Statement
of Mark Rey
Under Secretary for Natural Resources and Environment United States Department of Agriculture And P. Lynn Scarlett Assistant Secretary for Policy, Management and Budget United States Department of the Interior Before House Committee on Resources Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health Concerning Firefighting Preparedness May 13, 2004 |
The President's Healthy Forests
Initiative (HFI) helped us tackle our gridlock of process that was impeding
our restoration of fire adapted ecosystems, including treatment of hazardous
fuels. HFI resulted in the development of a number of administrative tools
and included a request for congressional help to further reduce procedural
barriers. On December 3, 2003, the President signed into law the Healthy
Forests Restoration Act of 2003 (HFRA), giving Federal agencies additional
tools needed to implement the 10-Year Comprehensive Strategy and Implementation
Plan. Its passage sent a strong message of bipartisan support for reducing
fuels and restoring forest health, especially in the wildland-urban interface.
The 2004 fire season is shaping
up to be another challenging year. While most of the nation is anticipated
to be near normal in terms of the expected number of fires and acres burned,
portions of some states in the interior West is expected to have the potential
for an above normal wildland fire season. The potential for build up
of fuels, recognition that long-term drought persists over much of the
interior West, and an increase of drought-stressed and insect- damaged
trees and brush have resulted in a greater potential for large wildfires
in the West. Last week's fires in Southern California resulted from stifling
heat and an abundance of dry brush. Although last year's fall wildfires
in Southern California charred more than 740,000 acres, they consumed
only 7% of the dying trees and dry chaparral lands that surround the local
communities. FIRE AVIATION CHANGES The report also concluded that
the Forest Service and the Department of the Interior were responsible
for ensuring the safety of firefighting aircraft. To continue to use these
contract large airtankers when no mechanism exists to ensure their airworthiness,
presents an unacceptable level of risk to aviators, the firefighters on
the ground and the communities that we serve. Large airtankers are but
one of the many tools that we use to suppress wildland fires. During any
year, thousands of wildland fires are suppressed without the benefit of
air support. We have developed a strategy for the 2004 fire season to
supplement our wildland firefighting efforts with other available aircraft.
These additional aircraft assets include the use of large helicopters
and helitankers, single engine airtankers (SEATS) and military C-130 aircraft
equipped with the Modular Airborne Firefighting System (MAFFS). A long-term evaluation of the
mission and composition of aviation assets that includes certification,
maintenance and inspection programs based on available funding will be
developed by the leadership of the Forest Service and the Department of
the Interior agencies. 2003 FIRE SEASON REVIEW In 2003, while the number of
acres burned nationally was below the ten-year average, California suffered
its worst wildland fire season in modern history. Over 3,600 homes were
lost, and 24 people died, including one firefighter. The State and Federal
agencies spent $157 million to contain the fires. Sixteen people died
in the floods and debris flows that followed as a result of the fires.
A large portion of the damage to resources and improved property occurred
on state or private lands. Santa Ana winds combined with extended drought
conditions and high fuel loads led to extreme fire behavior and evacuations.
