Some Stories About Housing and Some Reflections: III. The Concept of Rural Gentrification

I’m sure that US social scientists have examined rural gentrification, but I’m not up on current literature, so please link in the comments to any studies.

I did run across this Chinese paper  (2022) by Lu, Rao and Duan, that had a brief literature review from the worldwide perspective.

British scholar Parsons first observed the phenomenon of rural gentrification in a study about British residents’ classes in rural areas. The rural gentrification mainly refers to the urban middle class migrating to rural settlements, for living and recreational space, thus causing the change in the rural social class structure, and leading to the shortage of rural housing and the relocation of indigenous people [15]. Gentrification is a gradual process mainly initiated and maintained by immigrants. These gentrifiers may be urban middle- and upper-class residents with rich capital, such as retirees and “urban elites” (national economic elites and cultural elites), who pursue rural pastoral life in order to “escape” from the city [16,17]. They may be artists looking for cheap accommodation near the countryside and are described as well-educated low-income people [6,11]. The motivations of these migrants in rural areas are different from those in urban centers, where, for example, the middle class is attracted by employment and undervalued housing, whereas rural migrants are attracted by specific rural amenities, especially those related to the natural environment. Parsons and other British scholars have shown that the “gentry” in rural gentrification is not limited to some specific middle-class people with high economic level and social class, and economic level and class composition are not the only criteria to identify the gentry group in rural areas. Diversified social groups with different purposes are likely to become the subjects of rural gentrification. As long as the cultural capital and economic levels of immigrants are higher than that of local residents, rural gentrification may occur [17].
Rural gentrification is a complex process involving the migration of the urban middle class from cities to rural areas [18]. It has brought about four major changes: the transformation of rural class structure, the post-productive process of rural capital accumulation, changes in rural housing structure and the motivation of rural reform [19]. In the study of rural gentrification in Quebec, Guimond and Myriam also emphasized the complexity of rural gentrification at various levels, including social population, housing and economic impact, community and culture, material, environmental and political aspects [20]. Davidson and Lees point out that any form of contemporary gentrification should include: capital dominating the restructuring of the architectural environment, a large number of high- and middle-income newcomers, local residents’ displacement and landscape change. The restructuring of the architectural environment means that the built environment in rural areas is changed by the capital “reinvestment” of land owners, housing owners, investors, developers, etc., emphasizing ecological aesthetics and environmental governance [21]. The structure change of the rural population is the most outstanding impact of rural gentrification, involving the characteristics of the population moving from the city to the countryside. The aging of post-war baby boomers in the United States shows a strong willingness to move to rural life. It is estimated that 2.7 million baby boomers moved from cities to villages in the first 10 years of the 21st century [16]. Landscape can most intuitively describe the great changes in rural gentrification areas, such as the transformation of rural areas from primary production to consumption LED landscape, the changing housing tastes in rural areas and the rising real estate prices [22,23]. Displacement has always been an important result of gentrification, including population displacement, housing displacement and space displacement in rural areas [24]. In addition, rural gentrification also means injecting new classes and social structures into the destination, not only bringing better social capital and networks to the local community, but also triggering discussions on rural governance issues, such as local land use planning, environmental aesthetics and resource management [16,25].
The cause and influence of gentrification in rural areas can be interpreted from the perspectives of consumption and production [26]. From the perspective of consumption, rural gentrification highlights the existence of a “new cultural class” in rural space consumption. It suggests that the core of the economic form in the process of rural gentrification is an experience economy and an aesthetic consumption. In the process it also emphasizes the experience of rural cultural connotation and the formation of specific cultural taste. [17,27]. The “idyll” in rural Britain and the soothing “Rocky Mountain” lifestyle in rural western America have attracted highly skilled urban labor, entrepreneurs and retirees [16,22,28]. From the perspective of production, it emphasizes the redistribution of capital and profits to interpret rural gentrification, not from the perspective of people. N. Smith put forward the theory of the “rent gap” (the difference between the potential value of land and the actual value of land) to explain gentrification [29]. With the decline of rural traditional agricultural productivity and the weakening of agricultural policy protection, rural landscape, rural space and rural built environment become less attractive to capital, and the potential value cannot be realized as actual monetary value, which objectively requires the emergence of more diversified rural economy and investment models [30]. Globalization is seen as one of the main drivers of rural gentrification because the middle and upper classes, the main components of urban-to-rural mobility, benefit from globalized capital accumulation and appreciation of land or property values. They allocate their assets to highly comfortable rural destinations. For example, the rural gentrification in remote and comfortable areas in the United States reflects the spatial positioning of surplus capital accumulated by high-wage urban occupations in the globalized service industry [31,32]. Clark believes that the two explanations are complementary [33].

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I’d also point out that both gentrification and tourism leads to a combined need for low-income workers.  So there is a correlated need for new lower income workers to move in to meet that need. At the same time, housing prices go up.  When you think about it, it’s surprising that communities are doing as well as they are.

