but the acres that are the
most important, whether it's private land owners or whether
it's State or whether it's national forest BLM, to make sure
that we're getting the right acres and we're strategically
locating those treatments to where they'll make the biggest
difference.
Senator Salazar. Let me just ask, to point the question,
maybe get a little more clarity, though, if you had the money,
we could move, in Colorado, from the treatment of 80,000 acres
up to 240,000 acres. My understanding is that it's simply a
budgetary shortfall that is keeping us from moving up to the
240,000 acres of hazardous fuel treatment that's already been
approved by NEPA. Is it a money issue?
Mr. Bosworth. I believe that you're numbers, from my
recollection, are very close. You asked if we had additional
dollars, we'd treat additional acres, that's correct. So----
Senator Salazar. Let me say----
Mr. Bosworth. And there are a couple hundred thousand
acres, excuse me, there are a couple hundred thousand acres, I
believe, are through the NEPA process, on the shelf.
Senator Salazar. Okay, let me also say that as tough as
this problem is, it's going to take the work of a lot of people
working on it together and I appreciate the work of the Forest
Service staff on the ground working with the several task
forces that we've put together to try to address the issue. I
think it's local government, State government, the private
sector as well as the Forest Service that ultimately will help
us in making sure that we have a good plan that we can do as
much as we can to help address the problem.
Let me quickly, because I know I don't have a lot of time
here, moving quickly over to this biomass issue, I know that
under, I think it was title II of HFRA, there was research and
grants provided into biomass energy production. We talk a lot
about it in Colorado. Can you just give us a one minute
encapsulation of what you're doing with respect to the biomass
research and funding of grants for these projects in the west
and maybe across the country?
Mr. Bosworth. There were, I believe, five grants made
originally that totaled up about $5 million, somewhere in that
vicinity. Those were, I can't tell you specifically which areas
they were awarded to, I believe one was awarded to someone in
Colorado. They're a combination of research, technology, I
think some of them are, sort of, public education to try to
help figure out how to educate the public better on things that
they can do in and around their homes and property. Ways to
motivate people to do the right thing on terms of treating the
lands. There's also some that have to do with better
utilization and new ways of utilizing small diameter material
to effectively use that economically so that it will lower the
cost on the per acre basis. I'd be happy to get you a more in
depth report on that. I think we've gotten like a first or
second quarter report that's either about out or is out.
Senator Salazar. I would, Chief Bosworth, appreciate very
much receiving the description of those five projects so that
we can learn in other areas of my State, and I'm sure my
colleagues would want to learn as well and I look forward to
meeting with you and with your staff to push this issue forward
because it's an issue that I know concerns you and concerns all
of us. Thank you very much.
Mr. Bosworth. I'd be happy to do that, thank you.
Senator Craig. Ken, thank you very much, now let me turn to
the Senator from Wyoming, Senator Craig Thomas.
Senator Thomas. Thank you, sir. I'll be very quick, thank
you Chief and Secretary. Obviously lots of challenges in this
thing and lots of acres that's hard to get to. Are you
specifically limited to Wildlife Urban Interface issue areas?
Mr. Bosworth. Wildland Urban Interface? No, we're required
to do 50 percent in the Wildland Urban Interface. We have done
about--I think the Forest Service is about 65 percent, but we
also--we're looking for the highest priority areas, which often
is in the Wildland Urban Interface, but it may be in a
municipal watershed, in or around a municipal watershed or an
area that has threatened or endangered species habitat that's
very critical. There's a number of reasons why it might go to
different areas.
Senator Thomas. Yeah, I understand, but we haven't had any
in Wyoming at this point, as a matter of fact and we do have
quite a bit of forest.
You testified that, in your testimony that you created
23,000 acres and 71 treatments and before Katrina, 62,000 acres
and 138 treatments. What's the meaning of the word treatment?
Mr. Bosworth. Well, generally, when we're referring to a
number of treatments, there will be a unit that--it's either an
area that we have thinned, we'd refer to that as a treatment, a
thinning treatment. Prescribed burning would be a treatment.
So, those are really----
Senator Thomas. Is that synonymous with any EPA decisions
and how many NEPA decisions have you made?
Mr. Bosworth. No, it wouldn't be synonymous with a number
of decisions. We may go through an Environmental Impact
Statement, make a decision on a large landscape area and then
have a number of different projects that we would accomplish
across that landscape. It may be, again, if it's with a
community wildfire protection plan, we may do an Environmental
Impact Statement for the whole area. It's a little different--
--
Senator Thomas. It seems a little peculiar that out of the
23,000 acres 71 treatments, that's only 300 and some acres per
treatment. Why isn't it more efficient to do 1,000 or 5,000
acres?
Mr. Bosworth. It generally is more efficient to get more
acres accomplished, but it depends upon----
Senator Thomas. Well, that isn't the way that you've done
it.
Mr. Bosworth. Well, it depends on the particular area and
sometimes it's more effective to do some smaller treatments,
thinning or prescribed burning, that are strategically located
that will protect a larger area than itself. What I'm trying to
get at is that doing a number of treatments that are not right
next to each other can sometimes protect a larger area so you
don't have to treat every acre.
Senator Thomas. Well, I understand, it must be difficult,
but it seems like efficiency, you'd be more efficient, you'd be
able to go into an area to do more than just 300 acres. That's
not very large in terms of forests.
Mr. Bosworth. That's also why we generally try to do a
large area, from a NEPA standpoint, doing an Environmental
Impact Statement----
Senator Thomas. I would think so.
Mr. Bosworth. We'd try to do it for a larger area rather
than doing a whole bunch of small ones.
Senator Thomas. We'd do to much of our time doing NEPA
statements as opposed to actually doing the treatments and I
understand that, okay. Thank you Mr. Chairman, I'll let you go
on with----
Senator Craig. Craig, thank you for being with us and
asking those questions. I'd like to do a second round, but our
time is not going to permit that. Obviously, all have
demonstrated very real concern. I said, as we legislated the
Healthy Forest Act, that we have largely lost the confidence of
the American public as related to the management of our
forests, that we're going to have to crawl before we walked
again and then before we ran, we would have to walk. I think
we've kind of come up out of the crawl and clearly you are
accomplishing things. We are entering areas and asking for
categorical exclusions and are asking the public for permission
to do certain things that heretofore would have been contested
and yet much of what you're trying to do is still questioned
and resisted by many, even though it is clearly within the
purview of a healthy forest or restoring the health of a forest
and I'm quite confident that we're going to have to continue to
gain that confidence, and in doing so, give you a greater
resource and I think you're going to hear from my colleague,
and let me turn to Ron for additional comment, a question of
accountability as to where that resource goes.
Senator Wyden. Chief, just as we leave, you're going to get
us now, something that's going to allow us something resembling
English to see where all of this money is going in the various
forest health accounts, is that correct?
Mr. Bosworth. I will be happy to work with your staff to
figure out what it is that would be useful from you're
standpoint and what we have and what we keep track of.
Senator Wyden. Well, I will tell you, what we have on the
record, I mean, here's Mr. Rey, for example, in March 2004, he
said, I'll just quote here, ``We will be on a path to address
this problem in 8 to 10 years.'' Now, if you look at the title
I money, something you can actually, you know, measure, the 20
million goal in the Forest Health Act, we're at 77,000 acres.
That doesn't indicate we're going to turn anything around in 8
to 10 years. In fact, we're going to turn around, by that
calculation, in centuries not years. So, we need you to give us
information that is going to allow us to adequately track these
accounts so we can see that this work is getting done, the
taxpayer money is being spent wisely.
And finally I'd want to wrap up that looking again at what
we were told in March 2004, you all made it very clear that you
could use existing money to get this key work done. Today you
are coming and saying, essentially, gosh, we'd like to do all
this work that Senator Feinstein wants to see done and Senator
Murkowski wants to get done, but we just don't have enough, you
know, money. So, what you've said even on funding today, and I
have looked at what you said in March 2004, you didn't say
anything in March 2004, when the program was getting under way,
that you needed the kind of funding that you're saying that you
need today.
So, we're going to need to follow up on this. We're going
to do it in a bi-partisan way. I work very closely with the
administration on the forest health legislation, still have the
welts on my back to show for it, I'd say, and I want to get
this act carried out and carried out properly and as always, I
intend to work very closely with the chairman and we did that
when I was chair, we do it when he is chair and I thank you
very much, Mr. Chairman for scheduling this hearing.
Mr. Bosworth. Mr. Chairman, I would like to respond.
Senator Craig. Please do.
Mr. Bosworth. Again, we will, by the end of next year, I
expect between the Department of the Interior and the Forest
Service, we will have accomplished around somewhere between 20
and 25 million acres of fuels treatment since the National Fire
Plan was established. I'm not telling our people that they need
to use the HFRA authorities. I am telling them that they need
to get the job done using whatever authorities work the best
for them.
We're not lagging behind, I didn't come here to say that we
need a bunch more money, what I came here to say was that we
are using the authorities we have available, and quite frankly
because Congress passed HFRA with such support, that's helped
us with some of the healthy forest initiatives that we have
through regulatory processes and we're using those authorities
as well.
So, from my perspective, what you would want is for us to
get the job done on the ground, not necessarily always using
the HFRA authority to do it. That you'd want us to get the job
done on the ground for the cheapest price and the quickest way.
That's what we're trying to do. That's why we're going to have
between 20 and 25 million acres accomplished since the National
Fire Plan was completed.
Ms. Hatfield. And I might add that the Community Wildfire
Protection Plans have been just invaluable to us in terms of
prioritizing to get to the right acres and I would agree with
the Chief that we're trying to get to the right acres to reduce
the most risk.
Senator Craig. Well, we thank you very much. We know that
the right acres are transitional in reality in the West
especially where the Urban Wildland Interface continues to
creep outward and folks still choose to build their dream home
amongst the trees only to find out that they build it in a
firebox and there has to be, and I've said it at every one of
our hearings that deals with fires, there has to be a private
responsibility tied with a public responsibility and a State
responsibility in combination. We'll obviously stay very close
to you on this issue, both Ron Wyden and I are passionate about
it as we deal with this issue.
Ranking members, just to turn, Jeff, do you have any
questions of this group?
Senator Bingaman. No, I did not, I'm going to ask the next
panel.
Senator Craig. Okay, fine enough. With that, we'll excuse
you and thank you very much for your time here. Gail it's good
to see you.
Ms. Kimbell. Thank you, it's good to see you.
Senator Craig. We'll see you out West, all right?
Mr. Bosworth. Thank you.
Ms. Kimbell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Wyden. Mr. Chairman, as our witnesses are coming
up, I want to join Senator Smith in welcoming some Oregonians.
We've got Ann Morrison from Lane County, Judge Steve Grasty
from Harney County, Colleen MacLeod, who's going to be
testifying from Union County, we thank you all for coming. I
had a town meeting in Canyon City just a few days ago, so I'm
glad you're all here and look forward to talking with you as
well.
Senator Craig. Ron, thank you very much. Now, we'll invite
our second panel forward. We thank you all very much for being
with us, and Jeff, I noticed you have a constituent here from
Ruidoso, would you choose to introduce our first panelist.
Senator Bingaman. Well, I'm glad to, Mr. Chairman, thank
you very much. Rick DeIaco is extremely well recognized in our
State as the forester for the village of Ruidoso, and does a
great job. He gave me a wonderful tour of their various
efforts--their thinning efforts that they're engaged in some
several months ago when we were out there, I think it was
February. But, any rate, he has a lot of insights into what
ought to be happening in many communities around this country.
Senator Craig. Jeff, thank you very much, we also have
Matthew Koehler, executive director, WildWest Institute of
Missoula and of course, your constituent, Ron, Colleen MacLeod,
commissioner, Union County testifying on behalf of the
Association of Counties from La Grande, Jay Jensen, executive
director of the Counsel of Western State Foresters from
Lakewood, Colorado. Rick, we'll start with you.
STATEMENT OF RICK DEIACO, DIRECTOR OF FORESTRY, VILLAGE OF
RUIDOSO, LINCOLN COUNTY, NM
Mr. DeIaco. Thank you sir. Thank you Mr. Chairman, members
of the subcommittee. Thank you for this opportunity to testify
on the progress of the Healthy Forest Initiative and
specifically on the Healthy Forest Restoration Act and its
effects on the Wildland Urban Interface and its relationship
with the Forest Service and communities.
In general, Ruidoso has exercised their--or has enjoyed a
wonderful relationship with the Forest Service. On a larger
level, we have some specific things that have come up now with
regard to Healthy Forest Restoration and I'm hoping that some
of my examples that we've been using in, that I'll bring up
around Ruidoso, maybe might have broader perspective across the
country.
I'm going to give you a little background on Ruidoso for
those who haven't visited or haven't gotten your free ski pass,
which our Chamber of Commerce would be more than happy to issue
to you. And talk more about collaborativeness, accountability
and performance measures. Because that's really what I was
hearing with the other panel and some of the concerns of
Senators.
We've got a wonderful program here with HFRA and it almost
seems, in my mind, that you have put together a Maserati and
you tossed them the keys. But there's a big organization out
there, and a lot of those folks in that organization, don't
know how to drive a stick shift. So, we need to get some
performance measures, we need to get some training and, again,
the things that I'll be talking about--the points I'll be
hitting on right here are a subset of what's going on. There's
a number of wonderful things going on out there with the Forest
Service. But there are some real serious problems and they are
affecting HFRA and I believe, in my mind, that some of these
have to with the way collaboration is.
But let me start with Ruidoso and a little bit of
background with Ruidoso. Ruidoso is located in south central
New Mexico in the Sacramento Mountains at about 7,000 feet of
elevation, large stands of Ponderosa pine mixed conifers.
Tourism and enjoyment of the natural environment is the key
economic driver. If we don't have the environment, we don't go
anywhere, we need it. The gross receipts tax finances of
municipality, and that means tourists.
In 2000, Ruidoso was assessed by the State of New Mexico as
the number one community at risk to catastrophic wildfire and
U.S. Forest Service rated us number two in the Nation. That's
not one of those things you put up on the Chamber of Commerce
marque. It's something you get busy with quick and our Village
Council did. We hired a forester, we've got a forestry
department and over time, we have put together mandating
ordinances--a whole suite of ordinances that deal with new
construction with fuels management on every square foot of the
village of Ruidoso.
So, when we talk about communities and Community Wildfire
Protection Plans, etcetera, we are not looking for a handout,
and I think there are communities out there that are. And I
don't mean that in a bad way, looking for a handout,
communities need to take responsibility for what they're doing.
Forest contracting companies have increased from three in
2001 to more than 20 in 2006. We have added 50 jobs because of
our forest industry that we have going and it's all small
stuff, one and two man kinds of companies. Also in 2000, the
Ruidoso Wildland Urban Interface was formed. It was a Forest
Service, village of Ruidoso, State of New Mexico and some other
land agencies that are around and we have been working to put
together management objectives and goals that dovetail very
well whenever we came around to putting together our CWPP.
Once HFRA came and said, okay, communities can get some
work done if you've got a CWPP. We went and put that together,
and it was a pretty easy do for us. One of the issues is
funding. At the time that that HFRA rolled out in 2003, 2004
there were programs that were supposed to precipitate and we
were hoping that some of these dollars would come down. But,
money is always an issue and it would be great to have more
money. But, more effective use of the money is really what
we're looking at, and what some of my examples here might be.
Let me speak a moment of collaboration. I think an emerging
challenge with HFR is, kind of, the adage of teaching old dogs
new tricks. It is difficult for some line officers to look at
land management from the perspective of collaborative
development of goals and objectives. Some line officers have
the mind set that collaboration is roderick and not reality.
Some folks have the argument that, well we should have--
just have the Forest Service, because they are the
professionals, make all these decisions. Well, that may be true
in a number of cases, but sometimes with these growing Wildland
Urban Interfaces in communities, there's other management
objectives that have to be taken into account. And CWPPs
provide that conduit to do so and it's one of the great
benefits of HFRA for communities.
Effective collaboration requires skill sets that might not
have been previously needed within the agency as people have
come up through the Agency. What is that status with the regard
of the Agency workforce? One might consider the one third rule
here as it might apply to any organization dealing with
significant change, that is one third of the Agency line
officers possess the skills and will easily grasp the concepts
of collaboration. They will, in turn, maximize HFRAs powerful
tools. Another one third can be taught and one third lack the
necessary skill sets and will struggle endlessly.
Ruidoso is experiencing the latter third in an ongoing
project called Perk-Gindstone. Ruidoso remains at serious risk
because of the decision making and unrealized opportunities. It
becomes very evident at the local level when good collaboration
occurs. Line officers reject pervasive institutional thinking
in tough situations and look for new ways to achieve results
and those new ways come in the form of some of, oh, I'm over
time.
Okay, may I have a second, I'm sorry.
Senator Craig. Please continue, Rick.
Mr. DeIaco. I thought I had two hours. Okay----
Senator Craig. Only Senators have that privilege, and we
abuse it often.
Mr. DeIaco. Thank you, and if I may, let me just conduct my
summary here. Ruidoso's deeply concerned and frustrated that a
commitment made 5 years ago remains unfulfilled. There are
always plenty of excuses, but the facts are that the condition
class in Perk-Grindstone that contributed to Ruidoso's rating
of second highest to catastrophic wildfire in the Nation
remains. We all have witnessed the devastation of the Cerro
Grande fire in Los Alamos. Our citizens don't want to see
Ruidoso follow a similar path.
Ruidoso's community is doing it's part with its citizens
and takes responsibility for our own wildfire protection on
private land. We have our own community forest management plan
and the WUI group has collaborated and developed our CWPP for
additional public lands. I respectfully submit these following
recommendations.
Develop training programs and performance measures that
emphasize collaboration and commitment to legacy strategies.
Make collaboratively designed projects a priority of planning
NEPA projects and funding. Identify strategic areas not on the
low cost of treatment, but on the ability to protect assets at
risk. Those areas must be identified in collaboration with the
local fire councils, public safety and the CWPPs.
Stop double counting acres, even if the money comes from
double line items--from different line items. Double counting
has the unintended consequences of prohibiting utilization and
not getting the best value to the taxpayer dollar. Don't count
the acre until the fuels treatment is complete. That is until
the acre is ready for maintenance burning. Currently the acres
treated by the Forest Service by pile and burning, they have so
many piles that there is such a back log that the fire risk has
increased.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify and I'd be happy
to welcome any questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. DeIaco follows:]
Prepared Statement of Rick DeIaco, Director of Forestry, Village of
Ruidoso, Lincoln County, NM
Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to testify on the progress of the Healthy Forest Initiative
(HFI) and specifically on the Healthy Forest Restoration Act of 2003
(HFRA) and its effects on Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) communities.
This testimony will reflect the relationships and collaborations with
the USDA Forest Service Region 3 and the Lincoln National Forest and
will suggest common themes to opportunities and challenges throughout
the Forest Service and Department of Interior agencies.
background
Ruidoso is located in south central New Mexico in the Sacramento
Mountains at 7000 feet of elevation amidst vast stands of Ponderosa
pine and mixed conifers. The population is 8,700 permanent residents
with thousands of second homes and a growing number of condominiums,
hotels and convention center facilities. The area is dramatically
beautiful and is surrounded by the Lincoln National Forest, Mescalero
Apache Reservation and to a lesser degree other federal and state
lands. Tourism and enjoyment of the natural environment is the main
economic driver. A ski resort with 55 trails and elevations up to
12,000 feet draw skiers throughout the winter season. Ruidoso is four-
season seasonal community.
In 2000, Ruidoso was assessed by New Mexico State Forestry and the
Forest Service for its risk to catastrophic wildfire. Ruidoso was rated
the most at-risk community in New Mexico and the second most at-risk in
the nation. The Village Council quickly got to work and added a
forester to staff and followed with a Forestry Department. It's the
only municipal Forestry Department in the state and among other
charges, implements a suite of ordinances mandating fuels management on
all private lands. In addition, Ruidoso recycles to compost 100% of the
forest debris collected. Forest contracting companies have increased
from three in 2000 to twenty licensed companies in 2006. Fifty forest
industry related jobs have been created in the past five years.
In November of 2000 the Ruidoso Wild/and Urban Interface Group (WUI
group) was formed and has met monthly for six years. Members include
the Lincoln National Forest, New Mexico State Forestry, BLM, BIA,
Mescalero Apache Tribe, Lincoln County, Village of Ruidoso, Village of
Ruidoso Downs, NM State Land Office, South Central Mountain RC&D, River
Association, and local contractors, companies and residents. The goals
of the collaborative group are to develop and implement a forest health
and wildfire protection plan for Ruidoso and surrounding Lincoln
County. In addition it acts as a grant opportunity watershed and think
tank to develop forest strategies and assist entrepreneurs in the
forest industry. In 2004, the WUI group transformed this plan into the
current Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) under HFRA
guidelines.
hfra authority
With HFRA only in its third year, Ruidoso and the WUI group thank
this committee for the opportunity to suggest and catch unintended
consequences so early on in the process. From a community point of
view, having an authority that allows a plan to be developed locally is
an enormous incentive. However, HFRA rolled out with the promise of new
dollars in the form of grants and programs to be available to
communities with CWPPs for projects on county, municipal and private
lands. It appears only HFRA authority is available and use is limited
to projects on Federal lands with alternative funding. Communities are
waiting for grants and programs to precipitate for effective work on
non-federal lands.
collaboration
An emerging challenge within HFRA is ``teaching old dogs new
tricks''. It is difficult for some line officers to look at land
management from the perspective of collaborative development of goals
and objectives. Some line officers have mindsets that collaboration is
more rhetoric than reality. A significant paradigm change faces agency
administrators and line officers. The act requires real collaboration
between Federal agencies and local communities. Effective collaboration
requires skill sets not previously necessary within the agency,
although many line officers naturally possess these skills. Community
collaboration is where the rubber meets the road and we see it.
What is the status, in that regard, of the agency workforce? One
might consider the ``1/3'' rule here as it might apply with any large
organization dealing with significant change. That is, 1/3 of agency
line officers possess the skills and will easily grasp the concepts of
collaboration. They will in turn maximize HFRA's powerful tools.
Another 1/3 can be taught and 1/3 lack the necessary skill sets and
will struggle endlessly. Ruidoso is experiencing the latter third in an
ongoing project called Perk-Grindstone. Ruidoso remains at serious risk
because of this decision making and unrealized opportunities. It
becomes very evident at the local level when good collaboration occurs;
line officers reject pervasive institutional thinking in tough
situations and look for new ways to achieve results. There are some
bright spots on the Lincoln in terms of line officers possessing the
correct skill sets and Ruidoso hopes their efforts translate to reduced
risk to catastrophic wildfire.
Examples of how strong collaborations benefit projects are found
funded by the Collaborative Forest Restoration Program in New Mexico.
