Randy Moore, pictured at the upper right, with OHV riders. Photo courtesy of Don Amador.
From the Lake County News. Please feel free to link to other tributes to Randy in the comments below.
This tribute is published in response to the recent announcement that Forest Service Chief Randy Moore is retiring from the agency.
I had the privilege to meet Randy Moore shortly after his appointment in 2007 to serve as the Pacific Southwestern Regional forester. After shaking his hand and looking him in the eye, I knew he possessed the character, commitment and leadership skills needed to guide the agency through the difficult challenges it faced.
That first meeting at the Region 5 HQ in Vallejo, CA was with a core team of OHV leadership and our partners at the CA State Park Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Division. The discussions were centered on our shared commitment to ecologically-balanced motorized recreation on Forest Service System lands.
After the initial welcomes, Randy opened the meeting by sharing his background and his willingness to meet with OHV and other key stakeholders but that attendees should be aware of what I called Randy’s Rule” and that was, “If you come to my office with a problem, you also need to come with a solution.”
During the course of his tenure as the Regional Forester (2007-2021), the “Trail Community” deeply valued their relationship with Randy and his management team. And, that his door was always open to the recreation community providing your meeting focused on solution-based discussions.
I also appreciated his shared passion for field trips on an ATV or Dirt-Bike where Randy could review some of the important recreation and trail management challenges facing the agency along with solutions being implemented to address those concerns.
Randy should be commended for the collaborative manner that his office and staff conducted themselves during the 2018-2020 intense wildfire seasons to build agency and partnership capacity to address post wildfire recovery efforts of both motorized and non-motorized recreation facilities and areas damaged by wildfires.
I believe that Randy had the right stuff or blend of field level experience, character, administrative and political acumen, and people skills to succeed both as the R5 Regional Forester and Chief of the Forest Service.
I want to thank him for his 45 year career with the Forest Service and for “Caring for the Land and People” along with his strong commitment to working with agency partners in support of managed recreation and resource management of public lands.
I wish him all the best in the next chapter of his life.
Don Amador has been in the trail advocacy and recreation management profession for 35 years. He is president of Quiet Warrior Racing LLC, past president/CEO and current board member of the Post Wildfire OHV Recovery Alliance, and a co-founder and core-team member on FireScape Mendocino, a forest health collaborative that is part of the National Fire Learning Network. Amador served as an AD Driver for the Forest Service North Zone Fire Cache during the 2022, 2023 and 2024 fire seasons. A northwest California native, Amador writes from his home in Cottonwood, California.
I’m looking for reputable numbers of Forest Service employee numbers over the last 50 years. Are we bloated, are we on the decline?
The next post will go further into the past, but for now, let’s talk about the recent past.
We are very fortunate here to have an actual HR person answer some of our questions, so a special thank you to that person! Also, these numbers may not agree with other numbers you read. Part of that is the timing of them being pulled, and since many op-eds and other publications don’t include that information, nor give the source of the numbers, it is hard to compare. ISo I don’t know but this is the best I could get, from a very recent data check.
It seems that there are many more news stories about the Park Service and Forest Service than other agencies, but that might be just due to my news sources. It does look like the Forest Service hired many permanents in the last few years. Many of these were on various kinds of authorities (non-competitive?) that require a 2-year probationary period. So.. given that overall 20% (I hope you check my math) of the permanent workforce was hired in the last two years, and that they were hired under authorities with-two year probationary periods (instead of one year for those hired under other authorities), then it would explain why firing probationary workers would have had a disproportional impact on the FS. If, as our HR source says, 2200 probationary employees were actually terminated at this point (see below), that would still leave the perms above the average of 2018-2022 (added 5860, lost 2200). But is it fair to count the converted 13/13s ( around 1400) as a real “addition?”
We could still subtract the 13/13 conversions from the 5860 and get 4460 new not converted. If 2200 positions were lost, the FS would still have 2260 more perms than previously. Again, please check my logic and math.
Given the conversions, perhaps the only way to answer Anonymous’s question would be to compare hours worked by all perms + temps, over time.
Who Gets a Probationary Period and How Long?
HR Notes: Let me qualify this first by saying I am not an expert on this issue, but here is my understanding of it. Any new hire to the Federal Service is subject to a 1-year probationary period. However, certain excepted hiring authorities, such as Direct Hire Authority (DHA), Veterans authorities, Schedule A, and others are subject to a 2-year period (called something else) but essentially a 2-year probationary period. A lot of the recent hiring (last couple of years) was using DHA, Sch. A, and Veteran authorities. Any SES selectee is subject to a 1_year probationary period (I think the FS had about a dozen). Finally, anyone hired into a supervisory position for the first time is subject to a probationary period. There are other nuances to all this, but this is the general, basic guidance.
What are the current numbers of terminated employees?
Off the top of my head, there were over 5,000 employees (both fire and non-fire) who were identified as probationary. Fire was mostly exempted from being DOGEed, so about 3,500 non-fire were ultimately identified to be terminated, but this number dropped significantly as further review of cases were made. Last I heard, there were maybe closer to 2,200 or thereabouts who were actually terminated. Now, there are efforts to try and hire some back, plus court rulings may ultimately bring some back, at least for a short time. This may all change again depending on who might apply for and be accepted for Voluntary Early Retirement (VERA). It will likely change yet again if/when a potential RIF plan is submitted (first iteration of Plan due to the Department very soon…March 13) and then implemented.
I hope someone will send me a copy of the RIF plan.
“Here are the actual Onboard numbers for the last 7 years, 2018 – 2024, plus 2025 year to date:
All (perm + Temp) Perm (incl. Fire) Perm Fire Temp (all fire+non-fire)
2018 35,210 27,730 7,280 7,300
2019 35,740 27,420 7,680 8,190
2020 36,920 28,930 8,670 7,830
2021 35,985 28,720 8,550 7,070
2022 35,990 29,700 8,970 6,070
2023 38,180 32,780 9,710 5,200
2024 38,820 35,650 10,400 3,050
2025 ytd 35,220 34,630 10,090 460″
HR Notes: the low temp number for 2025 reflects the time of year when count is made plus the effects of the hiring freezes put into effect by Chief Moore (mid 2024) and USDA (2025). Temp numbers have been trending down as the agency began moving toward more Permanent Seasonal Emplotyee (PSE) 13/13 positions in lieu of temp 1039 appointments. This started within the fire organization back in 2018 or earlier but accelerated in the last couple of years. Over 1,400 non-fire positions that were formerly temporary 1039 appointments were advertised and filled in 2024 as PSE positions. The percent of permanent fire positions relative to the total workforce was 26.25% in 2018, and was 29.2% in 2024.