 

Pyramid Mill Closure- Seeley Lake Montana and Rural Gentrification

Thanks to a TSW reader for this story. This fits into our ongoing theme of housing difficulties and the exodus of the working class in some Western communities. And if the economy is based on tourism, which doesn’t have high-paying jobs in general, it seems like these communities may be moving to a two-tier society. Perhaps with lower-end retirees and work-from-homers in the middle.  Also there is the idea that at some point, with these kinds of pressures, the timber industry could go belly-up just when people are coming around to it being helpful in keeping fuel treatment material from being burned into the atmosphere.  Meanwhile we have a housing crisis in many areas, more people are moving to these places (both migrants from other states and other countries), and wood is needed as a building material.  And we don’t want new communities to “sprawl,” (get larger), so densification is cool,  and yet ideas like Accessory Development Units don’t allow people to build equity via ownership.  And many increases in density come with decreases in urban trees.  Reminds me that old Thomas Sowell quote “there are no solutions, only trade-offs.” But is anyone looking at the big picture here?

It seems like a tangled ball of policy yarn, with no clear loose end to begin to unravel it.

Over the last five years, a “Now Hiring” sign has been posted along U.S. Highway 83, and the starting wage at Pyramid has been creeping up, Browder said.

He said other workers will be affected as well, such as loggers who are independent contractors and brought raw mateerial to Pyramid.

But he said getting mill employees and finding them places to live is difficult.

Housing creates costly employee attrition, because the company might train a worker who only stays six or eight months, Browder said: “That person leaves because they’re living in some crappy little trailer.”

He said it’s a problem for smaller merchants and retailers, too.

“We just have a serious housing problem in Seeley Lake, and it doesn’t just affect them,” Browder said of Pyramid.

The “blue collar demographic” will take a hit as a result, and Browder said he isn’t sure what young mill workers or couples will do instead because there’s little else in western Montana for them.

“All the working class people are being squeezed out,” he said.

Tourism has become a larger part of the economy, and more retirees who don’t rely on a local job for their income are part of the change in Seeley Lake, Browder said. But he volunteers at the food bank, and he said he anticipates a spike in demand there.

Generally, he said, attendance at community council meetings is low, and he hopes the news will at least bring more people with new ideas to the discussions.

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Kier, with the Missoula Economic Partnership, said if the mill closes, it will have ripple effects on the wood products and forest industry. He said he believes the Seeley Lake mill is one of the few that takes Ponderosa logs, which are plentiful in the region.

A couple of other businesses in Montana depend on byproducts from the mill, he said, including Roseburg in Missoula, which produces particleboard, and Weyerhaeuser in Kalispell, which offers plywood panels, among other products.

“Having adequate supply is important for those large manufacturers in terms of a regional system,” Kier said. “So it’s a really fragile system right now.”

He said it’s clear Pyramid intends to shut down, but a lot of people are emerging “by the hour” and talking about whether options exist for others to keep the facility open given it’s an important part of managing healthy forests. But Kier said it’s “premature to suggest there’s any real solution.”

“I hope that the folks who are in Seeley and the folks who are working at the mill know a lot of people care about what is happening to them,” Kier said.

In their closure announcement, Pyramid said “there’s no better solution” for the owners than to shut down the mill permanently. They were advised to close it in 2007 and didn’t, but this time, they said, the financial crisis is worse.

“The owners would like to thank our employees, both past and present, for their hard work and professionalism over the years,” Pyramid said.

“Their dedication has truly been the difference between Pyramid and its competitors. The owners would also like to thank Seeley Lake and the surrounding communities for their support over the years.”

Deschutes National Forest Annual Report 2023

 

Thanks to the Old Smokeys’ mailing list for this.  I’m up for posting any Forest annual reports that folks send.  We’re always talking about things people disagree about, controversies and difficulties.   I can’t even get journalists interested in the Stanislaus success story.  I think it’s important to try to highlight all the great work that Forest Service employees are doing.

Here’s the link.  Lots of great work and great photos.  Thanks Deschutes (and for this publication)!

Some Stories About Housing and Some Reflections: II. Denver Post Article on Mountain Towns’ Efforts, Including Building it Themselves

I’m posting these so that others can share if housing is or is not a problem in communities nearby to federal land, and if so, what are the communities doing about it?

The Denver Post has an excellent series, including one article on resort town efforts with inclusionary zoning.

Redefining affordable

At the core, inclusionary ordinances represent a realization that the free market, left to its own devices, won’t supply enough affordable housing to lower and even middle-income workers in expensive real estate markets.

“Housing is inextricably tied to economic success and our community can’t exist without a strong housing program,” said Betsy Crum, housing director for Snowmass Village. “People need to be able to live close enough to where they work, or the town will face an existential crisis.”