This Forest Service grant program has enjoyed continued support from
Senator Domenici and Senator Bingaman and has turned out close to 80
projects in the past five years. A successful project in this program
must show collaboration in project development with appropriate
Federal, State, Tribal, local governments, and to the degree possible,
commodity, scientific and environmental interests. It is kind of like
Thanksgiving dinner with the relatives you don't see too often and may
not get along with so well. The rule is that no one gets any turkey
unless everyone agrees to the size of the portion. It is consensus
driven. When project development is well thought out and inclusive at
the front end, there is little or no objection at the public comment
phase. I would encourage review of this program as a training framework
for collaboration and multi-party monitoring.
I believe developing and funding a required HFRA program to train
line officers how to collaborate with communities and understanding the
entrepreneurial spirit would yield great benefit. Whether it is local
capacity building or bidding as the general contractor on stewardship
contracting projects, non-agency people are taking risks to engage the
Forest Service. These risks are real and personal. Agency line officers
do not always understand that it is OK for business to make money. Line
officers would benefit from knowing how to be better partners, how to
assess real world situations and to arrive at realistic cost-benefit
conclusions. Training programs that include targeting District Rangers
and Forest Supervisors could lead to better decisions and a more
informed workforce. It then could follow that, latitude at the regional
level and above be afforded to progressive thinking by line officers.
The result would be effective treatments, better utilization of
materials and safer communities. Additional benefits would include
improved workforce capabilities and ultimate savings to the taxpayer.
The next consideration is to have the appropriate performance
measures that speak to a desired outcome and include measurement
strategies. A paper (included)* with performance goals developed by
community forestry groups and the Rural Voices for Conservation
Coalition was submitted to the Forest Service earlier this year and
could serve as a starting point. These performance goals support the
training I suggest is necessary to effectively move HFRA forward. The
four performance goals are:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
* All attachments have been retained in subcommittee files.
Increase collaboration between public land communities and
federal agencies.
Build and maintain capacity in public lands communities.
Improve forest and watershed condition.
Reduce risk from catastrophic wildland fire.
accountability
Probably the most glaring disconnect within HFRA is the acres
target issue. It's the hard acres versus easy acres calculations,
double counting of acres and not accounting for real value. This fuzzy
calculus is especially limiting when utilization of small diameter
material is possible and not considered best value. An example might be
as follows:
100 acres are thinned @ $600.00/acre = $60,000.00;
then, a year or so later the same 100 acres are burned
@ $300.00/acre = $30,000.00
The dollars per acre reported get calculated as $90,000.00/200
acres for a reported cost of $450.00 per acre and 200 acres counted.
Then it could happen that a utilizing contractor comes in with a cut
and utilization bid (one time entry) of $750.00 per acre or $75,000.00
they lose the bid.
Acre count should occur only after initial tasking is completely
done and the land is ready for long term maintenance burning. Given
that utilization treatments have slope consideration; acres treated
with full utilization in Ruidoso are ready for maintenance burn now.
Condition classes are reduced immediately in those areas and we are not
waiting years for prescribed burn windows to open. In addition, the
general public sees a completed project.
The WUI group feels strongly that small diameter material removal
and biomass utilization is a land management issue and not just an
energy production issue. Ruidoso Municipal Schools are preparing to
build a new middle school and are interested in incorporating biomass
heating. I believe all public buildings in Ruidoso should consider this
abundant resource. The long term source of this material would come
from Forest Service lands.
Another down side of the acres target problem can appear when
considering WUI acres. In Ruidoso, community protection received less
priority than acre targets. Currently, only two of twenty-seven NEPA
ready projects on the Lincoln are in the Ruidoso area. The WUI
geography (map) was expanded to accommodate easy acre push and burn
treatments northeast of the community to achieve acre targets. Treating
acres on the northeast side of a community in southern New Mexico is
mostly ineffective as the winds historically come from the southwest.
A 5,500 acre project called Perk-Grindstone was assessed as the
number one Forest Service priority in 2000 when the WUI group started
because it is located directly southwest of the community and its major
potable water reservoir and treatment plant. This project remains hung
up without a NEPA decision and remains unfunded. Line officers are
compelled to meet acre targets at the expense of community protection.
This is absolutely unacceptable! Village Council signed a resolution
encouraging the Lincoln to move forward with Perk-Grindstone earlier
this year. The Village collaborated with an environmental group that
had objections and resolved issues pertaining to MSO PACS in the unit.
We help were we can. Inaction on public lands is impeding Ruidoso's
ability to implement ordinances on private land. I get calls with angry
residents asking why they should spend money treating their property
when there is nothing done on the other side of the Forest Service
fence, literally.
It appears the Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART), a strategy to
get the ``best value'' for work done might actually do the opposite
given the existing performance measures. Transformation of the
condition class (acre targets) as a performance measure is vastly
outweighing other measures such as collaboration and utilization based
on PART. This leads to the ``easy acre''. Wildfire can burn 5000 ``easy
acres'' and no one blinks. When wildfire burns 1000 acres and a
community loses 29 homes, as Ruidoso did in 2002 with the Kokopelli
fire, it is devastating. Where is the ``best value''? Communities
deserve a better system of accountability and line officers need
realistic performance measures to make the right decision and achieve
HFRA goals.
A more general issue affecting accountability is agency mobility.
The normal rotation of personnel with the agency reduces commitment and
accountability. The line officer (District Ranger) I started with in
2000 had been there for many years and was committed to the community.
Decisions were made based on the best value for community safety. He
retired in 2002. Since then I have seen personnel changes at: the
district level--Ranger, FMO, AFMO, Range staff, Timber staff, Fuels
specialists and below; the Forest level--Supervisor, Fire & Aviation
staff, Timber staff; and even a new Regional Forester and some
associated staff. Communities understand this movement is inevitable to
some degree but some way to maintain a legacy strategy would yield
stability to collaborations and overall confidence in agency policy.
Goal 1.4 in the above mentioned performance measures paper (attached)
offers some ideas.
summary
Ruidoso is deeply concerned and frustrated that a commitment made
five years ago remains unfulfilled. There are always plenty of excuses
but the facts are that the condition class in Perk Grindstone that
contributed to Ruidoso's rating of second highest to catastrophic
wildfire in the nation remains. We have all witnessed the devastation
of the Cerro Grande fire in Los Alamos, New Mexico in 2001. Our
citizens do not want to see Ruidoso follow a similar pattern of
unrecognized risk and inaction on Forest Service land due to a lack of
urgency.
Ruidoso is committed to doing its part with its citizens and takes
responsibility for its own wildfire protection on private land. We have
our own Community Forest Management Plan in place (www.ruidoso-nm.gov)
and the WUI group has collaborated and developed our CWPP for
additional public and private land. The Village and the WUI group stand
ready to move forward with HFRA when funding programs become available.
I respectfully submit the following recommendations:
Develop training programs and performance measures that
emphasis collaboration and commitment to legacy strategies.
Make collaboratively designed projects the priority for
planning (NEPA) and funding.
Identify strategic acres not on their low cost of treatment
but on their ability to protect assets at risk. Those areas
must be identified in collaboration with the local fire
councils and public safety officials (CWPPs).
Stop double counting acres, even if the money comes from
different line items. Double counting has the unintended
consequences of prohibiting utilization and not getting the
best value for the taxpayer dollar.
Don't count the acre until the fuels treatment is complete.
That is, until the acre is ready for maintenance burning.
Currently the areas treated by the Forest Service by pile and
burning have so many piles on them (lack of burn windows) that
the fire risk has increased.
If HFRA will be used to treat strategic acres that: are defined by
collaboration with communities; will allow for true accounting in terms
of acres treated and unit costs; and will encourage reduction to fire
risk class I; then it will be the useful tool the congress and the
President intended.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify before this subcommittee.
I would welcome any question you may have.
Senator Craig. Thank you very much, Rick. Now lets turn----
Senator Wyden. Mr. Chairman, just one thing. I may not be
able to come back and question you, Rick, but could you give us
some examples, for the record, of double counting of these
acres? Because I have suspected that's what's going on and we
really need some concrete examples. Could you make that
available to the subcommittee?
Mr. DeIaco. I surely will.
Senator Wyden. Thank you.
Senator Craig. Thank you. Thanks so much, Ron. Now let's
turn to Matthew Koehler, executive director, WildWest Institute
of Missoula. Matthew welcome to the subcommittee.
STATEMENT OF MATTHEW KOEHLER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, WILDWEST
INSTITUTE, MISSOULA, MT
Mr. Koehler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman and
members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to
testify at this important hearing.
As the chairman said, I'm the executive director of the
WildWest Institute based in Missoula, Montana. Our mission is
to protect and restore forests, wildlands, watersheds and
wildlife. We are working very hard to craft positive, proactive
solutions that promote sustainability by restoring naturally
functioning ecosystems degraded by systemic management.
As my written testimony illustrates, our organization is an
active participant in the number of collaborative efforts to
help protect communities from wildfire and move ecologically
based restoration work forward and I'd be happy to answer any
questions you have regarding these promising efforts.
Since 2003, very little fuel reduction work has been
accomplished by the Forest Service using HFRA in the northern
Rockies. According to the Agency, current fiscal year
accomplishments under HFRA include zero acres of fuel reduction
accomplished in Montana and Wyoming and 103 acres accomplished
in Idaho.
What these numbers tell me is that limiting public
participation and streamlining environmental laws is not the
solution to increasing community wildfire protection efforts.
Rather, based on our experience working with the Forest Service
in the northern Rockies, the major limiting factor is lack of
funding. Given the way Congress currently funds the Forest
Service and based on the administration's proposed Forest
Service budget, I'm afraid that misplaced funding priorities
will continue to hamper community wildfire protection efforts,
not to mention critical restoration work on our national
forest.
This is especially unfortunate and frustrating as I believe
there is growing consensus on the need to move forward with
common sense fuel reduction activities on private State and
Federal lands immediately adjacent to communities and to help
revitalize our communities through the emerging restoration
economy. I urge Congress and the administration to fund the
Forest Service based on the desires of the American people who
want to see their communities protected from wildfire and these
public national forest lands protected and restored to provide
clean water, critical wildlife habitat and enjoyment and
inspiration for future generations.
Our organization has been intimately involved with two HFRA
projects in Montana. The middle east fork project on the
Bitterroot and the DeBaugen project on the Lolo National
Forest. As you can see from our written testimony, our
experience on these HFRA projects has been as different as day
and night. Time doesn't allow me to go into detail, so again
I'd be happy to answer any questions about what has worked and
what has not worked.
Based on our organization's experience with HFRA and a
review of the administration's fiscal year 2007 budget request,
I would like to make the following recommendations and
observations; one, the Forest Service's healthy forest budget
does not provide adequate support for community wildfire
protection efforts on non-Federal lands where it would be most
effective, especially since nationally up to 85 percent of the
land presenting a risk to communities is non-Federal land. Yet,
the Forest Service's healthy forest budget only directs 4
percent of the funding in this area and in some cases important
programs such as the State and volunteer fire assistant program
are being dramatically cut or eliminated.
Industrial logging that does not benefit community
protection or improve forest health is also being included in
HFRA and HFI projects. So, too, the old growth forest and large
tree retention requirements of HFRA are, in some cases, being
ignored and manipulated by the Forest Service. These practices
increase controversy and mistrust among stakeholders as well as
tie up valuable resources that should instead be directed
towards real community protection and forest restoration.
I recommend that all old growth logging and cutting of
large trees, as well as entry into roadless wildlands be
prohibited in all future HFRA projects. Finally, the required
HFRA collaborative process is in some cases being ignored or
manipulated by the Forest Service. An open, honest and
inclusive process with neutral outside facilitation appears to
be the best course of action and I would recommend that it be
included in all future HFRA collaboration.
I look forward to answering any questions that you may have
and again, thank you for this opportunity to testify at this
important hearing.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Koehler follows:]
Prepared Statement of Matthew Koehler, Executive Director, WildWest
Institute, Missoula, MT
Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, thank you for the
opportunity to testify at this important hearing to review
implementation of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act (Public Law 108-
148): It is an honor to appear before you, and I hope that my testimony
will move us forward as we protect and restore America's national
forests and help provide communities with effective wildfire
protection.
I am the executive director of the WildWest Institute, a Montana-
based conservation group that formed in April 2006 through a merger of
the Native Forest Network and Ecology Center. Our mission is to protect
and restore forests, wildlands, watersheds and wildlife in the Northern
Rockies Bioregion. We monitor and participate in the public land
management decision processes in the Northern Rockies and craft
positive, proactive solutions that promote ecological and economic
sustainability through restoring naturally functioning ecosystems
degraded by systemic mismanagement.
We ensure that the government follows the law when managing our
public forests and wildlands. With the assistance of WildWest's
biologist and forest ecologist, we stay abreast of, and seek out, the
latest scientific research on forest and fire management, biological
diversity and ecologically-based restoration. We also strive to get on-
the-ground in all project areas to gather site-specific information. We
then provide this research and information to specialists within
government agencies so that the best-available science and site-
specific information is incorporated into public land management
decisions.
Our organization is also very active in a number of collaborative
efforts to help protect communities in the Northern Rockies from
wildfire and move bona-fide restoration work forward on our national
forests. Our goal is to work together with diverse interests to help be
a catalyst for the establishment of a new, sustainable restoration
economy in our region for the 21st Century and beyond.
Before I get into the specifics of reviewing implementation of the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act, I'd like to share with you some recent
examples of our collaborative work with the hopes that these examples
will clearly demonstrate the willingness and dedication of the
conservation community to find solutions that benefit our forests,
wildlands, watersheds, wildlife and communities.
Recently, we helped plan a very successful Montana Communities and
Wildfire Conference with the support of the Western Governors
Association and a diverse set of stakeholders across the state of
Montana including scientists, firefighters, homeowners, realtors,
planners, foresters, developers, legislators, conservation
organizations and other community leaders.
One of the results of that conference has been the establishment of
a Montana FireSafe Council, which will serve as a clearinghouse for
homeowners and communities seeking information, resources and
assistance about community wildfire protection. One of our staff
members serves on the steering committee for the Montana FireSafe
Council and we remain committed to helping it succeed.
Our organization is also an active member of the Salmon Forest
Collaborative, who along with the community of Salmon, Idaho, Lemhi
county commissioners and the U.S. Forest Service are seeking to find
common-ground surrounding community wildfire protection and restoration
projects on the Salmon-Challis National Forest. In fact, during the
past two days, one of our staff members was in Salmon, Idaho attending
a two day meeting of this collaborative to hammer out the details of
how the group operates and what criteria will be used as we move
forward with project selection. In addition to relationship building,
one of the early results of this effort was getting on the ground with
the U.S. Forest Service and community members to settle an appeal our
organization filed on a fuel reduction project near the community of
Gibbonsville, Idaho. The appeal resolution allowed the community
wildfire protection work to go forward without unnecessary harm to the
forest, wildlife and roadless wildlands.
Since the start of the year we have also been involved with a very
similar collaborative effort in Libby, Montana with the Lincoln County
Commissioners, community members and business leaders to find agreement
on community wildfire protection and restoration projects on the
Kootenai National Forest. Our organization holds a position on the
leadership team of the Kootenai Forest Stakeholders Coalition, and just
as with the Salmon, Idaho example, in addition to relationship
building, one of the early results of this effort was getting on the
ground with the U.S. Forest Service and community members to settle
concerns a number of conservation organizations had with a fuel
reduction project near the community of Yaak, Montana.
In mid-May, the WildWest Institute and the West End Volunteer Fire
Department in DeBorgia, Montana joined forces for the DeBorgia
Community Wildfire Protection Work Weekend. The goal of the work
weekend was to bring people together to create defensible space on
private land around the DeBorgia community through education, action
and fellowship. Special emphasis was placed on improving defensible
space around the homes of elderly members of the community, along key
roads in the community and establishing a safe zone near the firehouse
and community center. By all accounts, the work weekend was a
tremendous success. The fellowship component of the community work
weekend included a community potluck barbeque at the DeBorgia
Schoolhouse, which poetically, was one of the few buildings in the
entire area to survive the 1910 wildfires. In addition to lots of
volunteer help, the community work weekend was supported by a grant the
WildWest Institute secured through the National Forest Foundation. The
grant money was used to hire a local fuel reduction crew through
Wildland Conservation Services, which helped put some money into the
pockets of local workers.
In addition to the DeBorgia Community Wildfire Protection Work
Weekend, which we plan to replicate in future years, the WildWest
Institute, West End Volunteer Fire Department and others local
residents, businesses and conservation groups are also currently
engaged in a collaborative process through the Healthy Forests
Restoration Act with the Lolo National Forest to develop a common sense
plan for fuel reduction work on Forest Service land directly around the
greater DeBorgia area. I'll address details of this process and project
later in my testimony.
Yet another example of our organization's proactive work to find
solutions took place in the Blackfoot Valley, near the Community of
Ovando, Montana last summer. Following a series of fieldtrips to the
Monture Fuel Reduction project with the U.S. Forest Service and local
logging contractors--during which we expressed some concerns with the
fuel reduction project as proposed, especially concerns with potential
soil damage and an excessive cutting of trees within this very diverse,
mixed conifer forest--the district ranger agreed to give us a small
parcel of the project so that we could complete a pilot project that
would allow us to put our restoration and fuel reduction vision to
work.
The type of ecologically-based fuel reduction work that we wanted
to complete on the site was to be guided by the Restoration Principles,
which WildWest and others helped develop through a three-year bridge-
building effort between conservationists, scientists and community-
based forestry advocates.
We partnered with a local logging contractor and our project
successfully demonstrated the viability of a forest restoration
approach that enhanced ecological integrity, protected soils and
reduced fuels while again putting money into the pockets of some local
workers. Along the way, we also gained valuable hands-on experience
with various ecologically-based fuel reduction and forest restoration
techniques, as well as continued to build a better working relationship
with the district ranger and his staff.
Another important point that I want to deliver with this testimony
is that if Congress is looking to help revitalize rural communities,
perhaps the best place to start is to properly fund the nearly endless
ecologically-based watershed and road restoration opportunities that
abound on our national forests and often enjoy broad consensus among
diverse stakeholders. With appropriate funding from Congress, watershed
and road restoration could not only help provide good-paying jobs for
generations, but it would move us all a long ways towards building
trust and better working relationships.
I have yet to meet a Forest Service line officer or specialist who
believes that Congress is even coming close to properly funding
ecologically-based watershed restoration programs. For example, right
now in the Northern Rockies the Forest Service estimates that 85% of
the fish-passage culverts are currently impassible to fish, with an
estimated cost of over $200 million to just fix the top priority
culverts. Right now the Forest Service's road maintenance backlog in
just Montana and Idaho is $1.3 billion, and nationally the road
maintenance backlog is nearly $10 billion.
The Forest Service needs more direct appropriations of real
restoration funds from Congress. Restoration of our national forests
should not be tied to industrial logging and resource extraction. One
important reason is that we will never be able to log enough trees to
pay for all the needed restoration work. Plus, industrial logging can
cause more restoration needs through negative impacts such as loss of
critical wildlife habitat, soil compaction and erosion, increased
siltation in rivers, proliferation of noxious weeds, opening up forests
to increased illegal ATV use, reduction of biodiversity and even short-
to long-term increases in fire risk and severity.
Congress has passed, and the Forest Service is currently utilizing,
Stewardship Contracting provisions; however, Stewardship Contracting
doesn't necessarily result in better logging. It's a contracting
mechanism and the truth of the matter is that in the Northern Rockies
we are seeing many of the Forest Service's large logging projects done
using Stewardship Contracting. In some specific cases, Stewardship
Contracting may work for funding restoration, but only when cutting
down lots of commercially valuable trees is needed to restore a forest
and if this logging doesn't compromise other resource values. But
again, with literally billions and billions of dollars in just
watershed and road restoration work needed on national forest lands
across the country there is no possible way that we could ever cut
enough trees to pay for this restoration work.
I'd like to provide this Committee with one example of a needed
watershed restoration project. Our organization is currently working
with the Lolo National Forest, the community-based Lolo Watershed Group
and fellow conservation groups on a watershed restoration project for
the Upper Lolo Creek watershed west of Lolo, Montana, along the trail
used 200 years ago by the Lewis and Clark Expedition and for thousands
of years by the Nez Perce. Our work on this important collaborative
restoration project was initiated a few years ago during regular
meetings we are holding with the Lolo National Forest leadership team.
We were really excited to get involved in some good watershed and road
restoration work that we all could agree needed to be done and this
project seemed to fit the bill perfectly.
Specifically, this project calls for removing or replacing 21 fish-
passage culverts to improve native fish habitat, decommissioning 17
miles of unneeded old logging roads and permanently closing 63 miles of
roads and ``jammer'' roads.
To help the local communities learn more about this specific
project, as well as gain a better understanding about the concept using
forest restoration to create local jobs, we worked with the Lolo
Watershed Group to help put together a workshop titled ``Putting Local
Labor to Work on Forest Restoration,'' which took place at the Lolo
Community Center last summer. Our work on this project continues to
this day. In fact, as I give this testimony, one of our staff members
is leading a public fieldtrip in conjunction with the University of
Montana to the Upper Lolo Creek Watershed Restoration Project to look
more closely at this project and also explore larger issues surrounding
watershed and road restoration in the northern Rockies.
Unfortunately, since it is my understanding that the U.S. Congress
provides the Forest Service with so little money for this type of
watershed restoration work, this common ground watershed restoration
project is literally just sitting on the shelf waiting to be
implemented, which is very unfortunate since this restoration project
enjoys support from the Missoula County Commissioners and Carpenters
Union Local 28 and because it would employ local workers improving
forest and watershed health once implemented.
Since I am testifying before you today, I would like to
specifically request that the U.S. Congress work together to find a way
to provide funding for the Upper Lolo Watershed Restoration Project--as
well as the countless other bona-fide watershed restoration projects
throughout our region that would put local people to work restoring
watershed health, if only Congress properly funded this important work.
Finally, before getting into the specifics of reviewing
implementation of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act, I'd like to say a
few words about the general issue of appeals and litigation, as I'm
sure some members of this Committee will be asking me questions related
to this topic.
With much foresight, and with the recognition that the U.S. Forest
Service has, unfortunately, a long history of mismanagement, Congress
established the public appeals process as an integral part of the
public decision making process and an important and necessary means for
the public to maintain a ``check and balance'' when it comes to the
management of the public's land.
During the entire public process established by Congress, including
the public appeals process, our organization strives to work together
with the Forest Service and their specialists to provide the Forest
Service with the best available science, research and site-specific
information so that this important information is incorporated into
public land management decisions.
Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, sometimes the Forest
Service decides to move forward with a project that is not based on the
best available science or the laws of this nation. The public appeals
process provides one final opportunity for the Forest Service to
reconsider an ecologically misguided and potentially illegal project.
