There is another election coming up. TSW has been around for the 2012. 2016, 2020, and now 2024 Presidential elections. So now is a good time to ask the question “what would you do if you were appointed to be undersecretary?” What issues would you focus on?
What initiatives that you think are important might appeal more to R’s or D’s? This is the time, before the election results are in, to think outside the box, that is.. way outside the box if possible. And no partisan vitriol today, thank you.
It’s only fair that I give my own.
1. I am concerned that forest policy wonks, (NGO’s and the foundations who support NGOs) focus on the big picture, including getting more money, and the nuts and bolts of doing things, spending the money, and what is accomplished with what degree of difficulty, gets overlooked. So I would go back to the basics. I would host some kind of conversation with FS employees (focused on the District level, but with input from other levels) on what are the main barriers to their work, and their ideas for fixing them, large and small. And of course, going ahead and streamlining the path for folks to try new things. I was part of the Pilot effort in the 1980’s (on the Ochoco) for administrative helpful changes and was able to get the FS paying by check established as a practice. It sounds a bit silly nowadays, but it meant something to us then. And there was the spirit that we could actually identify new, better ways of operating and be supported in making change, which was great for morale.
2. What would it take for the Forest Service to be able to be visible and helpful to the public? As I’ve said, humility and invisibility is a value, but people are doing great work out there and should be, say, appropriately visible. Many forests are doing this, or trying to. What are the obstacles? What few things might make a big difference? Where do human beings matter most? Where should federal employees (not contractors or grantees) matter most?
Planning:
3. Put plan revisions on hold until each “wildfire forest” has a wildfire (including PODs, conditions for WFU, prescribed fire and maintenance, reducing ignitions) amendment and EIS with public involvement and comment.
4. Set up FACA committee (and employee and stakeholder and retiree workgroups) to answer the questions “what values come from forest planning in the 21st century, and can those values be achieved more directly?” with an eye to potentially revising NFMA with bipartisan support.
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Hopefully those ideas will spark something in you. Like I said, there are only certain times we can dream big, and today is one of those before we find out what new Admins want to do and whom they pick for political jobs.
1) If a certain candidate is elected we will be lucky to have all of our NF land in 4 years. The Mike Lees of the country will have their way.
2) Fund from the ground up. Let Districts decide how much “support” they need/want from upper levels and at what expense. Ensure projects are funded wholly without shortchanging. Ensure all permanent positions at Districts are funded without having to chase fires to fund their salaries.
3) Thorough analysis of all permanent positions as to what they are really contributing.
4) Accept much more fire in fire dependent ecosystems.
5) More law enforcement on the ground and better process/organization to prosecute.
6) Less analysis paralysis.
7) More administrative backbone to prevent another Crazy Mtn debacle where a District Ranger was moved out and a Senator assured a mega rich development would be successful in getting a land exchange and the public would lose reasonable trail access.
8) Administrative priority to protect historic public access to their public lands
Interesting! Thanks, Greg! Some thoughts/questions.
1. I thought that the newish budget process did have salaries separate?
2. Is LE a separate line item in Budget Requests to Congress?
3. Is more funding in Lands all that is necessary to protect public access, and is also reorienting DOJ to prosecute necessary? Would this also help with encroachment of various kinds?
Sharon, thanks for taking up these big questions. I like your suggestions for org reform and would support these.
I also think to support org reform, we need to rethink the role and purpose of data and overhaul FS data systems accordingly. Based on nearly 2 decades working to evaluate and learn from FS policies and programs as a partner on the outside that had spent considerable time and energy trying to understand these dynamics from the inside, my observation is that the current data systems have been created/accreted solely to respond to Congressional or other demands for upward reporting. For this reason, the systems do little to help support decision-making.
An example: The FS reports quarterly on the volume of timber harvested and sold by National Forest, Region and State. Surprisingly, the FS is not able to report on where that timber goes or what it is made into–not because they don’t have the information but because that information is stored in paper truck tickets and no one ever required that they digitize it or associate that information with the “cut and sold” data. Even as truck ticket data have transitioned, at least in some places, into a digital record, they still are not compiled or associated with any other data. Further, the standard 2400-17 report that summarizes information on timber harvested and sold at the sale level also includes a field for the county in which the sale took place. Yet getting access to timber harvest by county data can turn into a multi-year wild goose chase to try and find the one person that knows how to pull and compile that data out of some archaic data system.