Click to enlarge

An influx of high-earning remote workers during the pandemic caused housing costs, already high, to surge even more in desirable places to live.

About 75% of remote workers in Colorado’s mountain resort areas in 2021 were making $150,000 or more a year, while only 30% of locals were making that much, according to the Mountain Migration Report from the NWCCOG.

In a fight for housing, locals were the ones who lost out to newcomers. In Snowmass Village, home prices have risen 81.5% in the last four years, in Steamboat Springs, they are up 81.5% and in Basalt, they are up 76.3%, according to Zillow.

Although it isn’t the norm, Aspen has a deed-restricted home valued at $2.5 million, in part so it can attract doctors to work in the city, Anderson said.

Along the Front Range, and across most of the U.S., affordable units target those earning between 30% to 80% of the area median income or AMI, with 60% as a common definition.

That range reflects federal rules for using Low-Income Housing Tax Credits, and Denver adopted that definition in its inclusionary ordinance. But in resort areas, 80% up to 200% is more typical in inclusionary ordinances.

“You can be in the workforce earning 150% of the AMI and be nowhere close to being able to afford a home,” lamented Hannah Klausman, director of economic and community development for Glenwood Springs.

That 150% number works out to an income of $104,250 a year for a single person and $148,800 for a family of four in Garfield County. The median price of a home in Glenwood Springs is $862,500, according to the Zillow Home Price Index.

And things only get more expensive the further up the Roaring Fork Valley someone goes. In Carbondale and Basalt, someone making double the area median income will struggle to find a home or apartment, she said.

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In 2019, Glenwood Springs tightened the rules on short-term rentals and a year later it loosened rules on accessory dwelling units, which had been in place since 2013. Last year, the city created rules that made it easier for hotels to convert to residential units in exchange for deed restrictions, and this year it is considering rules to make it easier to add density.

But Glenwood also faces a balancing act. If it makes things too difficult, development could flow to areas with lower requirements and costs like New Castle, Silt and Rifle.

A criticism of inclusionary zoning is that it can make private development too costly or push it toward areas without requirements, an issue Denver will likely have to deal with. And like a big champagne powder day, the conditions have to be right.

“Whenever you introduce a subsidized component to a development project, it puts pressure on the upper price point to carry that,” acknowledged Tim Belinski, president of IND Ventures and a developer in Basalt.

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But Belinski said inclusionary rules have been part of the equation for so long in the mountains, and the math mostly works, assuming land is available. Resort residents also are acutely aware that the economy needs to have enough workers to function, and housing is a key part of that happening.

Several communities, facing critical shortages, have put on their hard hats and started building housing themselves from dedicated revenue sources, like a portion of sales taxes, fees on deed transfers and short-term rentals. Colorado is also setting aside a share of state income tax revenues for housing.

“Local governments getting involved in building housing has increased since the pandemic. The need is very great, to what some communities were calling crisis proportions,” said Rachel Tuyn, director of the Northwest Colorado Council of Governments.

The city of Aspen recently completed 79 units in the third phase of its Burlingame Ranch project and up next is Lumberyard, which will provide 277 deed-restricted units on an 11.3-acre parcel near the Aspen Airport Business Center.

Avon is looking to annex 100 acres of state land to build 700 deed-restricted units and 60,000 square feet of commercial space. Winter Park Resort, with the support of the Town of Winter Park, is looking to build dorm-style housing with 330 beds. The Yampa Valley Housing Authority has a 10-year plan to build 1,100 housing units for those earning the median income in the Steamboat Springs area.

Some Stories About Housing and Some Reflections: I. High Country News Article on Building on Public Land

 

A recent High Country News story talks about housing developments on public land.

The U.S. government owns 49% of the land in the 13 Western states, including Hawai‘i and Alaska, according to Headwaters Economics, a nonprofit research group based in Montana. (And that’s not counting all the land owned by the states, municipalities and the military.) In the remainder of the country, the feds own just 3.5%.

At the same time, the West is also experiencing a severe housing crisis: Seven of the 10 states with the greatest housing shortages are on this side of the country.

It’s not surprising, then, that the region’s combination of limited housing supply and vast tracts of undeveloped land has prompted the question: Could building on public lands help ease the housing crisis? From Colorado to California, politicians, academics and housing advocates are trying to find the answer. Here’s what you need to know.

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Projects on federally owned land: These can occur when a federal agency, such as the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), sells, leases or trades parcels of land for development. Due to the nature of federal holdings, these parcels are more likely to be on the outskirts of communities. In Nevada, for instance, the BLM has been selling land around Las Vegas to local developers since 1998, with profits flowing back into the state; a new bill could open up nearly 16,000 additional acres of land, most of it federally owned, for housing around Reno.

Federal lands in the Western U.S. managed by five agencies, using 2005 National Atlas data.Congressional Research Service

Lawson said we have two choices: Either build more densely on already available land, or open up new areas for development. The latter option, she said, is particularly pertinent in urban areas where land is scarce, and in rural communities that are surrounded by public lands. Teton County, Wyoming, for example, where Jackson is located, is 97% public lands.