Over the past two years, our organization has explored, with
willing Forest Service rangers, a number of ways to make the public
appeals process work better, including face-to-face meetings before
public appeal deadlines and on-the-ground meetings within project areas
to talk about our differences and hammer out agreements.
Sometimes it is necessary for our organization to file a lawsuit in
order to hold the government accountable and ensure that logging and
roadbuilding projects on our national forests don't cause unnecessary
harm and are bound by the law. But again, this course of action is only
taken after our participation in the public decision making process.
Most people also think it's too much to ask for the government to
follow the laws of this nation when conducting logging and roadbuilding
projects on our public forests. Furthermore, the success that
conservation groups such as ours have in the courts is testament that
our lawsuits have merit and are preventing the government from breaking
the law--something I think we'll all agree is a good idea.
Personally I feel it's unfortunate that some people would like to
provide an over-simplistic view of these important issues, which might
lead some to believing that there are two types of conservation groups:
those that work to find solutions and those that just simply file
appeals and lawsuits and refuse to work together. As I hope the
Committee can clearly see by the numerous examples I have provided,
this is simply not the case.
While organizations such as the WildWest Institute may file a
lawsuit to hold the government accountable, we are also working hard
trying to find solutions that will benefit our forests, wildlife and
communities and help put the Northern Rockies--and our nation--on a
path towards a more economically- and ecologically-sustainable future.
community wildfire protection plans
In addition to specific information about our experience with the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act, I was asked to provide comments on the
development of Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPP). Since
development of a CWPP in most cases precedes development of a HFRA
project it makes sense to look at CWPPs at this time. Specifically, I
was asked to address what worked and what can be done to improve those
plans and the collaboration called for in those plans? And how CWPPs
translate into projects undertaken by the Federal land management
agencies and how, or whether, our experience suggests that the
collaboration called for in the development of the community wildfire
protection plans is translating into collaboration in the development
of the specific projects?
Since our organization has limited experience with the development
of CWPPs I took the liberty of gathering information from professional
foresters, fellow conservationists and former firefighters from
throughout the western U.S. The perspectives gathered are also included
to help provide this Committee see a more complete picture of the
development of CWPPs and what's working and what's not.
Our organization has been involved with the development for only
one CWPP, the Missoula County CWPP. Our experience with the Missoula
County CWPP, which admittedly was somewhat limited (with the bulk of
our participation coming from a board member who is now currently on
our staff), was largely positive. This CWPP was initiated by the
Missoula County Office of Emergency Services and they did a commendable
job of making sure to invite a large, diverse set of stakeholders from
throughout the county--something which unfortunately doesn't appear to
be happening with the development of all CWPPs, but appears to
undoubtedly be one of the common components of all successful CWPPs.
From our perspective working on the Missoula County CWPP, it would
be helpful to further focus fuel reduction treatments even tighter from
the typical Wildland-Urban Interface boundary of 1\1/2\ miles (although
some CWPPs have WUI boundaries that extend three miles or more) to a
Community Protection Zone (CPZ) boundary of 1/4 mile.
Our rationale is really quite simple: given limited resources and
limited time it makes most sense to focus fuel reduction activities--
whether on public or private land--immediately around the community
rather than ignoring legitimate threats and focusing instead on the
larger WUI, which can extend out 1 to three miles. Perhaps once we have
done all the work within the 1/4 mile Community Protection Zone we can
explore options for treatments outside of the CPZ; however, the reality
is that CPZ treatments will likely need to be conducted on such a
regular basis so as to tie up all of the available time and resources.
The. other advantage of focusing limited time and resources within the
CPZ is that we can ensure that more at-risk communities are provided
some level of defensible space rather than just focusing on treating a
limited number of communities and extending treatments out 1\1/2\ to 3
miles.
We also believe that both landowners who are developing private
property and real estate developers need to take on a large level of
the responsibility for home and community wildfire preparedness, rather
than just expecting U.S. taxpayers to fund fuel reduction activities on
public lands. As we stated in our comments on the Missoula CO CWPP, we
would support county government efforts to enact defensible space codes
and to provide certain incentives to landowners and developers who
agree to incorporate this into their property development. Obviously,
the insurance industry can have some influence on this as well but
county governments need to create some regulations so other county,
state and federal taxpayers aren't left essentially holding the bag for
those who choose to live and build in high-risk areas.
This is also where joint educational efforts could go a long ways
towards facilitating greater public awareness and participation in
community wildfire protection efforts in the county. For example,
public forums, community meetings and a Parade of FireSafe Homes should
be organized in our communities on an on-going basis. I'd like to point
out that our organization has hosted a number of these public forums
featuring the Forest Service's own experts on defensible space, fire
chiefs and local fuel reduction contractors.
The other day I also spoke directly with Tracy Katelman, a
professional forester and owner of ForEverGreen Forestry in Eureka, CA,
who has authored four community wildfire protection plans in Northern
California and Southwestern Oregon, including the Lower Mattole Fire
Plan, one of the early CWPPs models cited in the SAF/NASF Guidelines.
Ms. Katelman explained, ``When developing Community Wildfire
Protection Plans it is vitally important that a diverse set of
stakeholders be at the table from the outset. This includes those
perceived to be at the extremes--such as the timber industry and
environmental advocates. CWPPs that only include government, fire
fighters and federal land management agencies--while fundamentally
important participants--are likely not as effective over time because
they lack authentic community involvement. The local knowledge provided
by residents at the neighborhood scale is important both in terms of
reducing wildfire risks and hazards in the WUI, but also for empowering
communities to take responsibility for reducing those risks and hazards
over the long term.''
According to Katelman, even though CWPP guidelines exist (e.g.
those developed by SAF/NASF), they are so general that the methodology
varies significantly, with one community going about the plan one way
and a neighboring community going about it another way. This makes it
very difficult to get a state or regional perspective both in terms of
what works or doesn't, but also in terms of the priorities at that
larger scale.
``Resources are an issue, as there is basically no more money
available to do CWPPs. National Fire Plan money for doing CWPPs
virtually no longer exists in California, instead that funding is given
to projects that can produce the most `acres treated' by fuel
reduction. If the desire is for communities to create effective CWPPs
that both identify and reduce the risks and hazards of wildfire, more
resources need to be available at the community level, preferably
through non-governmental organizations. These needed resources include
standardized guidelines that encourage neighborhood-level
participation, training, and finances,'' stated Katelman.
Finally, Ms. Katelman offered that ``CWPPs work best where agencies
and the public have existing working relationships and effective
communication, and all stakeholders are involved from the beginning.''
In my conversations and correspondence with fellow conservationists
I've also heard some of the following themes about CWPPs:
The development of CWPPs in many areas were poorly publicized and
they were not publicized through federal channels in some cases. As
such, a common concern expressed was that federal public lands were
essentially privatized (or given to local communities) by CWPPs.
Some CWPPs were essentially crafted by contractors (forestry
consultants) in association with the county commissioners. In some
cases the state and federal land agencies were included, but none of
these county plans were developed with true collaboration.
The CWPPs are supposed to prioritize areas and identify project
areas that the federal agencies then turn into fuel reduction projects.
Instead, in some cases it appears as if the Forest Service will simply
submit a list of every timer sale, which then gets stapled onto the
county plan. This then becomes the foundation for the Forest Service to
argue that the projects were identified and prioritized by the county
collaborative committees.
In some instances the level of true collaboration, including
interested stakeholders (as discussed in the WGA's 10 Year Wildfire
Strategy) has been non-existent in many areas.
review implementation of the healthy forest restoration act
The purpose of this hearing is to review implementation of the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act. As I'm sure members of this Committee
are aware, this is a somewhat difficult task for the simple reason that
since the HFRA was signed into law in December 2003, so little work has
been accomplished under the HFRA by the U.S. Forest Service. Further
complicating the issue is the fact that the Forest Service often lumps
HFRA projects together with Healthy Forest Initiative projects put
forward under Categorical Exclusion (CE) authorities. Yet, many CE
projects in the Northern Rockies, and elsewhere, are found deep in the
backcountry and have primarily timber production goals, which often run
directly counter to community wildfire protection or forest restoration
goals.
I'd like to highlight information that was provided to this
Committee last week by the U.S. Forest Service detailing fuel reduction
accomplishments of the HFRA.
According to the U.S. Forest Service, FY 2006 accomplishments under
the Healthy Forest Restoration Act are as follows:
Montana--zero acres of fuel reduction accomplished on Forest
Service land under HFRA.
Wyoming--zero acres of fuel reduction accomplished on Forest
Service land under HFRA.
Idaho--103 acres of fuel reduction accomplished on Forest
Service land under HFRA.
Certainly, it's hard to make the case that 103 acres of total fuel
reduction accomplished by the Forest Service under the provisions of
the Healthy Forest Restoration Act in FY 2006--2\1/2\ following HFRA
becoming law--in the states of Montana, Idaho and Wyoming is much of an
accomplishment.
Even if you broaden the view to look at Forest Service
accomplishments in the eight-state Rocky Mountain Region, including the
states of Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah
and Nevada, you find that that in the 2\1/2\ years since HFRA became
law the U.S. Forest Service has accomplished 7,995 acres of fuel
reduction under HFRA in FY 2006.
It's also important to remember that in some cases the Forest
Service is apparently placing acres into the ``accomplished'' list even
if no actual on-the-ground work has taken place, but simply if a timber
sale is under contract. Therefore, on-the-ground accomplishments may be
much less.
What are the reasons for these anemic HFRA fuel reduction numbers
in the Northern Rockies and Rocky Mountain Region? Given that the HFRA
limited some forms of public participation and streamlined provisions
within the National Environmental Policy Act the HFRA fuel reduction
numbers over 2\1/2\ years since HFRA became law certainly calls into
question the rationale of many of the most ardent supporters of the
Healthy Forest Restoration Act who told us that so-called ``analysis
paralysis'' was solely responsible for preventing the Forest Service
from moving forward with bona-fide community wildfire protection
activities.
It appears that limiting public participation and streamlining
environmental laws is not the solution to increasing community wildfire
protection efforts. It is my hope that this Committee and Congress take
this reality into account when you consider important public lands
bills in the future, such as H.R. 4200.
It clearly appears that one of the major limiting factors is
funding. This has been our experience working with the Forest Service
in Montana and it seems to be a common theme across the west. For
example, the New Mexico Business Weekly reported in April that Senator
Bingaman is concerned that important fuel reduction projects in his
state won't happen because of a lack of funds the federal agencies have
for contracts, staff and equipment.
Unfortunately, given the way Congress currently funds the Forest
Service and based on the Administration's FY 2007 proposed Forest
Service budget I'm afraid that the funding problem will continue to
hamper community wildfire protection efforts, as well as critically
needed ecologically-based restoration work on our national forests.
For example, it is my understanding that the Administration's FY
2007 proposed Forest Service budget would eliminate the Economic Action
Program that provides funding for communities for economic
diversification, assessments for wildfire risk and planning for
defensible space. The State and Volunteer Fire Assistance programs,
which provide for community protection planning and projects through
both the State and Private Forestry and Wildland Fire Management
programs, would be cut by nearly $23 million--a 30 percent reduction.
While most programs will see funding reductions, spending for the
federal timber sale program would increase in the proposed FY 2007
budget. For example, the timber sale program would receive nearly an
11% increase of $30 million. I must also point out that since FY 2000,
the forest products line-item has increased from $216 million to the
proposed $310 million in FY 2007--a 43 percent increase. The proposed
Forest Service FY 2007 budget also includes a $41 million increase (117
percent) in funding for timber sales under Northwest Forest Plan to log
800 million board feet of trees. Achieving that goal will require
logging more ancient, old growth forests that the public owners of
these forests--along with the two previous Chiefs of the Forest
Service--clearly want to see protected. In addition, the Forest Service
plans to divert $23 million for new timber sales from the Knutson-
Vandenburg (KV) Fund, which formerly was used to pay for reforestation
costs and the restoration of logged over forests.
Now I don't profess to be a Forest Service budget expert, and
having worked closely with the budget officer on a national forest in
Montana recently to try and figure out solutions that would allow this
national forest to spend more money on bona-fide community wildfire
protection and restoration projects, I can tell you from this personal
experience that attempting to get a handle on where the Forest Service
spends its money and what funds are ear-marked for certain programs and
what funds are discretionary is, at best, a confusing and somewhat
subjective exercise.
However, the fact remains that while Congress and the
Administration press for more funding for the timber sale program
(which often just increases fire severity and causes more restoration
needs) critical funding for community wildfire protection and
ecologically-based restoration projects lag far behind and in many
cases are being significantly decreased. I challenge Congress and the
Administration to fund the Forest Service based not on the demands of
special interests and their lobbyists, but on the desires of the
American people who want to see these public national forest lands
protected and restored to provide clean water, critical wildlife
habitat and enjoyment and inspiration to future generations.
a tale of two healthy forest restoration act projects: the middle east
fork hfra project on the bitterroot national forest and the debaugen
hfra project on the lolo national forest
Middle East Fork HFRA Project, Bitterroot National Forest, Montana
One of the first proposed Healthy Forest Restoration Act projects
in Montana is called the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction
project on the Bitterroot National Forest. Undoubtedly, the Middle East
Fork HFRA project has been one of the most controversial HFRA projects
in the country, not only due to the specifics of the project itself,
but also due to a series of problems associated with the HFRA
collaborative process Bitterroot National Forest officials selected to
use, or failed to use.
Because of the controversial nature of this project, I fully
acknowledge that perhaps others have a different perspective on the
process and the project. And I would encourage this Committee to talk
with those people as well. However, the perspective I'm going to share
with you comes from not only our organization, which has invested
approximately 2,000 hours in the Middle East Fork HFRA project/process,
but also from some longtime Bitterroot Valley residents, affected East
Fork homeowners and prominent Ph.D. faculty members at the University
of Montana's School of Forestry who are some of the nation's leading
researchers on issues related to entomology, soils, fire and fuels,
forest ecology, aquatics, fisheries, wildlife and public process.
The purpose of sharing this perspective with this Committee
reviewing implementation of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act is not
necessarily to rehash problems associated with the Bitterroot National
Forest's Middle East Fork HFRA process and project, but to ensure that
as the Forest Service moves forward with HFRA projects mistakes are not
repeated and compounded.
The proposed Middle East Fork project would mix some bona-fide
community protection work, which everyone agrees should go forward,
with logging over four square miles of the Bitterroot National Forest
(nearly 3,000 acres in total), including logging in previously unlogged
forests that as recently as 2004 the Forest Service considered meeting
the requirements of old-growth habitat. Many of these proposed logging
units, which target larger trees, also sit outside of the identified
Wildland-Urban Interface, far from homes.
These forests along the East Fork of the Bitterroot River are home
to elk, bighorn sheep, moose, mule deer, white-tailed deer, black bear,
wolves, coyote, bull trout, cutthroat trout, goshawk, martin, black-
backed woodpecker, pileated woodpecker, downey woodpecker and
flammulated owls. It's also important to note that many of the areas
slated for logging under this HFRA project are pockets of unlogged
forest that are literally surrounded by clearcuts from previous
industrial logging projects. In fact, past logging, roadbuilding and
terracing on the this particular portion of the Bitterroot National
Forest was so egregious that it lead to the Bitterroot Clearcutting
Controversy of the early 1970s that eventually lead to the passage of
the National Forest Management Act.
According to the Forest Service, 33% of the Middle East Fork
project area has already been logged, much of it done during the
clearcutting, roadbuilding and terracing binge of the late 1960s and
early 1970s. There are currently 208 miles of roads within the project
area, an average of 5.2 miles of road per square mile. The Forest
Service also estimates that the 1,482 miles of roads (and 1,682 stream
crossings) in entire East Fork of the Bitterroot watershed contribute
151 tons of sediment per year to streams.
It appears that the Forest Service claims that the first official
HFRA collaborative meeting for the Middle East Fork HFRA project was
held in Sula, Montana on March 18, 2004. Despite the fact that we are
on the BNF's official mailing list, our organization--which at the time
was called the Native Forest Network--was not invited or notified of
this March 18, 2004 meeting. Sula District Ranger Tracy Hollingshead
acknowledged this fact in a November 30, 2004 email in which she
stated, ``. . . the notification for the Middle East Fork meeting in
Sula on March 18, 2004 was not sent to Native Forest Network. . . .''
Why was our organization never notified or invited to this March
18, 2004 meeting? Documents that we obtained via a Freedom of
Information Act (FOIA) request reveal that BNF officials intentionally
crossed out and failed to invite numerous other organizations to that
March 18, 2004 meeting, including Wilderness Watch, Friends of the
Clearwater, Bitterroot Trout Unlimited, Center for Biological
Diversity, Intermountain Fire Sciences Lab and The Wilderness Society.
It's also important to note that the BNF's announcement for the
March 18, 2004 meeting that was mailed to a self-selected portion of
the BNF's mailing list didn't even mention anything about the Healthy
Forest Restoration Act or the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction
project. These words were simply not in the announcement. Therefore, in
our view, this March 18, 2004 meeting doesn't fit the requirement for
an HFRA collaborative meeting. How could it if the announcement never
mentioned anything about the HFRA or the Middle East Fork Hazardous
Fuel Reduction project?
Yet BNF officials have repeatedly penalized our organization for
not attending this March 18, 2004 meeting. This is especially
frustrating since, as I mentioned, our organization wasn't invited to
this meeting and the meeting announcement didn't mention anything about
the Healthy Forest Restoration Act or the Middle East Fork Hazardous
Fuel Reduction project.
Further casting doubt on the BNF's claim that this March 18, 2004
was part of the HFRA collaborative process are the statements from Jed
Fitzpatrick, an East Fork community member who attended that March 18,
2004 meeting, that appeared in the October 5, 2005 issue of the Ravalli
Republic:
``At the press conference Tuesday, other residents from the Middle
East Fork community were present who supported alternative 3. Jed and
Jessica Fitzpatrick live at the southern end of the proposed project
boundary and attended the first public meeting in Sula, which didn't
seem to discuss logging at all, Jed Fitzpatrick recalled. `They didn't
say we're going to log this much acreage in the Middle East Fork,' he
said. Rather, the meeting focused on things the agency could do to
benefit the local community, he said. He remembered talking about
things like back-country access for horses, fishing access and more
toilets. `There was no way this plan (alternative 2) was birthed from
that,' he said. He doesn't understand the need to log areas far away
from the community, as is proposed in alternative 2. `The area they're
going to cut is not a threat to us,' Fitzpatrick said. He would like to
see alternative 3 implemented because it keeps the values intact that
he treasures about his surroundings. `I live here because it's wild and
I want it to stay wild,' he said. However, Fitzpatrick does see where
some logging could be done, but he wants to make sure it happens in a
non-invasive way by local loggers. He's fearful of outside commercial
logging interests coming in and making money and destroying soils and
watershed resources. `I think you could harvest that with a balance,'
he said.''
On September 21, 2004 the Bitterroot National Forest mailed out an
announcement, which stated, ``You are cordially invited to a
collaborative planning meeting for the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuels
Reduction Project, Wednesday, Sept 29th at the Sula Clubhouse.'' The
announcement also states ``This project fits the intent of the Healthy
Forest Restoration Act (HFRA) passed by Congress and signed by
President Bush in December 2003. This legislation emphasizes citizen
participation by requiring projects be collaboratively developed
between citizens and agencies.'' This is the first announcement sent to
the public which clearly states the name of the project and the fact
that this project will be conducted under the Healthy Forest
Restoration Act.
Unfortunately, due in part to the fact that the Forest Service only
gave the public a one week notice for this meeting, representatives of
our organization were unable to attend the September 29, 2004 meeting
because our entire staff was attending a conference that we had been
helping to organize for the better part of a year.
So, when looking at all the facts, BNF officials appear to be
penalizing our organization for not participating in the collaborative
process of HFRA because we simply were unable to attend one single
meeting (September 29, 2004) that we received one week's notice about.
Since the Bitterroot National Forest has repeatedly informed us that we
not did participate in the official HFRA collaborative process for this
project we can only assume that the HFRA-mandated collaborative process
for this project started and ended with that September 29, 2004
meeting. In the nearly two year's that have passed since that meeting,
the Bitterroot National Forest refused to hold any other HFRA
collaborative meetings as part of this project. I don't believe that
this constitutes the type of ``collaborative process'' that Congress
envisioned when it passed the Healthy Forest Restoration Act.
Yet, apparently outside of the Bitterroot National Forest's version
of the HFRA collaborative process, since the fall of 2004 our
organization invested nearly 2,000 hours trying to work with the Forest
Service and community members to help develop a common-sense fuel
reduction plan that would provide effective and efficient community
wildfire protection for the East Fork community.
Our organization hosted public meetings about this project in Sula
(May 3, 2005) and Missoula (March 30, 2005) and public science panels
about this project in Hamilton (June 2, 2005) and Missoula (June 28,
2005) featuring some of the region's most well-respected scientists and
researchers.
Through a dozen public field trips over winter, spring and summer
that we organized--including a major tour on May 4, 2005 featuring
nearly sixty people representing the logging industry, East Fork
residents, Forest Service and interested citizens--we have taken over
one hundred people from the Bitterroot and Missoula Valleys into the
woods to get an on-the-ground look at this project. We also went out in
the project area with prominent Ph.D. faculty members at the University
of Montana's School of Forestry to hear their perspectives and have
them share their considerable knowledge with us.
I would like to point out that in comparison, the Bitterroot
National Forest has, to date, not held one single public field trip
about the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction project. Again, I
don't believe that this constitutes the type of ``collaborative
process'' that Congress envisioned when it passed the Healthy Forest
Restoration Act.
In response to the harmful parts of the Bitterroot National
Forest's Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuels Reduction project, in
November of 2004 conservation groups, together with some Bitterroot
Valley residents and former Forest Service employees, collaboratively
created an alternative that was intended to provide far superior
wildfire protection to the East Fork community, protect old-growth
forests and elk.and bighorn sheep winter grounds and implement bona-
fide restoration activities within the East Fork area. We called this
the Community Protection and Local Economy Alternative and we submitted
it to the Forest Service in December 2004 during the official scoping
process for this project.
While the Bitterroot National Forest did accept and develop the
Community Protection and Local Economy Alternative into Alternative 3
within the environmental impact statement, regrettably, Bitterroot
Supervisor Dave Bull decided to arbitrarily eliminate nearly all the
watershed and road restoration components from Alternative 3. This was
unfortunate, as these restoration activities had the potential to
provide hundreds of local jobs restoring watershed and forest health in
the East Fork of the Bitterroot River drainage.
We still don't fully understand why the Bitterroot National Forest
decided to eliminate from further analysis the major restoration
components of the Community Protection and Local Economy Alternative.