So it appears that the trend to make seasonals permanent and hire many new perms (past Admin) was on a collision course with the this Admin’s idea of firing probationary employees (except for fire positions).
The temp number is low for a few reasons. This ytd number is where we stand from Oct. 1 thru early February. Typically, not many temps are hired for this timeframe. Some beat the freeze, so to speak, by having an offer letter, accepting the offer, and having a report date by February 8. All others in the pipeline were caught in the freeze. Some of these, if they were for fire positions, are now unfrozen based on an approved exception, and are back on track (within a week or two) of their originally planned onboard dates. A second exception recently approved released for advertisement a number of fire positions. I believe most of the fire jobs in the temp world are usually onboarded between PP 8 and 11, and thus are potentially still on track, assuming we get viable candidates.
My next question (you all can check my math): And to interpret the perms including fire.. it stayed about the same.. gradual increase, from 2018 to 2021. Then in 2022, 1000 were added with 420 of those fire.
In 2023, 3080 were added of which 740 were fire.
in 2024, 2780 were added of which 690 were fire.
So in two years, 23 and 24, the FS added 5860 permanent positions, of which 1430 were in fire? If we take, say, 28,500 (the average of 2018-2022), that would be about a 20% increase in perms in two years?
HR Notes: Yes, the agency did some major non-fire hiring over the last couple of years. Foresters, Forestry Tech (timber), Partnership Coordinators, Recreation 401s, archaeologists, lands and special use administrators, Engineers, and probably a few other categories, all had national collective hiring processes/events that brought in new employees. The agency did so well at this that they overshot what the budget could cover, hence the partial freeze that Chief Moore put into effect back in April 2024.
Note the “overshot” part- how could that happen? See next post going further into the past.
Again, everyone feel free to check my math and logic.
Just a gentle reminder.. TSW is not the place for generic statements about politics, nor to attack other people on this site nor elsewhere. I have been tightening up, so if you don’t see your comment posted, that’s the reason. There are plenty of other places full of generic comments you can visit,
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I’m still looking for any documents related to the Transformation effort. The Museum and the Forest History Society don’t have any. I sent an email to the Forest Service historian and haven’t heard back. It just seems like something that cost so much time and effort should have some documentation available. Otherwise, we’re going to have to depend on my memory… and that would be bad. Guest posts about your own experiences with Transformation would be welcome. Why? Because folks are talking about reducing non-Forest and District personnel and that’s exactly much of what went on with Transformation.
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Anonymous asked this question:
I’m looking for reputable numbers of Forest Service employee numbers over the last 50 years. Are we bloated, are we on the decline?
There are a few moving parts to this question. I’ll review the 2019 NAFSR study in the next post, and look at the overall numbers in the third of these three posts.
1. Has the work itself grown, decreased or otherwise changed over time?
If you were in Region 6 during the big timber days of the 80’s, there was a great deal more timber work going on, with associated work and expertise (for example, the Ochoco had a full time transportation planner in the Engineering shop).
Like reforestation, this decreased over time. At the same time, recreation work increased, as did fire work, and probably lands and special uses. Different kinds of work goes with different series of employees and different ways of getting it done (contracts, grants, agreements, concessionaires and so on.)
2. What is the role of federal employees? Even in the 80’s, the FS used contractors for timber sales. We also used contractors for tree climbing and reforestation. You need fewer employees to contract work than to do it force account, but you still need employees for the paperwork and quality control (CORs and inspectors). During some contracting effort in the past, we used to talk about work that was “inherently governmental.” I wonder if that has changed over time,as I don’t hear much about that anymore.
In the last few years, work has been done via grants and Good Neighbor Agreements and so on. You need G&A people to get the grants out, and it’s unclear in some situations if the grantee monitors themselves or not (based on my read of the agreements). There are also many concessionaires doing recreation work including campgrounds and trailheads.
Depending on that, conceivably programs like American Forests’ work in reforestation or NWTF’s and other efforts on fuel reduction projects would require fewer FS permanent employees. Or any of the Keystone Agreements. But maybe just different kinds.. more G&A employees and fewer natural resource folks.
3. Has the composition of the workforce (in terms of series) changed based on different needs?
NAFSR (Forest Service retirees) did a terrific Workforce Capacity study that looked at this. We’ll dive into that in the next post.
4. How have the numbers of field vs. non-field changed over time (for the purposes of this discussion, field =District and SO)?
It’s not clear that this information is available, in the Budget Explanatory Notes, I think in the Notes the FS counts everything not WO as the field.
4. What is the role of permanents vs. temporary employees? We saw last year that some temps were converted to perms. The temps were told not to come back for 2025, but then the converted ones were probationary and let go.
This reminds me of the “toilets not being cleaned” news stories associated with recent cuts in permanent employees. This certainly varies by Forest, but where I am, most of the campgrounds are run by concessionaires. Last fall, I overheard temps working on cleaning toilets at a visitor center talk about not knowing if they had a job next year. On another Forest I ran across what might have been permanents in uniform cleaning a campground’s toilets. According to this story from last fall and the freeze on hiring temporaries:
The Forest Service recently converted 1,300 seasonal positions into permanent jobs, including 105 in the Rocky Mountain Region and 15 in the White River National Forest.
That Colorado Sun story is also interesting as it focuses on interviewing volunteer organizations on how they will be picking up the slack.
The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation recently joined with partners to distribute $3.7 million for 33 projects in Colorado, including elk research, fencing projects and habitat improvements in the Arapaho, Gunnison, San Isabel, San Juan and White River national forests.
Blake Henning, the chief conservation officer for the foundation, does not expect the Forest Service hiring freeze to impact these projects.
“Most of the work we provide funding to the Forest Service for, a lot of it is done by their fire crews,” Henning said. “Those people are going to help continue the projects we have granted money to. Talking with our partners in the Forest Service, my sense is that a lot of these temporary folks are related to recreational programs like trail maintenance and campgrounds.”
It sounds from the quote as if RMEF received funding from the FS to hire FS fire crews. That’s somewhat confusing. Also were temporary fire folks caught in the previous temporary freeze?
5. What about the big chunks of money? As I’ve said before, it’s hard for an organization to spend so much funding suddenly. If they give out lots of grants, they need more G&A folk, contracts, contracting folks. If they hire more people to do the work, or even the contracting or G&A, what happens when the funding goes back to normal (or less). The only solution, it seems to me, is for Congress to not give agencies huge boluses of funding. Look at what happened with the EPA. Certainly the Forest Service did better with the groups it selected, but it’s not really clear whether the Forest Service had any choices that would have been possible to implement without hiring some people, either in G&A or to do the work, or to coordinate with the grantees plus G&A folks.
