Smokejumper Editorial: Burned Out Towns In USFS Wildfires

by

Editor Chuck Sheley has compressed my current article, “Burned Out: Deadly National Forest Fires now Entering Towns” into a succinct one-page editorial for the current issue of Smokejumper Magazine. I will post the entire article, with color photos, map, and tables when I get my copy — it was supposed to arrive a few weeks ago, but western Oregon USPS is seemingly going through troubled times lately.

I posted this on a couple of forestry Facebook pages as two JPEGs, the Smokejumper cover and my editorial. Chuck did his normal great job of editing — he has been doing this for 25 years — but I didn’t want to try and re-create  his edits from draft, so I’m also going to post as JPEGs here. The entire article is more than 3500 words, but Chuck catches the essence and key summary conclusion perfectly well. Details to follow [Here is the original post: https://forestpolicypub.com/2024/10/02/burned-out-us-forest-service-is-destroying-our-western-towns 

Guidance on Streamlining and Simplifying Permitting- April 22 Letter

by
Example of a random SOPA , note that direct contact info for FS employees is available on the SOPA but I blocked for this image. 

The Forest Service Press Office (thanks!) sent me a copy of  this rather lengthy letter.   Here’s a bit of a philosophical question to frame the whole Emergency effort: is wildfire really an emergency?  Some would argue that climate is an emergency; some would argue that wildfire is an emergency but other solutions that vegetation manipulation on federal lands should be chosen.  Some would argue that vegetative manipulation is OK, but it’s not an emergency enough to change current procedures. Others would argue that vegetation manipulation  is OK but not cutting trees to be used commercially.  But if we back up, it seems like some people who believe that global warming is a crisis also believe that (some) mitigation projects should be expedited, but not adaptation projects.  If we frame the wildfire crisis as being about climate change, which some people do.  It’s very confusing, but I thought that it was important to lay out that context before we discuss “what we think is OK to do in an emergency” we need to talk about exactly what we think the emergency is and how we define it.

Here are the general introductory statements:

On April 3, 2025, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins signed Secretarial Memo 1078-006 titled Increasing Timber Production and Designating an Emergency Situation on National Forest System Lands. The Secretarial Memo implements Executive Order 14225, Immediate Expansion of American Timber Production (March 1, 2025). Acting Associate Chief Chris French provided additional direction to Regional Foresters in a letter dated April 3, 2025, Implementation of Secretarial Memo 1078-006. This letter directed the Deputy Chief of the National Forest System (NFS), within 14 days, to release direction for using Emergency National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), Endangered Species Act (ESA), and other regulatory authorities to streamline and simplify the permitting process. The following guidance contained in this memo fulfills this requirement.

To address specific challenges related to wildfires and forest health, the Secretarial memo contains an Emergency Action Determination (EAD) under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), Section 40807, Emergency Actions authority. NFS will support use of this new EAD with additional information, increased Emergency Action Portal functionality and several mapping products to identify the lands included. All actions eligible within the lands covered will use this EAD authority as the default approach including ongoing actions. To use this Forest Health and Hazardous Fuels EAD, proposals must be submitted through the Emergency Action Portal for final approval by the unit’s Forest Supervisor.

Tribes and States Can Request Additional Areas.

Secretarial Memo 1078-006 provides federally recognized Tribes, Alaska Native Corporations, and States the ability to request additional areas to be included in the EAD through the Regional Forester to the Chief of the Forest Service for approval. Additional process guidance for addressing these requests will be forthcoming.

NEPA

When applying this authority to ongoing NEPA actions, consider if a change in the NEPA process will provide for efficiency given its current stage. If an opportunity for objections has already been communicated to the public or is within the objections process, the project timing may not be a good fit for use of this authority.

Public notice and an opportunity to comment is required for IIJA authorized projects, however the statute affords greater discretion in how that is accomplished. To expedite emergency actions, use streamlined approaches under the Agency’s NEPA procedures rather than relying on the notice and comment procedures of the displaced objection processes set out in 36 CFR Part 218. For example, publication via the Schedule of Proposed Actions and distribution of a notice through the unit’s mailing list may be done for environmental assessments (EAs) and categorical exclusions (CEs). Public notice for an environmental impact statement should follow the direction in 36 CFR 220.5(f).

To further expedite these projects, seek to minimize process requirements like scoping, extraordinary circumstance review, and decision memo requirements while still fulfilling all applicable legal requirements.

My bold. At this point, if I lived near or was otherwise interested in forest projects, I would make sure that I was on the forest’s mailing list, and also check the SOPA at least once a week. You can just type in the forest name and SOPA into a search engine, and find the projects,  the dates, the link to the project website and whom to contact. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any luck clicking through today and sent a note to the WO about the broken links.

1. Scoping for emergency actions shall be commensurate with the scope and scale of the project. Such scoping efforts should be focused and brief. Formal comment periods will not typically be required for EAs and CEs. Alternative forms of public involvement are sufficient to fulfill agency responsibilities under NEPA and the IIJA.

I’ve seen many EAs with apparent comment periods and even response to comments, so this is interesting.