In scenic places like Vail, Colorado or Bozeman, Montana, often referred to as  “gateway” communities, Rumore said that increasing the housing supply doesn’t necessarily result in affordability. “If you build more housing and your community is a very popular place to visit, then often that housing gets consumed by short-term rentals” or second homes, she explained. Unless new projects are “very carefully protected for the local workforce,” Rumore fears they won’t make a dent in the housing crisis.

Lawson, the Headwaters economist, agrees, saying that it’s crucial for projects to explicitly tackle affordability. She is optimistic about one in Colorado, where the U.S. Forest Service leased a parcel of land to Summit County to build housing for middle-income earners, such as teachers and firefighters.

On the other hand, Lawson isn’t a fan of efforts that fail to guarantee affordability, such as the HOUSES Act sponsored by Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee. Research supporting the bill suggests that just 0.1% of the West’s federal lands could provide space for 2.7 million new homes. But the lack of affordability provisions in Lee’s bill has led some critics to call it the “McMansion Subsidy Act.”

While affordability is paramount, Lawson noted a few other factors to keep in mind.

  • The local economy: In areas like Jackson or Moab, where nearby public lands drive tourism, Lawson warned against developing any land whose loss could negatively impact the local economy— either by removing recreational areas or creating sprawl that detracts from the town’s appeal. As she put it, “It’s very difficult to undo these decisions.”

  • Infrastructure: When deciding whether a piece of land is worth developing, Lawson recommended examining the existing infrastructure. Are there water lines nearby? What about roads? If infrastructure is lacking, she said, residents need to understand that the cost of building it will likely fall on their shoulders.

  • Hazards: Communities should also ask whether building on a particular plot will increase the risk from natural hazards, especially wildfire.

Overall, Lawson believes housing projects on public land make a lot of sense when they’re close to towns and existing infrastructure. “It helps communities build more densely within their existing footprint,” she said. “Where I get concerned is when the parcels being talked about are on the fringes.”

 

 

 

 

 

New Sage Grouse Draft Plan Released: Incorporates Ideas from Obama and Trump Admin Plans

 

This is a great article by Scott Streater of E&E News; fortunately a TSW reader forwarded it to me, as it has a paywall.  It’s pretty comprehensive and hard to excerpt from, but I’ll try.

Here’s the link to the BLM press release, public meetings and the DEIS.  Here’s the BLM’s title and tagline;

BLM proposes stronger greater sage-grouse conservation plans

Analysis uses best available science and lessons learned to benefit species and western communities

I’ll try to hit the main points of the Streater article.

  1. It blends some of the Obama decision and the Trump era decision. Perhaps some horse-trading with western Govs? Or realizing that the 2015 approach doesn’t fit with desired renewable buildout?

In essence, the proposal outlined in a draft environmental impact statement Thursday is a compromise that a BLM news release emphasized draws on “the most successful components” of the Obama administration plans in 2015 that mandated protections for the most sensitive grouse habitat across 10 states and revisions to those plans the Trump administration approved in 2019 that gave states more leeway to greenlight projects near grouse breeding grounds and other sensitive habitat.

2.  Sgamma thinks that it’s an improvement

“It’s positive that the preferred alternative seems to be a blend between the other approaches and prior plans, which indicates that BLM is trying to find a workable balance,” said Kathleen Sgamma, president of the Denver-based Western Energy Alliance.

3. WEG and CBD don’t like it.

People familiar with the plan under development at the BLM previously said they expected the proposal to include 11 million “acres of critical environmental concern” to safeguard priority grouse habitat. But the preferred alternative released Thursday did not include ACEC designations, which provide strict land-use regulations that would severely limit livestock grazing, recreation and other activities. Other alternatives, which could still be selected in the final plan, do include the conservation designations.
The proposal would also remove one of the most contentious aspects of the 2015 plans: the designation of 10 million acres of “sagebrush focal areas” considered vital to the bird’s survival, where mining and oil and gas development would be prohibited. These areas will now be managed as priority habitat management areas.

My understanding is that the focal areas were added at the last minute by folks in DC, and stuck in some craws of some State folks who had worked collaboratively on effort.  If you remember from my story on  it, that my source said:

Folks from Garfield County, CO did a FOIA and found out that the changes were associated in time with meetings with various environmental organizations, including Pew. One particular idea added during these last changes was the idea of “focal areas”. The States went ballistic.

The Governors sat down with Secretary Jewell and tried to negotiate.

4. Pew Does Like It

For whatever reason, Pew seems to have an outsized influence on federal decision making under this Admin and also the Obama Admin, so this could be significant.

Marcia Argust, director of the Pew Charitable Trusts’ U.S. Conservation program, applauded the BLM “for bringing the latest science, including planning for climate impacts, to this round of sage grouse plan updates.”

