Many thanks to Jim Furnish for providing this guest post! Remember, not only can you comment, but you can contribute your own post and if you want, submit it anonymously. We have been spending a great deal of time on visioning and big-picturing, but we’ll return to our standard news and research programming in the New Year.
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My thoughts on a future Forest Service, which I’m sure the Trump administration eagerly awaits!
I joined the FS in 1965, encountering a “blowin’ and goin’, CAN DO outfit”! Although I came to question the outcomes achieved (focused primarily on timber production), I must credit the mostly white guys who “Got shit done”. The challenge as I see it is to bend the mission, consistent with both laws and emergent societal expectations, toward a fulsome and holistic ecosystem management framework. And to do so while reestablishing an esprit de corps that, to a notable degree, emulates that of a bygone era.
I watched the 40-year-long program to regulate forests via a “clearcut the old-growth” policy crater dramatically while serving as Siuslaw NF Supervisor (the MOST timber-centric forest in the US). What followed appeared to me a well-intended – but poorly achieved – reset of the agency’s basic resource priorities. Since those turbulent 1990s, the emergence and dominance of fire in the overall equation has left the FS troubled and struggling. While dreaming, I often wonder: “What if the FS enjoyed strong public support, admiration even, as a superb steward of the public estate?” Is that destiny possible?
For purposes of brevity and readability I will paint in broad strokes.
My major premise is that public values have shifted and agency policies must respond, much as they did following WWII. Policy drivers of the late 1900s no longer apply. The Big Timber era catered to commercial interests, largely ignoring the (angry) environmental sector. Proper balance should address all interests. But consider these rhetorical questions: Having skewed management toward timber production for decades, is it reasonable to push the pendulum the other direction? Did the Roadless Area Conservation Rule serve this purpose?
In my 2015 book, Toward A Natural Forest, I posited that forests can and should be managed, but the aim these days must not be timber production, per se, but naturalness. I suggest such things as maintaining mature forest canopy, aiming for treatments that support clean water and abundant fish and wildlife, preferring natural regeneration to plantations, using fire wisely for opportunities to shape habitat, harvesting trees primarily for non-commercial objectives (including fire risk reduction), and using stewardship contracting rather than timber sales. Manage forests for multiple purposes, yes, but acknowledge that these are public lands, not private, which serve a different constituency – not the board room, but the public square. Timber harvesting can be a commercial transaction, but should not be skewed toward timber production.
That may seem a bit gauzy, but I think it speaks to the best long-term interests of the broader public’s values. Some might argue that this “mission” violates applicable statutes. I disagree. I’m happy to entertain objections.
As to specific changes needed to obtain such a future, gulp . . .
1) Select leaders that believe in, and will act, to achieve ecosystem management principles.
2) Move the FS to Interior. Long overdue; future generations will see the wisdom here.
3) Create a Fire Service (already pretty much a done deal) that works across all federal lands.
4) Keep a DC office, but eliminate regional offices (to be replaced by a small cadre focused on liaison functions with State govt). Rely on modern technologies to support budget formulation and distribution, accountability measures, command and control functions. Forest supervisors make big bucks – make them earn it by wisely exercising their considerable authorities.
5) Build training modules that support the notion of an agency career. Invest early and often to create pride, esprit de corps, an appreciation for history and legacy. Build on the notion of exemplary professionals stewarding spectacular landscapes.
That’s a starter kit.
Some thoughts:
I was on the Ecosystem Management team in the 90’s led by Hal Salwasser and Wini Kessler. We spent many hours and there is much literature talking about what “ecosystem management” was and how it was defined and so on. This was after “sustainability” and before “forest health” “ecosystem health” “ecosystem integrity” and now “climate smart” or as I’m told an Important Foundation prefers (as do I) “climate informed.”
Jim asks “Having skewed management toward timber production for decades, is it reasonable to push the pendulum the other direction? Did the Roadless Area Conservation Rule serve this purpose?”