Data systems should be built to answer the questions line officers and specialists face on a regular basis that could help them make decisions, define trade-offs, and communicate such to the public. It is beyond frustrating when a community member asks what impact a project might have on their community and a line officer can’t (or won’t) tell them where the workforce is likely to come from and where the timber will likely go to be processed.
This is a good idea, but it would cost money, and the land management agencies are historically reluctant to ask for funds for data/analysis capabilities that are not directly and immediately relevant to their day-to-day management activities. This may in part reflect a lack of desire to run such requests through the flaming gauntlet of OMB, and also a fear that should – by some stroke of luck – Congress ultimately appropriate the necessary funds, it will also have cut an equivalent amount from other agency programs.
Chelsea and Rich.. we talked about that about 11 years ago, the discussion was around The People’s Database, you can search on the category and here’s an example from 2013.
https://forestpolicypub.com/2013/04/27/needed-coalition-for-public-access-to-information-on-national-forests-aka-the-peoples-database/
I think a group (FACA?) could generate ideas in discussion with IT and program folks in the FS (and partners who are doing work, and contractors).
I know it would never happen but, I’d like to see the Forest Service ‘fact check’ what members of (both Parties) of Congress are saying. Voters deserve to see the facts, and to see that those facts are addressed by Congress, as a whole.
With regard to being “more visible and helpful to the public” the Forest Service at the field unit level could refocus at the field level on ensuring that knowledgeable and recognizable personnel be more available to the public on the ground by ensuring appropriate orientation of personnel to the agency mission in its entirety rather than on just their narrow specialty and making such personnel more accessible to and visible to the public they serve (or should be serving) by ensuring they perform appropriate aspects of their jobs in the field and in uniform. For several years I and several senior and influential Forest Service retirees promoted establishment and operation of a U.S. Forest Service Academy for entering career professional and technical personnel (a Forest Service officer candidate school, if you will) to inculcate agency appreciation, knowledge, skills and ideals, and appearance and behavior patterns appropriate (and, in my experience and opinion, essential) to successful representation to the public–to no avail. In my opinion, the need for such orientation has continued to increase over time.
Les, I think that with Covid shutting offices, and online work, plus getting many new employees at once, plus a dearth of mid-level employees and retirements would make this idea still or more, relevant.
Sharon, Thank you for this well-reasoned support of the U.S. Forest Service Academy concept that I and others who sponsored the proposal wish had received the national leadership attention necessary to advance this cause so crucial to on-the-ground success in providing the full range of services deserved by the citizen-owners of the National Forest System.
Let’s shake this up a bit; looks like too many “heavy thinkers”, who have made good points, but does not alleviate the funding and repetitive nature of big government. Lace up your boots ‘cause here we go!
Remove NFS from the WO and make it its own entity. Take all the other Deputy Areas (Business Ops, CIO, Planning, Lands and Special Uses, S & PF, Research and HR) and put them together with the BLM! Reorganize that mess to remove repetitive functions between the two Agencies, making one service area for everything but NPS. NFS would be extractive resources; mining, timber, wildlife, range and recreation. I may have missed something – sorry. Close all Regional Offices and supercharge the Supervisors Offices with those RO staff areas in SO’s that would make sense for that old Region. Those SO’s would become the only other management center between the BLM/FS and RD’s.
That organization would remove at least 1/3, if not 1/2 of the employees, saving $ and streamlining work on the ground. Fire would be in NFS, but not stovepiped as it is now. More boots on the ground – cross trained in resource management and fire/fuels. LE & I would not be under the NFS.
The answer in any of this is more boots on the ground!
I also favor getting rid of Regional Offices (but leave a small cadre there to deal with States, interagency stuff). The computer era can deal with budget formulation/distribution. Yes, get more people back at the RD level
Honestly, from where I’m sitting on a District, the biggest challenge facing the FS is that much of the senior leadership came from outside the agency. They don’t understand handbook and manual, and have no practical experience or understanding of what it takes to put a timber sale out, and they’re full of bad ideas. I’ve heard the same from my counterparts on other Forests.