2. For extraordinary circumstances review, analyze the degree of effect to the proposed action not just the mere presence of a resource condition. Focus on the most important
resource conditions, those listed in 36 CFR 220.6(b) and do not casually expand the scope of conditions being assessed.

But if you expand them thoughtfully, I guess that would be OK.

3. For decision documents, use Agency templates and only include the content required at 36 CFR 220.6(e) and 36 CFR 220.7(c). Additional emergency compliance tools under NEPA can be found on the Ecosystem Management Coordination SharePoint site. Where applicable, prioritize use of CEs to meet NEPA compliance. To expand use of CEs, the
Forest Service recently adopted over 40 additional categories from other agencies under Section 109 of NEPA. Please examine these additional categories, as well as current USDA, Agency, and statutory CEs when considering compliance actions in support of the Secretarial Memo.

Note that this adoption was last July, prior to the current Administration.

************

There are also emergency suggestions for for NHPA compliance and Tribal Consultation.

*****************

Since Jon knows about ESA, I thought I’d throw this section in this post.

For compliance supporting the ESA:
1. Employ existing, and develop new, innovative, options for expediting ESA consultation and achieving conservation objectives. Refer to the June 26, 2024, Interagency Memo on
“ESA Section 7 Streamlining Guidance for Implementing the Wildfire Crisis Strategy” for a summary of existing options and opportunities for efficient and effective ESA consultation (https://usdagcc.sharepoint.com/sites/fs-nfs-niesc).

Seems like that Interagency Memo (from the last Admin)  is probably available outside the sharepoint site for those curious.

2. Bring innovative ideas to the WO Natural Resources staff to develop additional options and opportunities. New opportunities are being developed as part of the National Active
Forest Management Strategy.
3. Where expedited consultation is necessary, provide as much essential information as feasible to the Services in advance of the action, in order to: determine appropriate design
features to incorporate; assess whether leadership elevation may be warranted; and minimize the time/capacity investment required after any emergency actions are completed.
4. Use the below suggested consultation initiation language where expedited consultation is needed: “XX National Forest is requesting expedited consultation to perform YY work
pursuant to Secretarial Memo 1078-006. The project is expected to commence on ZZ date. If expedited consultation cannot be completed prior to that date, the Forest requests the
consultation be completed under the emergency consultation regs and procedures. (50 CFR § 402.05).”
5. The WO Natural Resources staff are working with ESA consultation agencies to develop additional guidance and methods involving emergency consultation.

To the simple-minded like me, it seems like ESA consultation would involve something like “in these areas, for these kinds of projects, you need to do X, Y and Z to protect A, B and C species.” We know this because dozens of fuel treatment projects likely have been done in the same area.  I get that there are landscape-level considerations. It looks like there already emergency consultation regs and procedures in place, but then that goes back to where we started “is it an emergency, and if so, what kind?”

Does the Emergency Situation Determination “Open Up 112.5 Million Acres” to Logging? No. And New Map Coming

by
Original ESD map

A Big Shout-out to the Forest Service Press Office for a quick response on this.

**************

I know I can be critical of the media, but in this case I also think the Department could have done a better job on the rollout.  All it would have taken is one clarifying chunk of words in an accompanying press release (or maybe it was there and I didn’t see it?)

*************

What does it mean in English to “open up” areas for logging?  Using plain English,  “to make available or possible” implying that those areas had not been previously open.  This was possible as we can see from these media outlets:

WaPo

Trump administration orders half of national forests open for logging

LA Times

Last week, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins issued an emergency declaration that ordered the U.S. Forest Service to open up some 112.5 million acres of national forestland to logging.

USA Today

A new policy opens 58% of U.S. national forests to logging by rolling back environmental protections.

****************************

And we found out from the folks at the Associated Press (who wrote a fair story) that the acreage came from the Secretary’s announcement of  acres covered by the ESD.

However, those of us experienced in this area might wonder “how does this related to other designations and forest plans?”  Let’s look at the language the Secretary referred to in her memo from IIJA which sets out the parameters of ESD’s.

For emergency actions 40807 (b) (3) IIJA says .
            (3) Relation to land and resource management plans.--Any 
        authorized emergency action carried out under paragraph (2) on 
        National Forest System land shall be conducted consistent with 
        the applicable land and resource management plan.

Now, we have acres where fuel treatments are allowed in the forest plan.  The memo doesn’t actually change that.  I asked the Press Office about other designations (Wilderness, Roadless etc.) and here is the answer from them:

The current map reflects boundaries within which there may be wilderness, roadless, or other special designation areas, as well as lakes, roads, structures, etc. Mechanical treatments are not allowed in designated wilderness areas, so logging is excluded. Restrictions or conditions associated with project level decisions, forest plans, regulations or Congressional Designations remain.

So the order, in and of itself does not, in fact,  “open up” any new areas to “logging.”  If a new project is proposed in an area that is OK based on all the other forest plan and other designations and restrictions, then it uses the ESD  assists: no objection process-one action alternative-special injunction relief (the latter Rich J. was kind enough to explain.) Abbreviated NOP-OAA-SIR

Now some might argue that with this push for increasing timber harvest, forests might be inclined to do more projects that would require a site-specific plan amendment, and that’s possible, but forests could have done those anyway without the ESD.  So in that sense, the ESD itself did not open anything.  If a forest wants to go somewhere not in the forest plan, though, via a site-specific plan amendment, it would make the project analysis quicker via NOP-OAA-SIR.