I don’t think we can really talk about this without talking about ENGO’s. Because they are not solely about timber as a commercial interest. They don’t seem to like grazing and minerals (fluid and otherwise) either, while commercial recreation, wind and solar are fine. I think when we choose western Oregon timber wars as a lens to look at the FS, we are missing a great deal of (more) current and regional issues around which, IMHO we could indeed build what Jim and I agree on an “esprit de corps”. For example, access, encroachment and recreationist damage and conflict are larger issues in many areas.
Perhaps we have to ask the question “if we are avoiding the board room in “the interests of the public square,” should that be all board rooms?” Including those, perhaps, of ENGO
s?
As to this I pretty much agree his “naturalness” list but also think that that’s what the FS is already doing. Perhaps the idea of only using stewardship contracts has some value, and we could look into that further.
I think Jim’s naturalness concept, based on practices, is more practical than “ecosystem integrity”. Yes I know it’s in (one) regulation, but regulations can be changed.
So I’m OK with his 1. 2. Hard no, for the reasons I laid out yesterday. I do think a concerted effort to harmonize regulations, to pick one way of doing things that are expensive e.g.,landscape level analyses, monitoring, assessments; and where the land is checkerboarded doing them together and once, dual delegation, and so on as in Service First. Like our ill-fated joint San Juan joint RMP/forest plan. And if there are legislative hurdles, encourage legislators to hurdle them.
What we gain by two separate agencies is a buffer from politically bad ideas. For example, we were told by BLM politicals that they couldn’t do their job adequately without the Public Lands Rule.. and yet the FS can.. hmm. The FS says to spend BIL and IRA bucks they have to obligate (hundreds of millions) to preferred NGOs.. and yet the BLM didn’t. Like we think of federalism, with States being the laboratories of democracy, having the two agencies doing more or less the same kind of thing under different political actors and cultures makes for an opportunity for creativity and for us to compare and contrast.
3. I’m agnostic about a Fire Service. Seems like we need people to trust that they know how to do their work. Would that be just another layer of feds who can’t afford to live in the communities they serve? Does working on an ID team help fuels practitioners have a more holistic view of the land?
4. I don’t think this is a bad idea, but there’s much expertise that is not needed at the Forest level. Would that be contracted then? Who would have the expertise to inspect the contracts? Like my story of Region 9, would WO experts pick up the slack on expertise? Also, my observation of the “small cadre focused on state governance” was that some Supes did not appreciate farming out their direct relationships with the State. So I’m not dismissing this, but there has been a great deal of experience with all this and I think we could learn about what has worked and what doesn’t. Say if a litigation problem escapes containment on a Forest, I guess it would go directly to DC? Perhaps this would focus too much authority for hard questions on those in DC? This might be better to try as an experiment. Because if it’s a Supe vs. the WO we know how that will turn out.
5. I totally agree.
I think I agree with Jim’s list except as noted:
2) Reorganizing bureaucracies is hard. While I have no particular dog in this fight, bear in mind that moving the FS to Interior will take much longer, and be at least somewhat less effective, than planned, because all reorganizations take much longer, and are at least somewhat less effective, than planned. Those costs may nevertheless be worth paying, but in assessing whether a move makes sense they cannot be ignored.
3) As Jim suggests, an argument in favor of establihsing a Fire Service is that we’re most of the way there and there is at least occasional virtue in acknowledging reality. However, many of the FS folks I’ve talked to over the years point out that there is often no bright line between land management and fire management activities, and that drawing such a bureaucratic line (as Sharon notes) could, as it were, backfire.
As a practical matter, I suspect that some FS actions on the ground are being dressed up as fire related to ensure they get funded. This would be harder if a separate Fire Service existed. And in an era of (at best) frozen land management agency budgets, a separate Fire Service would likely have first claim on the limited available funding since no member of Congress wants to be accused of “underfunding” that agency in the year that half a county in their state or district goes up in smoke. Again, maybe this is in fact the best way to prioritize funding, but it would come with some potentially significant drawbacks.
