Forest service

• PINE BLUFF, Ariz., March 28, 2024 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- The USDA Forest Service has awarded American Forests $12 million to help tribes and underserved communities access financial and technical support for resilient reforestation.
• Over the next three years, American Forests will collaborate with the Forest Service and numerous partners to make resilient reforestation more affordable and accessible for underserved landowners, including federally recognized tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations.
• Through the award, American Forests and partnering organizations will help forest owners participate in emerging private markets for resilient reforestation.
• Funded by the Inflation Reduction Act, the program is investing $145 million in organizations that support underserved and small-acreage forest owners.

• The case centers around the Forest Service's alleged failure to properly study the massive environmental and climate impacts of its timber targets and the logging projects it designs to fulfill them.
• Each year, the Forest Service and Department of Agriculture set timber targets, which the Forest Service is required to meet through logging on public lands.
• But rising timber targets push the agency to clearcut forests and log carbon-dense mature and old-growth forests.
• Internal Forest Service documents show that achieving timber targets is the agency's "#1 priority."

• MISSOULA, Mont., Feb. 26, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- The National Forest Foundation (NFF), the congressionally-chartered nonprofit working to improve and restore the health of the 193-million-acre National Forest System, and USDA Forest Service announced today the "Nature Connects Us" outreach campaign which sparks awakening and strengthening of all peoples' connection to national forests and grasslands.
• Through listening, learning, and taking action, the NFF has collaborated with the Forest Service to enhance the truth behind the phrase "Nature Connects Us," to bring this campaign to life.
• This outreach campaign is the largest and most comprehensive outreach campaign that the Forest Service has collaborated on with the NFF throughout their partnership over the past several decades.
• To learn more about the Nature Connects Us campaign, visit www.natureconnectsus.org , and explore the diverse ways in which nature can be experienced.

A wet winter and spring followed by a hot, dry summer can be a dangerous combination in the Western U.S. The rain fuels bountiful vegetation growth, and when summer heat dries out that vegetation, it can leave grasses and shrubs ready to burn. In years like this, controlled burns and prescribed fire treatments are crucial to help protect communities against wildfires. Well-staffed fire crews ready to respond to blazes are essential, too.

• Moore told agency employees to expect budget cuts from Congress in 2024.
• However, taken at face value, budget cuts could be interpreted as a reduction in the firefighting workforce, compounding recruitment and retention challenges that the Forest Service is already facing.
• We study wildfire policy and fire ecology, and one of us, Camille Stevens-Rumann, has worked as a wildland firefighter.

The fire funding fix

• The fire funding fix allows federal firefighting agencies to access up to US$2.25 billion in additional disaster funding a year starting in 2020 and increasing to $2.95 billion in 2027.
• Prior to the fire funding fix, fighting fires – suppression expenditures – consumed nearly 50% of the U.S. Forest Service budget.
• The fix protects agency budgets, ensuring that a high-cost fire season will not completely consume the budget, and that allows more funding for preventive efforts and all the other programs of the Forest Service.

Prevention is a rising priority

• The Forest Service has also made fire prevention a higher priority in recent years.
• That work won’t be completed before the 2024 fire season, but fuel treatments will be underway.

Prescribed burning must be done when conditions are safe to limit the potential for the fire to get out of control, usually in the spring and early summer. However, climate change is expected to shorten the prescribed burning window in the western U.S.

Staffing is still a concern

• In 2023, over 18,000 people were employed as federal wildland firefighters.
• The government boosted firefighters’ pay in 2021, but that increase is set to expire unless Congress votes to make it permanent.
• The agency has started many initiatives to recruit and retain permanent employees, but it is too early to assess the results.

Everyone has a role in fire protection

• Homeowners can reduce the fire risk to their own properties by following defensible space recommendations.
• Several states also have programs, such as Colorado’s Forest Restoration and Wildfire Risk Mitigation Grant Program to support community investment in wildfire mitigation.
• Consistent funding is crucial, and homeowners can help by taking defensive action to reduce wildfire risk on their property.

Camille Stevens-Rumann receives funding from US Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, and the US department of Agriculture. She used to work for the US Forest Service and works closely with Federal, State, and non-profit organizations that help manage forests across the western US Jude Bayham receives funding from the United States Forest Service. He is on the Protect Our Winters Science Alliance.