So I would say that “opening for logging” based on the ESD, is not correct.

The Press Office told me that there will be a more detailed map shortly, so we’ll post that.

Interior Draft Strategic Plan Leaked.. What Do You Think About Professionalism, Ethics and Leakage?

by

 

The website Public Domain published a draft version of a strategic plan for the Department of the Interior.

Here’s what the Department of the Interior said about the leakage:

“It is beyond unacceptable that an internal document in the draft/deliberative process is being shared with the media before a decision point has been made,” an Interior Department spokesperson wrote in response to queries from Public Domain. “Not only is this unacceptable behavior, it is irresponsible for a media outlet to publish a draft document. We will take this leak of an internal, pre-decisional document very seriously and find out who is responsible. The internal document is marked draft/deliberative for a reason – it’s not final nor ready for release.”

Nothing sounds too surprising in the Public Domain summary, and it says that when the Department releases a draft we’ll all have an opportunity to comment.

DOI will seek input from the public, tribes and Congress from May to July and plans to finalize its strategy by October, according to the draft.

I thought that this might be a good time to discuss leaking to the media and to others.  Personally, I’ve never done this.   I have worked on projects whose drafts were regularly leaked to outside groups, but not necessarily the media.  It seems to me that it happens more in some Admins than others.. this could be due to the political predilections of employees, and/or that of the media. I wonder whether anyone has ever studied that question?

In what kind of situations would you consider that leaking should be done?  Why?

Oregon’s Wood Product Manufacturing Industry Is Still Important, Especially in Rural Areas

by

This is an article by Brian Rooney, the Regional Economist for Douglas and Lane Counties in Oregon. It’s pretty interesting about Oregon and the forest products industry.  Thanks to Treefrognews  for this one! Below is an excerpt. Interesting employment projections at the end of the article.

Smaller Harvest, Technology, and Economies of Scale Contribute to Decline

Several structural shifts in the wood products industry have contributed to the long-term employment decline. First, there was a drop in timber harvests from environmental concerns in the early 1990s. As harvest from federal lands reduced the amount of available raw material to mills, employment dropped, indicating that harvest reductions were a cause for the employment loss in the early 1990s.

Graph showing Oregon employment and timber harvest levels

New technologies brought another structural change to the industry by making lumber mills less labor intensive. Employment continued to drop even after harvest levels stabilized in the late 1990s, and employment did not increase much despite a housing construction boom in the mid-2000s. Jobs in wood product manufacturing per million board feet harvested dropped steadily after 2000, at least partly due to technology.

Lumber production per worker in Oregon is another way to look at efficiency gains. By combining Western Wood Products Association production data with sawmill employment data, we can create a measure of lumber production per worker. It increased rapidly in the early 2000s, going from 806,000 board feet per worker in 2000 to 1.1 million in 2005. It then dropped back to 791,000 board feet during the Great Recession. It’s likely that mills cut production through fewer hours to some extent instead of letting go of workers during the recession. After the recession, production per worker increased to the elevated levels it had reached before the recession, reaching roughly 1.2 million board feet in 2012. Production per worker has stayed close to 1.2 million board feet per worker through 2022 but dropped to 1.1 million board feet in 2023.

In addition to new technologies, smaller mills were shuttered, creating efficiency through economies of scale (larger mills can produce more per worker). The average production of sawmills operating in the western U.S. increased as smaller mills were shuttered and efficiency increased through economies of scale and new technology. Between 1990 and 2021, the number of mills in the western U.S. dropped from 600 to 144 while average production per mill increased from about 35 million board feet per year to 102 million board feet per year. The number of mills has since dropped to 141 and average production per mill dropped to around 97 million board feet per year in 2023.

Graph showing sawmills operating in the Western U.S. 1990-2023

Wood Products Are Still Important in Oregon, Especially in Rural Areas

Even with the long-term decline, wood product manufacturing is still a large industry in Oregon. In 2024, there were 22,400 jobs and roughly $1.5 billion in total payroll in the industry. While statewide the industry makes up only 1.1% of total employment and 1.1% of total payroll, the concentration is much higher in some counties, especially rural ones. For instance, in Curry County, 8.1% of total employment and 11.7% of total payroll was in wood product manufacturing. Most of the counties with a high concentration of employment in wood product manufacturing are rural.

Table showing Oregon counties measured by wood products manufacturing percent of total employment and payroll in 2024

In counties where the percent of total payroll exceeds the percent of total employment, average wages are higher in wood product manufacturing than the overall average wage. This is the case in most of the rural counties listed, indicating that wood product manufacturing provides some of the higher paying jobs in rural counties.

Jobs Generally Pay Well and Do Not Require High Levels of Education

The top 20 occupations in wood product manufacturing are mostly medium wage but do not require high levels of education. Most of the top 20 occupations have a typical entry-level education of a high school diploma or less. Some of the more technical occupations like industrial machinery mechanics and electricians have average annual wages of more than $70,000 a year and have a typical entry-level education of a high school diploma, providing opportunities for those who don’t pursue a college degree.