5. If Grouse don’t like roads and footprints of O&G operations, they probably don’t like roads and footprints of renewable energy and transmission lines.

This has become an issue as the Biden administration works to build renewable energy projects on federal lands as well as the transmission lines needed to carry that green energy to market. BLM press materials announcing the proposal mentioned “clean energy projects” in discussing how the plans will allow for multiple uses “in a manner that limits impacts to sensitive resources and can also help combat climate change — the main driver of greater sage-grouse habitat loss.”

Actually, what the press release says is  “Populations once in the millions now number fewer than 800,000, largely due to habitat loss exacerbated by climate change, such as drought, increasing wildfires, and invasive species.”   Habitat loss seems to be the actual main driver, not climate change.

6.  RMP Amendments Around 2015 Sage Grouse Plans for Transmission Lines.

The BLM this month announced it was exploring amending three federal land-use plans to work around mandates in the 2015 grouse plans limiting the size of transmission lines and their proximity to priority grouse habitat. The BLM concedes it might need to do so in order to approve the 235-mile-long Greenlink North power line in Nevada that’s a Biden administration priority due to renewable energy

Hopefully those transmission lines will be well-maintained..and not cause further fires which are bad for sage grouse.

Human Being Throws Shade at Oregon State Prof Johnston and Blue Mountain Forest Partners

As you know, I am a fan of Blue Mountain Forest Partners and the entire post Timber Wars peace-seeking enterprise.
So this story from Daily KOS struck me as odd.

The court case took a turn when James Johnston, an Oregon State University assistant professor, filed an amicus brief supporting the Forest Service. The amicus brief included a letter that Johnston and 14 other forest ecologists signed that contended the six conservation groups’ arguments “are designed to give the impression of scientific controversy where no meaningful controversy among scientists exists.”

Many non-industry ecologists disagree with the sentiments in Johnston’s letter. More than 100 independent scientists signed an open letter to the Forest Service in 2020 that argued, “removing protections for large trees is highly controversial from a scientific perspective.”

When Jerry Franklin signed the letter, he wasn’t a minion of timber industry but there’s a bit of an implication.  “Independent” researchers, regardless of quantity, may also know less about the forests involved.

“There is scientific controversy regarding the removal of large old trees and forests preemptively before fire burns,” says an experienced ecologist that wishes to remain anonymous. “[L]ess than 1% of thinned areas experienced fire annually.

Many acres are thinned and also experience wildfires. I’m not sure where the 1% figure comes from. It sounds relevant but may not be. I’m a little leery of scientists who “wish to remain anonymous.”

The USFS and its supporting consultant are promoting cutting of large old trees in the name of “restoration,” yet in the six eastside national forests, […] the largest 3% of trees on inventory plots account for 42% of the biomass carbon.”

“Only a very small percent – 8% – of all the plots have the large-tree co-occurrence of ponderosa pine and grand fir that is their primary reason for doing away with the protections for big trees. The fact that 92% of the forested landscape does not fit their rationale to open up the entire landscape to large tree logging is a key part of the scientific controversy,” adds the anonymous ecologist.

Johnston was the lead author of a paper that showed diameter limits on logging hindered forest restoration in eastern Oregon. The research was funded by the Forest Service and Blue Mountains Forest Partners, a forest collaborative operated by and for private timber industry interests.

(my bold)

More than half of BFMP’s Board Members, including their President, have direct ties to the timber industry.

I think Susan Jane, for example, has “direct ties”  but not the kind of ties that a reader might think- based on the way this is written. Here’s their board.

The collaborative’s Executive Director said BFMP “staked extensive political capital on the validity of an alternative approach” to the 21-inch rule in a letter to the Ochoco National Forest’s Forest Supervisor.

Johnston says that all of his papers “are robust and objective,” given that they went through peer review.

He believes that the large trees likely to be logged as a result of the 21-inch rule’s amendments “have little value to most timber operators” and that “the most highly valued trees [in eastern Oregon] are smaller ponderosa pine.” However, the owner of Rude Logging, an AFRC member, mentioned in an article that sturdy pines over 21 inches are more valuable than smaller pines when discussing the benefits of the Forest Service’s decision to eliminate the 21-inch rule.

The below is also a little weird.

Johnston also consulted for the Forest Service during the 21-inch rule amendment process.

“It’s my job to provide information to land managers, members of the general public,” says Johnston. “[The] Forest Service asked me for information about their revision, and I provided them information upon request just as I do for anyone and everyone that asks me, including conservation groups.”

A Freedom of Information Act request revealed that a Forest Service Special Project Coordinator emailed Johnston about payment for his consultation work. The Special Project Coordinator asked him to send them an invoice and said the Forest Service set aside $2,500.