I’m a Silv/TMA, and my shop is understaffed with an absurd workload. As a Forest, we haven’t hit target in years. But my SO staff thinks we have enough bodies (I currently have 3 employees to carry out all silv, timber and sale admin tasks across two Districts) to get all of our veg management done, and is really fixated on filling hydro and rec positions. They really have their priorities straight.
If I had my wish, it’d be that Line Officers, Staff Officers, and Program Managers can’t be hired from outside the agency, and that all District Rangers and Forest Supervisors be hired from the 0460 series. Timber is our biggest target and we constantly miss it. It’s time to get folks who know what it takes to achieve timber targets and manage forests into leadership positions.
Or it is time to re-think Timber being the one and only most important target.
It has a very important place. In 2024, so does hydrology and rec. And many other aspects.
You blow off/s*** on those positions, your forest will not only continue to suffer, but most likely also suffer from lawsuits and/or intense local/less intense non-local scrutiny. The intense local scrutiny, well, good luck keeping anyone not tied down to the District, in the District. No one wants to live somewhere where the locals despise you and tell you how to run the forest…yet absent a full staff in each department, that is what you get.
Maybe your District is special; the majority of SOs are full of career USFS staff looking for the next promotion upwards. Therein lies the problem, really.
I think you are missing the issue; it’s not disparaging the other resources so much as “other resource areas” come with a higher price tag. Cost to the government (not salary, but what it costs to employ) for a GS 12 (specialist of some kind) is about 165 thousand/year. A GS 5 is about 55 thousand, so you can get three employees with boots on the ground for one office slug.
As for Supervisors office employees, many are just parked for the duration; not many are “climbers”. Also, it takes years of training and experience to make a good timber person, it even takes a while to be a “good” paint squirter”. I don’t see timber falling any more in favor than it already has, but I would also never doubt the levels of incompetence of leadership. Until targets actually mean something again, I unfortunately, see little change…..
Many timbermarkers don’t see their own ‘glass ceiling’, working in timber. Their careers are often capped, due to a lack of a real career ladder. Maybe after 10 years of experience, there might be a GS-7 job that you can ‘compete’ for.
Hierarchy of needs. No local cares if the vault toilets are clean or the streams have sediment in them if the mills are closing, people are loosing their jobs and wildfires threaten their homes every summer.
The Forest Service manages forests. Congress keeps giving us veg management CEs and doing things like passing the REPLANT Act and declaring a wildfire crisis, clearly managing vegetation is a high priority for many Americans. Producing timber is a byproduct of good forest management, and targets don’t need to be re-thought because they’re a metric of how much restoration and fuels work has been done in a year, and what the economic benefit to communities has been as a byproduct.
Until Congress pulls an about-face on its priorities, it’s pretty safe to assume that timber/silv/fuels positions should probably be filled before anything else.
Neither Party cares about Forest Service vegetation management people. Congress and USFS leadership feel that any ‘warm body’ can be easily trained to do that kind of work, when it is needed. We’ve already seen that strategy in action, during the last 3 decades.
That is very true, and a big piece of what I was getting at when pointing out that many of our leaders don’t have practical timber experience. If Congress won’t specify that we need to hire foresters and skilled timber technicians specifically, it falls to forest leadership to build org charts that reflect those needs and do the work to recruit the right people.
If leadership fails to do that, we end up with disinterested warm bodies (mostly fire folks) half-heartedly putting together timber sales, or in most cases, nobody putting together the sales and other veg projects.
Forest Service leadership made the decision to not tell Congress that there is a problem with timber employment. One doesn’t even need to know their tree species, to qualify for a timber position. How many Forest Supervisors have ever been a Certified Cruiser? How many can survey a piece of land accurately enough for the math to ‘close’? How many have actually read the C Provisions of a standard Timber Sale Contract?
I guess we’ll see what happens in this next fiscal year, how well the Agency can function with minimum input from Permanent Seasonals (being held to their minimum tours of duty).
As a Forest Sup, I could do all that and Residual Value Appraise. Surveyed for years, Certified Sale Administrator, cruise and grade (Region 6), scale and spent 17 years as a chicken farmer!🤣🤣
Certified Cruiser in Regions 5, 6 and 9. Although I was a Timber Sale Administrator, no one wanted me to get Certified. It was “the way”, back then. Accurate surveying in a real forest, with real terrain, is quite the challenge, especially decades after you did it at Humboldt. I was the only person on the marking crew who knew what to do.