One thing I wonder about is whether other agencies have the same proportional cuts as the Forest Service. I’m not hearing about them, but I’m not following them closely, either. Anyway, here’s the story. It’s interesting that the story is based on two agency employees and “others familiar with the Trump administration’s thinking.”
The Forest Service plans to shed as many as 7,000 additional employees in the coming months through force reductions and early retirements, with a heavy toll on research that supports healthier forests, according to two agency employees and others familiar with the Trump administration’s thinking.
The mass departures — more than double the number terminated in the recent firings of probationary employees, if realized — would affect a wide range of missions as the administration looks to shift the agency’s decision-making away from Washington and toward local offices. The Forest Service had around 30,000 total employees prior to this year’s reductions.
With a large organizational chart of managers compared with other departments, one Forest Service employee told POLITICO’s E&E News on Wednesday, “We are sheep headed to slaughter when it comes to our innocence compared to other agencies.”
I’m not exactly sure what that means. “With a large organizational chart” sounds like the FS might be chosen because they appear to be full of fat and tasty for cost-cutting exercises. Not sure what innocence has to do with it.
And wouldn’t the correct comparison be “compared to other agencies that manage large chunks of federal land”. And I could think of only one.
A reader pointed out: USFS has 35,000 employees for 193 million surface acres. BLM has 10,000 employees for 245 million surface acres and 700 million mineral acres. It was 10,000 employees 20 years ago. Perhaps the FS has more rangers and employees per square mile than the BLM? But having fewer and consolidating would run against being more present in local communities; those same communities the FS needs to build trust with for successful wildfire prevention, management and community resilience.
Employees who shared details about the plans aren’t authorized to speak publicly and requested that their names be withheld.
The projections are part of the Forest Service’s personnel-cutting plans due for submission to the White House by March 13, a deadline other agencies face as well.
They reflect twin objectives of making the forest agency smaller and realigning policies to be more in tune with the new administration.
Even in the current atmosphere of workforce reductions, the envisioned cuts were jarring to outside groups and individuals who work in forest policy.
“I don’t know how they do anything with cuts like this,” said Susan Jane Brown, principal at Silvix Resources, a nonprofit environmental law firm in Oregon.
Hopefully we can get a copy of the document at some point.
They also come as the Department of Agriculture faces a court order to temporarily reinstate probationary employees terminated February.
Details emerged as the new Forest Service chief, Tom Schultz, prepared for his first employee wide call Thursday, after stepping into the job at the beginning of the week.
Schultz is a former timber executive in Idaho with a background in public land management there and in Montana.
The call was rescheduled.
Other priorities shared with E&E News include cutting forest restoration tied to climate change
But all restoration and fuels treatments were “tied to” climate change, if only through a few sentences here and there.
and reducing or eliminating urban and community forestry that supports tree-planting in public spaces throughout the country.
I think the UCF program has several complexities associated with it. 1. It gives urban people an opportunity to support the FS budget (quite significant, given proportions of urban vs. rural people), 2. It can be used to reward communities that an Admin wants to reward (as one Clinton-era Undersec was heard to say “the UCF authorities are so broad you could drive a truck through them.”), and 3) it raises the question “what is the federal government’s role in communities? Certainly cities could pay for their own trees, or native plant programs or sidewalks, or rural communities could pay for wildfire mitigation and fire department support. Then we might talk about “why not block grants to the States?” and tell them it’s generally to support a laundry list of programs, which would save much administration at the federal level.
In addition to research — which touches on everything from pests and diseases to climate change — initiatives such as international programs to keep out invasive species could see sharp reductions. But fire science and forest inventory and analysis would be spared the heaviest hits, according to the people familiar with the plans.
Fire-related positions would not be exempt, although the definition of fire-related jobs is broad, an employee who’s seen the plans told E&E News.
The Forest Service and the USDA, which oversees the agency, didn’t immediately return a message seeking to verify the information.
The agency would also seek to increase timber harvesting, an existing goal being ramped up by the Trump administration.
Reductions of the level officials envision would put the total cuts at the Forest Service this year in the range of 10,000, although estimates have fluctuated as the agency
reverses some terminations.
The staff reductions set the stage for spending cuts across several Forest Service mission areas in the next fiscal year that begins in October.
Internal communications viewed by E&E News outline as much as a $316 million cut from forest and rangeland research — which is most of its annual budget — and $40
million from urban and community forestry, which is virtually its entire budget.
My understanding is that Congress decides these line items in the budget. The Administration gets to decide what to spend it on, within the broad outlines of Congress. Also, this would be a really bad idea. In my experience with both the FS and USDA R&D, in-house research tends to be more relevant and pragmatic to users, which is exactly what we should want. That’s not to diss university research, (after all that was my gig at the agency that is now NIFA) but entire disciplines like forest economics or genetics can be lost at universities, so they don’t apply for grants, so the work doesn’t get done.
Research has been a “sacred cow” at the agency, Brown said, suggesting the idea of cutting it won’t have much support. “We’ll see how all that happens.”
Plus anytime the idea is raised to close up local Research (or other) facilities, elected officials become involved.
And while the administration is promising bigger timber harvests to meet an executive order President Donald Trump signed last weekend, “you’re sure not going to do that
without people and infrastructure,” Brown said.
Significant losses in personnel could jeopardize Forest Service work on clean water, wildfire mitigation and other missions, said Ellen Montgomery, public lands campaign
director for Environment America.
“Our forests filter drinking water for millions of Americans, shelter hundreds of species of wildlife and provide spaces for Americans to ski, climb, hunt, fish, hike and camp,”
Montgomery said. “The Forest Service research and development arm provides invaluable research and resources, while other staff do significant fire mitigation to protect communities from future wildfires.”
Side note: while Environment America seems to think that fire mitigation is protective, according to our friends at the Center for Western Priorities, “scientists say” thinning doesn’t work.
Scientists say that increased timber production is not a solution to wildfires. Climate change and drought are what make wildfires bigger and more destructive, and forest thinning can actually increase wildfire intensity by reducing shade from the forest canopy and changing the forest’s microclimate.
“They’re not hiding the ball,” said Blaine Miller-McFeeley, a senior legislative representative at Earthjustice. “It’s just about trying to cut as much [of] our forests as possible to line the pockets of timber industry executives.”
