Forest advocates: Private landowners need firefighting funding too
August 20, 2014 | 06:01 PM
By JERRY HAGSTROM
and ALEX GANGITANO
Private forest landowners, many of whom live in the East and also farm, need a change in funding for fighting forest fires just as much as the national forests in the West, a key forestry group said today as Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack released a report on funding issues in the U.S. Forest Service.
Rita Hite
“This isn’t just a Western issue,” said American Forest Foundation Executive Vice President Rita Hite, in a telephone call to reporters. The call was organized by the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership to promote a bill to change funding so that the money to fight the worst forest fires would come from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
When Forest Service money shifts to the West, “the pressing issues in the East” like fighting invasive species and diseases, such as emerald ash bore and preserving wildlife habitat, don’t get proper treatment, Hite said. She also noted that an effort to improve the habitat of the northern long-eared bat and avoid its listing as an endangered species is threatened by the need to shift money to fighting forest fires.
About two-thirds of American forests are owned by private landowners, and one-third to one-half of those owners are also engaged in farm operations, she said.
Whit Fosburgh
“Since the Western part of the country is on fire, it is the eating the budget for the rest of the country,” Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership President and CEO Whit Fosburgh said.
There have been more than 37,000 forest fires throughout the United States this year and the fire season is now 60 to 80 days longer than it used to be, Vilsack said in his own press call.
Vilsack released a report showing that as the cost of fighting forest fires has rapidly increased over the last 20 years, the budgets for other forest programs, including those that can help prevent and mitigate fire damage, have substantially shrunk.
“The fact that the budget has been reduced and required us to shift funds to fight fire, it exacerbates the problem,” Vilsack said as he called on Congress to adequately fund fire fighting. “Fires need to be treated as what they are, which is a natural disaster.”
Vilsack noted that the percentage of the Forest Service budget used to fight fires has risen from 16 to 40 percent. He noted that Congress usually does not provide enough money for the firefighting budget, and that when the Forest Service exhausts its firefighting resources, it has to use its authority to borrow from other accounts.
Six out of the last 10 years, Vilsack said, the Forest Service has borrowed money to fight fires, and this year expects to borrow $400 million. Over the past 10 years, the Forest Service has borrowed more than $3 billion and Congress has not restored all those funds, he added.
Robert Bonnie
“The problem is not just the amount of money, but the fact that the borrowing disrupts long-term Forest Service programs throughout the country,” Agriculture Undersecretary for Natural Resources and Environment Robert Bonnie said in the call with Hite and Fosburgh.
“We don’t borrow regionally, we borrow nationally,” Bonnie said.
The Obama administration is backing the Wildlife Disaster Funding Act, which would permit the Forest Service to utilize federal disaster dollars to pay for catastrophic fire costs. The main goal of bill, sponsored by Rep. Michael Simpson, R-Idaho, Rep. Kurt Schrader, D-Ore., Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, is to stop borrowing money from other Forest Service accounts to fight fires.
Thus far, there are 131 co-sponsors in the house and 18 co-sponsors in the Senate, Hite said.
“We have really good, diverse representation there,” Hite said. But, she added, it is still necessary to educate the public that fighting forest fires is a national issue, not just an issue in the Western states.
The act would fund the fighting of 98 percent of forest fires through the current process but fund the remaining 2 percent which are started by lightening strikes and turn into huge conflagrations, out of an emergency budget the same way that hurricane damage is addressed.
Bonnie said the Congressional Budget Office score for the Wildlife Disaster Funding Act is zero because Congress already pays back the Forest Service for the funds it borrows from other accounts.
Hite and Fosburgh noted that Congress has already tried to attach the bill to other bills but that those bills have not passed. Hite said that when Congress comes back into session in September there may be an attempt to attach it to a continuing resolution to fund the government while Fosberg said it might attach to another bill in the lame duck session.
But the main issue Hite, Fosburgh and Bonnie said, is to get the public and members of Congress from around the country to realize that updating the system for funding fire fighting is a national, not just a western regional issue.