I’d only add to what Rich J. says that if suppression policy entails monitoring and/or setting off fires a ways away because “the ecosystem needs it”, then putting the ecosystem experts in a different organization seems, at best, counterintuitive.
Yes, holistic forest management, as Jim says. Holistic management means for the most part not disturbing ecosystems unless it actually is beneficial to ecosystem integrity and function. Mostly that means restoration that helps drying forests to retain moisture.
Getting some good discussion going… thanks. About move to DOI – I don’t feel that FS has been well-served by USDA, They don’t “get us”, we’re their bastard child, don’t tout us well with Congress. FS no longer has the “autonomy” we enjoyed back in the days when USDA pretty much let us do our thing. We would immediately be the biggest DOI agency; getting alignment might take some time, but take the long view! FS would hold much greater power and influence in DOI.
Jim has some excellent suggestions for how to make the USFS an agency to be proud of. Thanks for the guest post.
I like everything Jim suggests, with one caveat. What if the Forest Service’s problems today have less to do with its land management practices, which are dramatically different from the 1990s, and more to do with characteristics shared by most (all?) federal agencies?
During the Forest Service’s halcyon days that Jim recalls, public approval of the federal government overall was much higher than today.
The distrust-in-institutions viral pandemic is not limited to government either, as a certain recent assassination illustrates tragically.
I don’t think the problems of today are shared by all agencies. When the BLM proposes a timber harvest, they don’t dress is up as restoration. That type of honesty allows for real conversations about how to meet the timber goals and balance other objectives. There isn’t a single USFS project I have been a part of over the past 10 years that didn’t suggest that all of the commercial was somehow a byproduct of some other need. When there is a lack of transparency and blatant dishonesty, there is no ability to honestly and efficiently compromise.
Way too many times the USFS timber shop plans and drives the projects, ask for input from the ologists and fuels staff, whom frequently don’t agree or do not think the level of commercial harvest is needed. Shoot, I was on a field trip a few weeks ago for a fuel break and the fuels staff told me on the side that they did not plan the fuel break or think it was in the right place and timber was leading the charge to bag commercial in a place where the only way they could do it was with a fuel break. Then the ranger goes on and on about how they need the fuel break to protect a community. The lack of honesty is not something that increases trust, especially when the rumors fly about how and why the projects really get planned. This is not a one-off, similar things have happened countless times during my career.
I was glad to read Jim Furnish’s thoughts. I wholeheartedly support his position.
#5 – Isn’t this what exists currently, the GM cradle to grave career model? Not sure that’s where Gen Z or the future of work and careers is headed.
I respect Mr. Furnish’s service, but looking for answers from someone who left the agency a quarter century ago seems a little off base.
I see your opinion has credence in its thought, I’ve even questioned such advice from some of the “old timers” myself – then became one….🤣 However, what I see in the most dire calling to put the FS back on track is a return to some of the past tenets of why the Agency was formed in the first place.
I still remember, and God I wish I could still, sitting around the breakfast table discussing FS policy and operations with my dad. It would have been about 1976-77; he already had 40 years into the FS as a technician, going back to his time in the CCC’s. I was a smart-ass forestry graduate, full of education and just a bit of myself. We had fantastic discussions of the changes the Agency had went through already, and “the good and bad” of some of those changes.
Time is a great denominator in the equation of life; it’s amazing how a person changes perspective as knowledge learned is supplemented by experience. Also, the history of the FS is a fascinating chapter in American culture. The perspectives of Char Miller help in differentiating the fly poop from the pepper.
If I really want to go back a ways, I pull out the letters from the Forest Supervisor to my grandpa, dated 1929!
So….. yes, Jim Furnish has been “out” for a while, but he has that distinctive character of wisdom that can only come with time. I think we all need to listen!