Johnston says that he cannot find that email and that he has no recollection of reading it. “I never invoiced the Forest Service. I’m unaware that they set any money aside for me. They didn’t pay me any money,” adds Johnston.

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Timber industry representation

Forest Service interveners AFRC noted that Johnston filing an amicus brief was peculiar. “Participation from scientists in cases like these is uncommon, which signals that the 15 forest ecologists felt strongly that the court should be provided with an accurate portrayal of the state of the science,” stated an AFRC newsletter.

Two attorneys from Northwest Resource Law PLLC, an AFRC member with a history of representing timber industry interests, represented Johnston in his amicus brief. Johnston declined to comment on his choice of legal representation, citing the ongoing court case. However, he ignored requests for comment after the case ended.

One of Johnston’s Northwest Resource Law attorneys participated in a legal presentation at AFRC’s 2021 annual meeting. The presentation explained how AFRC develops legal precedent, defends timber volume, and defends its members.

You say peculiar, I say uncommon.  Maybe it should become more common in cases in which “the science” is at issue? And was Johnston supposed to find another lawyer for free, and if no one volunteered, simply give up because AFRC is tainted- according to some?

The comments are a bit of a hoot. Most are about Trump. In response to one comment that articulated the case for thinning, the author said:

Oh look — someone decided to show and spread industry propaganda here. You’re greatly exaggerating the need for thinning and the harm of wildfires (for obvious reasons). And if you think logging is such an ecological necessity than surely you must agree that the industry should be nationalized, right?

At first I thought it might be an AI story since the claims about BMFP and Johnston seemed not to be true, but sounded plausible if you don’t have previous knowledge. Now I’m not as sure.. Jon has pointed out that outlets need content, and may not be careful as to the accuracy thereof. Perhaps that’s the case here.

We know what the timber industry needs, but what can the Black Hills provide? Commentary by Dave Mertz

An area of the Black Hills National Forest east of Custer in 2023, where the forest was previously thinned by logging. (Courtesy of Dave Mertz)

Here’s the link. I posted it below.

The traditional way logging happens in the Black Hills National Forest is through timber sales. The U.S. Forest Service designates areas available for logging, and companies bid for the right to purchase and harvest the timber.

On Saturday in Spearfish, there was a forestry roundtable discussion about the reduced levels of timber sales in recent years.

U.S. Rep. Dusty Johnson, R-South Dakota, invited two of his fellow congressmen, Doug LaMalfa, R-California, and Austin Scott, R-Georgia. Johnson also invited two Forest Service officials, Regional Forester Frank Beum and Black Hills National Forest Forest Supervisor Shawn Cochran. The panel was rounded out with timber industry representatives and the South Dakota state forester.

After introductions, the panel quickly turned to grilling the two Forest Service officials. I am familiar with LaMalfa from watching him in congressional hearings. He can come across as combative, and he was all of that. Scott was also aggressive. It is not clear to me why these two were on this panel. They have absolutely no familiarity with the Black Hills. It appeared that they were there to browbeat the Forest Service. Johnson participated in these tactics as well.

An audience listens to a roundtable forestry discussion March 2, 2024, in Spearfish. (Courtesy of the Office of U.S. Rep. Dusty Johnson)
 An audience listens to a roundtable forestry discussion March 2, 2024, in Spearfish. (Courtesy of the Office of U.S. Rep. Dusty Johnson)

At issue was why the Black Hills National Forest plans to sell only 63,000 CCF (1 CCF equals 100 cubic feet) of timber this fiscal year. The timber industry representatives said they need 120,000 CCF to survive as they exist today. Beum said that with budget limitations and 76 employee vacancies, 63,000 CCF is all the Forest Service can do. He also stated that to get to 120,000 CCF, the forest would need an additional $20 million of funding.

Much of the hour and a half revolved around blaming the Forest Service for not selling more timber and for being ineffective. This came from three members of Congress, which doesn’t exactly have a stellar record of getting things done. When will they pass a budget?

Repeatedly, panelists stated what the timber industry needs. Never was there any concern for what level of timber harvesting the forest needs. Only toward the end did the elephant in the room finally get discussed — that there are no longer enough sawtimber-size trees left on the forest to support the capacity of the timber industry as it exists today. (A tree big enough to qualify as sawtimber is one that’s at least 9 inches in diameter when measured at a point 4.5 feet above the ground.)

Large wildfires in the early 2000s, the mountain pine beetle epidemic and the associated aggressive timber harvesting to address it all led to a major reduction in sawtimber-sized trees across the forest. This has impacted how many trees can now be sustainably logged on an annual basis, and this will continue for a good while into the future. Acceptance of that is the key to finding solutions.

Beum explained that the Forest Service is conducting an inventory of the forest at a cost of $2 million with LiDAR, an aerial survey method that uses pulses of laser light to determine the presence, shape and distance of objects in great detail. Never before has this been done on an entire national forest. This will provide a 3D map of the forest down to individual trees, and give a very clear picture on how many sawtimber-size trees remain on the forest. This issue has been in dispute, because the timber industry discounts the numerous studies that show there is a problem.