▪ U.S. Forest Service — The Rising Cost of Fire Operations: Effects on the Forest Service’s Non-Fire Work
▪ S. 1875 — Wildlife Disaster Funding Act of 2013
▪ Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership
▪ American Forest Foundation
and ALEX GANGITANO
Private forest landowners, many of whom live in the East and also farm, need a change in funding for fighting forest fires just as much as the national forests in the West, a key forestry group said today as Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack released a report on funding issues in the U.S. Forest Service.
“This isn’t just a Western issue,” said American Forest Foundation Executive Vice President Rita Hite, in a telephone call to reporters. The call was organized by the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership to promote a bill to change funding so that the money to fight the worst forest fires would come from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
When Forest Service money shifts to the West, “the pressing issues in the East” like fighting invasive species and diseases, such as emerald ash bore and preserving wildlife habitat, don’t get proper treatment, Hite said. She also noted that an effort to improve the habitat of the northern long-eared bat and avoid its listing as an endangered species is threatened by the need to shift money to fighting forest fires.
About two-thirds of American forests are owned by private landowners, and one-third to one-half of those owners are also engaged in farm operations, she said.
“Since the Western part of the country is on fire, it is the eating the budget for the rest of the country,” Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership President and CEO Whit Fosburgh said.
There have been more than 37,000 forest fires throughout the United States this year and the fire season is now 60 to 80 days longer than it used to be, Vilsack said in his own press call.
Vilsack released a report showing that as the cost of fighting forest fires has rapidly increased over the last 20 years, the budgets for other forest programs, including those that can help prevent and mitigate fire damage, have substantially shrunk.
“The fact that the budget has been reduced and required us to shift funds to fight fire, it exacerbates the problem,” Vilsack said as he called on Congress to adequately fund fire fighting. “Fires need to be treated as what they are, which is a natural disaster.”
Vilsack noted that the percentage of the Forest Service budget used to fight fires has risen from 16 to 40 percent. He noted that Congress usually does not provide enough money for the firefighting budget, and that when the Forest Service exhausts its firefighting resources, it has to use its authority to borrow from other accounts.
Six out of the last 10 years, Vilsack said, the Forest Service has borrowed money to fight fires, and this year expects to borrow $400 million. Over the past 10 years, the Forest Service has borrowed more than $3 billion and Congress has not restored all those funds, he added.
“The problem is not just the amount of money, but the fact that the borrowing disrupts long-term Forest Service programs throughout the country,” Agriculture Undersecretary for Natural Resources and Environment Robert Bonnie said in the call with Hite and Fosburgh.
“We don’t borrow regionally, we borrow nationally,” Bonnie said.
The Obama administration is backing the Wildlife Disaster Funding Act, which would permit the Forest Service to utilize federal disaster dollars to pay for catastrophic fire costs. The main goal of bill, sponsored by Rep. Michael Simpson, R-Idaho, Rep. Kurt Schrader, D-Ore., Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, is to stop borrowing money from other Forest Service accounts to fight fires.
Thus far, there are 131 co-sponsors in the house and 18 co-sponsors in the Senate, Hite said.
“We have really good, diverse representation there,” Hite said. But, she added, it is still necessary to educate the public that fighting forest fires is a national issue, not just an issue in the Western states.
The act would fund the fighting of 98 percent of forest fires through the current process but fund the remaining 2 percent which are started by lightening strikes and turn into huge conflagrations, out of an emergency budget the same way that hurricane damage is addressed.
Bonnie said the Congressional Budget Office score for the Wildlife Disaster Funding Act is zero because Congress already pays back the Forest Service for the funds it borrows from other accounts.
Hite and Fosburgh noted that Congress has already tried to attach the bill to other bills but that those bills have not passed. Hite said that when Congress comes back into session in September there may be an attempt to attach it to a continuing resolution to fund the government while Fosberg said it might attach to another bill in the lame duck session.
But the main issue Hite, Fosburgh and Bonnie said, is to get the public and members of Congress from around the country to realize that updating the system for funding fire fighting is a national, not just a western regional issue.
▪ U.S. Forest Service — The Rising Cost of Fire Operations: Effects on the Forest Service’s Non-Fire Work
▪ S. 1875 — Wildlife Disaster Funding Act of 2013
▪ Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership
▪ American Forest Foundation