Thanks for saying this Anon and I wholeheartedly agree. All of these recent posts from Jim, Sharon, Phil, and (especially) Frank are coming from a boomer echo chamber. While we can all appreciate their past service and dedication to the agency, things have changed and moved on. Armchair quarterbacking from your CSRS retirement chair and saying how the agency is broken and needs to change is conveniently ignoring the fact that most of them have 30+ years of culpability in making the agency what it is today.
Time to get some fresh voices in the room.
OK, that’s fine.You and other non-boomers are welcome to submit posts on your own perspective. We old folks do talk to younger people, but our filters may well prevent us from seeing clearly. I look forward to your contribution!
I only wish there were more fresh voices who want to preserve our forests. It’s generally the older generation who has come to understand the vital importance of our forests. The brave new world of the USFS, as an agency, is not working in many ways. Any experienced voices are important — young and old(er). It doesn’t matter so much how we got here, except in an effort to understand what has gone wrong solely so it can be made right now. I think older people are acutely aware of the natural legacy that we are leaving our children, and that it must be protected.
Yeah -yeah; I may be a boomer but I can keep up with ANY mid-career punks! 🤣🤣. I retired in 2018, so if I were you, I’d listen carefully to the ones who have gone before; this brave new world will eat your lunch! And, have you noticed that most of Congress, AND the President (both in-coming and out-going) ain’t Spring chickens?
As for timber target, they need doubled to just keep up with mortality and fire salvage! Four Billion bd ft ain’t that bad…..
Well, there’s not many left from the “Next Generation”, as those who had all the experience from decades as Temporaries are either retired or in other careers. I’d expect a mass exodus from the ones who did get Permanent positions. I was one of the many who wanted more ‘naturalness’, with timber volumes being a nice side effect.
My prediction is that the new Administration will waste time trying to push their agenda against established law. They did that the last time, when they had the House, Senate and Presidency. They will have trouble in trying to see which issues have priority, and much of the arguments will be among themselves, at least to start. The courts probably aren’t willing to spend political capital on all the changes that Project 2025 will be pushing. They will be clogged up, and the pace will be glacial. (Remember when it took 4 years to return Sierra Nevada diameter limits back to 30 inches?)
Agree. Rapid change in a short time and challenging constraints that make success nearly impossible even for the most “can do” of fed agencies.
I totally support Jim’s concept of naturalness as the major objective of forest management on public lands. However, it will be impossible to achieve much success in that direction unless the timber target is abolished.
Hi Mary: I am curious about your (and Jim’s) definition of “naturalness.” To many people this seems to be a forest management approach in which human intervention is marginalized or even absent. Close?
These types of words mean many different things to many different people. To me, it is only “natural” that a “healthy” forest is one in which safe and healthy people are also present. When people are present in a forested area — often for thousands of years –it is only “natural” for them/us to make trails (and then roads) along rizegelines, rivers, and streams; to constantly gather and burn wood along these routes and around settlements at the mouths of rivers, or adjacent to lakes or the ocean; to systematically gather and harvest edible plants and to systematically kill and eat fish and game animals; and to purposefully establish meadow, prairies, and expansive hardwood savannas. Because that is what we do to survive.
If this is how Jim is defining “naturalness,” then I am in full support. People aren’t pathogens, but rather critical components of most terrestrial “ecosystems” on the planet, and an important resident or visitor to most “healthy” forest environments. Your thoughts?
Not trying to be glib Bob… but there is a certain “ish” to my view of naturalness. I can agree with much of what you describe. A Supreme Court Justice once said about porn “you know it when you see it”. But clearcut, burn, spray, plant monoculture to high density is NOT it. In fact the whole notion of “regulating” virtually every NF forest system is antithetical to the idea. But we’re past that now, aren’t we? Yet the battle is on over how much logging is necessary to save our forests (esp mature/old growth) from fire. Smart people disagree. But it seems like FS is going “all in” for one (heavy-handed) approach . Doesn’t humility also call for trying a light handed approach in many places? It may sound simplistic but I’m arguing for management that doesn’t REEK of management, but “feels” natural. More in my book…
Hi Jim: I think we are inching closer to agreement as more of our public forests — including old-growth — continue to be lost to wildfire.