Anyway…
Force reductions would fall more heavily in the Washington headquarters and the Forest Service’s nine regional offices around the country, employees said. That pursuit could have broader support, as organizations that work with the Forest Service complain that it’s too top-heavy.
I wonder who these organizations were?
Past proposals to eliminate regional offices haven’t gone far, but Brown said there may be some merit to reorganizing them. She said she wouldn’t be surprised if the administration seeks to consolidate regional offices. Among officials’ goals, they said, is to put more decision-making authority in the hands of local offices that have a better handle on community priorities. Putting more decision-making authority in the hands of forest supervisors and other local officials would build on efforts already underway. Those include “good neighbor” agreements that the Forest Service uses to work with non-federal partners to thin forests and do other restoration work in places where national forests abut state and
Timber industry groups have long applauded the collaborative approach, although they’ve also watched nervously as sweeping staff reductions threaten to undermine the administration’s goal of stepping up forest management.
Cuts to community and urban forestry would not be new ideas to the Trump administration, as it sought a similar move during Trump’s first term. Doing so would allow the Forest Service to concentrate more fully on wildfire in the West, the first administration said.
The National Association of State Foresters and other groups have urged continued funding for urban and community forests, saying they cover at least 138 million acres nationwide. The Inflation Reduction Act steered $250 million to state forestry agencies for the program, although some of that funding appears uncertain in the new administration.
The Admin can try to zero this stuff out, but traditionally the States lobby for it and get it. To me, if the Admin wants to minimize the amount spent on the “programs that Congress wants funded and will anyway” while maintaining transparency and accountability around those federal funds, that’s a very different question and requires a different approach.
Here’s the E&E News story.. maybe time for the Trump Admin with its newly confirmed Secretaries to take a step back and approach the need to downsize using the same pathways used by the Clinton Administration, which didn’t arouse the same degree of controversy.
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Thousands of fired workers at the Department of Agriculture must get their jobs back for at least the next month and a half, the chair of a federal civil service board ruled Wednesday.
The ruling said the recent dismissals of more than 5,600 probationary employees may have violated federal laws and procedures for carrying out layoffs.
The decision is a blow to the Trump administration’s effort to drastically and quickly shrink the federal bureaucracy. Though it applies only to the USDA, it could lay the groundwork for further rulings reinstating tens of thousands of other probationary workers whom the Trump administration has fired en masse across the government.
But it’s far from a final resolution of the legality of the mass terminations. The administration may have further options to place the reinstated workers on administrative leave or fire them again as part of a formal “reduction in force.”
The ruling blocks the USDA from implementing the firings for 45 days while the merit systems board continues to review the issue. During that time, fired workers must “be placed in the positions that they held prior to the probationary terminations,” Harris wrote.
The merit systems board is a three-member independent agency in the executive branch that adjudicates federal employees’ complaints over terminations or suspensions.Meanwhile, President Donald Trump is separately trying to fire Harris herself. She is fighting in court to keep her job because a federal law limits the president’s ability to remove her from her position.
Trump’s effort to reduce the workforce across the federal government has targeted probationary workers — typically workers who have been in their positions only for a year or two and lack full civil-service protections.
Harris took particular aim at the USDA’s decision to use form letters, apparently crafted by the Office of Personnel Management, that told the employees that “based on your performance … you have not demonstrated that your further employment at the agency would be in the public interest.”
Harris’ ruling came in response to a petition filed by Special Counsel Hampton Dellinger, who serves as a watchdog for the federal workforce. He argued to the board that USDA’s claims of performance issues appeared dubious.Trump has also tried to fire Dellinger. Like Harris, he is protected by federal law from being arbitrarily fired and is fighting in court to hold onto his job.
Dellinger welcomed the stay Wednesday and telegraphed that he is exploring the possibility of seeking similar short-term protection for thousands of other probationary workers beyond USDA.
“I am calling on all federal agencies to voluntarily and immediately rescind any unlawful terminations of probationary employees,” Dellinger said in a statement.
“My agency will continue to investigate and take appropriate action on prohibited personnel practices including improper terminations of probationary employees. Voluntarily rescinding these hasty and apparently unlawful personnel actions is the right thing to do and avoids the unnecessary wasting of taxpayer dollars,” he added.
I “borrowed” these photos from Evergreen Magazine from their interviews with Michael here..https://evergreenmagazine.com/mike-rains-4/
Michael has had a long and distinguished career with the Forest Service, including in senior leadership positions outside of NFS. As he says below, he worked for nine Chiefs and five administrations. He brings up the Carter Admin idea of one Department of Natural Resources, which we haven’t previously discussed. And he’s been in the room for many budget hearings, which many of us have not. So he brings a unique and valuable perspective to all this.
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To begin, I took the last line of Sharon’s recent message: “Anyway, those are all the things I could think of, others? And what do you think makes an “able administrator” as Silcox was thought to be” to direct my comments.”
And please know, I (Michael T. Rains) am trying to be constructive. If my words offend anyone, I am sorry. That is clearly not my intention. Also, you will see that I consistently use the word “we” when I talk about the USDA Forest Service. It’s a habit. I am now retired from the Forest Service. The agency was and remains such an important part of my life. I think about it, mentioned it, or suggest someone should work for it, every day. Albeit somewhat “stale” at this moment in time, the Forest Service is a grand organization that requires the best “RKP” leadership available. I am hoping the new Chief can provide the correct leadership “style” to achieve the next great step for the Forest Service for another hundred years.
Actually, my mind has been racing about whether or not I should respond. That is, comment to this blog. Candidly, I was/am a bit afraid to do so and I am retired; go figure. I thought about my 2007 Student Teaching Experience working on my Teacher Certification in the 9th Grade, Earth and Space Science class at Marple Newtown High School in Pennsylvania, and a poster I made for the classroom. It was entitled, “Everything is Connected.” It focused on ecosystems, but the notion still strongly carries with me today. That is, there is always a reaction to every action. I often take from Newton’s Laws (smile).
Then my thoughts focused on my current position as a substitute teacher at the 6th thru 8th grade levels. I am certified in three subject matters, but as most of you know, a “Sub” has to be flexible; you are there to serve. Now I teach at only one school after years of gaining experiences from grades 5 through high school. In my school, there are signs throughout saying, “no room for bullies.” To me, a “bully” is a “person, organization or notion” that because of position power, can be harsh just because they can. The thing about bullying, eventually it has profound lasting harmful impacts on everyone – even the bully.