Table showing top 20 wood product manufacturing occupations in Oregon

Looking Ahead

Employment projections from the Oregon Employment Department show that wood product manufacturing employment is expected to gain 700 jobs (3%) between 2023 and 2033. The plywood and engineered wood products, and other wood products subsectors are expected to have 3% growth while sawmills and wood preservation is expected to drop 3%.

Like many industries, wood product manufacturing has an aging workforce reaching retirement age. This creates demand for workers through replacement needs. Aside from gaining 700 jobs between 2023 and 2033, there are expected to be roughly 8,900 openings from people leaving the industry and the labor force, largely due to retirements.

Back to the Future?: Potential Changes to FS R&D- E&E News Story and Additional Context

by

I’ll put some thoughts in this, but also dive into some history that may help explain where FS R&D is and how it got there to provide some context.

 

GREENWIRE | The Trump administration is gearing up to redirect the Forest Service’s scientific work toward timber and wildfire and away from pests, diseases, forest ecology and the effects of climate change.

I’m not sure about this.. it seems to me that traditional organismal biology positions such as entomology, pathology, physiology and genetics have been downplayed for some time.  In fact, the Forest Service seems a bit like some universities.  In the case of some universities, user-oriented disciplines like entomology and pathology are now only found in Extension, whereas in the Forest Service they are found in Forest Health (part of State and Private).  This is not the fault of FS R&D, with limited budgets, they felt they had to go for bigger science bucks like climate change or other Big Science fads like sequencing genomes. I remember sitting with a Station Director at the SAF Convention in Rochester, NY in 1988 who blithely said “we’re tapped into the bucks for climate now and we’re never going back to helping you (NFS).”  I’m not blaming them.. given the conditions it was the choice to make.

Also, about wildfire research, I am wary of proposals such as the Wildfire Intelligence Center in FOFA that could be seen as NOAA and NASA poaching wildfire research funding. Let’s face it, FS R&D is a minnow among the sharks of the Big Science world.  It’s interesting that Nick Smith’s news roundup today had precisely that, NASA working with DOD on prescribed fire. One of the most amazing things to me about the way federal R&D works is that no one ever checks for duplication. Perhaps that’s what the Wildfire Intelligence Center will do.. but I have my doubts.

The realignment of the forest agency’s research priorities has been in the works for weeks and reflects staff reductions — some already completed through deferred resignations, others on the way — as well as forthcoming spending proposals that would be left to Congress to decide, according to employees and outside organizations familiar with the administration’s thinking.

The fallout of the shift in the Forest Service’s focus would ripple not just through national forests but on state and privately owned land across the country, where the agency’s research guides land management practices.

Preliminary budget-related communications within the Agriculture Department and the ever-changing internal roster of employees and their jobs offer clues about where the research mission may be headed, said an employee who shared some of the materials with POLITICO’s E&E News.

Three agency employees familiar with the administration’s thinking said the approach aligns with long-simmering views within the Forest Service and in Congress that the agency’s research mission is overdue for some tweaking, if not an outright overhaul.

Congress has long been concerned that federal R&D in ag and forestry has departed from utility.  Hence (in the distant past) the Fund for Rural America and other efforts.  Tensions within the Department about “listening to stakeholders too much” led to the firing of my boss at the time, the head of the Fund for Rural America.  Putting stakeholders on panels! Some folks had come over from NSF, and earnestly believed that R&D direction and funding needed to be of the scientists, by the scientists and for the scientists. I acknowledge that formula funds at the land grants could be a Dean’s slush fund, but some universities also had councils of stakeholders to advise on R&D priorities with their USDA research funds. So slowly and subtly the connection was broken and research has slowly drifted away from stakeholder involvement.

But outside organizations and some employees said there’s a danger that the administration will go too far, losing seasoned researchers and weakening the Forest Service’s ability to apply long-term research to current, everyday problems.

That’s true not just on the 193 million acres the Forest Service manages but in privately owned forests across the country that depend on the agency for up-to-date science on everything from disease outbreaks to the likely consequences of the warming climate. Challenges await cities large and small as well, where Forest Service research — and grants, up until now — support urban tree-planting programs.

A USDA spokesperson declined to comment on forthcoming restructuring or spending proposals, saying in a statement it would be inappropriate to speculate on future restructuring or funding.

But, the spokesperson said, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins “fully supports the President’s directive to improve government, eliminate inefficiencies, and strengthen USDA’s many services to the American people,” adding, “Secretary Rollins is committed to ensuring critical research and essential services remain uninterrupted.”

Research on long-term issues can include forest ecology over 30 years, said Richard Guldin, a former research official in the Forest Service’s Washington office and a board member at the National Association of Forest Service Retirees. While the administration may be focused on more immediate problems — like wildfire — short-term needs and long-term trends go hand in hand, he said.

“We need to figure out how to help the national forest land managers begin to apply what we are learning,” Guldin said. “You do the long-term research, and it has to be good — but it has to be good for something.”

