I wouldn’t be following this story but..here’s a story from an outlet called Newsbreak
In an email sent out on Thursday, USDA Director of Digital Communications Peter Rhee detailed the process, which required staff to “identify and archive or unpublish any landing pages focused on climate change” and “document it in a spreadsheet.”
Pages are separated by the tiers that their climate-related content falls under, “Tier 1” including pages dedicated entirely to climate change and “Tier 2” categorizing those where a significant portion of the content relates to climate change.
Website managers at the Agricultural Research Service received a separate email that emphasized the urgency of the request. Several websites went dark on Friday, including the United States Forest Service website. It has resources such as research and adaptation tools that provide vital vulnerability assessments for wildfires.
The bolded part was news to those of us who had been following it.
OK so the FS website did not go dark. But the vulnerability assessments did. But other very odd ones are also gone. Like this one for wildfire crisis landscape investments (???)
Click to access WCS-Second-Landscapes.pdf
And here’s one about climate change that’s still there as of now (10:32 AM MT).
https://www.fs.usda.gov/about-agency/features/economic-risks-forest-service-estimates-costs-fighting-wildfires-hotter.
(As of 11:41 AM MT I could see the content on Chrome but not on Firefox.. as if I couldn’t get any more confused).
I also ran a search on the Foreign Ag Service for climate change and there were 154 results including a Ghana Climate Change Report which sounds like it’s all about climate change.
https://www.fas.usda.gov/search?keyword=climate+change
So here are my thoughts.
1. Many things appear to be messed up at the FS in terms of links, regardless of what the memo says, outside of the climate biz. Like the Wildfire Commission report.
2. We still don’t know what the memo says.
3. It seems likely that the agencies are being told to do something, but that there is some fall down (unknown intention) between what they are told to do and what’s disappearing. We don’t know why other than systems are complicated and searches are complicated and don’t always work (I had this experience with FOIA searches they ran at CEQ during the Biden Admin).
We could impugn the motives and/or capabilities of anyone along the way from the writer of the memo to the IT folks, but we don’t know, so why add to the negative energies in the universe? It is likely to sort itself out.
Let’s now look at this media outlet who said the Forest Service website “went dark” Friday. Traditional uses of the English language and my browsing history would suggest that that is not true.
The source is called Upolitics. The editor says here it “delivers the news liberals need to know.”
It also said that “research and adaptation tools provide vital vulnerability assessments for wildfires”; I think they meant “for planning responses to wildfires” except that’s not true either. I don’t blame the reporter, our stuff is complicated. At first I thought it was AI generated, since often those write-ups sound plausible but don’t actually make sense.
The story came to me via via Newsbreak, which is the “nation’s leading local news app”. But that particular news is not local and it appears to have originated at Medium? Oh well, it turns out the reporter appears to be Angela Schlager from Medium. Below is her info.
Here to explore ideas represented through diverse stories in the entertainment industry. From all things literature, to cinema and videogames; I plan to to look into the psychological and sociological components of storytelling that make these displays compelling.
I hope that I can share my opinion and collaborate with others who share similar views–or learn from those who have different ideas! As a journalism student, I will often times aim to be an informative source. However, I also wish to use this platform to simply talk about how I feel on a matter and start a conversation with others.
Even more puzzling.
I hate to think we have to do DIY journalism around here, but sometimes that appears to be the case. At least we can be transparent and accountable.
I dunno — it reads to me like you’re stretching to find explanations for why this isn’t as horrifying as it looks.
Not in bad faith, but because it’s so awful to contemplate. But at some point if it looks like a duck and walks like a duck and quacks like a duck….
It’s worth putting this in context of what happened over at NASA:
All this crap isn’t reform. It’s trying to rewrite reality.