According to information the Forest Service provided to us (which is
contained in the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction Draft EIS,
2.7.4. Elements Outside This Project's Scope Eliminated From
Alternative 3):
``Additional watershed restoration opportunities are not identified
in this analysis. This was consciously done for three reasons. 1) The
HFRA authorizes prescribed fire and vegetation management tools to
reduce fuels and restore fire adapted ecosystems, but does not
specifically authorize watershed improvement projects. 2) The Forest
Service wants to assure that the activities proposed can and will be
implemented. . . . 3) The Bitterroot National Forest currently has a
backlog of watershed restoration needs which will be completed as time
and resources allow. Because of this backlog, members of the public
have expressed concerns about identifying restoration work that might
not be completed in a timely manner. The Bitterroot National Forest
concurs and sees no value in adding to that list of watershed
improvement projects at this time.''
The Purpose of the Act (HFRA) is in part ``to enhance efforts to
protect watersheds and address threats to forest and rangeland health,
including catastrophic wildfire, across the landscape; and to protect,
restore, and enhance degraded forest ecosystem types in order to
promote the recovery of threatened and endangered species as well as
improve biological diversity and enhance carbon sequestration.''
The restoration component of the Community Protection and Local
Economy Alternative focused on achieving these goals. Since the HFRA
does not contain language that prohibits specific types of bona-fide
restoration activities (but in fact clearly calls for efforts to
protect watersheds and restore degraded forest ecosystem types) we
believe any decision to not consider watershed and road restoration
activities would be arbitrary and capricious, and we believe would
violate the intent of the HFRA.
Furthermore, according to the best available science watershed and
road restoration work is an integral part of restoring fire-adapted
ecosystems, which is one of the primary objectives of the Middle East
Fork HFRA project. Therefore, this only added additional confusion as
to why watershed and road restoration work contained within the CPLE
Alternative was excluded.
We were also especially troubled with the statement Bitterroot
National Forest officials made under reason 3. While we, and the
public, are concerned that the Bitterroot National Forest has a backlog
of watershed restoration needs--especially related to the $16 million
short-fall for watershed and road restoration activities as part of the
2001 Bitterroot Burned Area Recovery Plan, but also an annual road
maintenance shortfall on the forest of $2,245,000--we think the
Bitterroot National Forest is grossly mischaracterizing that concern
with the statement above in reason 3.
We are not aware of anyone within the environmental community, or
the public at large, that has ``expressed concerns about identifying
restoration work.'' Rather, the concern that has been expressed from
the environmental community, and the public at large, over the past few
years has centered on the failure of the Bitterroot National Forest to
implement the required watershed and road restoration work as outlined
in the Burned Area Recovery Plan FEIS and Record of Decision.
This concern was compounded over the first three years of
implementation of the Burned Area Recovery Plan due to the insistence
from Bitterroot National Forest officials--including numerous
statements by Supervisor Bull--that BAR plan watershed and road
restoration work was ``on track'' despite the facts, which clearly
showed the loss of millions of dollars in restoration and
rehabilitation funds and the overall slow pace of the watershed and
restoration work.
I should also point out, as we have done repeatedly in meetings,
personal communications and within the Community Protection and Local
Economy Alternative, that we were not asking that all watershed and
road restoration work within the Middle East Fork HFRA project area be
implemented as part of this project. Rather, we clearly articulated
that all watershed and road restoration work within the Middle East
Fork HFRA project area be identified (along with an economic analysis
of the dollar amount needed to complete all the identified work) and
that from the identified work a prioritized list of watershed and road
restoration work be created.
Despite the setback with the watershed restoration work being
eliminated from this Healthy Forest Restoration Act project,
Alternative 3 still included 1,600 acres of fuel reduction work on
Forest Service land, including 600 acres of strategic fuel reduction
within a 1/4 mile Community Protection Zone around structures within
the project area and an additional 1,000 acres of fuel reduction work
outside of that zone but still within the wildland-Urban Interface.
According to the Forest Service, this plan would have generated $1
million in labor income and provide 45 local jobs in the Bitterroot
Valley.
Unfortunately, some in the logging industry knowingly misled the
public when they characterized this alternative as ``no action on the
forest except for a small amount of work done around houses and raking
needles from under decks.'' I guess only a logging industry lobbyist
could see local conservation organizations supporting and encouraging
fuel reduction on 1,600 acres of Forest Service land that would
generate $1 million in local labor income and provide 45 jobs as ``no
action'' and just ``raking needles from under decks.'' I'd also like to
point out to the Committee that when the Montana Logging Association
filed their official HFRA objection on this project they stated,
``Alternative 3 must be stricken from the FEIS document.'' It really
seems quite remarkable to me that the logging industry would go to such
lengths to purge a fuel reduction project that would reduce fuels on
1,600 acres, pump $1 million in local economy and create 45 jobs.
During the late spring and summer of 2005, while the Bitterroot
National Forest was accepting public comments on their Draft EIS for
the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction project, we began to
notice on field monitoring trips into he project area that the Forest
Service was busy marking logging units, helicopter landing pads and
temporary roads based solely on their preferred alternative. In other
words, months before the eventual Record of Decision for the Middle
East Fork HFRA project would be signed (in April 2006), and while
accepting public comments on the draft project, the Forest Service was
using taxpayer dollars to mark logging units associated with their
preferred alternative. Just how much money did they spend? Information
obtained from the Bitterroot National Forest via a FOIA request shows
that at least $208,000 in taxpayer funds were used to mark logging
units during the public comment period and prior to any official
decision.
Whether technically legal or not, I hope members of this Committee
will realize that this pre-decisional expenditure of $208,000 in
taxpayer funds does a huge disservice to genuine democratic process and
collaboration and only serves to poison civic participation.
A few days after this pre-decisional expenditure of taxpayer funds
was revealed to the public, on September 22, 2005, Bitterroot National
Forest Supervisor Bull released the Final EIS for the Middle East Fork
HFRA project with a press conference at the Supervisor's Office of the
Bitterroot National Forest in Hamilton, MT. When members of Friends of
the Bitterroot were informed by the media of this press conference
announcing the release of the much anticipated Final EIS for the Middle
East Fork HFRA project they went to the Bitterroot National Forest
headquarters.
``I was removed from the press conference at the public Bitterroot
National Forest office under escort by an armed Forest Service law
enforcement officer who was wearing a bullet-proof vest,'' explained
Jim Miller, 53, President of Friends of the Bitterroot. ``We're not
dangerous. All we were armed with was pen and paper to take notes. We
can only assume that what Supervisor Bull and the Forest Service fear
most is the truth.''
Also barred from attending the public press conference at the
Bitterroot National Forest office were longtime Bitterroot Valley
residents and members of Friends of the Bitterroot, Stewart Brandborg
and Larry Campbell.
Eighty years young, Brandborg is a former Forest Service wildlife
biologist whose father was the Supervisor of the Bitterroot National
Forest from 1935 to 1955. In fact, a photo of Brandborg's father still
hangs in the hallway of the Supervisor's office where he was turned
away from the press conference.
``My father was a supervisor on this forest for twenty years. I
have an interest in what is taking place on this public forest and want
to witness it. I've never been barred from attending a public press
conference in sixty years of conservation work.'' According to
Brandborg, the Bitterroot National Forest had hand-selected those who
could attend the press conference in the Bitterroot National Forest
Headquarters office, only allowing individuals to attend who support
the Bitterroot National Forest's controversial HFRA project.
Ironically, back in 2001, Campbell, 57, was on the receiving end of
an assault in the parking lot of this very same Forest Service office.
Campbell was assaulted, spit on and threatened by a band of
approximately a dozen loggers right in the parking lot of the
Bitterroot Supervisor's office in Hamilton as he emerged from inside
the office after picking up some public documents. ``Bitterroot
National Forest officials did absolutely nothing about the assault and
made no attempts to come to my rescue. Instead Forest Service officials
simply sat inside the office and peered out the window as the assault
took place,'' related Campbell.
During the official HFRA objection process, which took place in
October 2005, the Bitterroot National Forest received two official HFRA
objections to the project from families that live in the East Fork
community, as well as objections from longtime Bitterroot Valley
residents and two Ph.D. faculty members at the University of Montana's
School of Forestry. Official HFRA objections were also received from
the logging industry, as well as the local conservation groups that
helped develop the Community Protection and Local Economy Alternative.
In the nearly six months between when the HFRA objections were
filed and when the Record of Decision was signed, the Bitterroot
National Forest made no attempt to work with our organization, except
for a brief phone call I received from Supervisor Bull in January 2006.
During the entire time our organization participated in the
development of the Middle East Fork HFRA project we clearly stated to
the Forest Service, East Fork community and the general public that we
were very supportive of effective community wildfire protection work
going forward in the area, and we remain supportive of the effective
community wildfire protection work going forward to this day. In
October 2005 we even meet personally with Undersecretary of Agriculture
Mark Rey to urge the Forest Service to consider splitting the Middle
East Fork HFRA project into two Records of Decision--one that would
immediately implement the 1,600 acres of common-ground community fuel
reduction work found in Alternative 3, and a second decision that would
have included the controversial aspects of this project, including
logging of large trees far from the nearest homes and outside of the
WUI.
The Forest Service refused these repeated requests and instead
signed a Record of Decision that opted to defer a small portion of the
Middle East Fork HFRA project that was clearly illegal due to soils
issues (with the full intention of bringing back this portion of the
project at a later date), while still going ahead with misguided
logging of large trees in previously unlogged forests that don't pose
an immediate threat to scattered homes found up the East Fork.
In late April 2006, our organization, along with Friends of the
Bitterroot, filed a lawsuit on the Middle East Fork HFRA project and
currently that lawsuit is making its way through the judicial system.
In the meantime, the Forest Service is going forward with auctioning
off some of the first timber sale contracts that are part of this
project and they expect work to begin in late August or early
September.
In the Forest Service's legal brief, the government states, ``Fire
season is fast approaching, and delaying the (Middle East Fork) Project
even for a short period increases the risk that if a fire occurs, it
will be severe.''
Yet, relegated to the background is the surprising scientific truth
stated clearly in the Forest Service's own environmental impact
statement (p. 3.1-38): ``Generally, for logistical and economic
reasons, the larger fuels are treated first and the treatment of
smaller fuels typically follows 1-3 years later. During that time
period, before treatment is complete, fire behavior severity is
increased.''
What lessons can be learned from our situation with the Bitterroot
National Forest's Middle East Fork HFRA project?
First and foremost, any HFRA project needs an open, honest and
inclusive collaborative process that includes participation from a
diverse set of stakeholders. When various stakeholders and the Forest
Service already have issues with mistrust, an open, honest and
inclusive process becomes all the more important. Collaboration does
not include the Forest Service coming to an initial HFRA meeting with
logging units already mapped out, as was the case with the Middle East
Fork HFRA project.
It is highly inefficient for the Forest Service to tie bona-fide
community wildfire protection work with industrial logging of large
trees further from homes and, in some cases, outside of the Wildland-
Urban Interface. If the goal of a project is to help offer some
protection to a community in the event of a wildfire that should drive
the project, not industrial logging of large trees in the backcountry.
If the Forest Service attempts to tie misguided logging with community
protection, controversy increases and the project is often placed on
shaky legal ground.
In order to help this Committee understand the level of concern and
opposition that the Middle East Fork HFRA project and process elicited
I'm including the following information in this testimony:
``When you lay out expected receipts and costs, this would
bring into focus that costs will far exceed receipts. It would
be clear that timber sales would not fund your healthy forest
goal. . . . You say that selling timber, even at a loss,
provides you with funds to partly offset the cost of doing
Healthy Forest work on lands adjacent to the logged area. I
don't think this is true on the Bitterroot or other Region 1
Forests. . . . I can't see how you can fund any part of the off
sale acres you desire to treat under the Healthy Forest Act.''
--Bob Wolfe to Supervisor Dave Bull specifically about
the Middle East Fork HFRA project (Sept. 29, 2005)
``. . . there has been a consistent, deliberate removal of
information that accurately portrayed the conditions of the
soils and the prescriptions and mitigations needed to address
those degraded soil conditions. Therefore, I can not support
the DEIS in terms of assuring we are meeting the SQS. I can no
longer say the proposed actions are legal regarding NFMA and
other pertinent laws and FS policies. I am very disappointed
that all my hard work has been erroneously reinterpreted,
rewritten and changed far from what I wrote and intended by the
editor(s) who weren't even on the ground doing soils
investigations in this project area!''
--Ken McBride to Supervisor Dave Bull (May 5, 2005).
McBride was the Bitterroot NF's soil scientist for 16
years before retiring in the fall of 2005.
Text of Official Middle East Fork HFRA Objection received on October
14, 2005 from Robert S. Francis, 2546 E. Fork Rd., Sula, MT
59871
``I wish to object to the planned `preferred' Alternative #2 that
would `treat' 6,472 acres instead of Alternative 3 that would impact
1,064 acres. I object on a personal and a general basis.
On a personal level my objection is based on the fact that my ranch
house is next to Forest Service road #5778. The logging truck traffic
resulting from Alternative #2 will make that structure uninhabitable.
This observation is based on a small project set up by Sula Ranger
Hollingshead last year. Her total lack of courtesy and consideration
resulted in logging trucks roaring by our house at 3 am. I have no hope
that attitude will change.
On a general level I object to the premise that logging, etc
outside the 400 meter zone protecting property is useful. There is no
evidence it helps stops wildfires. In fact, there is ample evidence
that logging increases the intensity of fires due to the drying effect
on the understory and the piles of tinder-dry trash, slash, et at
logging sites.
On a general level I object to the premise that logging will affect
the Douglas-fir bark beetle epidemic. There is ample historical data
that shows this is a normal, cyclical process. It is natures way of
thinning. Logging does not cure it. To use this infestation as an
excuse to `get the cut out' is, at best, intellectually dishonest. This
course of action makes sense only if one accepts the attitude that our
national forest is a tree farm--not an ecosystem. I do not share that
attitude.
I object to Alternative #2 on an economic basis--as a taxpayer.
Logging is a notorious money-loser. The value placed on the product is
much too low. If my corporation conducted business the way you folks
do, we would have gone out of business years ago.
Finally, I object to the heavy-handed methods used to ram
Alternative #2 down my throat. Under the guise of getting `community
support' you have used scare tactics, and have hand-picked certain
people for `testimonials' that support the plan you wee going to use--
no matter what.
I have one last request--please give me at least 3 months warming
before the log trucks start rolling along road #5778, so I can move
out.''
Text of Official Middle East Fork HFRA Objection received on October
24, 2005 from Jed and Jessica Fitzpatrick, PO Box 45, Sula, MT
59871
``My wife, daughter and I live on the eastern edge of the project's
boundary and feel that Alternative 2, the proposed alternative, will
negatively affect this area. Treating nearly 6000 acres through the
prescribed methods will greatly increase the spread of noxious weeds,
disturb fragile soil systems, greatly increase sediment (26 tons) into
the Bitterroot River, while not reducing the urban fire threat or the
pine beetle infestations.
We support Alternative 3 for this project because it focuses on
urban interface, rather than backcountry logging. Alternative 3 would
resolve the questionable aspects of the project proposed.''
Text of Official Middle East Fork HFRA Objection received on October
24, 2005 from Cheryl Holden Rice and Jack D. Rice, 329 El
Capitan Loop, Stevensville, MT 59870
``In the 1860s, a twice-widowed grandmother Eliza and her Carlton
and Holden sons settled on what they named Carlton Creek fed by Carlton
Lakes off Carlton Ridge and Lolo Peak. Larry Creek Campground is
namesake to her third husband Larry Lavey. My grandchildren are
seventh-generation to the Bitter Root Valley, where seven of their
fourth-great-grandparents worked it. Moreover, a sister and some
cousins share eight generations in the local timber industry. By 1993
in this valley, 53 different surnames of families over the century are
my relatives, some providing other names on the landscape. Like the
Salish before us, when we marry and have children, we make certain we
do not marry a blood relative. Therefore, we knew our neighbors, and
for the most part, still do. We wave to each other in recognition.
Importantly, we also know that our forests enrich our lives through the
ages.
Last spring, a tour organized by Montana environmentalists and
loggers peaked my interest. I joined them up the Middle East Fork of
the Bitterroot, an area ravaged by the fire of 2000. There, Bitterroot
National Forest Supervisor Dave Bull introduced himself when he kindly
invited me a ride up. Instrumental in obtaining the first approval
under the Healthy Forests Restoration Act, Mr. Bull merits praise.
Riding next to me was Bill Glasser, owner and builder of southern
Bitter Root's Lost Trail Ski Resort. He graciously shared special
sunglasses to better depict the expanse of bark beetle-killed trees.
I also met Matthew Koehler who represented Native Forest Network.
Perceptively, he initiated the public tour after many trips to study
the area. He, like my timber family, cares about the forest for the
sake of the forest, which includes people, wildlife, and flora. We both
realize that, unlike coastal areas, our semi-arid valley does not allow
trees to rapidly replenish as is evident in clear cuts. As Mr. Glasser
told me, the seeding and planting up the West Fork after the fire, is
damaged by drought.
That morning, a welcome gentle spring mountain rain with its wet,
pungent, charcoal snags and downed timber amidst beetle-killed stands
awoke the memory of fire. Also, miles of numerous road strings over
this range reminded one of others who left their mark, including my
family of sawyers and loggers. As the sky cleared, birds reveled among
a freshly washed, sprouting, newborn forest. On mountain tops, we each
contemplated what is best for this forest and the life bound to
flourish with time.
Each soul among us seemed to agree that the urban-interface below
the ridges is our first concern. Close trees shelter most homes along
Middle East Fork. Everyone I questioned agreed that just as I am
responsible for the huge poplar over my roof, neighbors who chose to
live in the forest have personal responsibility to protect their homes
from the trees in their yards. Significantly, Mr. Koehler pointed out
alternative 3 focus on these homes with crucial concern for our
neighbors. That is consensus.
Then in September my husband and I learned that last summer Mr.
Bull, who decided on alternative 2, prematurely authorized $208,000 of
taxpayer money to mark trees to be cut before any final decision was
properly made. We drove up Middle East Fork to see. Trees still hover
over private homes. Two bore blue bands depicting a future cut. Driving
up logging roads in the area visited in spring, we saw no fire or
beetle killed trees marked blue. Green, healthy, blue-ribbon trees of
various sizes were to be cut.
Having stated our views in June, we continue to support alternative
3 with its immediate treatment to 1,587 acres to protect homes about a
mile on both sides of the river's Middle East Fork and, upon
completion, with opportunity to address bums, beetles, fuel reduction
and restoration further back.
Whether outfitter, logger millworker, forester, scientist,
environmentalist, conservationist, or anyone else, Bitterrooters wave
to neighbors. We can work together as demonstrated for generations and
by the tour. Richly blessed with a Bitterroot forest that is home to
most of us, let us ensure this into eternity. Consensus for treatment
of nearly 1,600 USDA acres toward a healthy forest with homes that
would bring about 45 jobs and $1 million local labor income is a first-
rate start!''
Text of Official Middle East Fork HFRA Objection received on October
14, 2005 from Stephen F. Siebert, Professor, Department of
Forest Management, University of Montana College of Forestry
and Conservation, 6310 Woods Rd., Missoula, MT 59802
``I am writing to express my opposition to the Middle East Fork
Hazardous Fuel Reduction project in terms of both substance and
process. While I do not have official standing to file an objection, I
submit this statement for the record. I visited several forest stands
that will be impacted by the proposed project this past summer,
attended the field trip that Forest Supervisor Dave Bull organized for
College of Forestry and Conservation faculty members, attended the
public meeting in Hamilton, and was a panel discussant at the Missoula
public meeting.
On the faculty field trip and at the public meetings, numerous
questions and concerns were raised with regard to Bitterroot national
Forest assumptions about fire regimes and behavior, potential to
control bark beetle infestation, noxious weed invasions, elk forage
cover relationships, soil compaction, stream sedimentation, and
fisheries. In my opinion, these concerns have not be adequately
addressed.
Give the inherent uncertainty and unpredictability of management
actions in a project of this scale, a case could be made to pursue the
proposed alternative as a learning exercise. This would necessitate
documenting, monitoring and assessing impacts through rigorous,
replicated, randomized studies with adequate controls. However, as
proposed, the project will not serve this function either.
Based on the failure of the Forest Service to address substantive
concerns about the proposed alternative and the dismal decision-making
process (particularly the selective inclusion of the public and
ejection of some members of the public from the public announcement
meeting), the Bitterroot National Forest Sula District has achieved
`catastrophic success.' The American public and the U.S. Forest Service
deserve better.''
Text of Official Middle East Fork HFRA Objection received on October
24, 2005 from Diana L. Six, PhD, Associate Professor of Forest
Entomology/Pathology, Director, UM Mentoring Program for Women
in Science, Dept. of Ecosystem and Conservation Sciences,
University of Montana College of Forestry and Conservation,
Missoula, MT 59812
``The Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction Project has
substantial problems in its design and its ability to meet its stated
objectives. I will restrict my comments to planned work outside of the
urban interface zone as that work is clearly needed, meets objectives,
and is not in contention. In contrast to the community protection zone,
much of the additional work that is planned, especially in the higher
elevations, is not likely to meet objectives and may even work counter
to them. This area is primarily composed of mixed fire intensity stands
which do not behave the same as low elevation low intensity high
frequency fire adapted stands and thus cannot be assumed to respond the
same ways to thinning treatments. By opening these stands they become
drier and windier and can burn hotter (per comments by fire expert Ron
Wakimoto and others). Furthermore, as planned, these are spacing
treatments not restoration treatments that truly attempt to restore
historic stand structure and function (see Franklin et al, . . .). The
lack of application and use of current knowledge in the ecological
sciences and ecosystem management principles in this project is as
disturbing as the apparent poor understanding of when and where to
properly apply certain types of treatments.
My expertise lies in insects and disease of forests and in genetics
and I will confine the majority of my remaining comments to these
topics. Thinning of stands to reduce tree susceptibility to bark
beetles can be a very effective preventative strategy when applied
properly and at the correct time. While the efficacy of thinning in
Douglas-fir remains to be tested it is likely to be effective in many
situations. Thinning works by releasing trees in overdense stands from
competition. This release means that trees have higher levels of
resources of which some then be made available to produce defensive
compounds. While Douglas-fir does not use pitch to defend itself
against beetles as do pines, it has other defenses that are resource
dependant. The effects of thinning, however, are not immediate.
Typically, trees in thinned stands become more susceptible immediately
after thinning due to changes in stand conditions including increased
light and wind to which they are not accustomed. After a lag period of
one or more years, trees then often exhibit an increase in their
defensive capabilities and become more resistant. Therefore,
immediately after thinning, trees become more susceptible-if thinning
is done in a stand with high levels of beetle activity this can
increase, not decrease, mortality. Such treatments, therefore, are most
appropriate and effective as preventative treatments applied before
beetles become active in considerable numbers in an area.