October 28, 2003 had the largest acreage burned in one day with 135,851
acres. The Cedar Fire, on and adjacent to the Cleveland National Forest,
burned 280,293 acres, ultimately becoming the largest fire in California
recorded history. The Cedar fire burned 80,000 acres in 10 hours. These
fires burned in and around wildland-urban interface areas, requiring extensive
evacuations of communities, subdivisions, and ranches. 2004 SEASONAL WILDLAND FIRE
OUTLOOK HEALTHY FOREST INITITATIVE In May of 2002, the Secretary
of the Interior, the Secretary of Agriculture, the Chair of the Council
on Environmental Quality, and the Western Governor's Association met to
sign an implementation plan for the 10-Year Comprehensive Strategy, A
Collaborative Approach for Reducing Wildland Fire Risks to Communities
and Environment. The Strategy and Implementation Plan provides a road
map for helping communities to protect themselves from the risk of wildland
fire. The Council has been leading the fire management agencies in eliminating interagency differences to ensure more seamless delivery of a coordinated fire protection program. In its first year of operation, the Council:
We are actively using authorities under the President's Healthy Forests Initiative that offer additional categorical exclusions to accomplish hazardous fuel reduction before and rehabilitation work after a fire. These two categorical exclusions facilitate scientifically sound, efficient, and timely planning and decision making for the treatment of hazardous fuels and rehabilitation of areas so as to reduce risks to communities and the environment caused by severe fires. These new procedures to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act allow high-priority fuels reduction and forest restoration projects identified through collaboration with state, local and tribal governments and interested parties to move forward more quickly. The President sought, and in
2003 the Congress provided, long-term stewardship contracting authority
for the Bureau of Land Management and expanded the limited authority it
had previously granted to the Forest Service. Stewardship contracts or
agreements allow communities, tribes, private companies and others to
retain forest and rangeland products in exchange for performing services
for the agencies, such as fuel reduction treatments, riparian improvements,
thinning trees and removing dead wood. In addition to the planned treatments, the agencies treated an additional 719,624 acres through wildland fire use - the management of naturally ignited wildland fires to accomplish specific resource management objectives, such as ecosystem maintenance and restoration. For FY 2004, the Department of the Interior and the Forest Service plan to treat an additional 2.7 million acres of hazardous fuels. We will focus our resources to optimally mitigate fire risk by effectively reducing fuels and maintaining healthy forests and grasslands on priority projects. Forest Service research indicates that well planned treatments in key areas can successfully influence fire behavior, thus protecting many more acres than are actually treated. Two treatments, one a prescribed burn and one a mechanical treatment, each significantly altered the behavior of Colorado's Hayman Fire in 2002. The Polhemus prescribed burn mitigated the spread of the Hayman Fire despite even though the fire approached the treated area driven by winds exceeding 30 mph. When the fire reached the mechanically treated area that portion of the fire was more easily suppressed. In 2002 the Cone Fire entered the Blacks Mountain Experimental Forest in northern California. When it reached an area where trees had been thinned and surface fuels had been treated, it dropped from a crown fire to an easily controlled surface fire in a matter of feet. We continue to use the full
range of options available to us to achieve our goal of restoring fire-adapted
ecosystems where appropriate, through mechanical thinning, prescribed
fire, wildland use fire or through other programs. For example At Oregon's
2002 Biscuit Fire, areas where thinning had been followed by prescribed
burning exhibited the least burn severity of all portions of the forest
that were studied. We do not anticipate that we will treat every acre of wildland forest or grassland that has a high fuel hazard. Neither the Forest Service the Department of the Interior or other Federal, state or local fire agencies can absolutely protect the growing number of homes and businesses adjacent to wildland areas. Given severe fire conditions and high home ignitability, exposure to flames and particularly firebrands can result in residential destruction. It is critical that private landowners also take steps on their own to protect their property. We are providing help to homeowners through research on adequate defensible space, educational materials and grant assistance to FIREWISE programs. FIREFIGHTING COST We recognize that the cost of suppressing wildland fire is high. We need to strike a balance between the costs of suppressing fires and the need to protect property and resources. Large fire cost reviews, which began in 2003 will be continued in 2004. These reviews provide wildland fire management leaders with detailed on-the-ground cost information with which to make more cost-efficient resource decisions. The Wildland Fire Leadership Council has directed the agencies to take actions to respond to key finding of the large fire cost reviews including;
This year, the Wildland Fire Leadership Council also convened a high level panel comprised of senior State, local, Tribal and Federal representatives, and incident team members, representing a mix of on-the-ground and policy expertise, to examine cost containment issues in a broader, land management- context to integrate suppression and vegetation management. The panel's findings and recommendations will be presented this summer. SUMMARY
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