For those who haven’t followed this, there has been a long-standing tension between what (some) R&D scientists want to study, and what NFS managers think would be useful.  This led to folks like forest health folks with Ph.D.s doing their own work (so-called “administrative studies”) because R&D scientists (and university folks) weren’t interested (nor funded).   I have never been a fan of the “we scientists will determine how to frame the problem, what and how to study it, and then tell you all what to do.”  In my view, that’s not what FS R&D nor the land-grants institutions should be doing.  It tends to divide, when finding out knowledge should bring people together, in my view.

A vast research mission

Federal spending on forest research and development has climbed slightly in recent years, from $296 million in discretionary appropriations in fiscal 2022 to more than $300 million the past two fiscal years. The Biden administration requested increases, citing the need for more information about climate change and expansion of markets for wood products, among other priorities.

Do we need “more information about climate change?” Or do we deal with the impacts as they manifest themselves in real time?  For some time, current problems are not funded in pursuit of predicting future problems.

The Forest Service is the world’s largest research organization, the Biden administration said in its budget request for the current fiscal year. The mission includes 76 experimental forests, four experimental ranges and four experimental watersheds.

I don’t know what “largest” means in this context.. certainly not in funding.  Maybe acres?  All of USDA (ERS, NIFA, FS, ARS) is a drop in the science bucket. See the chart at the top.

A forest products laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin, explores alternative uses for wood, such as in tall building construction. The Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory in Missoula, Montona, has a 66-foot-high combustion chamber that allows for burn tests in controlled conditions, according to the Forest Service.

The budget also covers five research stations, distributed in each region of the country. And the agency’s forest inventory and analysis program — which the administration has signaled will remain a top priority, according to employees — provides crucial data about the condition of the nation’s forests.

One of the reasons FIA is so popular is that it has a strongly supportive group of stakeholders, and regularly listens to their feedback.

Still, research accounts for just 4 percent of the Forest Service’s budget, according to the agency.

A 2017 report by the U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities said the number of researchers in federal land management agencies has plummeted in recent years, particularly in areas such as plant pathology and entomology. Even the forest products lab — which the Trump administration has marked as a higher priority — lost most of its workforce in the decades after World War II, the report said.

Corporations, too, have retrenched on research, the report said, and universities don’t spend as much on applied forest research as they once did.

My research colleagues in industry lost their jobs when the tax changes encouraged forest products companies to sell their land.  And universities are subject to the same science market forces.. practical work isn’t cool nor funded.

Deep cuts at the Forest Service research probably couldn’t be made up by universities or other nonfederal entities, researchers and other people close to the programs said.

In part, that’s because forest research that takes decades to play out on the ground doesn’t translate into quick profits for the wood products industry, said Peter Madden, president and CEO of the Endowment for Forestry and Communities, based in Greenville, South Carolina.

But forest health — which may take a hit in the President Donald Trump budget — can’t really be separated from forest products, Madden said. The emerald ash borer has clobbered markets for ash trees, and in Canada, a bark beetle outbreak “literally wiped out a lot of those markets, a lot of those communities that depended on timber.”

Biodiversity and forest health are big issues, Madden said, “but I don’t really see private industry spending the money.”

Having watched the demise of industry R&D, it was never about “quick profits”.. forest genetics has never been very quick.  And then there is NCASI, which had done much good work.

Realigning Forest Service research could go along with the priorities of some congressional Republicans. In recent years, Republican appropriators have called on the agency to refocus research on wildfire and wood products.

Like I said, I don’t see R’s as the danger to wildfire research.  And wood products..both sides of the aisle are interested in uses for biomass, if that’s the same thing.  I wonder exactly what the appropriators said?

Gaps and concerns

A study by the National Academy of Public Administration in 2021 also pointed to organizational troubles in the Forest Service’s research and development, including a lack of coordination and conflicting views about which science takes priority.

Research is critical to the agency’s mission, the report said. “However, pressure to undertake more applied research and focus on delivering existing science to meet near-term needs raises concerns about how to maintain support for basic research.”

The study added, “Moreover, for many of R&D’s internal agency partners, station research is associated with a university-style approach to research with little attention to addressing mission challenges.”

Does the FS need to do “basic research”? Isn’t that NSF’s job? And “little attention to addressing mission challenges” is fairly standard over the past 30 years or so, but to be fair if you tell your scientists to get their own funding, and Big Science doesn’t care about small landowners or the national forests, what were they supposed to do?

Focusing on one type of research without paying enough attention to others overlooks the complexity of forest science, said Matt Betts, a forestry professor at Oregon State University and lead scientist for an ecological research program at the school’s H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest. The program is cooperatively managed with the Forest Service.

I don’t think, technically speaking, the Andrews belongs to OSU.

“It’s hard to do research in isolation,” Betts said. Someone who invests in forests to make wood products, for instance, needs to know how fast certain trees grow based on conditions, as well as how wildfires spread, he said.

If the Trump administration is serious about boosting timber harvests by 25 percent, Betts said, forest research will be even more critical — and some of it is more suited to the government than to industry.

Sometimes, forest science and business practices don’t exactly overlap. To meet demand for wood, timber companies often don’t want to wait until a Douglas fir tree, for instance, has hit its target of 80 years for full maturity. Instead, they cut it at 35 or 40 years old, he said.