In epidemic situations, such as the areas affected by the project,
thinning is ineffective and may exacerbate mortality in remaining
trees. Such efforts and expense would be better placed into areas on
the Bitterroot Forest where beetles are not yet active but where
conditions would support increases in their populations and where the
treatments can do some good and are appropriate. This project will not
reduce beetle populations or mortality due to the small amount of area
being treated relative to the size of the infestation and thinning in
these areas is not likely to help save the remaining live trees.
Another concern with the project is the source of stock to be used
for replanting at some of the sites. It is now well known, and has been
for some time, that replanting with trees not native (same species) to
the site can be devastating to the long term health and function of a
forest. Forest geneticists have recommended that replanting should be
done using seed sources from the site as this assures replacement of
dead trees with site-adapted trees and less of a potential for losses
in genetic diversity if seed is properly collected. The genetic
diversity present in a stand is ultimately tied to how well a forest is
able to deal with changes in the environment that occur in the short
and long term. Unfortunately in the past, and still in many places
currently, the value of maintaining genetic diversity is not
understood. Nor is the fact that trees are site-adapted to more than
just temperature, elevation, precipitation and soils at a site. We now
know that more than optimal site conditions for tree growth are
important in maintaining a healthy forest. The genetics of trees at
particular sites have resulted from millennia of adaptation to
conditions that go well beyond temperature, precipitation and soils and
include susceptibility to many diseases and insects, ability to survive
prolonged drought, and other disturbances. Problems related to the
genetics of offsite trees often do not show up until decades after
planting. By that time, the trees have produced pollen that has spread
throughout the forest and their alleles have been incorporated into the
genomes of the ``native'' trees potentially polluting and diluting the
genetic pool and affecting adaptive traits that evolved there. Once
this happens it cannot be reversed.
I hope the Forest will reconsider the non-community zone portion of
this project and in the future base more of their management on
ecological principles and the best available science. Management is
clearly need in many places but should always strive to use the best
information available to ensure the greatest likelihood of doing
good.''
Ravalli Republic (Hamilton, Montana) Letters to Editor--June 20, 2006
Middle East Fork project needs examined
By Jed Fitzpatrick, Sula, MT
I would like to comment on the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel
Reduction Project scheduled to begin soon in Sula. My family and I live
year round here in Sula on the far Eastern end of the project boundary.
We have been involved with this project from its inception, attending
the community meetings and receiving all the literature from the Forest
Service pertaining to this project.
We feel the ``collaborative effort'' touted by the Forest Service
on this project has created much confusion and argument from the
beginning. The meetings at the Sula Clubhouse were very poorly
orchestrated and mediated by Forest Service management, leading to more
of a community argument rather than a constructive debate. What you
know now as the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reeducation project, 11
million board feet of timber harvested, apparently spawned from these
two disorganized meetings. I do not believe this project originated
from these meetings, and I feel our community has been unfairly divided
and used as leverage on an issue we actually have no say in.
This beautiful valley teems with game and is probably the most
coveted mule deer special tag area in the state; huge herds of big horn
sheep inhabit the same country. Logging and burning will obviously
affect these critters, not to mention the hunters trying to find the
game while helicopter logging operations continue throughout the
hunting season.
I urge everyone on both sides of the fence on this project to
examine it closely as I have done, and ask yourself if this project is
actually ``healthy'' for our forest and this community.
DeBaugan HFRA Project, Lolo National Forest, Montana
The WildWest Institute, West End Volunteer Fire Department and
others local residents, businesses and conservation groups are
currently engaged in a collaborative process through the Healthy
Forests Restoration Act with the Superior District of the Lolo National
Forest to develop a common sense plan for fuel reduction work on Forest
Service land directly around the greater DeBorgia, Montana area.
Thankfully, our experience with the DeBaugan HFRA process on the
Lolo National Forest has been night and day different from our
experience with the Middle East Fork HFRA project/process. In fact, to
date, it's been a refreshing process and I personally believe that
Superior District Ranger Rob Harper and his staff deserve a lot of
credit. Credit also needs to go to the West End Volunteer Fire
Department and their Chief Bruce Charles who have been instrumental in
keeping this process flowing smoothly, as well as a local organization
called the Happy Homemakers, who have graciously provided the beautiful
DeBorgia School House (which again, was one of the only buildings in
the entire area to survive the 1910 Fires), as well as tasty cookies
and brownies, for all our the HFRA collaborative meetings.
According to the Forest Service's own scoping document for this
HFRA project, the DeBaugan collaborative group (so named for the
communities of DeBorgia and Haugan) was formed in early 2005 by the
community members and environmental group representatives from
Missoula. Since May of 2005, there have been six HFRA collaborative
public meetings and two HFRA collaborative public field trips to
discuss how to effectively protect homes from wildfire, current forest
fuel conditions and potential fuel reduction opportunities.
These HFRA collaborative meetings and field trips have been
facilitated not by the Forest Service, but by outside facilitation
provided by Dr. Jim Burchfield, assistant Dean of the University of
Montana's School of Forestry and Conservation. Dr. Burchfield has done
an excellent job and the outside facilitation has a allowed the
collaborative group to build trust, rather than fight with a
facilitator who might have their own agenda. Attendance at these HFRA
collaborative meetings and fieldtrips has been very high, with 114
individuals participating, which given the small populations in these
communities is quite remarkable.
Just to be clear and for comparisons purposes, the Bitterroot
National Forest held only one official HFRA collaborative meeting and
no public fieldtrip for the Middle East Fork project, while as you can
see the Lolo National Forest has held six official HFRA collaborative
meetings and two HFRA collaborative field trips.
Again, according to the Forest Service's own scoping document for
this HFRA project, based upon this intensive nine-month effort, the
DeBaugan collaborative group developed a proposal to reduce fuels near
the edge of National Forest lands and in most cases immediately
adjacent to private land near the communities. The proposal specifies
fuel reduction activities on 5,732 acres through prescribed burning and
cutting, removal and slashing of small trees.
While the WildWest Institute and other conservation groups involved
are very supportive of fuel reduction work around the DeBorgia area on
Forest Service land to help protect the community from wildfire, we do
have some concerns with the Forest Service's proposal as it now stands.
We have let the Forest Service and collaborative group know that our
concerns center around issues related to old-growth forests, soils,
water quality, roads and endangered species such as lynx and bull
trout. We are optimistic that these concerns will be properly addressed
and rectified as the Forest Service goes through the environmental
effects analysis and puts together an Environmental Impact Statement.
However, unlike our experience with the Bitterroot National Forest
on the Middle East Fork HFRA project--where the Forest Service refused
for over a year to even consider making changes to their project and
government officials insisted at all costs that they knew what was
right--the Lolo National Forest has been very upfront and open to
changes in the project stating in their official scoping document that
``the proposal may be modified, additional actions proposed to mitigate
negative effects, or dropped from consideration as needed to meet
federal and state laws, Forest Service regulations and policy, and Lolo
Forest Plan standards, objectives and guidelines.''
The Forest Service has informed the collaborative group that fuel
reduction work on the Forest Service lands around the DeBorgia area
will not be implemented until at least 2009 due to the HFRA process,
Forest Service budget issues and unforeseen circumstances that have
drawn Forest Service employees off their regular duty, including a
human-caused wildfire along Interstate 90 last year, as well as
Hurricane Katrina.
It's interesting to note that when the collaborative group was
informed last summer that it would be at least 2009 until this project
would be implemented community members, the volunteer fire department
and conservationists asked the Forest Service to consider moving
forward with the most important community fuel reduction work under the
provisions of the Categorical Exclusion authority. We were told that
doing so would move the HFRA project back even further.
This experience, coupled with accounts such as the one given
recently by Senator Bingaman, really illustrate to me the serious
nature of the Forest Service's budget crisis.
Furthermore, the fact that work on the DeBaugan HFRA will not begin
until at least 2009 just further emphasizes the importance of the
defensible space work around the homes of elderly members of the
community, along key roads in the community and near the firehouse and
community center that the WildWest Institute and West End Volunteer
Fire Department completed this past May as part of our DeBorgia
Community Wildfire Protection Work Weekend.
What more could be done to improve upon HFRA and what steps could the
Administration take to improve its implementation of HFRA?
Based on my experience with the HFRA process and resulting
projects, and a review of the administration's FY 2007 budget request,
I would like to make the following observations and recommendations.
1. The Forest Service's ``Healthy Forests'' budget does not
provide adequate support for community wildfire protection
efforts on non-federal lands where it would be most effective,
especially since nationally 85% of the land proposing a risk to
communities in non-federal land.
2. While increasing the budget for the timber sale program,
the Administration's FY 2007 proposed Forest Service budget
also would eliminate the Economic Action Program that provides
funding for communities to conduct assessments for wildfire
risk and planning for defensible space. Furthermore, the State
and Volunteer Fire Assistance programs, which provide for
community wildfire protection planning and projects through
both the State and Private Forestry and Wildland Fire
Management programs would be cut by nearly $23 million--a 30
percent reduction.
3. Environmentally harmful logging that does not enhance
community protection or forest health is being included in HFRA
and HFI projects. Paying for bona-fide community wildfire
protection projects and ecologically-based restoration work
through the federal timber sale program does not work. This
practice not only increases controversy and mistrust among
various stakeholders, but commercial timber sales often
increase fire risk and severity and cause additional
restoration needs.
4. The required HFRA collaborative process is, in some cases,
being ignored, or highly manipulated, by the Forest Service.
Again, this practice only serves to increase controversy and
mistrust among various stakeholders. An open, honest and
inclusive collaborative process with outside facilitation
appears to be the best course of action.
5. The old growth forests and large tree retention
requirements of the HFRA are, in some cases, being ignored and/
or manipulated by the Forest Service in order to cut down large
trees. Once again, this practice only serves to increase
controversy and mistrust among various stakeholders, not to
mention that it may result in increased fire risk and severity
as well as significant damage to overall forest health.
For all future HFRA projects I would urge:
1. That a greater portion of the Forest Service ``Healthy
Forests'' budget be dedicated to non-federal lands in the
Wildland-Urban Interface. In FY 2007 the administration
proposes to spend only 4% of the funding in this area that
makes up 85% of the risk nation-wide.
2. That when developing fuel reduction projects to protect
communities from wildfire the Forest Service and BLM focus fuel
reduction activities within the 1/4 mile Community Protection
Zone. Given limited resources and limited time, it makes most
sense to focus fuel reduction activities immediately around a
community rather on the larger WUI, which in some CWPPs extends
out 1/2 to three miles or more. Another advantage of focusing
limited time and resources within the CPZ is that we can ensure
that more at-risk communities are protected.
3. That the Forest Service allow the local collaborative
process to work and together with a diverse set of stakeholders
help design authentic community wildfire protection and
restoration projects, not just timber sales under the guise of
community wildfire protection and restoration. In order to help
with this effort, the Forest Service should seek outside
facilitation for the HFRA collaborative process and begin
working more closely with independent researchers and
scientists at colleges and universities throughout the country
to make sure that protects are based on the best available
science.
4. That old growth logging and cutting of large trees and
entry into roadless wildlands be prohibited in all future HFRA
and Healthy Forests Initiative projects. This practice only
serves to increase controversy and mistrust among various
stakeholders and takes valuable resources away from bona-fide
community wildfire protection and ecologically-based
restoration projects.
Mr. Chairman and members of this Committee, I look forward to
answering any questions that you may have and thank you for the
opportunity to testify at this important hearing to review
implementation of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act.
Senator Craig. Matthew, thank you very much. Now,
Commissioner MacLeod.
STATEMENT OF COLLEEN MACLEOD, COMMISSIONER, UNION COUNTY, OR,
ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF COUNTIES
Ms. MacLeod. Good morning Chairman Craig, Senator Wyden,
Senator Bingaman. Thank you for the opportunity and the honor
of testifying before you this morning.
I am Colleen MacLeod, a commissioner from Union County in
the northeast corner of Oregon. I appear before you today on
behalf of the National Association of Counties.
While every county is unique, I believe that our
experiences using the tools of the Healthy Forest Restoration
Act to improve forest health and protect our communities are
typical of those of many of my fellow county officials across
the country.
Our county is mountainous, heavily forested and covers over
a million three hundred thousand acres. Half of that land is in
Federal ownership. As you might well imagine, we, as a board of
commissioners, devote a great deal of attention, time and funds
in an effort to repair the damage to our economy and declining
health of the forests that surround us.
We are fortunate to be represented here in Washington by
your colleagues on this committee, Ranking Member Ron Wyden and
Senator Gordon Smith, as well as by your counterpart in the
other chamber, Greg Walden, chairman of that committee. They
are all tireless advocates for our natural resource-based
communities. So, perhaps it is not entirely coincidental that
we enjoy a terrific relationship with our local Federal forest
managers.
We are also fortunate in that our county still has three
working mills that have the potential to process the timber
that clogs our forests and threatens our surrounding
communities. Mills that have managed to hold on despite the
fact they can not depend on the Federal forests that surround
us. They have managed to exist through that 180 degree turn,
where the public lands that were originally designed to insure
resources to our Nation, have now deferred that responsibility
back to a dwindling supply of private ownership.
Our efforts to creating a meaningful wildfire plan have
been more successful and useful due to our record of teamwork.
We were participants in efforts such as the Blue Mountain
Demonstration Project and have an appointed Forestry
Restoration Board with very broad representation. It is not a
flawless process, nor does it guarantee that groups
participating in that collaborative process will forgo their
right to appeal projects recommended by the group. It is,
however, an open process that invites discussion before
litigation and demands justification for litigation after the
process.
Our collaborative efforts on our plan have been a model.
The core planning team included members from Federal and State
agencies, local and tribal governments as well as
representation from private landowners, industry and small
rural fire protection districts. The resulting document from
this professional collaboration and the subsequent community
meetings, is an in depth analysis of wildfire risk assessment.
It was designed to reduce the potential for wildfires that
threaten the people, resources, structures and infrastructures
that the people in my county value.
Process was data-based approached and combined information
and expertise of the planning agency members. Sixteen WUI areas
were identified and their risk level was ranked. The
responsibility for implementing those projects was determined
by specific landowner or managing agency.
Each WUI area contained multiple uses and unique concerns,
and what became clear to us was that no one project could be
implemented entirely within one agency or at one level of
government. Due to our process of sharing those resources and
combined knowledge we've had the ability to combine this
disparate data and prepare and refine a comprehensive plan.
So, where do we go from here? What do we do now that the
planning is done? What needs to be done is powerful knowledge.
However, powerful knowledge requires equally powerful action.
Planning without proper implementation is a wasted process.
On the private side, landowners in the affected areas are
stepping up and cleaning house. Residents are creating
defensible space, thinning overstocked stands, planting fire
resistant vegetation, and improving emergency access. They have
been able to access over a half million dollars in Fire Plan
money and some commercial thinning they've done has provided
funding to reduce their costs and vulnerability.
On the public lands side, the risk reduction efforts have
been much slower. Restoration and fire hazard reduction on
public land is a process of running through sand. If the
lawsuits don't get you, then the paperwork will.
There is little comfort and safety assurance to a landowner
who's taken the necessary steps to fire proof his property,
only to find the process of treating the Federal land that
surrounds him is either 2 years out in the planning process, or
held up by litigation in the courts somewhere. It does no good
to fire proof one room in your home if the rest of your house
is a house fire waiting to happen.
HFRA and HFI have been helpful to us, but we still run into
regulatory issues like Eastside Forest Screens, PACFISH or the
endangered species, issues that prevent us from doing needed
treatment and require we do a EA to amend our forest plan. An
EA usually takes 2 years from start to finish. Unfortunately
forest fires do not work on schedule. The categorical
exclusions in the Restoration Plan have allowed us more
flexibility, but those usually take a year from start to finish
and awarding of a stewardship contract.
No matter what our level of collaboration, and we work
really hard at that in my county, we expect some form of appeal
on every project and it has become a tool for obstruction and
delay.
In closing, I ask you to continue to take what ever steps
necessary to remedy this timeframe for restoring forest health.
We need to get on with things. The forest needs our help and
the citizens of this Nation need our help.
If you have not viewed the literal cauterization that
happens to an overstocked forest after a major fire, I can tell
you first hand that it is no longer protection, nor habitat for
man, beast vegetation or watershed.
I am one of those residents in the WUIs who looks directly
out my front window every day at an overstocked, unhealthy
forest, a forest that suffers from lack of treatment mainly
because it had the misfortune to be designated wilderness, oh,
I'm done, I'm almost done. This is not designated wilderness
because it's sat untouched by human activity. It has actually
been accessed and used extensively for years.
No, I am not one of those people who seem to be drawing
derision for building new McMansion out where others deem they
shouldn't. My home and the homes of my neighbors have been in
place along the base of that mountain for over 100 years. The
humans, the resources and the wildlife in that forest have
managed to co exist in a multi-use forest framework for
decades. The hand thinning we've managed to get through the
restoration project will be no match for even a small fire. I
have furnished you a photo I took from my driveway of a fire
over the ridge a couple of years ago. Residents of my county
and all across the landscape of public lands shouldn't have to
live with this kind of preventable threat.
Thank you for listening and for your ongoing efforts.
[The prepared statement of Ms. MacLeod follows:]
Prepared Statement of Colleen MacLeod, Commissioner, Union County, OR,
on Behalf of The National Association of Counties
Good morning Chairman Craig and Senator Wyden. Thank you for the
opportunity and the honor of testifying before you this morning.
My name is Colleen MacLeod. I am a County Commissioner from Union
County in the Northeast corner of Oregon. I appear before you today on
behalf of the National Association of Counties.
While every county is unique, I believe that our experiences using
the tools of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act (HFRA) to improve
forest health and protect our communities are typical of those of many
of my fellow county officials across the country.
Union County is located in the Wallowa Whitman National Forest,
which, along with the Umatilla and Malheur National Forest comprise
what is known as the Iron Triangle.
Our county is mountainous, heavily forested and covers over a
million three hundred thousand acres. Half of that land is in federal
ownership. As you might well imagine, we, as a Board of Commissioners,
devote a great deal of attention, time and funds to try to restore the
natural resource balance in our region; a region that has suffered
economic upheavals and declining forest health over the past several
decades.
Mr. Chairman, as you may know, Union County is fortunate to be
represented here in Washington by your colleagues on this Committee,
Ranking Member Ron Wyden and Senator Gordon Smith, as well as by your
counterpart in the other chamber, Chairman Greg Walden--all tireless
advocates for our natural resource-based communities. Perhaps it is not
entirely coincidental that we enjoy a terrific relationship with our
local federal land managers.
Having said that, I must let you know that as I prepared for this
hearing many of my fellow county officials from across the country have
wanted me to emphasize the positive working relationships and
collaboration that they also enjoy with their federal partners. For one
excellent example of these partnerships, please see the attachments *
describing the collaboration between the New Mexico Association of
Counties, the BLM and the New Mexico State Forestry Division. Mr.
Chairman, as you know, NACo has not hesitated to be sharply critical of
these agencies in the past, but in this case, Chief Bosworth and
Director Clarke are getting the message out to their people on the
front lines, and it is making a difference.
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*All attachments have been retained in subcommittee files.
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We in Union County are also fortunate in that we have retained some
of the infrastructure essential for large forest health improvement
projects. We still have three working mills able to process the trees
that clog our forests and threaten our surrounding communities. Those
mills have managed to survive, in spite of the fact they can not depend
on the federal forests that surround us for their timber supply. They
have managed to exist through that 180 degree turn, where the public
lands that were orginally designed to insure resources to our nation,
have now deferred that responsibility back to a dwindling supply on
private land.
We also have the advantage of having been early practitioners of
the kind of collaboration this committee has endorsed in HFRA and other
legislation in recent years. We have, by design and through necessity,
built a consistently open and collaborative working relationship with
our federal, state and local partners. It has been an effort to move
forward and remedy what we perceive as an imbalance. Our efforts at
creating a meaningful Union County Community Wildfire Plan have been
more successful and useful due to our history of teamwork. We have
historically been participants in efforts such as the Blue Mountain
Demonstration Project and have had, since 2001 a local Forestry
Restoration Board. That board tours project sites and collaborates on
outcomes for planned USFS projects. Appointees to that board represent
the county, federal and state forestry, tribes, fish and wildlife,
marine fisheries, ranching, small woodlands, environmental and
industry. It is not a flawless process, nor does it guarantee that its
projects will not be appealed. It is, however, an open process that
invites discussion before litigation and demands justification for
litigation after the process.
The collaborative effort on our CWPP has been a model. We started
early and we cast our participation nets very wide. The core planning
team included members from federal and state agencies, local and tribal
governments as well as representation from private landowners,
industry, small rural fire protection districts and emergency service
providers. The resulting document from this professional collaboration
and the subsequent community meetings, is an in depth analysis of
wildfire risk assessment. It was designed to reduce the potential for
wildfires that threaten the people, the resources, structures and
infrastructures that the people in my county value.
Our CWPP process was a methodical, data-based approach that
combined the information and expertise of the planning agency members.
Sixteen Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) areas were identified and their
risk level was ranked based on such factors as population, level of
development, topography, vegetation and weather patterns. The
responsibility for implementing projects was determined by specific
landowner or managing agency. Buy-in to hazard mitigation was obtained
by comprehensive participation through the project identification
process.
Although each WUI area has within in it, multiple uses and unique
concerns, what became clear was that no one project could be
implemented entirely within one agency or at one level of government.
Due to our process of shared resources and combined knowledge we have
had the ability to combine this disparate data and prepare and refine
this comprehensive plan.
What do we do now that the planning is done? It is good to know
what needs to be done. That is powerful knowledge. However, powerful
knowledge requires equally powerful action. Planning without proper
implementation is a wasted process.
On the private side, landowners in the affected areas are stepping
up and cleaning house. Residents are creating defensible space by
thinning overstocked stands, planting fire resistant vegetation,
improving emergency access. They have been able to access over a half
million in Fire Plan dollars and some of the commercial thinning has
provided funding to reduce their costs and vulnerability.
On the public lands side, the risk reduction efforts have been much
slower. Due to the usual circumstances, restoration and fire hazard
reduction on public land is a process of running through sand. If the
lawsuits don't get you, the paperwork will.
There is little comfort and safety assurance to a landowner who has
taken the necessary steps to fire proof his property, only to find the
process of treating the federal land that surrounds him is either two
years out in the planning process, or held up by litigation in the
courts somewhere. It does no good to fire proof one room in your home
if the rest of the house is a house fire waiting to happen.
However the tools you have given us are providing some light at the
end of the tunnel. For instance, my colleague on the NACo Public Lands
Committee, Commissioner Alan Thompson of Ravalli County, Montana, tells
me that U.S. District Court recently ruled on a high-priority project
from their local CWPP that had been appealed. After considering
different alternatives in collaboration with local stakeholders--and
adjusting proposals in light of concerns raised in the process, the
Forest Service settled on an alternative that proposed harvesting a
significant number of dead and dying trees both in the WUI around the
little community of Sula and on the Bitterroot National Forest. In the
course of the appeal which followed, Ravalli County intervened on the
side of the Forest Service. After hearing arguments from the County and
the Fire Chief of Sula, Judge Malloy ruled in favor of the Forest
Service and the County. Commissioner Thompson says that without HFRA
the time spent planning the projects and the appeals and litigation
which seem inevitably to follow would be too long to remove the
hazardous fuels which threaten our citizens and their property, not to
mention the fish and wildlife that depend on the forest. The provisions
of HFRA that streamline the appeals and litigation process are proving
to be very valuable and we believe that they should be preserved and
perhaps extended to other agency planning activities.