Here is the list of “no-nos” the National Science Foundation is looking for. (So why are they different? I’d like my tax dollars to be wasted efficiently :-).
https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2025/02/04/national-science-foundation-trump-executive-orders-words/?utm_campaign=wp_post_most&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F40ea4c3%2F67a39d1d5f7a0441f3286517%2F5d3a0ebdae7e8a7c4f4664c2%2F30%2F57%2F67a39d1d5f7a0441f3286517
Advocacy
Antiracist
Barrier
Biases
Cultural relevance
Disability
Diverse backgrounds
Diversity
DiversifiedEthnicity
Excluded
Exclusion
Equity
Female
Gender
Hate speech
HistoricallyImplicit bias
Inclusion
Inclusive
Inequities
Institutional
IntersectionalMale dominated
Marginalized
Minority
Multicultural
Oppression
Polarization
RaciallySegregation
Socioeconomic
Systemic
Trauma
Underrepresented
Underserved
Victims
Women
Hello Sharon,
Just FYI
I sent a msg out to various agencies I use, including NASA. Below are some USFS websites I used and could not get back into. Same is occurring with Semi-Annual Regulation Reports posting on the Federal Register last couple weeks…many are withdrawn due revoked EO 13990, 14008, 14094, &c., by EO 14148, among others – https://www.federalregister.gov/presidential-documents/executive-orders/donald-trump/2025
Excerpt from my query emails:
…the snipped USFS webpage notice, “You are not authorized to access this page” and, “Looks like you wandered off the trail…” message came up when I tried to get into specific websites that I was previously using that utilized IPCC “settled science” for policy-makers, domestic intangible assets, and international natural eco-asset services valuations during planning or carrying out land management projects. I can still get into all of BLM’s websites so far…NASA is same as USFS – reference mapping…
1. CARBON https://www.fs.usda.gov/science-technology/climate-change ; this one comes up as forbidden – https://research.fs.usda.gov/srs/climatechange
2. CLIMATE TOOLS AND DATA https://research.fs.usda.gov/rmrs/products/dataandtools/interactivemaps/climate-map-exporter-tool map no longer functions;
3. SUSTAINABLE LAND MANAGEMENT OPERATIONS https://www.fs.usda.gov/managing-land/sustainability-and-climate/data-dashboard ; https://research.fs.usda.gov/centers/ccrc ; https://www.fs.usda.gov/managing-land/sustainability-and-climate/climate-action-tracker
Cheers,
Well, that’s peculiar indeed.. if they removed the links, why not have the same message? So I am not a fan of taking these sites down, but it also raises some questions in my mind.
Did you use ” IPCC “settled science” for policy-makers, domestic intangible assets, and international natural eco-asset services valuations during planning or carrying out land management projects.” for policy or projects?
I remember folks using some IPCC stuff and the social cost of carbon (which I consider to be a bogus number) but not “domestic intangible assets, and international natural eco-asset services valuations” in recent projects I’ve looked at.
Actually, it might be useful to look at what data and projections are commonly used in actual plans and projects and focus on making them better for people using them.
Sharon – I won’t get in-depth about this since (IMO) it is completely convoluted; everyone can research for themselves and determine any pro and/or con.
As far as IPCC — AR6 was used in policy memos by FS (and all agencies) on those USFS websites I cited. I failed to download information, never thinking the sites would go dark.
The domestic intangible asset annual auditing component is decades ongoing and is currently being discussed (defined) thru DEC 2025 by FASAB.
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-01-23/pdf/2025-01533.pdf
Interest is based on direction of sffas-59, among other that have determined to de-recognize PP&E-Stewardship lands and as non-monetary (audit purposes) and place federal owned lands under 3 sub-categories using a “predominate use” formulation for auditing purposes effective FY2026.
FASAB handbooks – https://fasab.gov/accounting-standards/document-by-chapter/
[I was going to paste the schedule here but that didn’t work…page 3 of sffas-59]
USFS and BLM (for the first time) were then required to enter this by OMB Circular A-136 of May 19, 2023 and another memo I can’t find, on advice (??) of GOA. Previous to this, an FASAB board Member had the following dissent relating to one component of the rewriting of sffas-59 as follows:
“A41. Ms. Kearney dissents to the issuance of this Statement. She agrees with the goal of the Statement, which is to promote transparency into and accountability for the use of
Government land. However, Ms. Kearney shares concerns expressed by major landholding
agencies in response to the exposure draft and in subsequent discussions with the Board.