I am a former sheep rancher, tree faller, timber stand exam cruiser, and . . . bicycle racer. 🤣
To be honest, I truly feel for you in the current situation. It is like a living hell, I know, brought about by the very real issues you stated. I was very lucky, I was brought up in an intense timber program back in the day where commitments mattered. We had the positions and the knowledge to train those incoming timber folks, both techs and professionals.
I don’t remember any districts that suffered your dilemma because that’s just not the way it was done. However, starting in the early 2000’s, it became commonplace to hire for all other reasons, other than KSA’s! The knowledge needed to sustain an effective timber program slowly ran out the back door. And, not really concentrating on effective leadership qualities certainly “dumbed down” the effectiveness to address needs.
I left in 2017, and certainly saw the demise of timber being a consistent, professional out put from an Agency that was founded on those very principle; that and range and water. I wish I had advice for the short term but with weak leadership and no history of the FS continuity, as it relates to a family “git er done” Agency, you’ve got some tough sledding ahead of ya!
Thank you for your understanding! I was also lucky to start on a forest with a robust timber program and alot of knowledge to pass down from experienced foresters to new ones. It’s been hard watching the agency decline over the last few years of my career, but I really am holding out hope that the folks who have an understanding of how to run things will prevail. I at least try to do my part every day, and I’m lucky to have a couple of employees under me that seem eager to get out there, get good educations in forestry, and do good work.
Remanding lands in the public domain to the tribal communities from whom they were seized is long overdue then that will make the successful marriage between the FS and BLM more likely.
An interesting profile of Smokey Wire readers – reminds me of foresters a half century ago, before NFMA said Timber is no longer king. Maybe the problem is that the current Congress doesn’t like what that Congress did and ignores it when it keeps asking for more board feet, but it’s too outside-the-box to ask Congress to respect NFMA or change it. What I’d always hoped would happen was the Forest Service would try to embrace NFMA and forest plans as organizing principles for management and funding requests, instead of trying (including maybe even encouraging Congress to support it) to keep doing what they’ve always done.
The incoming Administration and Congress won’t care what agency officials (or retirees) say.
Given forthcoming changes in all three branches of the federal government, a shocking future might emerge. The dystopian system of federal land management outlined below is a wholesale repudiation of the 1970’s era framework for administering federal land and resources. It is the end of the public interest, interdisciplinary planning model of federal land and resource management. The federal judiciary no longer provides meaningful review of most agency actions.
Instead, natural resources are further commodified, commercialized, and “managed” by largely unregulated market forces. However, for political and economic reasons, federal lands stay in federal hands. (Unless, of course, the land is needed for resort-area and other amenity-based housing developments, or for low-cost public housing needed for working people in otherwise unaffordable leisure enclaves). Major elements of the new system are:
1. Congress moves all federal wildland fire management to a new separate agency. Actual fire suppression operations are outsourced to private contractors – mostly newly created corporations (e.g., Bridger Aerospace) that quickly consolidate into a few very large corporations. New legislation defines “fire management” as maximum suppression effort with strong disincentives for indirect tactics on incidents that escape IA (see MT Gov. Gianforte 2024 letter to Chief USFS). Federal agency role is largely limited to finance functions (budget management and contracting). Logistics, plans, and dispatch are delegated with federal funding to the States and NICC.
2. New legislation repeals and replaces NFMA. Forest “management”, including road construction/reconstruction and maintenance, is relabeled “fuels management.” Acreage targets and geographical priorities are set by State-specific Commissions appointed by a new Congressional committee and State governors. All non-Wilderness lands are included in target setting. Fuels management targets are accomplished through long-term (i.e., 25- 50-year) contracts. K-V and BD authorities are reformulated to supplement appropriations to fund prescribed fire, post-fire reforestation and “rehabilitation” (i.e., salvage), road access, and communication needs for “fire management.” Legislation commits federal agencies to carrying out programs and contracts authorized by State Commissions. Commission proposals are categorically excluded from NEPA and may be implemented “notwithstanding any other provision of law” including ESA, CWA, NHPA, etc. Responsibilities of massively downsized federal land management agencies are limited primarily to finance functions – budget administration (centralized) and contracting (small field offices).