Similarly, in Union County, HFRA and HFI have been very helpful to
us, but we still run into regulatory issues like Eastside Forest
Screens and PACFISH or other Endangered Species Act issues that prevent
us from doing needed treatment. While the ESA is not under the
jurisdiction of this Committee, let me pause here to make an important
point. We believe that the ESA, as it is currently implemented, is the
greatest single barrier to improving forest health on the scale and at
the pace that our dire forest conditions demand. Mr. Chairman, NACo
believes that the Senate should move to update and improve the ESA
before the 109th Congress ends. Failure to do so is a tragic waste of
an historic opportunity.
As you might expect, Mr. Chairman, funding also continues to be a
problem. A number of counties report that they have completed their
plans, but that priority projects are held up due to lack of funds to
implement them.
My colleagues in California are coming to the conclusion that this
is due in part to a disconnect between Forest Service project planning
and the CWPP process. While the agencies have been wonderful partners,
providing technical assistance to counties preparing CWPPs, too often
these plans are considered ``just'' community plans, not integrated
across the landscape, including federal, state and private ownerships.
Consequently, County Supervisors in California feel that they may not
be realizing the full benefit of HFRA. Part of the reason for this may
be that many CWPPs have included only projects that require grant
funding, which limits the opportunity for a coordinated approach to
fire risk reduction. Since CWPPs were designed to coordinate efforts to
reduce fire risk across the landscape, it may be a good ideal to direct
federal field personnel to integrate their plans with those of the
communities, and to consider landscape scale projects which may
generate revenue while accomplishing hazardous fuel reduction outcomes.
This will improve opportunities for community members to recommend a
community-wide fuel reduction strategy, provide meaningful
participation in federal projects and expedite implementation of
federal and private projects.
Another potential solution which we in Oregon have aggressively
pursued uses the synergy that exists between Title II and Title III of
your landmark Secure Rural Schools and Community Self Determination
Act. Many of our counties have been able to use Title III funds to
support the CWPP process and then invest Title II resources to leverage
project implementation.
Our colleagues in California's Regional Council of Rural Counties
have made a number of other useful observations and recommendations
which NACo submits as an attachment to this testimony.
In closing I ask that you continue to take what ever steps
necessary to remedy this timeframe for restoring forest health. We need
to get on with things. The forest needs our help. The citizens of this
nation need our help.
If you have not viewed the literal cauterization that happens to an
overstocked forest after a major fire, I can tell you first hand that
it is no longer protection, nor habitat for man, beast or vegetation.
I am one of those residents who look directly out my front window
every day at an overstocked, unhealthy forest; a forest that suffers
from lack of treatment mainly because it had the misfortune to be
designated Wilderness. This is not designated Wilderness because it has
sat untouched by human activity. It has actually been accessed and used
extensively for years.
No, I am not one of those people who seem to be drawing derision
for building new McMansions out where others deem they shouldn't. My
home and the homes of my neighbors have been in place along the base of
that mountain for over 100 years. The humans, the resources and the
wildlife in that forest have managed to co exist in a multi-use forest
framework for decades. The hand thinning we have managed to get through
the restoration process will be no match for even a small fire. I have
furnished you a photo I took from my driveway of a fire over the ridge
a couple of years ago. Residents of my county and all across the
landscape of public lands should not have to live with this kind of
preventable threat.
Thank you for listening and for your ongoing efforts.
Senator Craig. Commissioner, thank you very much. Now, our
last witness to testify, Jay Jensen, executive director,
Council of Western State Foresters. Jay, please proceed.
STATEMENT OF JAY JENSEN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, COUNCIL OF WESTERN
STATE FORESTERS, LAKEWOOD, CO
Mr. Jensen. Good morning, Chairman Craig, good morning,
Senator Wyden. Thank you for having the stamina to stay all the
way through to the end of the day.
First, I'd like to apologize that we could not get a State
forester here to testify before you and for giving me an
opportunity. Just as the temperature is reaching three digits
here in D.C., so it is in the West and the wildfire situation
particularly in the last week has really----
Senator Craig. I have a feeling they're all busy.
Mr. Jensen. They are. State foresters by enlarge are
strongly supportive of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act and
there really is one primary reason for that. It's the Community
Wildfire Protection Plans contained within that act and that's
going to be the focus of my testimony today.
It's been a State forester's collective experience that
when dealing with wildfire and natural resource issues, that
when you can have a locally driven community based solution,
those are the best sorts of answers that are most lasting on
the ground. Thanks to all of you around this dias and the
Congress that passed the Healthy Forest Restoration Act, that's
exactly what you provided with those community wildfire
protection plan provisions.
Let me talk to you a little about what's the importance of
those CWPPs as they're called and what that means. CWPPs are
bringing back a level of credibility back into the process
right now. Primarily through the collaborative process and
under which they are developed, they provide a formal avenue
for a way for communities to channel their energies on dealing
with wildfire issues. This is very important because it
empowers those communities to take their own responsibility for
dealing with the wildfire situation. If we're going to address
wildfire wholistically, we need--this is not just something
that it's the sole responsibility of government to handle. We
need communities and individuals to step up and take
responsibility for their own protection.
Where are we right now? I'll give you a snapshot of what it
looks like in the West. As of March of this year, there are 334
Community Wildfire Protection Plans completed across the West,
250 more coming on line. That translates to about--those cover
about 2,000 communities at risk and I wish I could provide you
a better State by State comparison of what that looks like, but
the numbers really don't match up that way, they're not--
because communities are all defined differently and look
differently and the coverage under those CWP's are different.
It's very hard to draw comparisons between States, but I would
encourage you to take a look at our recent report that came out
that we'll provide in the back of the room and you can see some
details of what's happening in each of your individual States.
I'd end by saying if you look at the national picture,
there are about 650 completed with about 600 more coming on
line soon.
Implementation, and I think this is the major focus of why
this hearing was called today. How are CWPPs getting translated
into projects. Let me remind you that CWPPs are all lands
documents covering both public lands and private lands. So, let
me cover the private land side of the equation first and talk
to you from the State forester's perspective where most of
their responsibility is.
The primary Federal mechanism there is through the State
fire assistance program. In the West, those projects for fuels
reduction are derived through a competitive process that
require them all to be derived from the Community Wildfire
Protection Plan, thus guaranteeing that all projects are of the
highest priority and are being done in the right area.
On the Federal side of the equation, I think as we've heard
here today, it's a little bit tougher to figure out all that's
going on. A few reasons for that, I'd think I'd offer HFRA may
not always be the best tool for hitting those high priority
acres. But, I think we're also seeing that NEPA projects--
there's a number of many NEPA projects on the shelf and those
line officers have a 2 to 4 year investment in those NEPA
analyses and they want to get those down on the ground. So, I
think what we'll start to see is more translation of CWPPs in
the projects in the next year or two.
Challenges ahead, the expectations are very high. A
community that finishes a Community Wildfire Protection Plan
expects Federal dollars to flow their way. That's troubling,
that is not the intent of how the Healthy Forest Restoration
Act was put together. What CWPPs do do is allow a community to
position themselves to compete better for scarce Federal
dollars.
Let me talk a little bit about some of the--well moving on
a little bit in terms of investment, and we've heard discussion
here today, fuels reduction work is very expensive. Easily
$1,000, $2,000 is common, we've heard 8,000, particularly when
you're dealing with mechanical treatments. We need to make sure
that we're dealing with the highest priority acres and CWPPs
provide that opportunity to do that.
Investments, and if we want to maintain the numbers we're
looking at, we're going to have to see the investments being
made on these high priority projects that are identified in
CWPPs. Reauthorization of the county payments legislation,
titles II and III provide some opportunities there with that.
We all know about the hazardous fuels line items and the state
Fire Assistance Program and the Forest Health Management
Programs also provide avenues.
Quick note on appeals and litigation, progress is being
made, CWPPs are reducing the conflict that's out there, the
objections processes under HFRA are helping with that, but it's
still a problem. Notably for the Forest Service, repeal or
modification of the appeals reform that could go a long way
towards helping out in this regard. It can be done in a way
that does not cut the public out of the process. What we're
talking about here, is trying to create and introduce some
flexibility into this system, into a system that's extremely
rigid right now and keeps us from getting timely projects on
the ground.
I'll finish up simply by noting that CWPPs are turning into
one of the most important aspects of the Healthy Forest
Restoration Act for State foresters in particular. Credibility
is being built, conflict is being reduced, high priority
project are getting accomplished and individual responsibility
is being promoted which is key to getting ahead of this
problem.
Thank you for your time and I'm happy to answer any and all
questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Jensen follows:]
Prepared Statement of Jay Jensen, Executive Director, Council of
Western State Foresters
Mr. Chairman, members of the Subcommittee, my name is Jay Jensen
and I am the Executive Director of the Council of Western State
Foresters. I welcome the opportunity to testify before you today. The
Council of Western State Foresters is comprised of the seventeen
directors of the State and six Territorial Island forestry agencies of
the West. The mission of the CWSF is to promote science-based forest
management that serves the values of society and ensures the health and
sustainability of western forests.
The Council has been keenly interested in the development and
implementation of the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003, and
continues to strongly support many provisions in that policy. In
particular, State Foresters recognize the importance of managing
forestland across ownership boundaries, and HFRA provides critical
tools for accomplishing this work. Additionally, and the primary
subject of my testimony today, HFRA formalized the role of communities
in fire management. Community Wildfire Protection Planning charges
communities with becoming active partners in their own protection from
wildfire, and presents an unprecedented opportunity for engagement at
the local level.
cwpp summary & background
Title I of HFRA focuses primarily on fuels reduction on federal
lands, and provides for the development of Community Wildfire
Protection Plans (CWPP) for communities at risk of wildfire. Drafting
CWPPs in collaboration with state, local fire and local government
officials, communities identify prominent sources of fire risk,
summarize structural ignitability concerns, and prioritize areas for
fuels reduction treatment. The main purpose of CWPPs is for localities
to improve their wildfire mitigation capacity while working with
government agencies to coordinate efforts to identify high fire risk
areas and prioritize areas for mitigation, suppression, and emergency
preparedness management on both federal and non-federal lands. States
have a legislatively-mandated and key role to play in the formulation
of CWPPs, acting as long-term, landscape-scale coordinators and outside
experts.
To assist communities in the development of their CWPPs, an
official CWPP handbook * was developed in March, 2004 by a
collaborative work group consisting of the National Association of
State Foresters, the Society of American Foresters, the Western
Governors' Association, the National Association of Counties and the
Communities Committee of the 7th American Forest Congress. This
handbook helps to highlight the common ingredients necessary for
successful CWPPs. Related, the National Association of State Foresters
(NASF) issued a Field Guidance on Communities at Risk (June 2003),
establishing a common definition for communities at risk and a process
model for the prioritization of communities. These two guiding
documents provide communities with powerful, easy-to-understand
information that empowers them to take wildfire protection into their
own hands.
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* The handbook has been retained in subcommittee files.
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It is also worth noting that CWPPs derive their collaborative
direction from the nationally agreed upon blueprint for dealing with
wildfire, the 10-year Strategy (2001), [A Collaborative Approach for
Reducing Wildland Fire Risks to Communities and the Environment. A 10-
Year Comprehensive Strategy], and its companion document, the
Implementation Plan (2002). Under direction from Congress, the Western
Governors' Association in consultation with numerous stakeholders
established a collaborative framework under the 10-year Strategy and
Implementation Plan for decision-making and priority setting. It is
clear that Congress has played a central role in empowering
communities, and continued Congressional support for CWPP development
and implementation is essential.
Goal number four in the 10-Year Strategy is to ``promote community
assistance'', with an emphasis on building community capacity and
developing stronger incentives for community-level fire mitigation
work. Current efforts to update the 10-year Implementation Plan are
underway, and through this process stakeholders have clearly voiced
support for CWPPs as an effective tool for empowering communities to
function as partners in their own protection from fire. Further, we
have found that when solutions are developed collaboratively and close
to the local level, controversy and conflict are reduced. By
identifying priority acres in need of treatment through this process,
many believe that CWPPs contribute to a reduction in appeals and
litigation of land management projects, thus expediting the reduction
of fuel loadings, one of the main tenants of the HFRA and HFI.
cwpp implementation: successes
As of the spring of 2006, more than 300 CWPPs that meet HFRA
standards were completed in the West, providing community protection
for more than 2,000 communities at risk. Nationally, an estimated 650
CWPPs have been completed and approved with an additional 600 currently
in progress. Several states have also completed community fire plans
that don't yet meet HFRA requirements, thereby offering additional
protection that is not reflected in the data. A state-by-state
breakdown of the western CWPP efforts has been catalogued in a March
2006 report by the CWSF, included in the appendix as a reference.
States have used a diversity of CWPP methods and community-at-risk
definitions, adapting the tools to fit their individual state laws and
wildfire situations. Because states have undertaken differing
methodologies by necessity, numerical comparisons between states do not
tell an accurate tale of CWPP development. Likewise, when looking at
the CWSF report, the number of CWPPs completed in each state should not
be calculated as a percentage of the total number of communities at
risk in the state to indicate a level of protection. Many CWPPs cover
more than one community, and many states have utilized such different
definitions of ``communities'' that calculating percentages would be
uninformative and potentially misleading.
The West is clearly moving toward increased community protection
through the CWPP process. Identifying local concerns and prioritizing
protection activities not only serves to attract agency attention to
fire management needs, but the very process of CWPP development tends
to increase community capacity and foster a heightened awareness of
local fire risk and responsibility. Furthermore, as federal, local, and
emergency personnel collaborate on a CWPP, they form lasting
relationships that extend beyond the immediate task.
With continued progress in local collaborative efforts, we expect
to see reductions in conflict, appeals and litigation. We strongly
encourage all decision-makers to maintain their long-term commitment to
CWPP development and implementation as we believe local level decision-
making will go a long way toward solving our catastrophic wildfire
problem.
cwpp implementation: challenges and recommendations
CWPP Project Translation
We do not know of any definitive data available on how many federal
land projects identified under a CWPP have been translated into HFRA or
other wildfire mitigation projects. We suspect that the actual numbers
are low for reasons discussed in this testimony. However, we do know
that the federal agencies are planning and in some instances have
provided direction to the field to prioritize CWPP identified projects
in fuels work. This will guarantee more CWPP projects getting
translated into projects, and ensure that our limited funding is going
to the highest priority treatments. We suspect that one reason why CWPP
projects are not reaching the ground in meaningful numbers is because
federal line officers already have a number of NEPA-ready projects on
the books, ready to be implemented. Because of the lengthy process and
resource commitment needed to develop NEPA projects (2-4 years at
times), line officers are understandably reluctant to adjust their
priorities until their investment in the NEPA-ready projects get off
the ground. We believe that as these NEPA-ready projects begin to be
implemented, we will see the emergence of new CWPP-driven HFRA
projects.
Guidance
This transition to CWPP-driven HFRA projects would be greatly
enhanced by national level clarification of existing agency direction
around integration of CWPP projects with HFRA authorities. Emphasis
should be placed on the involvement of multi-agency groups working
together to implement these projects. In many places, stakeholders have
long requested guidance on collaboration, and ``characteristics of
successful collaboration'' are forthcoming in the revised 10-Year
Comprehensive Strategy Implementation Plan. This information should be
distributed to field offices with detailed instructions for
implementation.
Expectations
Virtually all states report a common expectation in their
communities: a completed CWPP will automatically lead to a stream of
federal funding. This expectation is troubling for several reasons.
First, it is inaccurate; HFRA and associated policy language urges
federal agency planners to prioritize work recommended in CWPPs, but
does not require them to conduct all of the projects suggested by
communities. Second, when communities expect funding to follow their
plans, they tend to write plans that cannot be implemented without
outside support. Communities may invest in the analysis and process,
but are too often unable to implement their ideas without federal
agency involvement. Third, as agencies seek to build lasting trust with
local entities through the collaborative process, they may be
undermined when communities realize their expectations for federal
funding will likely not be met. Finally, the rationale for a CWPP is
meant to enhance individual responsibility, and not create a dependency
on government.
Investment
While there is no dedicated line item in the federal budget to
support the development of CWPPs, some communities and state forestry
agencies have found other funding sources to bolster their efforts.
Most prominently, the State Fire Assistance (SFA) program, part of the
USDA Forest Service's State and Private Forestry budget, directs
federal funds to State agencies for work on community assistance and
fire mitigation. These competitive cost-share funds are leveraged by
communities for CWPP creation and implementation.
In the West, it is now a requirement under the SFA that proposed
projects be tied to a CWPP in order to be competitive. Without reliable
federal funding to support communities' CWPP planning and
implementation, there is a very real risk that the most vulnerable, low
capacity communities will also become the least protected from fire.
The Council believes the demand for State Fire Assistance greatly
outstrips current availability of SFA funding for CWPP development and
implementation and that increases in SFA or other dedicated funding can
be put to demonstrated good use.
Funding for collaborative fuels reduction work in some parts of the
west also comes through the Secure Rural Schools Act. In particular,
Titles II and III offer a funding stream for both collaborative
processes and hazardous fuels reduction work on federal and private
lands. Reauthorization and funding of the Act with continued
flexibility for counties to undertake resource stewardship projects is
a significant complement to HFRA authorities.
Once a CWPP has been created, funding needs intensify. Hazardous
fuel work is very expensive, easily on the scale of $1000/acre, and
sometimes topping $2000/acre when mechanical means are utilized.
Funding shortages can push land managers to use prescribed burning and/
or look toward more remote areas as cheaper alternatives that enable
them to report higher acreage accomplishments. Many states report a
chronic shortage of crews and equipment to implement projects that are
ready. Other states suggest that the scale of the problem is so large
that multi-agency, inter-disciplinary teams should be assembled to
craft landscape scale projects across ownership boundaries. The simple
story is that if we want more fuels reduction work in high-priority
areas, additional investments will be necessary.
Performance Measures
Another way to increase the number of CWPP--consistent projects
being implemented is to establish performance measures that reward the
agencies for linking project planning with CWPP recommendations when
those ideas are consistent with existing land management plans. The
Council encourages the development of CWPP--relevant performance
measures. Currently, such efforts are underway in the update to the 10-
year Implementation Plan and will go a long way toward fostering CWPPs
in prioritization decisions.
Appeals and Litigation
We strongly support the HFRA objection process as a replacement for
the lengthy appeals process that remains applicable to many non-HFRA
projects. This issue is particularly important for the USFS, which is
the only federal agency that deals with wildfire to have their appeals
process codified in law. This rigidity reduces the agency's flexibility
and lengthens their response time, thus delaying projects. Modification
or outright repeal of the Appeals Reform Act is one option for
dramatically reducing the impact of litigation on project timeliness.
A number of our state members and their federal partners continue
to report time delays due to project-level appeals and litigation. In
one instructive example, the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuels Reduction
Project in the Bitterroot National Forest in Montana was developed
through a collaborative CWPP process. Project implementation was
delayed because two local environmental groups decided to seek
alternatives after agreement had been reached on a CWPP project. This
example underscores how important it is to achieve appeal and
litigation reform, particularly in relation to wildfire mitigation
projects. Systemic reform might prevent this story from replaying in
other communities.
In many instances, litigation is also the result of a lack of
definitive science on controversial fire management problems. In
particular, research that demonstrates the necessity and effectiveness
of fuels reduction work to reduce fire risk broadly across the
landscape is needed. Too often we hear that creating a small buffer
around a home is all that is needed to protect life and property. The
values associated with a functioning watershed, the critical habitat
for an endangered species, and critical power and energy lines needed
to keep hospitals, schools and our economy churning, do not stop 100
feet from homes and critical infrastructure. Scientific evidence about
reducing landscape scale fire risk would greatly enhance our ability to
succeed in many of these lawsuits. We therefore recommend continued
support for research programs, such as the Joint Fire Science Program,
that directly address these ongoing fire management controversies.
concluding remarks
All states have at least begun the process of creating CWPPs,
although rates of completion vary considerably. Across the West, as of
March 2006, 334 CWPPs have been completed and approved in accordance
with HFRA guidelines. These, and countless other community-based
wildfire planning documents, when implemented, will serve to protect
our communities at-risk. That is why it is vital that CWPP-identified
projects get translated into agency priorities. As communities and
states begin to share success stories and lessons learned, progress
will strengthen and accelerate. Already, templates and field guidance
have been developed by a number of non-profit, government, and research
entities to facilitate the process of community input into wildfire
mitigation projects. Although it has been two full field seasons since
the passage of the HFRA, we believe that we will soon see a faster ramp
up of HFRA projects, more reflective of HFRA expectations.
As this process begins to gather momentum, it will be vital to keep
a focus on developing and revising CWPPs, and getting those projects
translated onto the ground. Many who have been involved in CWPP
development are quick to note that in many cases the process is itself
a success. Collaboration around wildfire mitigation among local
landowners, local governments, federal land management agencies and the
states is creating lasting relationships that are invaluable for
information sharing and community capacity building. Throughout the
West, there is enthusiasm for improving collaborative efforts,
protecting communities, and developing strong wildfire mitigation
planning processes. These are the necessary ingredients to get the
desired results of more acres treated on the ground.
Last, although our testimony has focused on CWPPs and their
relation to Title I of the HFRA, it is also worth noting that the HFRA
includes several important titles in addition to Title I. The biomass
provisions of Title II, the Watershed Forestry Assistance Program in
Title III (for both private and tribal lands), and Title IV addressing
insect infestations and disease provide key program elements designed
to improve research, increase wood utilization, and address forest
management concerns on a landscape scale in order to sustain and
restore the health of forested watersheds. State Foresters from the
CWSF and across the country have worked with the USDA Forest Service to
develop implementation guidelines for the Watershed Forestry Assistance
Program in Title III, and we hope to see this program receive funding
for full implementation on both private and tribal lands. Among other
goals, its purposes are closely tied to those of Title I, by improving
landowner and public understanding of the connection between forest
management and watershed health, it enables application of landscape
scale approaches to forest rehabilitation and restoration.
Thank you very much for having me today, and I welcome your
questions.
Senator Craig. Jay, thank you very much for that testimony.
Now, let me turn to my colleague, Senator from New Mexico, Jeff
Bingaman, Jeff.
Senator Bingaman. Thank you very much Mr. Chairman, thanks
all of you for being here. Rick, let me ask you a couple of
questions. In your testimony, you talked about this Perk-
Grindstone project.