We now have a new Administration that is quickly gaining the “rap” of being a bully. Actually, I do think this is only partially true. I have been associated with some of the new appointments and these folks are “solid citizens”, no doubt. However, there are some that wield their position power in less than productive ways and it tends to create a total image; not fair, but it always seems to happen this way. For example, it only takes one or two very disruptive students in a 6th grade math classroom to turn the entire class sideways, creating a “rap” for the entire class; “be careful with Period 8, they are a handful.”
I do not know the new Chief Schultz. I want to assume he is solid for this incredibly important position as “America’s Chief Forester.” Sadly, almost any appointments from this new Administration initially takes my breath away because of my position on “everything is connected.” Allow me to suspend judgment prior to investigation. I think I can. I want to.
During my federal government career with the USDA Forest Service spanning almost 50 years, when asked about the agency, I provided the three brief statements: “…I like being employed. It is an honor to work for the Department of Agriculture. And, I work for the greatest organization in the world, the USDA Forest Service.” I love the Forest Service. However, it has become somewhat “stale” over the last two decades. I retired in 2016, so as a Senior Executive then, and to be fair, I must have been part of the problem. Maybe “stodgy” is a better term. I have often said that since retiring from federal service, I think I am now a much better contemporary “thinker.” Maybe it’s because now I am now working with younger learners (smile).
The notion of being somewhat “stodgy” reminds me of a time almost 40 years ago. I was completing my Developmental Assignment for the Senior Executive Service (SES). A professor asked the class of about 25 “students” (i.e., soon to be official SES members), “how many of you have political appointees as your boss.” 24 hands went up; not mine. All eyes turned to me when the teacher said, “you must be at quite a disadvantage.” I became somewhat indignant and began to let my ego overload by brains, explaining how “it’s possible for anyone in the Forest Service to become the top leader if they had the ability and willingness. A political appointee would stifle that aspirational opportunity.” Just a few years later I began to understand what the teacher was suggesting. I was very wrong and perhaps someone who is a great leader, without any natural resources management skills, could also be an outstanding Chief. In order to be a great leader, you have to be a great follower, as well. A great leader, Charlie Bolden — the former NASA Administrator — taught me that. I believed this strongly today. Great leaders are very good followers and learn quickly. I am getting to a key point. Hang in there with me please. Let my story unfold just a bit more
Most of the Chiefs in my Forest Service career really did not fully understand the level of power and impact the agency had/has. The Forest Service has a direct and indirect stewardship role on 80+ percent of America’s forestlands along a complex rural to urban land gradient, including 138 million acres of urban forests. What always troubled me was the fact that we were enamored with the “193 million acres of National Forests and Grasslands.” When I was deputy Chief of State and Private Forestry, I tried to change the narrative just a little.
I worked for nine (9) Forest Service Chief’s and five Administrations during my career. Some were very good. Only one Forest Service Chief admitted to me the more narrowly defined view he had of the agency’s mission. I will always recall what he said, and this was from a really vibrant Chief: “I must admit that state and private forestry and research do not roll off my tongue very well. It is because I have spent my entire career in NFS. I must change now.” Think about it, almost every Chief, Deputy Chief of the National Forest System, and Regional Forester of the Forest Service spends (or has spent) their entire service time in NFS; at least at that time while I was still in the agency. That’s really a shame. This prompted me to serve in every Mission Area of the agency, perhaps a fact that I am most proud of. There was a time when I was asked about my interest in the position of Deputy Chief for the NFS; I was a Research Station Director at the time. I was honored but nearing the end of my career. Honestly, I wondered about my stamina; that’s a very demanding job. I said “no” after thinking about it all night. I still think I did not have the required stamina at 68 years of age. That was almost a decade ago. I think I made the right decision. I think I did.
So, if the Forest Service is as complex as I say it is, and all the 9 Chief’s that I had the honor to work for were focused mostly on the NFS, why would anyone object to someone being another Chief who is new to the agency that “does not know the entire organization”? I know many will initially be concerned, but I do not think we should be overly concerned. One Chief that I worked for had some terrific ideas and was not a bully. But he had not come up through the agency, and I do not think we gave him an honest chance to fully succeed. Upon reflection, many of us were very wrong.
In the classroom, I always introduce myself by signing on the front white board, “Mr. Rains, R.K.P.” The R.K.P. represents, Respect, Kindness, and Productivity; my core values that I strive to deploy every day. I always ask the students to treat everyone with respect, please be kind, and be as productive in and out of the classroom as you can be. People that are bullies or learn that behavior from organizations that are bullies, will always lose. Maybe it will take some time, but eventually their behavior will be their Achillies heel. Never doubt this. So, if our new Chief Schultz is respectful, kind and productive as he can be, we should give him a real chance to succeed in leading the once greatest organization in the world that “cares for the land and serves people.”
Another thing, it is the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) linkage with the Forest Service that I ponder a lot. As Bernie Casey said in the movie “Another 48 Hours”, “not everything is everything.” Allow me to explain. In 1901, the Division of Forestry was renamed the Bureau of Forestry. The Transfer Act of 1901, at the urging of President Theodore Roosevelt, transferred the management of “forest reserves” from the General Land Office of the Interior Department to the Bureau of Forestry, Department of Agriculture. When Gifford Pinchot talked his friend “Teddy” into moving him (Gifford) to USDA so he would not be so constrained (some suggest not being bullied), the Forest Service was officially created on July 1, 1905. About 60 years later I would have the privilege to join the agency.
During the Carter Administration (Jimmy Carter, 39th President, 1977-1981), it was suggested we have a “Department of Natural Resources”, combining the Department of Interior and the Forest Service to achieve a more contemporary stewardship vision. The notion was quite solid. Thus, it was tossed to the side; too much change, too quickly. I think this proposal needs to be revisited. If one is truly looking for efficiency and effectiveness, it’s worth reviewing. And the Forest Service “Regions” could be reviewed in terms of the stewardship of landscape level ecosystems (i.e., the “Sierra Nevada Ecosystem). Hey, the current Forest Service organization is pretty outdated. It has served the country well for more than a hundred years. I think it’s time for a methodical review. The agency does not need to be bullied by dumping “all new employees”, for example. That’s not thinking. That’s just kicking butt and taking names; nothing good happens.
I heard very recently, the “fire program” with the Forest Service should be turned over to the BLM (Bureau of Land Management). If I may, that is a very bad idea. Believe me, I have some experience on this subject. If anything is to be done – for example, thinking about the “Department of Natural Resources” – keep the bullies at bay and very methodically think about a solid contemporary wildland fire organization that best serves the needs of our country. I do think it is time for a new version of the 2001 National Fire Plan. I would urge to please go slow on this. It has huge payoffs if done correctly.