Last I checked, economics was also a science. Hopefully we’re not back to de-emphasizing the social sciences- so 20th century.  After all, both Rs and Ds want to use small diameter woody material from thinnings rather than burn it.  Why have we been unsuccessful for the last 30 years of trying? What can we do about it?  FS economists and some university folks are studying that.

Gaps constantly emerge in forest knowledge, too, Betts told E&E News. A generation ago, many people believed old-growth forests were a waste, he said. Now, he said, researchers believe protecting old-growth forests is a way to balance environmental needs with maintaining the timber industry — a point Betts and others made in a paper in Science magazine Thursday.

“We still don’t really know how forests work,” Betts said. “The more I learn, the more I realize we don’t know about forests.

Two New Acting Regional Foresters: Blum and Newburn

by

The Forest Service Chief is announcing today that Gordie Blum will serve as Acting Regional Forester for the Eastern Region, effective May 1, 2025, and that Ben Newburn will serve as Acting Regional Forester for the Intermountain Region, effective April 28, 2025.  Blum will temporarily succeed Regional Forester Tony Dixon as he reaches his retirement date after 34 years of dedicated service.  Newburn will temporarily succeed Regional Forester Mary Farnsworth, who is retiring after 38 years of dedicated service.

Gordie Blum Bio:  

Gordie Blum comes to the Eastern Region from his position as director of Recreation, Heritage and Volunteer Services in the USDA Forest Service Headquarters in Washington, D.C.

 

Gordie has over 30 years of federal service. After serving in the U.S. Army from 1991-1997, he began his career with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Chicago, Illinois before joining the Forest Service in 2000 as the communications director for the Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin. He has also been a legislative affairs specialist in Washington, D.C., the deputy and acting forest supervisor on the Willamette National Forest in Eugene, OR, Pacific Northwest Region Recreation, Lands and Minerals Director in Portland, and Eastern Region Recreation Director. Throughout his career he has served in numerous acting leadership assignments; including USDA Natural Resources and Environment liaison, deputy director of Fire and Aviation Management, and acting forest supervisor on the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest.

Gordie has a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Wisconsin, and a Master of Arts from the State University of New York. He is also a graduate of the Federal Executive Institute, and the USDA Senior Executive Service program. A father of two and husband to his wife for 30 years, Gordie enjoys all sorts of outdoor activities and doing restoration work on their property in southern Wisconsin.

******************

 

Ben Newburn Bio:

 

Ben Newburn has been selected as acting regional forester for the Intermountain Region, following his role as the region’s director of Fire & Aviation Management since 2021.

Newburn attended Eastern Washington University where he earned a degree in biological sciences with an emphasis in botany. He brings over 25 years of land management experience to the position, gained through his work with both the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service. His previous roles include deputy forest supervisor, deputy regional director, and various positions in Fire & Aviation Management in Montana, Washington, California, and Utah. He has also served as an incident commander on several significant and complex incidents.

Ben, his wife and their young son enjoy a variety of outdoor activities, traveling, and sports. In his free time, Ben renovates their home in Ogden, Utah.

********************

 

 

On Divesting, Transferring, Privatizing Public Lands: It’s Not Fearmongering- Guest Post by Martin Nie

by

Martin was the co-founder of The Smokey Wire’s predecessor A New Century of Forest Planning back in 2009.  Note: it arrvied in my inbox nicely formatted, any formatting issues are my fault.

Martin Nie is Professor of Natural Resources Policy and Director of the Bolle Center for People and Forests at the W.A. Franke College of Forestry and Conservation at the University of
Montana. He writes here as a public citizen and is in no way representing the University of Montana or the Montana University System.

A post in response to the Smokey Wire’s coverage and criticism of the op-ed written by former Chiefs of the U.S. Forest Service (USFS), as published in the Denver Post on April 13, 2025. I
was heartened by this letter and the willingness of former Chiefs to speak out and defend our National Forests and public lands writ large. I was dismayed, however, in how the piece was
covered and the statement that widespread fears of divesting and privatizing public lands is standard “fear-mongering” that so exhausts some contributors to the blog.

“Oh for Gifford’s sake! Here we go again with the standard privatization fear-mongering…State’s don’t want them [i.e., public lands], and the private dog (except for local housing) won’t hunt,” states Sharon Friedman, making clever reference to the first Chief of the USFS Gifford Pinchot.

***

Cambridge on Fearmongering: “the action of intentionally trying to make people afraid of something when this is not necessary or reasonable.”

***

Current fears about the divestiture and privatization of federal public lands are anything but fearmongering. I hope to write more substantively about this when given a moment, but a few
scattered comments and observations.

First is to at least recognize the history of public lands and the centrality of this debate through the years. Public anxiety is deeply rooted in the past. We could go back to where most public
land histories begin—not with Indian Title—but with the story of federal acquisition, disposal, and retention of federal public lands. Or to the gilded age or progressive-era to see the tensions
between public goods and concentrated wealth and the implications for our shared lands (as told in meticulous detail by John Leshy in Our Common Ground: A History of America’s Public
Lands.).