At one point, Johnson thought the timber sustainability issue could be resolved with simple math. He asked Ben Wudtke, of the Black Hills Forest Resource Association, a timber industry group, about the growth rate of the forest. Wudtke said it’s 2.5%. Johnson did some rough math and declared that there is no problem with the timber inventory or sustainability. He failed to take into account the long-term average mortality (rate of tree death) of 1%, and also that the whole forest is not available for timber harvesting for a variety of reasons — including the presence of non-forested areas such as meadows, terrain that’s too steep and rugged, restrictive land designations such as wilderness and recreation areas, access problems, etc. He should actually read the Forest Service’s General Technical Report, which goes into great detail on these issues.

Beum said the Forest Service is subsidizing the rail transport of logs from California and Oregon to the Spearfish and Hulett, Wyoming, mills. Something like this has never occurred before. There was no appreciation expressed.

Scott asked about the revenues generated by timber sales, and Cochran had to explain that since the Forest Service is now primarily using service stewardship contracts to help the timber industry find places to work, the Forest Service is not making any money. In fact, the Forest Service is paying private loggers to harvest timber in an area where the cost of logging exceeds the value of the timber. For example, the Topaz Timber Sale is costing the Forest Service $3.5 million to log 550 acres on steep ground that otherwise wouldn’t get logged south of Sturgis. The timber operator gets the logs at no cost, in return for some service work. Clearly, the Forest Service is doing some extraordinary things to assist the timber industry.

Instead of seeking solutions, it appeared that this roundtable was more of an ambush. The two Forest Service participants showed up in good faith only to be interrogated. What was the point of all this other than some people enjoying seeing the Forest Service get beat up? No solutions were found that I could tell.

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Dave Mertz

Dave Mertz

Dave Mertz retired from the Black Hills National Forest in 2017 as the forest’s natural resource officer. Over the course of his career, he was a forester, silviculturist, forest fire management officer and a fire staff officer.

Science X -Forest Service R&D- Next Week is Human Dimensions Week

Some of you may remember the Patrick Brown and Nature kerfuffle.  I’ve got a whole future post that on “Patrick Brown didn’t go far enough” and one of the “emperor has no clothes” issues is that many climate modelers don’t, or can’t, incorporate actions of people on the landscape to adapt.  Often, they don’t involve or model the work of what we might call “adaptation communities” or specialists in hydrology, wildlife, botany, forests and so on.  As historically, in science world, physics (as in atmospheric modeling and vapor pressure deficits and so on) is cooler than.. all the other sciences.  And as I’ve said before, the models don’t include new and improved technologies that the US is spending megabucks on, either (think wildfire sensors and unpersonned helicopters). It looks like one of the talks is by a person studying ignitions.. which seems important.

So I wanted to give a shout-out to the sciences who always seem to be at the bottom of the scientific pecking order.. the social scientists. And these have continuing ed credits for the Society of American Foresters and the Wildlife Society.

Forest Service R&D has a week devoted to their work: ScienceX Human Dimensions week.  Here’s a link. Here’s the agenda:

Monday, Mar. 25

Recreating Equitably

  • Barriers and facilitators for accessing outdoor spaces among urban Hispanic recreationists | Lee Cerveny
  • Women hunters and the role of community in changing hunting representation | Lauren Redmore
  • ‘Anywhere outside my room:’ Urban BIPOC youth perceptions of the outdoors |​ David Flores

Tuesday, Mar. 26

Partnering with Communities

  • Strengthening understanding of and support for Indigenous agroforestry in Hawaiʻi |​ Zoe Hastings-Silao
  • Stewardship mapping: Connecting those who care for nature | Michelle Johnson
  • Community forests in the U.S.: Diverse approaches to collaboration in forest governance and management under different ownership regimes | Kathleen McGinley

Wednesday, Mar. 27

Valuing Benefits of Nature

  • Land use change and forest markets |​ Jesse Henderson
  • Managing urban forest pests: Using game theory to model cost share programs for pest treatments | Andrew Tilman
  • The value of information for spongy moth management | Matthew Sloggy

Thursday, Mar. 28

Managing Urban Forests

  • Management where homelessness and nature intersect | Monika Derrien
  • Selection and the city: A nursery supply chain analysis exploring domestic selection of urban trees | Nancy Falxa Sonti
  • Sustainability and resilience of social and ecological technology systems in the tropics | Tischa Muñoz

Friday, Mar. 29

Preparing for Wildland Fire

  • Are you set? California residents personal preparations for wildfire | Alyssa Thomas
  • Examining the influence of socioeconomic factors in human-caused wildfire ignitions | Jeff Kline
  • Systemic challenges for the federal wildland firefighting workforce | Erin Belval

Wildfire Crisis Hearing Tuesday and Thursday: E&E Story

Thanks to a TSW reader for this. Anyone interested in viewing and reporting back, please let me know.