The Forest Service is still with the USDA. In my view, that’s a problem. Most of the USDA Secretaries have been “wheat, corn and soybean” kinds of leaders, with all due respect to these commodities. That’s what the selected Secretaries understand. There is a Mission Area in USDA called “Natural Resource and Environment (NRE).” Now, it includes only the Forest Service. That’s called inefficiency and I am sorry to say, ineffectiveness. This should change. The Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS), the old Soil Conservation Service (SCS), left and went to another Mission Area – the Under Secretary for “Farm Production and Conservation.” I am not sure that was/is effective either. One needs to ask the NRCS employees. They are also amazing employees. They will know the truth and what works best.
If nothing changes, this means the Secretary or the Under Secretary for NRE need to be very sensitive to the complex Forest Service mission. Most of the time, they are not. Yes, if a huge wildfire causes political concern, their attention surfaces. Administration leaders have to understand that “forestry” is not “wheat, corn and soybeans.” Think about it. Would the USDA Secretary ever be someone with just a forest stewardship background? I doubt it. The farmers would not allow it. Heck, the NRCS probably would not allow it (smile).
This then requires a Chief that is very sensitive to the overall, complex stewardship role of the agency and be quite politically connected, or at least very politically astute. The latter is a problem; so far, most have not been or wanted to be connected effectively with Members of Congress, for example. Sure, they (most Forest Service Chiefs that I have worked for) will be obedient and “go to the Hill” if called. Otherwise, “fuhgeddaboudit.” And we face the alarming results that have surfaced over the last several decades and the impacts of lost land, lost lives and lost communities will continue. Nothing changes if nothing changes.
To be realistic, I am not sure the current arrangement of the Forest Service Chief being assigned to the Under Secretary of the USDA NRE Mission Area is productive or even fair. Allow me to present an example that I witnessed several times. The setting is the “Forest Service Appropriations Hearing” with Congress. The Chairman at the time was the late Senator Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia. At that time, I was the Director of the Northeastern Area, State and Private Forestry. West Virginia was in our twenty-state Area. Senator Byrd was a very big deal; incredibly powerful. Yet, since the topic was the Forest Service budget (vs. the agriculture budget), top leaders from USDA were absent. I know this was an affront to the Senator. In his mind (and in reality), he was a top leader in the Senate and he expected the top leader from the USDA to be present; not a person from an agency within USDA. From some reason, we just could not understand this very predictable dynamic. The result, unfortunately, was the Chief was treated unfairly, I thought. Actually, in my view he was bullied a bit by some Members of the Committee due to his lack of “psychological size.”; it was not good. I know this sounds odd. To me, the Chief’s position was/is iconic. To many others, the Forest Service was/is simply an agency that they do not know much about. “They fight fires, right?” And, in those circumstances, the Chief of the Forest Service simply is clearly at a disadvantage due to her/his position power level. Nothing really new and nothing changes. This need to change “Departmental readjustment” is critical, if the mission of the Forest Service is to rise to the level of attainment that is needed today. Perhaps now a “political appointee” would be better for the Forest Service. That Harvard University Professor sure thought so, even 40 years ago.
Let me be absolutely clear about “some” of the Committee Members treating – in my view — the Forest Service Chief somewhat harshly; unfairly in the example I described. It was not Senator Byrd. I know he was disappointed because he told me later when I was meeting with one of his staff. I loved Senator Byrd. He passionately stood up for America and his state and his constituents. To me, he was always R.K.P; very firm and very fair.
Back to our forests for just a minute. Did you know that about one-half of the National Forests are not healthy and not resilient to disturbances? Are you aware that about one-fourth of all the acres of forestland burned in 2024 probably did not have to burn? In part, due to a very intellectual argument known as “managed” fire. This drives me crazy. You cannot manage wildfire. It is called “wild.” First, put out the fire, then decide the best course of action to help restore the landscape, at least with today’s forest conditions. Ask the trees, they speak. They will tell you, “It is not a fair encounter to let the fire burn. Thousands of Americans’ die each year due to smoke-related health problems. Knowing this, why would anyone ever let a wildfire burn – “monitoring”; it’s called “watching.” It’s not a rhetorical question.
The single most important thing the Forest Service must do is be more aggressive in their direct AND indirect role in the stewardship of most of America’s forestlands. Become a much stronger partner with State Foresters and other leaders at the state and local levels, including cities. On the rural and urban land, many call this “forest management.” I refer to it as “forest maintenance” because so many people understand the word “maintenance.” To most it means “to care for.” In this case, words really matter.
The indirect role, I always refer to as “Federally Assisted State Programs,” is really key. The Forest Service needs to accentuate this. This demands inclusive behavior and actions. On the other hand, “Federalism” sounds a lot like the “Civil War era” and is clearly exclusionary, to the “max”, respectfully. If Chief Schultz is to be really effective as the next America’s Chief Forester, he must embrace a complex federally assisted role along a rural to urban land gradient. Think of the amazing support this stance would garner. It’s called the Forest Service, not the “NFS Service.”
If our new Chief could do just one thing this year, I would strong suggest putting an end – at least for the foreseeable future – to the practice of “managed” wildfire. The very first thing is to ensure that Chief Schultz’ annual “Letter of Intent for Wildfires” that will come out very soon, includes clear direction to “first put out the wildfire with a strong initial attack.” Over the past five years or so, a group of conservation leaders – about 80 or so with literally thousands of years of stewardship experiences, including some of the best fire control leaders in the world – have contributed to a document known as “A Call to Action.” Most everything that I have just said is in the document. Plus, lots of other relevant information that is important to the agency mission in wildland fire control. Check it out. If you want a copy, let me know. My email is [email protected].
“The Center Biological Diversity sued five cabinet-level agencies today seeking to stop the so-called Department of Government Efficiency and its DOGE teams from taking further actions against multiple environmental agencies until each team fully complies with the Federal Advisory Committee Act.
This is the first lawsuit challenging DOGE’s efforts to eviscerate the agencies charged with protecting the environment, natural resources and wildlife.Today’s lawsuit aims to protect the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service within the Department of the Interior; the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration within the Department of Commerce; the Environmental Protection Agency; the Forest Service and the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service within the Department of Agriculture; and the Federal Aviation Administration within the Department of Transportation.
President Trump’s Jan. 20 executive order establishing the Department of Government Efficiency requires each federal agency to implement so-called DOGE teams. Because these teams likely include a mix of full-time, part-time, volunteer and special government employees (the designation given to Musk) they must comply with the Federal Advisory Committee Act. To date, no agency has even announced its intention to comply with this important transparency law, which applies to advisory committees established by the president.”