“For Gifford’s sake”? No. Pinchot would be all over the Chief’s letter, just as he warned his peers about the dangers of privatization, corporate control, the “Economic Royalists,” State
ownership of National Forests, and “concentrated wealth’s…strangle hold over the general welfare” back in his day (Gifford Pinchot, Breaking New Ground, 1947, p. 508). My lord, his
third principle of conservation is “to see to it that the rights of the people to govern themselves shall not be controlled by great monopolies through their power over natural resources.” (Ibid;
see also the collective work of Char Miller, including Gifford Pinchot: Making of Modern Environmentalism).

Pinchot also saw the relationship between state ownership and control and the move towards privatization. He writes in 1920:

“It has been my experience that a Legislature can seldom be induced by considerations from outside to take action against the opposition of interests dominant in the State” [and] “[j]ust as the waterpower monopolists and grazing interests formerly clamored for State control, well-knowing they could themselves control the States, so now the lumbermen will be found almost without exception against Federal and for State control, and for the same reason.” Gifford Pinchot, “National or State Control of Forest Devastation,” Journal of Forestry (Feb. 1920).

The general period of disposal, goes the usual narrative, ends with passage of the Federal Land Policy Management Act (FLPMA) of 1976, where Congress declares a national policy that:

The public lands be retained in federal ownership, unless as a result of the land use planning procedure provided for in this Act, it is determined that disposal of a particular parcel will serve the national interest.

Some limited options here for disposal, which are now being fully exploited. 1976 is still a good demarcation point for the Sagebrush Rebellion, where most histories and contemporary writing
about privatization begin.

But calls for land transfers to States and related privatization schemes start way earlier and these earlier battles are a more helpful guide for today’s variation. They were most famously tracked
and analyzed by the writer and historian Bernard DeVoto, whose writing for Harpers is just as relevant today than it was when he was targeted by the FBI and McCarthy for being a public
lands-loving Communist. He traced all the innovative land grab schemes of his day, many of  which were framed as federal transfers to States: “The plan is to get rid of public lands altogether, turning them over to the states, which can be coerced as the federal government cannot be, and eventually to private ownership.” (“The West Against Itself,” Harpers, 1947).

My sense is that DeVoto was the first to expose the strategy of defunding, defaming and discrediting public land agencies as a pretense to sell the idea of why it is necessary to fix the
(manufactured) problem by transfer or divestment. It’s the story of the old Grazing Service, whose budget was slashed by 60 percent at the end of its days, what DeVoto called a “classic
demonstration on how to assassinate a federal agency.” He also detailed how the “skinning knife” would be used on the USFS: “The idea was to bring it into disrepute, undermine public
confidence in it by every imaginable kind of accusation and propaganda, cut down its authority, and get out of its hands the power to regulate…” (“Two-Gun Desmond is Back,” Harpers, 1951).

It’s also part of a larger story brilliantly told by Nate Schweber in This America of Ours: Bernard and Avis DeVoto and the Forgotten Fight to Save the World.  My point here is that these are not new tactics or concerns. The case for and against the privatization of public lands and National Forests was also a major theme of scholarship and wonky policy analysis throughout the 1970s and 1980s. This had a particularly economic-oriented flair (see e.g., the collective work of Marion Clawson, including The Federal Lands Revisited (1983). Heated exchanges in the scholarly literature, conferences and symposia, and elsewhere were common and provided some of the ideas and reasoning now being used by those pushing transfer or privatization (see e.g., Adrien Gamache, Selling the Federal Forests (Symposia at College of Forest Resources, University of Washington, 1983). Here is where you find unsettling discussions of how best to convey our public lands to private interests, from highest-bidder to first-in-time, first-in-right.

But let me pick up the pace to get to present-day:

*Instead of an economic framing and arguments for efficiency, different legal strategies are used post-FLPMA to challenge the Constitutionality of public lands in the 1980s through 2000s, all to force their transfer or sale. From Equal Footing and Enclave Clause to Tenth Amendment and everything in between. They fail.

*Utah passes a resolution seeking the transfer of public lands to State ownership in 2012. The language comes from the American Lands Council, providing template cookie-cutter bills and
rhetoric that spread throughout the West and are introduced into every State legislature other than California. How would transferred lands be managed? As State trust lands (which are not public lands)? Will there be protections against disposal and conveyance to private interests? Most fail to say and those that do fail.

*Political protest and confrontation. The Bundy’s and Bunkerville. The occupation and seizure of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. A district court in Nevada calls it “simply delusional to
maintain that all public land within the boundaries of Nevada belongs to the State of Nevada.” (Bundy v. Nevada, 2019).

*Okay, States can’t force the disposal of federal lands. So Utah’s Representative Jason Chaffetz introduces congressional legislation authorizing the disposal of 3.3 million acres of federal land.

*He loses big. #Keep It Public and related campaigns go bigger.

*The transfer and privatization movement learns a lesson and changes tactics. Instead of directly seeking land title and ownership, the movement produces bill after bill that would transfer
control over public lands to States and non-federal actors. Control instead of ownership. The power to make decisions without the costs of firefighting, roads, culverts, and so on.