Mr. DeIaco. Yes, sir.
Senator Bingaman. I think we visited that.
Mr. DeIaco. Yes, sir, we did.
Senator Bingaman. Yes, I remember going out there by that
reservoir.
Mr. DeIaco. That's correct.
Senator Bingaman. Now, your testimony says a 5,500 acre
project called Perk-Grindstone was assessed as the number one
Forest Service priority in 2000, when the Wildland Urban
Interface Group started, because it is located directly
southwest of the community and its a major portable water
reservoir and treatment plan. This project remains hung up
without a NEPA decision, remains unfunded, line officers are
compelled to meet acre targets at the expense of community
protection. This is absolutely unacceptable. Village Council
signed a resolution encouraging the Lincoln National Forest to
move forward with Perk-Grindstone earlier this year. What's
broken in the system that here we are in 2006, this was
identified as the number one priority project in 2000, and we
still can't seem to get it done. What does this committee have
to do or the Congress to get this kind of thing fixed?
Mr. DeIaco. Thank you for that question and an attachment
to my statement shows that matrix from 2001, that we had an
action plan, that it shows that. The line officers began the
process after HFRA. There was some work that was done in 2001,
but it was grossly inadequate and they were going to come back
to it. HFRA comes around and they started the process with
that, they, in my opinion, were not able to take advantage of
all the tools that HFRA might have given in terms of
categorical exclusions in some areas.
In terms of collaboration, this was a project that is so
close and so tight on the community that its fire hazard
reduction is imperative. There's two owl packs there. When they
went through and put the proposed action together, it was
consistent with the forest plan. In New Mexico, as you know,
sir, the forest plan holds the MSO recovery plan and that's
nothing over nine inches.
In terms of fire hazard reduction, that was not
satisfactory to the community. So, we, the working groups, so
what we did was, through the working group, through the
collaborative working group, we urged them to move to a
preferred action, which allowed them to amend the forest plan
and get into those areas and get some work done, some fuels
reduction done in those, either in PACS or in critical
habitats, which are the steep slopes.
When they put that forward, it was objected to by an
environmental group. That's fine, that's what they do. What
happened, the Forest Service just continued to kind of back
pedal on this, even after the community put together that
resolution passed by the council and what precipitated from
that was that the village and the environmental group got
together and we have come up with a memorandum of understanding
to get into those areas, look at it stand--in other words we
solved the problem. So, we thought that was a done deal, but it
turned out that the NEPA work was still not completed, still
not satisfactorily completed and it was returned at the
regional office.
So, I think what the best thing that could possibly happen
would be to get the correct--identify the correct training and
performance measures that are necessary so that line officers
can get the work done using HFR standards.
Now, to the point of WUI versus what I call the easy acres,
it's the push and pile burn kind of acres. What happened a few
years back was that the Forest Service basically just expanded
the WUI on the geography of the WUI and they expanded it to the
northeast and, as you know, sir, in the southwest, fire comes--
basically the fire winds comes out of the southwest and so when
you add 60, 70,000 acres to the northeast of the community,
you're not doing any good for the community in terms of fire
protection.
That was a management decision. My opinion, that was a poor
one, but what they can do then, is they can get acres and so
that speaks to my comment about going after easy acres versus
acres that'll do good for our community. I hope that answers
that.
Senator Bingaman. So basically your conclusion is that
there are some of these requirements to get a certain number of
acres, a target number of acres, are in fact, impeding the
ability to put attention on the priority areas.
Mr. DeIaco. That's exactly right. That's exactly right, and
right now the performance standards are basically set on acres.
Where for the most part they are set on numbers of acres burned
gets you more money or however that process works.
Senator Bingaman. So, the performance standards ought to be
based on a number of priority acres burned?
Mr. DeIaco. That's correct. That's correct, and treated
some how or another and completely treated and that spoke to
another comment earlier, if you're going to cut and pile, those
acres get counted, then 3 years later they go back and burn,
those acres are counted again in some degree. So, that's
something that needs to get fixed and I think putting that in,
and again, in the attachment I have there are some performance
measures that might be a good starting point, and I hope that
you folks can consider that.
Senator Bingaman. Good. Well, thank you very much for being
here. Thank you all for being here.
Mr. DeIaco. Thank you, sir.
Senator Bingaman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Craig. Rick, that's valuable testimony and thank
you. Matthew, Colleen and Jay, thank you very much for your
testimony. I'm going to forgo any verbal questions at this time
because we have run out of time and you've all been very
patient today. We do truly appreciate you being with us.
We will submit for you some questions, we hope you would
expand in writing. For example, Matthew, additional words from
environmental groups as it relates to the inter-play and the
collaborative effort that's under way in all of that. I think
it's important for this committee to understand it. Obviously,
CWPPs relate to what counties are doing and beyond where you
are going would be additionally helpful and any uniquenesses
that our State foresters see and understand, Jay, is extremely
important.
We're going to be sitting down with stakeholders and the
Forest Service again to look at our work product to see where
it can be fine tuned at the same time adhering to the
principals involved that were originally established in HFRA to
get us to the business at hand and look at some of those kinds
of difficulties that you've had, you've worked your way
through, Rick, in your community with a uniqueness to the
troubles you have. Obviously I've looked at the maps of your
community and your surrounding area, I mean, you were a
disaster waiting to happen and you're running hard right now to
stay out in front of it and that's understandable. So we all
know this is a critical issue for the West, for our environment
at the same time for the balance that is critical to our public
lands and their vitality. At the same time the uniqueness of a
changing West and how we deal with this interface remains ever
important.
So, thank you, thank you all very much for your time and
presence here today and you will be receiving questions from
the committee, we hope you'll respond. And with that additional
information that you want to place with it for the purposes of
record. Thank you all very much, the subcommittee will stand
adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:22 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
APPENDIXES
----------
Appendix I
Responses to Additional Questions
----------
Questions for Mathew Koehler From Senator Burns
Question 1. What elements of HFRA have been most successful in
getting effective treatments accomplished on the ground that increase
the protection of homes, other private property, and infra-structure
and municipal water supplies?
Answer. This question is rather difficult to answer for the simple
reason that since the HFRA was signed into law in December 2003 so
little has been accomplished by the U.S. Forest Service using the HFRA.
Our organization works primarily in the Northern Rockies and according
to the U.S. Forest Service, FY 2006 on the ground accomplishments under
the Healthy Forest Restoration Act were as follows:
Montana--zero acres of fuel reduction accomplished on Forest
Service land under HFRA.
Wyoming--zero acres of fuel reduction accomplished on Forest
Service land under HFRA.
Because the Forest Service has accomplished zero on the ground
acres using the HFRA in Montana and Wyoming I really can't directly
answer the question regarding what elements of HFRA have been most
successful in getting effective treatments accomplished on the ground.
To date our experience in the Northern Rockies tells me that HFRA
hasn't been successful at all in accomplishing much of anything on the
ground.
Furthermore, based on our experience with proposed HFRA projects in
the Northern Rockies it appears that proposed treatments planned under
the HFRA might actually increase the short-term fire risk thereby
increasing the risk to homes, private property and firefighters.
For example, in the Forest Service's own environmental impact
statement (p. 3.1-38) for the Middle East Fork HFRA project on the
Bitterroot National Forest they state: ``Generally, for logistical and
economic reasons, the larger fuels are treated first and the treatment
of smaller fuels typically follows 1-3 years later. During that time
period, before treatment is complete, fire behavior severity is
increased.''
It makes little sense to our organization, as well as some members
of the East Fork community near this HFRA project, to design and
implement a fuel reduction project that unnecessarily places
communities and firefighters at more risk because large trees far from
homes will be logged first and slash piles will be untreated.
Certainly, it's not too much to ask for the Forest Service to design
projects in such a way as to immediately and effectively reduce fuels
around homes and communities.
However, based on our experience here in the Northern Rockies I'd
like to take the opportunity to highlight our recommendations for all
future HFRA projects. I strongly believe that if the following
recommendations were followed that we would see an increase in
effective fuel reduction treatments accomplished on the ground.
Question 1a. What elements of HFRA have been most successful in
getting effective treatments accomplished on the ground.
Answer. For all future HFRA projects the WildWest Institute would
urge:
1. That a greater portion of the Forest Service ``Healthy
Forests'' budget be dedicated to non-federal lands in the
Wildland-Urban Interface. In FY 2007 the administration
proposes to spend only 4% of the funding in this area that
makes up 85% of the risk nation-wide.
2. That when developing fuel reduction projects to protect
communities from wildfire the Forest Service and BLM focus fuel
reduction activities within the mile Community Protection Zone.
Given limited resources and limited time, it makes most sense
to focus fuel reduction activities immediately around a
community rather on the larger WUI, which in some CWPPs extends
out 1\1/2\ to three miles or more. Another advantage of
focusing limited time and resources within the CPZ is that we
can ensure that more at-risk communities are protected.
3. That the Forest Service allow the local collaborative
process to work and together with a diverse set of stakeholders
help design authentic community wildfire protection and
restoration projects, not just timber sales under the guise of
community wildfire protection and restoration. In order to help
with this effort, the Forest Service should seek outside
facilitation for the HFRA collaborative process and begin
working more closely with independent researchers and
scientists at colleges and universities throughout the country
to make sure that protects are based on the best available
science.
4. That old growth logging and cutting of large trees and
entry into roadless wildlands be prohibited in all future HFRA
and Healthy Forests Initiative projects. This practice only
serves to increase controversy and mistrust among various
stakeholders and takes valuable resources away from bona-fide
community wildfire protection and ecologically-based
restoration projects.
Finally, I'd like to provide Members of the Committee with the
following letter that was sent to Regional Forester Gail Kimbell from
Mike Petersen, director of The Lands Council. As you may recall at the
hearing, Forester Kimbell was called before the Committee and gave an
account of the process surrounding the Myrtle Creek HFRA project near
Bonners Ferry, Idaho.
As you can see from Mr. Petersen's letter, Forester Kimbell
provided the Committee with an inaccurate account of the Myrtle Creek
HFRA process and project. I believe this is completely unacceptable
behavior from Forester Kimbell and only serves to increase controversy
and mistrust among various stakeholders. Our organization certainly
expects more from public officials.
The Lands Council,
Spokane, WA, July 25, 2006.
Dear Regional Forester Gail Kimbell,
Hello. I wanted to establish contact and give you a few thoughts
about the Myrtle Creek project. A friend of mine, Matthew Koehler heard
your recent testimony in DC about HFRA projects and I wanted to clarify
the involvement of The Lands Council and other conservation groups.
As background, The Lands Council has been involved in north Idaho
for over a dozen years, our former Forest Watch Director lives near
Priest Lake, and we have advocated for protecting the Selkirk Mountains
for over a dozen years. In the late 90's we challenged the Myrtle
Cascade timber sale, which proposed to log in inventoried roadless
areas, those units were removed at that time. My forest watch director
spent every summer as a child in Bonners Ferry, her grandparents
operated a mill and her relatives still live in the valley, so the
label of outsiders is inaccurate. In addition these are federal lands,
which every American citizen has a stake in.
Since our involvement in forest management on the Bonners Ferry
District, the Kootenai Valley Resource Institute has formed,
purportedly to bring people together to look at resource issues. The
Lands Council has never been invited to be part of KVRI, although we
were invited to take part in the subcommittee that looked at the Myrtle
Creek HFRA.
We were told early on that the project would not go into
Inventoried Roadless Areas, and we focused our concern on 83 acres of
old growth stands proposed for logging, which we opposed. The Idaho
Conservation League, who is a member of KVRI, also believed there was
no logging in Inventoried Roadless Areas, and so was generally
comfortable with the project. I believe KVRI voted to support the
project, even though a draft EIS had not yet been completed.
When the draft EIS was released it became apparent that something
had drastically changed, over half of the acreage was now in two
Inventoried Roadless Areas (IRA's), and it included clearcuts (with
reserve trees) in the IRA's. The project clearly does not meet the need
of protecting the Bonners Ferry community that is 5 miles away and
clearcutting is not a suitable treatment for a municipal watershed. The
lower part of the watershed is damaged from a timber sale slash pile
that was set on fire and burned several thousands of acres, followed by
extensive public and private salvage logging.
Given the national controversy over entry into IRA's, litigation in
five states and the recent announcement from the Governor of California
asking that all IRA's in his state be protected from logging, it seems
a poor time to be planning a timber sale that would log two IRA's, as
well as log in core Grizzly habitat.
At the same time as the Myrtle Creek HFRA ``collaboration'' was
taking place, The Lands Council, WildWest Institute, Sierra Club and
Alliance for the Wild Rockies have been taking part in a very different
collaboration on the Kootenai National Forest, one which I believe is
having respectful, open dialogue. I believe we are on the way to
finding common ground, helping rural communities protect themselves
from wildfire and possibly bringing a small diameter mill to the Libby
area for fuel reduction and restoration purposes. The Lands Council is
also involved in a very successful collaboration on the Colville
National Forest, a fledging effort on the Coeur d'Alene District of the
Idaho Panhandle National Forest and we recently were part of a
successful collaboration between dischargers, agencies and elected
officials on the Spokane River.
I would like to also see a successful resolution of the Myrtle
Creek timber sale, and suggest that if the roadless and old growth
units were dropped, our concerns would be addressed. I believe this
would help us move forward together throughout the region and show that
the Forest Service is sincere about collaborative efforts. The
alternative is likely to be a contentious timber sale battle in core
grizzly habitat and roadless areas that will gamer national attention.
I hope we can avoid that.
Please let me know your thoughts on the Myrtle Creek project and I
will share these with the other conservation groups who are deeply
concerned. I have cc'd relevant staff from Senator Crapo and Cantwell,
who are both keenly, interested in National Forest Management, as well
as the Mayor of Bonners Ferry, a Boundary County Commissioner, the
Kootenai Tribe member of KVRI and the KVRI facilitator.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Sincerely,
Mike Petersen,
Executive Director.
______
Questions for Commissioner Colleen MacLeod From Senator Craig
Question 1. In your presentation, you indicated that one of your
problems in implementing Union County's CWPP was due to regulatory
barriers--PACFISH etc. Could you elaborate?
Answer. The `Analysis Paralysis' that continues to clog management
efforts and restoration efforts in our part of the world are based on
some appallingly subjective science. It requires more procedural steps
that delay projects, prevent treatment and add to the cost.
Examples would be:
Eastside Screens were a purported temporary early 1990's decision
(supposedly 18 months) that no one seems to have the will to remove. It
is a process where tree size determines treatment of areas to protect
`old growth'. The theory being that a 21" dbh tree (diameter at breast
height) is old growth and must be excluded from removal.
The diameter of a tree does not determine age. There can be a 10
year old tree and a 100 year old tree that have the same diameter. Tree
size has many determining factors, including if the tree has gotten
enough light and moisture. Overstocked stands prevent tree growth.
Under the faulty science of Eastside Screens, leaving overstocked
stands will guarantee small diameter trees, making the cure the cause.
Allowing for only the cut of small diameter trees not only does not
protect old growth trees, it does not make projects pay and requires
the USFS to keep coming back to the federal well for management
objectives.
PacFish/Infish: where no treatment is allowed in riparian areas
without more analysis. This insures that some of the worst fire hazard
areas along water ways go untreated when they could be done
economically and environmentally. When there is a finite amount of time
to do busy work analysis, and a limited amount of money to be spent on
projects that have no financial return on investment, some of this
nation's most sensitive and threatened areas go untouched. They await
the inevitable cauterizing wildfires that clog streams with sediment
that kills fish.
Question 2. You also mentioned delays caused by appeals and
litigation. Have the expedited processes in HFRA helped at all?
Answer. Our Union County Forestry Board has an assigned place at
the table for the local environmental community. They attend meetings
and raise concerns and still file appeals to halt projects. However, we
understand the difference between collaboration and consensus and
continue to move hopefully ahead. Locally the USFS has used the
objections process on two projects. Our District Ranger has indicated
the process is more efficient and produces a decision sooner than
traditional appeals. It can allow for constructive dialog with those
raising the objection prior to issuing a decision. It also allows for
adjustments to the final decision and the NEPA document. It does not
insure against litigation but in some instances can serve to somewhat
lessen the threat.
Question 3. You noted that, in Union County, private landowners
were ``stepping up'' and reducing hazardous fuels on their property but
that getting the projects done on the public lands was taking too
long--what do county officials suggest we do to improve federal
performance?
Answer. Making the environmental community more accountable and
responsible for their actions will help the federal state and local
process.
They should have a requirement for actual and honest
participation in the local process
Their environmental documentation must pass muster
They should not be able to use litigation efforts to fund
their existence. It is a lucrative business to sue for legal
fees especially when the lawyers are staff an you are a non-
profit as well
If the federal government could allow for, and encourage a return
on investment (ROI) on public lands. When every project is just
expenditure, the resource goes untreated. Congress just sees the USFS
requesting increasingly more dollars to manage public land and local
schools and governments have to come asking for Congress for monetary
relief for the lack of activity on the land that surrounds them. It
does not have to be a clear-cut for dollars mentality to accomplish
this objective. In our N.E. Oregon RAC, one project was made to pay for
itself by cutting .6 (point 6) more trees per acres.
Questions for Commissioner Colleen MacLeod From Senator Burns
Question 1. What elements of HFRA have been most successful in
getting effective treatments accomplished on the ground that increase
the protection of homes, other private property, and infra-structure
and municipal water supplies?
Answer. Locally the USFS has used the objections process on two
projects. Our District Ranger has indicated the process is more
efficient and produces a decision sooner than traditional appeals. It
can allow for constructive dialog with those raising the objection
prior to issuing a decision. It also allows for adjustments to the
final decision and the NEPA document. It does not insure against
litigation, but in some instances can serve to somewhat lessen the
threat.
Question 2. In their testimony several of the witnesses have
included statements about Forest Service personnel being in some cases
very supportive and engaged with community collaborative planning, and
in other cases other Forest Service personnel are not engaged and are
not even helpful. Given how important collaborative planning is to
successful HFRA projects what needs to be done to get all Forest
Service personnel engaged and helpful with collaborative community
planning efforts like Community Wildfire Protection Plans?
Answer. Local collaboration is a mind set that requires both top
down and bottom up support from the USFS and Congress; support that is
a directive from D.C. supported and put into honest practice at the
local offices. It has to come from earned trust in the process as well.
In areas where local efforts are successful, it is usually because
people have come to the table to honestly collaborate, and their
efforts have been rewarded with results. People have ceased to trust
agencies that merely count heads to provide collaborative proof that
locals were involved. Local partners can generally get to collaboration
if not consensus. The frustration and process breakdown comes from the
delays caused by procedural paperwork requirements and litigation. That
cannot be fixed locally, but must be repaired in the federal realm.
Our Union County Forest Restoration Board has a position specific
board, similar to the subsequent Resource Advisory Committees created
through PL-106. We created it to involve and inform the community and
to allow the USFS to educate the public about planned efforts and
potential projects in the federal lands that surround us. We consider
this effort an excellent model for local decision making and would be
glad to provide a how-to report for other areas interested in
duplication.
Question 3. Several of the witnesses gave examples of successful
locally developed collaborative solutions that were challenged/
appealed/or litigated by others outside of the community and thus
stopping or at least holding up the implementation of the projects. Are
there changes you would propose to prevent or at least minimize this
from happening to HFRA projects? How about other fuel reduction
projects completed under categorical exclusions, or more traditional
environmental assessments or environmental impact statements?
Answer. Very few USFS projects are remanded for the `wrong
decision'; the remands are predominately based on `procedural
requirements'.
Reform of the process by which litigation has been allowed to
roadblock efforts is most certainly a federal fix. When an outside
group challenging a project can find a consistently willing ear in
specific courts like the 9th Circuit, then it really does not matter
how much local collaboration has happened or how much salvageable
timber will be lost due to delay. The destruction and wildfire danger
to rural residents not to mention the loss of our nation's wealth ought
to have a different set of judicial requirements than making sure that
is have been dotted and is have been crossed. You do not drown a
wildfire in paperwork and red tape, you merely feed it. Organizations
who challenge local collaborative efforts must be accountable:
They should have a requirement for actual and honest
participation in the local process
Their environmental documentation must pass muster
They should not be able to use litigation efforts to fund
their existence. It is a lucrative business to sue for legal
fees especially when the lawyers are your staff and you are a
non-profit as well
Categorical Exclusions have been a better tool, but even those can
take a year from start to finish. With environmental groups wanting no
action, no matter what, there will always be efforts on their part to
stop activity. The success of turning each one of those efforts around
lies in changing the mindset that has been allowed to cloud actual
science-based activity on federal land. That will happen when Congress
demands ESA reform, peer-reviewed science and expedited processes like
HFRA has attempted to provide.
______
Questions for Jay Jensen From Senator Craig
Question 1. You mention there are an estimated 2,000 communities
that could complete the community wildfire protection plans, but that
600 are completed and 600 are underway.
How can we get the remaining 800 communities to complete these
plans?
Answer. First, allow us to clarify that as of March 2006, 324 CWPPs
have been completed in the West, covering approximately 2,000
communities. Building on this information, it is important to expand
upon the link between the number of CWPPs completed and the number of
communities protected. Our work in the West shows that states take a
highly variable approach to defining communities, and that there is not
a one-to-one correlation between Plans and communities. Many completed
Plans cover multiple communities, or use the county as a planning unit
to cover all of the communities within it. Therefore, it is difficult
to say exactly how many communities still do not have a completed CWPP.
Our estimates suggest that there are some 30,000 Communities at-risk
nationwide, the vast majority of which are in the South, and that
approximately 2,700 of the nationwide are currently covered under a
CWPP.
To encourage the remaining communities to complete their CWPPs, we
believe efforts need to be made on two fronts. First, incentive
programs in the form of technical and financial assistance will
encourage communities to take action. State Foresters are ideally
positioned to deliver these incentive programs and form the critical
link between federal incentive efforts and communities. Second, when
more CWPP projects begin to be implemented, more communities are likely
to undertake the planning process themselves. Communities that see
their CWPP efforts influence project prioritization and implementation
decisions will be more motivated to engage and get new CWPPs drafted.
In the West, fire mitigation dollars are now being limited to
communities that have a completed CWPP. Thus, implementing CWPP
projects, and publicizing those success stories, will help to foster
momentum to get this important planning work completed.
Question 2. The data that the Departments provided our Subcommittee
suggest that 86% of the work completed to date under the Healthy
Forests Restoration Act has occurred in the Wildland Urban Interface,
yet you are concerned about the low number of recommended projects from
Community Wildfire Protection Plans.
Is your concern with the total amount of work undertaken, or that
the agencies are not implementing the projects called for within the
Community Wildfire Protection Plans?