Rich J. asked this question in a separate thread, but it seemed like a good topic for a Friday.
Maybe a topic for a separate post, but what does everyone think of the new Chief appointment? is an outsider inherently better or worse than a career appointee?
I ask as ask a skeptic of this appointment. But if I had to support someone without any FS experience, Schultz seems like a decent choice.
I’ll start off. And sometimes I remind myself of that old quote about economists (or lawyers or..)
Monotony has now been dispelled, however, by the discovery of the firm which advertised for a one-armed economist, the previous holder of the office having been no good because he always said “On the one hand this . . . on the other hand that . . .”.
That’s me, despite being neither a lawyer nor an economist, but here goes.
1. We have no empirical evidence, because there hasn’t been a true outsider since the 1930’s. I remember Chief Vicky Christiansen coming over to the Forest Service from being a State Forester. According to this Forest History site, she joined the Forest Service in 2010 and moved into being Deputy Director of F&AM in 2010. She was also Acting Regional Forester for the Northern Region, “the same region that produced three of her four immediate predecessors.”
Interesting that the new Chief also worked in Montana’s DNR. What’s up with the Region 1 to Chief thing? I could be argued that La Grande, Oregon, home of Chief Thomas, is in the “social-shed” of Boise, Idaho.
Yes part of Region 1 is in Idaho, (and North and South Dakota) but still… and Schultz was the Director of the Idaho Department of Lands.
Anyway, she was with the Forest Service for eight years before becoming Chief, which is enough time to get the hang of it, I would think.
2. The Forest History Society pointed out in Chief Christiansen’s bio:
She’s the first chief since Ferdinand Silcox (1933-1939) not to have spent the majority of their career in the Forest Service.
Silcox had a masters degree in forestry, and worked for the Forest Service (in the Northern Rockies !) after graduation, then went in the military and the private sector.
Extensive cooperation with the U.S. Army, Department of Labor, and other federal and state land management agencies was needed to get these programs to work effectively. His previous work for the Army and in the private sector proved to be invaluable for getting the job done. An able administrator, Silcox treated his associates and subordinates with great consideration and kindness. He had an enduring humanitarian viewpoint which resulted in doing his best to help the “have nots” in society. His ideas of forest conservation and advocacy of the public regulation of timber cutting all brought strong opponents as well as loyal adherents.
This might argue that “it’s the person, not the background.”
I thought this letter (“A Challenge,” from 1937) was interesting in terms of what has changed since Silcox’s time
3. Back to the topic. What can we expect from someone who hasn’t worked in the outfit?
Pros.. fresh set of eyes, trusted by Admin, (in Schultz’s case) probably has ins with other state organizations, understands State, Tribal and Private programs better than some internal candidates. Does understand wildfire, and various players involved.
Cons.. doesn’t understand processes or bureaucratic quagmires (the flip side of fresh set of eyes), might not have trusting relationships built up over time with some employees (trusted advisors), may not understand FS R&D. Employees may be afraid to work closely with Chief due to possibilities of retaliation in next Administration. Might not understand Eastern, Southern nor Midwestern Forests.
To be fair, though, there are internal candidates who don’t know as much about State Tribal and Private programs and R&D and non-Western Forests as might be desired, depending on their history.
What we don’t know.. commitment to moving Fire to USDI. This seems to me one of the greatest challenges of the new Chief, regardless of career background.
4. Just another random point. Chief Christiansen and Undersecretary Hubbard had both come from being State Foresters, not DNR (or equivalent) Directors. Harris Sherman, for example, had been a DNR Director in Colorado and became Undersecretary. So perhaps it would be more traditional for Schultz, based on his background, to become the Undersecretary and the Chief to have remained career.
5. If most career employees are D’s then if you (career person) were to become Chief in an R Admin and attempt to carry out their policies, you might be seen as a kind of traitor, and it would be fairly clear your time would be limited. Would you sign up for ending your career that way?
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Anyway, those are all the things I could think of, others? And what do you think makes an “able administrator” as Silcox was thought to be?
Andy Stahl remembered that the new Chief had been a co-author of an essay in the 193 Million Acres book, edited by our own Steve Wilent and published by SAF in 2018. Chief Schultz’s coauthors were Holly Fretwell (of PERC), Dennis Becker (long-term policy professor at U of Idaho) and Kelly Williams (I think she is a natural resources attorney in Utah).
The good news.. despite the resurgence fear-stoking “state takeover” and “privatization”, those do not seem to be his views, for reasons clearly outlined in the paper. There is a nice history of those tensions in the longer essay linked above. There are many references to successful collaborations and the use of Good Neighbor Authority.
The idea proposed is “Cooperative Federalism”; at first glance, it certainly makes more sense than “Competitive Federalism” or “Antagonistic Federalism” or ” Antagonistic and Cooperative Depending on Party Match between the State and the Feds.”
We detailed a fourth management paradigm for the national forests that relies on the concept of cooperative federalism. Ideas of cooperative federalism are grounded in the US Constitution that specifies that certain authorities are retained by the federal government and others are delegated to the states. The federalist form of government in the US recognizes a shared responsibility for governing the people and resources of this country. Within this framework is a shared responsibility in the administration of federal environmental laws (Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act), wherein the states can attain primacy to administer the federal laws on private, state, and even federal lands under the oversight of the federal government. In a similar fashion, cooperative federalism as a land management framework would dictate a shared responsibility to manage the federal lands. Federal laws enacted to manage and protect federal public lands would be administered by the states in a cooperative fashion with the Forest Service. The states would assist in the planning, development, and execution of land management projects on federal lands, yet the Forest Service (and eventually, BLM) would retain decisionmaking authority for projects. This framework would reduce the underlying causes of the current federal land management conflicts and gridlock.
There are four main reasons why a cooperative federalism framework is well-positioned to address the primary causes of conflict that have and continue to define and typify federal land management.
1. States Have a Legitimate Interest in Protecting Their Citizens
Protecting public health and safety is one of the police powers of state and local municipalities. The state has an inherent interest and responsibility to protect its citizens from natural disasters, including floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, and catastrophic wildfire. Federal agencies like the US Geological Survey and the National Weather Service provide assistance to the states with collection and monitoring of geological data and weather forecasting to help inform local and state government officials about weather or environmental hazards that could affect the lives of their citizens. However, it is the responsibility of state and local government officials to protect their citizens from these hazards
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The cohesive strategy and the subsequent national strategy and national action plan provide a framework of federal and state cooperation in planning for and management of catastrophic wildfire across federal, state, and private lands. Consistent with cooperative goals identified in the cohesive strategy, a state has the responsibility to protect the health and safety of its citizens from the risk of catastrophic wildfire. It is reasonable and necessary that the state not only has a role in fire suppression actions on federal lands, but also in assisting in the management of these federal lands to reduce the risk of wildfire through active forest management. The vast extent of intermingled ownership patterns, coupled with the imperiled health of the national forests, necessitates an “all hands on deck” approach to managing these lands. Cooperative federalism provides a structure for that assistance by the states.