Ms. Kearney’s concerns are that this Statement does not include an option to classify land
acreage as having multiple uses and that this Statement would require reporting and
auditing that has not been demonstrated to be cost-beneficial. Over two thirds of all of the Government’s land²⁰ is required by law²¹ to be managed under principles of multiple use. Requiring agencies to specify a single predominant use for multi-use land would put large land management agencies in the untenable position of having to identify and report a predominant use for land that is inconsistent with the use of the land as
specified in statute. At any particular time, land acreage may have multiple uses. It may be used simultaneously for ranching or logging (commercial), a wildlife habitat (preservation/conservation), and a staff office (operational). In addition, one or more of these uses can change over time, especially following catastrophic events, such as wildfires or hurricanes. Requiring agencies to assign a single predominant use to multi-use land would seem to frustrate rather than further the goals of transparency and accountability.
“Ms. Kearney appreciates that the Board intends to monitor implementation of this
Statement, including the ability to classify land according to a single predominant use. Ms. Kearney also appreciates that the Board intends to assess the need for further guidance to address any implementation challenges that may arise prior to transitioning the reporting from RSI to basic information. However, Ms. Kearney shares concerns expressed by major landholding agencies that the intended transition from RSI to basic reporting together with the challenges associated with assigning a single predominant use would create a burden on agencies that does not fully justify the cost of collecting, reporting, and auditing the information. Ms. Kearney shares these concerns particularly in light of: (1) the availability to the public of reliable Government land information (e.g., the Bureau of Land Management’s Official Federal Land Records website and the U.S. Geological Survey’s Protected Areas Database) and (2) the broad range of financial information that is currently reported as RSI under existing FASAB standards, including information about natural resources and deferred maintenance and repairs.”
Current 2025 POTUS removed OMB Circular A-4 of 2023 [“Benefit-cost analysis of a regulation and alternative regulatory approaches provides policymakers and the public with information about the important advantages and disadvantages of different courses of action. When all benefits and costs (including distributional impacts) can be quantified and expressed in monetary units, regulatory alternatives’ monetized net benefits— the difference between the monetized benefits and the monetized costs—are an indication of the alternative, from the set of analyzed alternatives, that generates the largest welfare improvement to society. In practice, it is often difficult to quantify and express all [like intangible environmental natural resource assets] of the important effects of a regulation in monetary units. When it is not possible to monetize all of the important benefits and costs, the alternative with the greatest monetized net benefits will not necessarily be the alternative that generates the greatest social welfare. It follows that, while monetized net benefits are an important guide for agencies deciding what course of action to pursue, regulatory analyses should encompass additional relevant factors; in particular, analyses should include any important non-monetized and unquantified effects. You should consider, … how to be as specific as possible in presenting such non-monetized and unquantified effects.”], and reinstituted Circular A-4, 2003 temporarily.
One issue of concern in certain circles and noted by Ms. Kearney has entered the realm of natural resource rights along the line of SEC’s failed rulemaking for Natural Asset Companies with language presented in FASAB’S, Josh Williams, November 20, 2024 Intangible Assets Memorandum. This comment page will not allow the strike out language option to copy what is ongoing in this forum but the following staff comments might shed a little light on the subject: “Staff believes that using the term “intellectual property” (e.g., patents, trademarks, copyrights, software) and natural resource rights (e.g., water rights, timber rights, power rights, oil rights, electromagnetic spectrum) generally covers the types of intangible resources in the federal government.”
“29. The second essential characteristic of an asset is control, which refers to the ability of the federal government to obtain the economic benefits or services embodied in a resource and to deny or regulate the access of others. It is possible that the government does not actively exercise control. Nevertheless, as long as the government currently has the ability to exercise control, the item is an asset of the government. In exercising control of the economic benefits or services, the government may, depending on the nature of the resource, hold or direct use of the resource; exchange it; use it to obtain cash, cash equivalents, goods, or services; exact a price for other entities’ use of the economic benefits or services; or use it to settle liabilities. Many resources are subject to certain legal or other external constraints, such as public land subject to preservation requirements or license restrictions on the use of intellectual property. Such restrictions on the use of a resource do not negate the government’s control of the economic benefits or services embodied in the resource.”
[One stakeholder stated that federal entities could acquire various natural resource rights from non-federal entities as part of land purchases.]
In short, congress, states, counties, &c., are wondering what the final tally could be in valuing intangible ACEC, WSA, “timber rights”, or other natural resource rights having no tangible monetary value during annual audits translating into codified methods of determining social and economic effects during federal land planning.
Might sound wishy washy to some, as lots of philosophy appears involved. I’ll leave that end of planning or project documents up to better educated folks than myself.