“How much logging is necessary?” From my perspective, that is an easy answer. First, salvage all of the trees possible ASAP after a wildfire, windstorm, landslide, flood, and/or insect infestation. Next, thin away the competing vegetation threatening our remaining old-growth, and finally, focus on thinning and restoring all of the industrial plantations on federal grounds as needed to keep local mills, logging businesses, and reforestation crews employed. 1897 Organic Act and Gifford Pinchot in 1905.
Active management of our forests is critical if we are to break this cycle of systematic destruction through wildfire. Those are the wrong types of jobs because they’re rarely local, among other reasons (mostly economical).
Worth reiterating Sarah’s first comment about managing/restoring ecosystems. We should be managing land in a way that minimizes the need to manage it (and minimizes all the costs, monetary and environmental, that come with that). Unfortunately, the leadership of an agency is not likely to pursue a goal of minimizing itself. (I actually see here a strange but possible alignment with the new Trump Administration.)
I learned from experience (twice) that regional foresters are too political. They will make decisions based on getting promoted to D.C.
Is that “political” in terms of internal politics or national partisan politics, though? What has been your experience?
I think it might be both. The closer you are to the Sun, the more likely you are to get burned. The best RFs I encountered were the ones who could balance the demands (or perceived demands) of the WO and the White House with the realities on the ground. Very few were good at this, not because they weren’t dedicated, but because we ask them to do the impossible (or at least, the impossible-adjacent). This is why I endorse JIm’s suggestion of abolishing the regions and pushing decisionmaking (to the extent practicable) to the forests and districts.
And the counterargument might be that it is easier for an RF to push back than a Supe.. RFs can concentrate power, are on the Executive Leadership Team so can influence the WO. I don’t know what the answer is, but conceivably the ranks of employees in the ROs could be thinned.
Attn Sharon; Jim Furnish’s “Toward A Natural Forest” hit the nail on the head pg 194, Chap 11 …The Committee of Scientists charged with reviewing the Nat Forest Mgmt Act in the late 1990 …the scientists stated, “Ecological sustainability, should be the guiding star for our national forests. Economic and social elements are important, but these should remain subordinate to environmental integrity.” I’m a Ph. D Biologist & have researched Ecological Integrity for well over 40 yrs: these prominent scientist are so factual correct! The USFS tried to re-invent the wheel …failing every time!
Hi Sam, are you new here? Welcome! We’ve talked here about the COS report many times – in depth about planning possibly to the boredom of other readers. I actually nominated someone for it who was not selected. Here’s a link one of the more recent posts https://forestpolicypub.com/2022/08/26/committee-of-scientists-report-23ish-years-later-origins-of-desired-future-conditions-and-the-loose-leaf-notebook/
To channel my old boss Tom Mills, “shoulds” are not science questions. Most people agree that the role of science is to tell people alternative approaches, not to determine the goal.
Also I don’t believe that “integrity” was a concept used much back in those days.
I also don’t believe you can be factually correct about what a goal should be. I am a Ph.D. biologist also and have been researching for 50 years, so there’s that. And we disagree about goals! That’s as it should be. We all get to disagree.
Sam, what prominent scientists are you talking about (that are so factual correct)? I am interested in your research re environmental integrity.
I very much agree with this — ““Ecological sustainability, should be the guiding star for our national forests. Economic and social elements are important, but these should remain subordinate to environmental integrity.”
Bob Zybach properly muses about whose “ecological integrity” definition gets the last word. For me, son of an intrepid officer corp stalwart coming home from WW2, getting his forestry degree at Fairbanks and Ohio State, then assistant ranger for a year before becoming a Real Ranger, my definition includes people and their activities. Jerry Schmidt (The Rusty Nail) used to remind us that we protect resources because resources protect people. Life and our quality of life are the objects of our attention, dreams, aspirations, and interplay, whether wilderness or gold mine, with our lands and all they contain.