*Along the way, Republican Party platforms, as a matter of course, contain planks calling for the sale and/or transfer of public lands. At the federal and state level. Do party platforms matter?
Not really but Project 2025 most certainly does. It says little about the National Forest System but its chapter on the Department of Interior was written by William Perry Pendley, the (sort-of)
Director of the BLM during the first Trump Administration and author of “The Federal Government Should Follow the Constitution and Sell Its Western Lands” (2016).

Fearmongering? States don’t want them?

*Let’s jump to present-tense and start with Utah’s Hail Mary throw to SCOTUS and now the lower court in State of Utah v. U.S (2025). Building on decades of futile legal arguments, the
State changes course and challenges federal ownership and management of ~18.5 million acres of “unappropriated land” in the State. “The time has come to bring an end to this patently
unconstitutional state of affairs” says the State. Utah is joined by several others, including Idaho, Alaska, Wyoming and the Arizona legislature….and other public land powerhouses like
Nebraska and Texas. The lawsuit now covers tens of millions of acres of public land.  What lands are “unappropriated,” a term not used in the Constitution or found in the major public land statutes? Answer: Those lands managed as multiple use. My elk camp is on “unappropriated public lands.”

*The zone is flooded with Executive and Secretarial Orders that wreck purposeful havoc on our public lands. Engineered chaos. The civil servants hired to fulfill the tasks required by statute are
let go, rehired, lather, rinse and repeat. The agency is given new marching orders in Executive Order 14225 (Immediate Expansion of American Timber Production) and related step down
guidance, but not with the resources and personnel. The press releases and talking points of the future: the USFS can’t get the job done and that’s why it’s necessary to transfer or privatize these lands or their management.

*Who now has special access in the Department of Interior? The Political Economy Research Center (PERC), a think tank out of Montana that just can’t seem to escape the views of its prior
leadership and his calls for the privatization of federal public lands (Terry Anderson, “How and Why to Privatize Federal Lands,” Cato Institute, 1999).

*For Senator Mike Lee, Chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and long-time champion of land transfer to the States and privatization, public lands are better viewed as
“Underutilized Space.” His HOUSES Act (the Helping Open Underutilized Space to Ensure Shelter Act) aims to privatize federal lands to increase available housing in the West. (Not as
sweeping of plan as is Homesteading 2.0, a similar vision advanced by the American Enterprise Institute and one that would auction off 850 square miles of developable BLM land.)

*Republicans in the House of Representatives, led by House Natural Resources Chair Bruce Westerman (R-Ark) debate sales of public lands in the budget reconciliation, as a way to fund tax
cuts and build housing. It dies in the Senate. (E&E Daily, 4.2.2025).

***

I’ll stop here and will fill in the details and gaps later. Or Maybe we crowdsource this chronology?

But this isn’t fearmongering. The public has every right and reason to be twitchy as hell when it comes to the transfer and privatization of public lands. It’s like when I had to eat lunch with bullies at my cafeteria table in grade school, I always kept my elbows up and one fist free. At the very least, I was aware of my surroundings and the context in which I ate. And context matters here too because the privatization threat is like knapweed and cheatgrass and not limited to auction-like proposals or threats via arcane budget rules and processes. The corner-crossing case in Wyoming is illustrative and you couldn’t get a better cast of characters to illustrate the new gilded age and what it means for our public lands (see Iron Bar Holdings v. Cape et al., 10 th Cir. 2025).

Now some might say that I need to relax because these proposals are deeply unpopular and keep losing in venue after venue and that the past is not prologue. But this is only because of constant public pushback and organizing—what some call fearmongering. It isn’t. It’s the latest chapter, and the most serious chapter, of public lands in my lifetime.

Chag Sameach, Happy Resurrection and Happy Easter!

by
Pasque flower in Colorado https://www.elevationoutdoors.com/go-outside/the-pasque-flower-harbinger-of-spring/ The common name pasque flower refers to its flowering period in the spring during Passover (in Biblical Hebrew: פֶּסַח pāsaḥ). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulsatilla

 

I’m taking off for until Monday, but will still be approving comments. On Monday, we’ll have something exciting, the lovely and talented Martin Nie (co-founder of The Smokey Wire’s predecessor A New Century of Forest Planning)  will return after 15 or so years for a special treat/post entitled “On Divesting, Transferring, Privatizing Public Lands: It’s Not Fearmongering.” So I’ll see you back here then, and for those celebrating this weekend (Passover ends, and this year that Orthodox and other Christians celebrate Easter on the same day):

Wishing you a joyful and meaningful Passover,

Wishing you peace, joy, and renewed faith this Pascha,

Happy Easter!

******************

If you weren’t here in 2023, you might enjoy my previous post on arguments “for the sake of heaven” and the schools of Hillel and Shammai.

And this still reminds me a bit of TSW discussions.

Mordcha: Why should I break my head about the outside world? Let them break their own heads.
Tevye: He’s right. As the Good Book says, “If you spit in the air, it lands in your face.”
Perchik: That’s nonsense. You can’t close your eyes to what’s happening in the world.
Tevye: He’s right.
Avram: He’s right and he’s right? How can they both be right?
Tevye: You know, you’re also right.

— Fiddler on the Roof