2. Improved Decisionmaking Process
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The Forest Service continues to use those collaborative groups (which now includes participation from the IDL) to help design restoration projects within the designated treatment areas. Under the statewide Good Neighbor Agreement, the State of Idaho implements projects on federal lands utilizing state employees and state contracting procedures. Decisions made by the Forest Service within the HFRA-designated treatment areas and implemented using Good Neighbor Authority include input from local stakeholders, the states, and the federal government. The state then implements those projects using its own contracting procedures. This overall process ensures that all interests, including the states, that choose to participate in the decisionmaking process are represented. Cooperative federalism, with its emphasis on shared decisionmaking, should reduce both local and regional conflict and increase the efficacy of management of the national forests. To date, none of the GNA projects have been litigated in Idaho.
3. States’ Expertise and Governance Experience
Western states employ skilled land, water, fire, and wildlife managers, including foresters, hydrologists, fish/wildlife biologists, fire wardens, engineers, GIS specialists, recreation specialists, procurement specialists, and fiscal staff to manage state trust lands and other state lands. The expertise and experience that these employees have gained through the management of state lands is directly transferable to similar management projects on federal lands. GAO (2009) noted that in Colorado, state foresters have the competence and skill to cruise stands of timber, determine timber volumes in stands to be harvested, conduct timber sale appraisals, and administer timber sale and service contracts. That same GAO report noted that the Forest Service in partnering with the state under Good Neighbor Authority was able to accomplish more restoration work than if they had not had the state as a partner. In effect, under GNA, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
4. Move the Locus of Control
The fourth reason that cooperative federalism will succeed in reducing federal land management conflicts is that the locus of control of those lands will shift from Washington, DC, to west of the 100th meridian. Much of the rhetoric regarding the transfer of federal lands to the states and others has originated in the West. Arnold (1982), Cawley (1993), Pendley (1995), and Kemmis (2001) traced much of the history of frustrations expressed by westerners regarding the ownership and management of the federal lands. Absentee landlords in Washington, DC, are ill-equipped to make decisions that affect the livelihoods and experiences of millions of US citizens who use the national forest lands. Cooperative federalism will not only engage local stakeholders in developing reasonable management alternatives, but will also rely on state governments and their employees to implement land management projects in a cooperative fashion.
Conclusion
Reliance on the states as a cooperative partner is a game changer. State land management agencies are run by statewide elected officials or their appointees. This ensures that the citizens, legislators, and locally elected officials of a state are represented by their state governments’ land management agencies in the management of the national forests. Similar to Secretary James Watt’s claim that he won the Sagebrush Rebellion because he was a Westerner who listened to and worked with Western governors, policies of cooperative federalism will tamp down Western calls to transfer the federal lands to the states and will encourage greater levels of engagement and cooperation by western politicians and the citizens that they represent to solve the problems surrounding the management of the National Forests.
If Mark Twain is correct, there are no new ideas. Fortunately, managing the national forests under a framework of cooperative federalism doesn’t require the passage of new laws or the appropriation of millions of dollars by Congress. It requires leadership, pragmatism, and hard-nosed commitment to work together to meet the ever-increasing demands on the federal public lands. America’s history demonstrates that the necessary components for successful forest management already exist. By insisting on a model of cooperative federalism, stakeholders will have fashioned something new from the best parts of prior good ideas, thereby serving as a beacon of light and hope that diverse interests working together can achieve more than when pursuing their self-interests. The whole is truly greater than the sum of its parts. Our nation needs a vision for success that promotes civility, collaboration, and results on the ground. Cooperative federalism provides that framework, which will assist the Forest Service in achieving Pinchot’s grand utilitarian goal of maximizing the public interest over the longest time.
The Forest Service Chief is responsible for the leadership and success in accomplishing the mission of the Forest Service.
WASHINGTON, Feb. 27, 2025 – U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins today announced Tom Schultz will serve as the 21st chief of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service.
“Tom is the right person to lead the Forest Service right now, and I know he will fight every day to restore America’s national forests,” said Secretary Rollins. “Together, Tom and the incredible employees at the Forest Service will work to execute the agenda of President Donald J. Trump to make America’s forests healthy and productive again.”
Upon being sworn in, Schultz will replace Chief Randy Moore, who recently announced his retirement in a message to all Forest Service employees after serving the agency for over four decades.
“I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunity to be the next chief of the Forest Service. I will work tirelessly to further support and protect our rural communities. Working with our partners, we will actively manage national forests and grasslands, increase opportunities for outdoor recreation, and suppress wildfires with all available resources emphasizing safety and the importance of protecting resource values,” said incoming Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz. “Chief Moore has been a diligent public servant and has demonstrated his steadfast commitment to stewarding our national forests and grasslands. We thank him for his dedication and leadership.”
Kristin Sleeper, deputy under secretary for the Natural Resources and Environment mission area at USDA, added, “Schultz is a respected leader, who has more than 25 years of land management experience in the West and the South. I am excited to work closely with Secretary Rollins and him as we optimize our workforce and return to our fundamental mission of caring for the land and serving people.”
“Working to further healthier forests and a better Forest Service on behalf of the American people has been the honor of my life,” retiring Forest Service Chief Randy Moore said. “I am confident that Tom will continue to take steps to ensure the longevity, productivity, and splendor of our national forests and grasslands.”
The Forest Service Chief is responsible for the leadership and success in accomplishing the mission of the Forest Service. Established in 1905, the Forest Service manages 154 national forests and 20 grasslands across 43 states and is the foremost leader in federal forest management, research and development and wildland firefighting.
Schultz previously served as vice president of resources and government affairs at Idaho Forest Group, where he led timber procurement operations and managed relationships with government officials at all levels. A former U.S. Air Force officer, Schultz also served as director of the Idaho Department of Lands, overseeing the management of several million surface acres of endowment lands and minerals. He held leadership roles in Montana’s Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, managing the Trust Lands and Water Resources Divisions.
Schultz holds a bachelor’s degree in government from the University of Virginia, a master’s degree in political science from the University of Wyoming, and a master’s degree in forestry from the University of Montana.