I like “ecosystem services” because the words cover anything and everything forests and open lands provide. Eye of the beholder.
I think Jim Furnish’s “naturalness” is a vision absent people except for the odd passerby, leaving only footprints, taking only pictures. I share some of that idea. Mostly, though, people define wildness and naturalness through their lives and interactions with the land. The hermit living on the riverbank. The lone cabin far from roads. The mine where dreams were dug. I love all of it.
I neither trust nor accept the Disneyland Forest model where ecosystems exist under a glass dome with a don’t touch sign. We doggedly, stupidly, destructively pursue that model to create spotted owl “refugia,” MOG preservation policies, salmon habitat, core riparian ZOCs, only to watch our narrow elitist plans come to nothing as disturbance factors far beyond our ken make a hash of our best laid plans.
The current generation of Personal Friends of Smokey T. Bear will soon contend with an imperative overriding all other considerations; the exigencies of war. The thing about war is that it perversely proves Jerry Schmidt’s hypothesis. We use the things of our Earth and when all is again at peace, the Earth abides and all is restored.
Some species leave the stage and thousands more enter the limelight every year. The circle of life. *smile* We were never meant to try to preserve all things forever. Nothing in Creation has ever even hinted at anything other than the evolution (not preservation) of species.
So, naturalness on a burning rock hurtling through space is dynamic. It’s why Elon is trying to build a new civilization on Mars. When all is said and done, my memories and desires of my heart remain, all else having moved on to the next iteration. Carry on.
Yes, “eye of the beholder.” Some see the golden egg (“services”), while others (including the law) see the goose (“integrity”).
Good point Jon. Long-term though, a focus on ecosystem integrity will benefit the desire for human-related ecosystem services. The really aggressive cutting and burning that is being done in many places degrades ecosystems to the point that they do not recover and flourish in the years going forward. The other option is to ask less in terms of human-related ecosystem services, but have the whole system be more sustainable in a long-lasting way. I know you know that, but this is a general comment.
Hi Sarah: Can you identify any places in which “aggressive cutting and burning” has “degraded an ecosystem” and caused it to “not recover?”
I have heard that statement many times over the years, but no one has ever pointed to anyplace where this has happened. Slash-and-burn agriculture has been around for many generations, but I’m not sure it has ever done permanent damage to an ecosystem.
Do such examples exist, and what is needed for them to “recover?”
Various locations in the Santa Fe watershed, Hyde Park, and La Cueva, all on the east side SFNF.
So you say those areas were “degraded” through cutting and burning and “can’t “recover?” How is that determined? How documented? I am seriously interested in such locations and what caused them to become unproductive.
By removing the majority of trees and disturbing the soils, the forest floor becomes much hotter, which makes it difficult for the forest to return to native conditions and encourages a vegetation type conversion from forest to shrubland. I have photos. Can’t post them here.
Thanks Sarah: I went to an article with a photo by you from earlier this year on this topic. You have different soils and tree species than we have here in western Oregon. Our conversions from trees to shrubs have more to do with loss of seed sources, rather than anything to do with changed soils. In the instance you show, it appears as if the thinning was done too late in the stand and that the “leave” trees are top-heavy compared to natural wide-spacing and may have been affected by sun scald following release. Shrubs may be an indicator of too-few prescribed burns, rather than soil. There are experts on this blog that are far more familiar with your trees and soils than I am, but those are my initial impressions.
And if anyone else has continued down this string this far, here is a link to your excellent article and referenced photo: https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/02/09/thin-from-below-in-dry-forests-out-of-the-frying-pan-into-the-fire/
“Ecosystem management principles” mean nothing to the Trump Organization. But after lands in the public domain are remanded to the tribal communities from whom they were seized a pared down Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management could become the Forest and Land Management Service within the Department of Interior without the need of regional offices.