3. Congress reimagines the Taylor Grazing Act by expanding authority of local grazing boards to manage grazing districts on federal lands. Congress amends TGA to provide local boards new authorities and exemptions from federal environmental laws. However, to appease critics, Congress allows that State laws and regulations may still apply. Grazing boards are authorized to coordinate with State Fuels Management Commissions in determining grazing use in forested areas.
4. Recreation resources are further commodified in order to increase “access” and fund recreation. Recreation management is “outsourced” to commercial recreation enterprises. O&G permittees provide trailhead and trail construction/maintenance in exchange for offsetting fees owed to the government. Additional funding for recreation management is generated through sale of recreation permits/annual passes for use of trailheads, trails and dispersed campsites that are required for unguided individuals and groups. All developed recreation sites/facilities (campgrounds, rental cabins, marinas, folf courses, MB terrain parks, motorcycle/ATV play areas, etc.) are converted to commercial enterprises (pay to stay/play). To facilitate commercial operations, the current hodgepodge of commercial recreation permits (e.g., G-T Permits, Resort/Marina Term Permits, Winter Sports Permits, etc.) Is remolded into a simple system of one or two types of commercial recreation permits with longer terms than current authorities. Consolidations of existing businesses quickly lead to emergence of a few large corporations (new versions of Vail Resorts, AMC, POWDR, etc) that develop and manage nearly all developed recreation sites on federal lands (e.g., campgrounds, cabins fold courses, terrain parks, etc.). New construction and reconstruction of facilities, expansion of permit areas, and increased service days are categorically excluded from NEPA documentation. Policies are amended to allow construction of employee housing for permittees on federal land for free. Little to no funding is available for permit monitoring and administration.
5. Locatable and Leasable Minerals keep on keepin’ on.
None of these abominable ideas are new. Bits and pieces, or small-scale tests, can be found in recent legislative proposal and “policy papers” by increasingly powerful commercial interests.
In the end, our hubris and short-sightedness will be revealed. Nature bats last, especially on the Pyrocene.
Hi Smoke, these are very interesting. Would you like to write a post that includes links to the legislative proposals and policy papers?
No. Too much work.
Ask the Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, and incoming Montana Congressional delegations. Peruse the public lands sections of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 or read some of the writings of the Property and Environment Research Center (“a national leader in market solutions to conservation”) and other natural resource industry lobbying groups.
But here are a few examples off the top…
Trump’s E.O. 13855 (2018) and E.O. 13976 (January 14, 2021 (?! Really!)) Establishing the Wildland Fire Subcabinet among other initiatives.
Numerous wildland fire/fuels management bills introduced over last 8 years seeking to exponentially increase “acres treated”, expand decision-making role of States (“collaboration/cooperation”), reduce or eliminate environmental protection and public involvement, etc. “The Firesheds Act” (S.2436 117th Congress) is an example.
Federal land recreation bill drafting has been particularly active the last few years, driven primarily by lobbying orgs for the outdoor recreation industry. Examples include S.1874 (117th Congress) (“Recreation Not Red Tape Act”); S.1229 (117th Congress) (“Simplifying Outdoor Access for Recreation Act”); H.R. 6492 (118th Congress) (“Expanding Public Lands Outdoor Recreation Experiences Act”). Many of these bills focus on legislative reforms to make it easier for the outdoor recreation industry to increase profits from federal lands by, among other means, reducing or eliminating required environmental considerations and public involvement.
For potential grazing “reforms”: see S. 4454 (118th Congress) (Operational Flexibility Grazing Management Program Act”); S1890 (118th Congress) (“The Malheur Community Empowerment for the Owyhee Act”). See also, State of Utah v. United States bill of complaint filed with SCOTUS in August 2024.
For “conveyance” of federal lands for housing and other uses, see Forest Service Facilities Realignment and Enhancement Act. Also, S.1693/H.R. 3562 (118th Congress) (“Forest Service Flexible Housing Partnership Act of 2023”)
The examples above are from periods where political power was split. With forthcoming single-party control of the legislative and executive branches, the imaginations of Congressional staffers and natural resource industries lobbying orgs are in hyperdrive and unconstrained by previous political realities. It’s not clear what if anything can stop them from radically transforming federal public land and resources management.