Answer. Our concern is primarily with the process of project
prioritization, which ultimately impacts both the total amount and the
specific projects being undertaken. CWPPs offer a tool that can assist
forest managers as they sift through projects and assign limited
resources to implementation. There is some concern that the federal
agencies are backing away from the cooperative commitment necessary to
deal with our western wildfire problem. However, there are ways to
proceed. The 10-Year Comprehensive Strategy offers guidance for
collaborative process that can frame project prioritization. Finally,
clarifying the link between CWPP project implementation and existing
Land Resource Management Plans would also help to streamline activity
on the ground. As agencies become more comfortable utilizing that
collaborative process and implementing CWPP projects, we will see
greater success rates.
Question 3. In your testimony, you mention that appeals and
litigation continue to delay projects. You point to the Middle East
Fork Hazardous Fuels Reduction Project in the Bitterroot National
Forest in Montana and seem to suggest that the Appeals Reform Act
(which was legislated through an Appropriations rider) should be
repealed. You also said you do not seek a total elimination of the
Forest Service Appeals process.
Would your organization and the State Foresters support efforts to
repeal the Appeals Reform Act and to direct the Forest Service to
develop an appeals process similar to that used by the BLM or limit its
use to areas outside the authority that the Healthy Forests Restoration
Act provides?
Answer. Modification or repeal of the Appeals Reform Act may be
necessary, but we must ensure that a flexible and practical process is
developed to replace it. Keeping the public involved and empowered in
forest management is essential. Having a legitimate appeals process
fosters credibility with the public that is needed by forest land
managers as they work to treat the necessary acreages. For the most
part, State Foresters do support modification of the ARA, and most
agree that the HFRA pre-decisional review process is an improvement
over the traditional appeals approach. Another problem with the process
is the Equal Access to Justice Act, which as currently interpreted
functions as a financial incentive that encourages appeals. Reformation
this act, cognizant of environmental justices issues, into a ``loser
pays'' system might help eliminate frivolous appeals.
On principal, the Council of Western State Foresters tends to
support avenues that offer a measure of flexibility, and the current
ARA process is too rigid. An appeals system that is workable, flexible,
and consistent across the agencies would go a long way toward keeping
the public engaged, enhancing land manager credibility, and yet
simultaneously minimizing time delays for project implementation.
Question 4. Alternatively, could you describe an appeals process
that you would recommend? Do you want that process to apply to just HFI
projects or are you interested in a broader application?
Answer. We believe the pre-decisional objection process works well
for HFI projects, as it provides an appropriate balance between
administrative review and the timeliness required for fuel reduction
work. However, we are finding that given the urgency of this work, we
recommend a shortening of the objection filing period to 14 days, more
than enough time for interested publics that have been engaged.
For projects not conducted with HFRA authorities, we generally
support the continued existence of post-decisional administrative
review. However, we do recommend two changes to the general appeal
process. First, we recommend shortening the appeal filing period to 21
days to help reduce project delay. We have found that appellants tend
to be familiar with the project under consideration and therefore do
not usually have additional time-consuming research to do before
filing. Second, we recommend re-writing the 215 regulations to clarify
the standing requirements for filing an appeal. Recent court rulings
have shed light on this complicated question and regulations should
reflect this judicial progress.
Question 5. I indicated a need for the Forest Service and the BLM
to find ways to undertake more mechanical treatments of overstocked, at
risk, forested lands. You indicated that you have some ideas to help
address my concern.
Could you provide the Subcommittee with your thoughts on how to
increase the number of acres treated through mechanical removal of
those fuels? Please understand that we are not interested in trading
off prescribed burning for mechanical treatment--rather, we would like
to see both activities increased.
Foresters are under a great deal of pressure to meet acreage
treatment targets. In some locations, this has meant a tendency to
utilize less expensive prescribed burning over mechanical thinning,
even when conditions on the ground don't favor such an approach.
Addressing the problem of targets as incentives for land managers is
complex, and involves reform of performance measures and program review
processes. Increasing appropriate treatment activities of all kinds
will require a commitment to the quality, rather than the quantity, of
fuels reduction work.
One of the most significant barriers to mechanical treatments
across the west is the lack of a market infrastructure to support
material coming from treated acres. Simply put, if there are
utilization markets in place, then treatments are cheaper and more
acres can get accomplished. In many cases, that material consists
primarily of small diameter wood that lacks commercial value in
traditional mills. In other cases, supply is so uneven that mills have
been forced to close and sometimes leaving valuable timber under-
priced.
Biomass utilization offers a powerful way out of this dilemma by
fostering forest health through the productive use of woody biomass for
wood product and energy uses. The USFS Fuels for Schools program is one
successful and growing example that links local schools and forest
health; many new schools are being established that use woody biomass
for heating, and older facilities are in some cases being retro-fitted
to support this new technology. Increased federal investment in such
programs will contribute significantly to a long-term solution for
funding mechanical fuels treatments.
Simultaneously, as we build our nation's biomass utilization
capacity, we need to ensure a reliable supply. Long-term contracts,
such as those found in Stewardship Contracting authorities, are a sound
way to give businesses the certainty they need to secure bank loans for
expensive fuel treatment equipment. Federal and state forest managers
would benefit from increased education in the development and
application of Stewardship Contracts.
And perhaps the most effective policy incentive are production tax
credits for electricity generation, such as those recommended recently
by the Western Governors Association (http://www.westgov.org/wga/
meetings/am2006/CDEAC06.pdf). Tax credits can encourage the generation
of renewable power and foster investment in those industries. The
credits need to be long-term (again, to increase certainty in the
business investment climate) and reflect parity for all renewables.
Biomass needs to be put on par with other renewable energy credits so
there is an even playing field. Only then will investment in
infrastructure expand enough to support the woody biomass industry,
thus reducing costs and increasing acreage treatments for land
managers.
Question for Jay Jensen From Senator Burns
Question 1. What elements of HFRA have been most successful in
getting effective treatments accomplished on the ground that increase
the protection of homes, other private property, and infra-structure
and municipal water supplies?
Answer. The most important aspect of HFRA's Title I that has been
implemented to date is the creation of CWPPs. When communities are able
to become actively engaged in identifying areas near their homes that
will improve their protection from fire, agencies are better able to
prioritize the allocation of scarce resources. Coordination among state
and federal agencies, local government, local fire departments and
stakeholders, ensures comprehensive implementation of local priorities.
CWPPs gives these communities ownership of the issue, and this
ownership is the key to getting more landowners to take personal
responsibility for wildfire mitigation around their homes and
communities. The government alone cannot solve the problem. Cost-share
funding made available for the implementation of CWPP projects on
private lands will make these goals a reality.
Appendix II
Additional Material Submitted for the Record
----------
Montana Wood Products Association,
Helena, MT, July 21, 2006.
U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests.
Re: Healthy Forests Restoration Act Implementation
These comments are submitted on behalf of the 17 member companies
of the Montana Wood Products Association. All of the member companies
as well as the 60 associate members of the MWPA rely upon the health of
Montana's forests for their livelihoods.
Montana's timber community worked diligently to ensure the passage
of the HFRA in 2003. All three of Montana's Congressional members voted
in favor of the bill.
Citizens in our local communities have worked hard together to
develop Community Wildfire Protection Plans. Many collaborative
meetings have been held so the citizens could identify prominent
sources of fire risk and prioritize areas for fuel reduction treatment.
Many Montana communities are sitting in and near dead and dying
national forests with watersheds and wildlife habitat at risk along
with homes and humans.
There are nine national forests in the State of Montana. Each of
these forests should have, at a minimum, three HFRA projects underway.
The acreage of each project should be at least 1,000 acres in size with
50 percent of each project in the wildland urban interface. The needs
of the citizens and the resource are there and crucial. The use of HFRA
by the Forest Service in Montana is abysmal.
The snail-like implementation of the HFRA is to say the least
extremely disappointing. The process oriented Forest Service simply
does not appear to be up to the task of moving in a timely manner. The
first HFRA project in Montana took two full years from the beginning of
meetings with local residents to the filing of litigation by outside
individuals. One other HFRA project that has been proposed and has had
active participation by local folks has a start date of 2009. This is
hardly the goal of the HFRA to ``streamline'' the process to actually
conduct work on the ground.
The Forest Service must follow the letter of the law when
implementing the HFRA but must do so expeditiously. Otherwise all of
the hard work of so many will be for naught. They must work with the
folks in the local communities using the Community Wildfire Protection
Plans to develop projects that will provide both fuel reduction and
restoration.
The Middle East Fork project on the Bitterroot National Forest was
the first HFRA project and has been litigated by the WildWest Institute
whose director testified at the July 19th hearing about how involved
they are in collaboration: They are currently plaintiffs in over 40
lawsuits in Montana's federal district court involving millions of
board feet of now rotting timber. This is a very distorted view of
``collaboration''.
Those individuals came in well after the local collaborative
efforts had determined a proposed project and demanded the Forest
Service accept a ``conceptual'' alternative for analysis.
Unfortunately, the Forest Service worked with them and attempted to
appease them by doing, an analysis even though their proposed
alternative did not meet purpose and need of the project.
Under HFRA the agency is required to analyze ``no action'' and
``preferred action''. The final action by the agency was to drop large
parts of the preferred alternative, again in an attempt to appease
those threatening litigation. Of course the attempt failed and the
serial litigators filed a lawsuit and asked for an injunction. So far,
the Judge has denied each of the plaintiffs' requests, but the case is
far from resolved.
One point the Judge did make in his ruling on the Middle East Fork
was that under HFRA he must make determinations using ``a balance of
harms'' and he did so when denying the plaintiffs' requests. The
balance of harm section of HFRA is extremely important and we are
grateful for its inclusion in the statute.
The pre-decisional appeal process in HFRA is also strongly
supported by the MWPA. If there is to be an appeal process, it must be
a speedy and workable one for the agency: It is extremely unfair for
the wishes of the majority to be overpowered by a minute minority while
the resource and environment suffers. We would prefer to see the HFRA
process transferred to other land management activities and the Appeals
Reform Act removed. It is simply a stalling tool used by the serial
litigators.
Detractors of HFRA claim logging cannot be part of the solution for
the forests. Logging and subsequent milling of merchantable material is
exactly the solution for Montana's ailing forest health. The same
individuals have no scientific rationale to back up statements using
words like ``environmentally harmful logging'' and ``industrial
logging''. They do not intend to be part of solutions for Montana's
rural at-risk communities but rather make a mockery of the public
process.
The Montana Wood Products Association continues to be a strong
supporter of the legislation we helped to pass. Yet, there is an ever-
growing frustration regarding, planning and process without
implementation of the critically deeded projects to restore our forest
health. Without a stronger push from Congress to more quickly implement
HFRA projects, it is doomed to failure. We request your help.
Thank you for the opportunity to present these brief comments for
your consideration.
Sincerely,
Ellen Engstedt,
Executive Vice President.
______
Statement of Craig E. Thomas, Forester, Stevensville, MT
background
Since the fires of 2000 which burnt 300,000 plus acres in our area,
I have spent several thousand (volunteer) hours meeting (517) with the
USFS to obtain results on the ground.
For instance: I and others formed the Forest Concessions Council
(patterned after the Quincy Library Group) and spent every Monday
evening 2-4 hrs for 18 months developing a proposal for the USFS called
Frazier Draw, when this came back in a project from the USFS it was
very changed and lost most of our direction. The USFS added enormous
mitigation factors which ruined the project, especially the Aspen
restoration. Confirm with Sonny LaSalle 406.375.0871, Mary Lee Bailey
406.642,6379, Bill Grasser 406.821.3508,
I volunteered forty clays to the effort to save the Lost Trail Ski
Area from burning in 2000 and was instrumental in this successful
effort (confirm with Bill Grasser 406.821.3508). This effort along with
the changes in log availability caused the shutdown and resulting sale
(at a loss) of our small sawmill.
I with many others met with (Sula Club House fall 2000 see Bryon
Kuahn) and requested that the USFS do something about the excessive
vegetation buildup in the East Fork area (BNF Sula District). This
finally resulted in the Middle East Fork Fuel Reduction project
beginning under the newly implemented HFRA.
Since the start of this project I and many others have spent
hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours of volunteer efforts to
help this project along.
I personally have completed many forest restoration projects on
private and USFS lands as examples for the USFS to use on our public
lands. These are successfully completed or ongoing projects. Some of
which are Burnt Fork Ranch (May June Bugle 2005 RMEF easement), Knopick
pvt., Person pvt., Brown Valley Ranch (MT F&G easement), Antrim pvt.,
Bailey Pvt., Pattee Blue TS (Missoula Ranger District Vick Ronck
administrator 406.531.9396), and others. I suggest reading
``Miminicking Natures Fire'' by Arno and Fielder.
I wrote and properly submitted an alternative T for the Middle East
Fork Project. Mine was the only legal alternative submitted and it was
not legally utilized under HFRA by the BNF. I objected and I was
dismissed. This alternative is very simple and is based on successfully
completed projects, the newest proven science, and the latest
techniques. I have been unable to obtain legal consul to force a review
of this alternative so my potential PHD witnesses remain unutilized.
Since I have exhausted my personal savings volunteering on this issue I
cannot proceed to get Equal Access to Justice as it does not apply to
an experienced white male forester that is promoting active management.
I simply cannot afford to personally pay for the legal fees necessary
to properly address this public forest issue.
Another irritating thing about this HFRA project in the Middle East
Fork of the Bitterroot National Forest is that almost all of the public
comment has been dismissed. For instance the USFS had many meetings to
publicly develop their alternative and after finalizing the public
process they have gone behind closed doors and negotiated away most of
the public's comments to allow some form of a project to proceed
because of extreme groups. This modified alternative now does not meet
purpose and need, the forest plan, or public comment. Most certainly it
does not meet the needs of the forest. What an absolute mess! This is
not what HFRA is supposed to be about. Total failure!
With this condensed background I offer the following comments:
The HFRA is a nonfunctioning process. Within the scope of the
FOREST PROBLEM NOTHING IS HAPPENING ON THE GROUND. As a concerned
citizen it is impossible to successfully comment or assist the USFS.
Finally at one USFS meeting I asked Matthew Kolher how he did
hunting last season and he replied that he had shot a nice smaller
whitetail buck on the Three Mile Game Range. So I asked him what he
thought of my logging job there as the R/W is through a restoration
project on the Brown Valley Ranch, and he replied that there was no
logging where he hunted! To get to the Three Mile Came Range he had to
drive through our project twice. A place where in June of this same
year my son had log decks neatly stacked 15-20 high, and after a
couple of months Matthew did not notice the area had been profitably
logged as a restoration project.
How can I help? Is it possible for me to help?
______
Rocky Mountain Log Homes,
Hamilton, MT, July 25, 2006.
U.S. Senate, Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests.
Re: Healthy Forests Restoration Act Implementation
Dear Mr. Chairman & Committee Members: Thank you for the
opportunity to submit this written commits pertaining to the
Implementation of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act (HFRA).
After countless months of participation, consultation, comments,
support and ultimately as an Intervener in Federal Court supporting the
USDA Forest Service's first HFRA project in Region One--Middle East
Fork--on the Bitterroot National Forest, I feel that I am in a unique
position to report to you. It is a very mixed assessment.
To the good: HFRA's approach to consider ``the balance of harms''
is the most important conceptual advance in Natural Resource Management
Policy since the National Forest Management Act three decades ago.
Finally, and let me repeat, finally the agency not only has the option
but is require by law to consider management project in a holistic,
truly pragmatic ecological approach. By this, I mean that Forest
Service personnel, under HFRA must review projects, and clearly
consider the outcomes both under ``no action'' and the other
alternatives This is done in a context that effectively asks ``what is
the best outcome for all the Forest and adjacent lands''. At last,
there is an authority that acknowledges that action and disturbance is
much, much preferred over a benign neglect that erodes the health of
the forest and endangers watersheds, cumulative wildlife habitats as
well as adjacent communities with massive fires. I believe that the
concept of ``balance of harms should be amended into NFMA to insure
that this analytical concept be used for all project throughout the
Forest Service System.
Many on the other side of the issue consider wildfires of any size
to be natural, and philosophically a way to purge the evil impacts of
mankind, or some such. True ecology should not set some false notion
that a pre-Columbian, or worse, a prehistoric state as an ideal
condition; rather, true ecology recognizes man as part of the natural
system. HFRA does this much better than any other authority that the
Forest Service now uses.
Watching the Middle East Fork Project from inception the effort I
have witnessed by the local Forest Service to communicate with their
neighbors has been unparalleled, yet organized ``environmentalist''
organizations have attempted to drown out the majority of the local
residents' concerns over fire risk. It would have been a much more
healthy debate on the merits and methods of the proposed project had
the mindset of the project's opposition was different. You see, in an
unguarded moment they admitted publicly that they were concerned that
``outside commercial logging interests'' might be able to make money.
Consequently, I am left to conclude that the opposition desired either
some style of welfare logging, or that they desired to see all
contractors not to make money and therefore go broke.
To the bad: I would throw out the concept of accepting and
analyzing a local community-based alternative. While well-meaning, the
idea has grown to a nightmare. The Middle East Fork project received
two such outside alternatives. Effectively one admonished the Agency
for not cutting enough trees and the other excoriated them for cutting
too many! The sole similarity of the two public alternatives was that
neither would have survived a judicial review for sufficiency as a
fully fleshed-out plan. As a result, the agency dismissed one
submission, and spent countless hours formalizing the other so it could
suitably compare to the Forest's own plan. Effectively, the Forest
wound up developing the third alternative itself. As part of the
Healthy Forest Initiative, HFRA was designed to address the wildland
urban interface. I conclude that the Forest Service would achieve much
more from HFRA if, in the future, it is obliged to do only an action-no
action analysis. Public input, ideas, and complaints would be handled
pre-decisional.
For the record, this Committee has already accepted testimony from
a group who plainly used this committee's time to further broadcast its
judicial complaint against the 1st HFRA project in Region One of the
Forest Service, the Middle East Fork Project. While it was disclosed
that the group did file a suit within the testimony, there was a
glaring omission that the local Federal Court, upon consideration of
similar and much more detailed exposition of information than was
submitted to this Committee, denied the Preliminary Injunction and
Restraining Order. The Court's order was clearly due to the
consideration of balance of harms, both short and long term for the
forest and adjacent lands.
Respectfully submitted,
Patrick O. Connell, Certified Forester,
Vice President, Resource Operations.
______
Montana Logging Association,
July 26, 2006.
Hon. Larry E. Craig,
Chairman, Subcommittee on Public Land and Forests, U.S. Senate,
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.
Re: HFRA of 2003--Subcommittee Hearing Comments
Dear Chairman Craig: Thank you for the opportunity to comment on
the above referenced subcommittee hearing held on July 19, 2006. The
Montana Logging Association (MLA) represents approximately 600
independent logging contractors, each of which operate a family-owned
enterprise that harvests and/or transports timber from forest to mill
in Montana. In Montana, the vast majority of timberland is managed by
government agencies, most notably the U.S. Forest Service; therefore,
the welfare of the MLA members is directly dependent upon the policies
and actions of federal land managers.
As you know, passage of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act (HFRA)
in 2003 represented a fundamental change in how public land managers
were directed to approach a national forest health crisis and the first
major natural resource policy change in over 30 years.
In 2002, Montana hosted over 12,000,000 acres Condition Class I,
II, and III in non-wilderness/roadless. Therefore, as an Association,
we were keenly interested in the content, authorities, and passage of
the bill. However, we are currently frustrated by the hesitancy of the
U.S. Forest Service to embrace and utilize this important and effective
tool.
It took over one year for Region One of the Forest Service to
provide a directive to field officers and it has taken three years for
this directive to result in action on the ground. Currently, Region One
has five proposed HFRA projects--three in Montana and two in Idaho.
Dominance for proposed treatment has been in the wildland urban
interface. Too often, due to environmental pressure, acres outside the
interface have been dropped from consideration. In addition,
approximately 50 percent of the treatments are prescribed burn and too
often the predominant logging system is helicopter.
If you visit the http://www.healthyforests.gov web site, you will
be able to view accomplishments listed under the Healthy Forest
Initiative. However, this is extremely misleading . . . at least in
Region One. Even though hazardous fuel reduction projects are listed as
accomplishments--most of those acres have actually not been treated!
Litigation and appeals in Region One has virtually brought active
management to a stand still. There is something inherently wrong with
an agency that reports to congress and the public that they have
treated over 250,000 acres under HFI--when in fact, this simply isn't
happening. In addition, these hazardous fuel reduction projects are not
using the HFRA authority. Projects under HFRA are not even listed.
So now, three and a half years following the passage of this
landmark Act--what has really be accomplished and what provisions have
resulted in changing condition class? We sincerely appreciate the
subcommittee's attempt to ferret this information out.
The Middle East Fork fuels reduction project was the first project
under the HFRA authority in Region One. The project was the culmination
of three years and hundreds of hours of meetings amongst collaborators
and stakeholders. Even as such, groups that oppose logging have pushed
this project into federal court. However, the court recently denied the
plaintiffs' request for a preliminary injunction and subsequent request
for emergency stay--which has prompted the plaintiffs to seek
injunctive relief in the 9th circuit court of appeals.
From the perspective of being intimately involved in these proposed
projects; the provisions that have had the most positive impact in the
local communities and in the courtroom are:
Community collaboration;
Identifying community fire protection zones;
Compressed environmental analysis
Pre-decisional process;
Balance of harms and;
Temporary preliminary injunction.
From our experiences, we recommend the Forest Service and/or
Congress:
Adopt the local community fire protection plans as the
Wildland Urban Interface for HFRA purposes;
Reinforce current NEPA statute language. The Forest Service
must follow HFRA guidelines when analyzing the no-action and
preferred alternatives. If an alternative is proposed from
outside the collaborative group and not representative of the
Purpose and Need, the Forest Service must not waste time and
money on further analysis and must reject these proposals and
must move forward in a timely manner;
Collaborate in a manner consistent with the 10-Year
Implementation Plan. The Forest Service must consider
recommendations by at-risk communities that have developed
community wildfire protection plans;
Make funding available to establish monitoring plots in
treated and untreated areas. This would be useful in analyzing
short-term and long-term outcomes of HFRA treatments and also
to determine the effectiveness of the Act;
Recognize that it is essential under current biological
conditions that funding for the Forest Inventory Assessment
(FIA) continue to increase and lastly;
Congress must revise the National Forest Management Act
(NFMA) by including the balance of harms and pre-decisional
appeals provisions for all federal resource management
decisions.
In conclusion, we have watched the Forest Service flounder in
confusion and inaction with regards to implementing hazardous fuel
reduction projects under HFRA. If Congress is serious about moving
condition classes back to historic fire regimes--the Forest Service
simply must take restoration and rehabilitation opportunities under the
HFRA more seriously.
Again, thank you for this opportunity to comment and for the
subcommittee's interest in this important federal land management tool.
Sincerely,
Julia Altemus,
Resource Specialist.