Biden officials due on the Hill to address wildfire crisis

Two Senate committees plan hearings this week on reducing the threat of wildfires for forests and nearby communities.

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On Tuesday, The Energy and Natural Resources Committee will take testimony from Biden administration officials on the findings and recommendations of a federal wildfire commission created through the bipartisan infrastructure law.

On Thursday, the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will hear from state, federal and local officials on responding to the continuing crisis.

The federal commission’s report issued in September 2023 lays out the situation in and around the nation’s forests, especially in areas of the West prone to drought and other climate-related dangers.

Federal fire suppression costs exceed $2.5 billion a year, and total wildfire costs across all types of landscapes and ownership may be in the tens or hundreds of billions of dollars a year.

Commissioners — made up of state and local officials, researchers and others — recommended greater coordination among officials at all levels of government, including tribal agencies, as well as a re-thinking of land management approaches.

At the same time, the leaders on Energy and Natural Resources, Chair Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and ranking member John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) have pushed their own solutions to the problem.

Last fall, they introduced legislation titled the “Promoting Effective Forest Management Act,” S. 2867, which would tilt federal policy toward timber harvesting by boosting logging workforce training, requiring forest-thinning targets and pushing back on Biden administration policies that could result in less harvesting of mature and old growth trees.

The Biden administration, however, has been cool to the proposal, as well as a separate revegetation plan from Manchin.

Officials from both the Interior and Agriculture departments, among others, will be on hand to answer questions about the recent wildfire commission’s report.

The report noted that the federal government has put more money into reducing hazardous fuels such as dead trees or thick overgrowth, but it said officials have paid less attention to reducing the danger in built-up environments. Emphasis could be placed on fire-safe construction and defensible space near homes and other buildings, for instance, the report concluded.

As a person with several friends in the local wildfire preparation space, it seems to me that the way the Commission was structured did not necessarily hear from the “boots on the ground” community types and the difficulties they run into, accessing and spending the federal dollars that are already there.  Again, as I’ve said before, it’s not about homes alone, it’s about infrastructure and barns and animals and evacuations and so on.

In addition, the report said, federal officials should consider policies that encourage a new relationship with fire, recognizing fire as an “integral and beneficial component” of forest management.

The commission said the government should “dramatically increase” the use of prescribed fire and cultural burning practices to make fire-adapted forest more resilient, in addition to maintaining timber harvesting, forest thinning and managed grazing of livestock.

Fire use
The recommendation for greater use of fire may raise questions with some lawmakers, as many Western communities already struggle with smoke from wildfires and face public pressure not to create more with fires lit on purpose.

Allowing some naturally lit fires to burn for ecological benefit is still more divisive, as some lawmakers and policy advocates press the U.S. Forest Service to return to an old policy of quickly extinguishing every reported fire, especially in places experiencing drought.

All of those approaches together are needed to lessen the crisis, while the government helps communities to coexist with wildland fire that’s a natural part of the landscape in many areas.

“Just as there is no single cause of this crisis, there is no single solution,” the report said.

Such changes will come at a cost, the report said, including establishing a year-round federal workforce aimed at wildfire policy and increasing wages and benefits for firefighters.

Congress has acted on the wages, extending a raise implemented a few years ago by the Biden administration, most recently in appropriations for the current fiscal year that ends Sept. 30. But lawmakers have done so in patchwork fashion in recent years, advocates say, failing to make the increases permanent and ensuring that the money will be available for the long term.

The Government Accountability Office, among witnesses for the Homeland Security hearing, has made several recommendations on wildfire policies, including tightening controls on contracted services and procurement for disaster recovery, bettering recruitment and retention of wildland firefighters and improving delivery of post-fire assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Schedule: The Energy and Natural Resources hearing is Tuesday, March 12, at 10 a.m. in 366 Dirksen and via webcast.

Witnesses:

Meryl Harrell, deputy undersecretary, natural resources and environment, Department of Agriculture.
Joan Mooney, principal deputy assistant secretary for policy, management and budget, Department of the Interior.
Cody Desautel, executive director, Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation.
Madelene McDonald, senior watershed scientist, Denver Water.
Kelly Norris, Wyoming state forester.
Schedule: The Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs hearing is Thursday, March 14, at 10 a.m. in 342 Dirksen and via webcast.

Witnesses:

Lori Moore-Merrell, administrator, U.S. Fire Administration.
David Fogerson, chief, Division on Emergency Management and Office of Homeland Security, Nevada Department of Public Safety.
Jamie Barnes, director, Forestry, Fire and State Lands, Utah Department of Natural Resources.
Lucinda Andreani, deputy county manager and Flood Control District administrator, Coconino County, Arizona.
Christopher Currie, director, Homeland Security and Justice, Government Accountability Office.