U.S. Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz argues full suppression is essential for this hazardous summer. And Brian Fennessy, director of the new U.S. Wildland Fire Service, defends a policy shift it’s made: Federal officials who want to promote forest health can no longer make the final call about whether to let a fire burn.
Public land managers have toggled back and forth about a full-suppression strategy over the past decades. Many believe that the full suppression strategy both overextends limited firefighting resources and ignores basic science about how fire affects forests.
“We don’t think wildfire should be divorced from the land,” said Bill Avey, president of the National Association of Forest Service Retirees. “That’s been a policy failure.” Decades of extinguishing wildfires and climate change-induced drought have left Western forests full of dry fuels, contributing to conditions that can produce catastrophic fires. Making full suppression the default response, they argue, could perpetuate that problem while demanding more firefighting resources than the government has available.
Bigger, Hotter Fires Are Slowly Erasing America’s Great Forests
Towering woodlands in the West are being permanently replaced by tracts of spiky shrubs. Conditions “just aren’t normal anymore,” one researcher said.
Excerpt:
On a gentle slope on the western side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, where a towering green canopy of ponderosa pines had stood for centuries, wildfires have transformed roughly 1,700 acres into brown, bare shrubland.
That forest is gone for good, scientists say. Spiky shrubs and poison oak have replaced the majestic trees. All that is left of the pines are burned logs and dead branches.
It’s part of a wider transformation that’s taking place across the Western United States, from Oregon to New Mexico, as bigger and hotter wildfires sweep through forests that have not evolved to survive such high-intensity blazes and a warmer climate. Recent studies estimate that as much as 40 percent of Western conifer forests will turn into shrubland by 2100 as a result.
“This is a permanent shift from one ecosystem type to a fundamentally different one,” said Winslow Hansen, a forest ecologist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, an independent research center in Millbrook, N.Y.
The consequences of the shift, for both people and wildlife, are expected to be profound.
Here’s a link to the DEIS Basically, it fixes maps, and takes out WUI.
Removing about ½ million acres of non-National Forest System lands from the national inventoried roadless area maps9. The Roadless Rule applies only to National Forest System lands (see also Potentially Affected Environment).
Curious about that? the footnote says:
There are 44.7 million acres of IRAs managed under 2001 Roadless Rule. Review of the geospatial data found that 44.3 million acres of these are on National Forest System lands, meaning about 0.4 million acres of lands have had land ownership change since the 2001 Roadless Rule or there may be vertical integration problems (mapping errors) between the inventoried roadless data and official land ownership boundary data.
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• Removing about 4 million acres of Congressionally designated areas, which have more restrictive and more permanent mandates than the Roadless Rule (see also Potentially Affected Environment).
Conceivably both of the above shouldn’t have been in there anyway.
• Removing 17.9 million acres which include 5.1 million acres within the wildland-urban interface and 6.3 million acres of roaded roadless and 4.7 million acres that are both within the wildland-urban interface and within 0.5 miles of existing roads. The remaining acreage was removed as the small, isolated areas did not meet previous mapping criteria.
“Roaded roadless” was just an artifact of the mapping process used in 2001; that’s why there are clauses about “substantially altered” acres being included.
♦ Roaded inventoried roadless areas were defined as the area within 0.5 miles (either side) of existing roads.
♦ WUI based on the Healthy Forests Restoration Act’s (HFRA) definition, which includes the areas identified in an existing Community Wildfire Protection Plans or, where a Plan is not in effect, the extent of at-risk communities and up to a 1.5-mi buffer around the communities and areas around evacuation routes for at-risk communities. The mapping process resulted in some small fragments of former IRAs remaining. Under this alternative, USDA would apply past criteria for designating IRAs and the western US (west of the 100th meridian) and Alaska, only retaining areas that are greater than 5,000 acres or share a border with Wilderness or recommended Wilderness. East of the 100th meridian inventoried roadless areas of any size were retained.
We had many lengthy discussions about WUI definitions and size of buffers (not sure we talked about evacuation routes specifically) during the Colorado process. You have to pick something and the choices were some kind of mapping, or using HFRA definitions. Certainly there are advantages to HFRA definitions. It might encourage communities to update theirs, although I’m not sure CWPPs are all equally worthy. But the fact is it’s enshrined in legislation, so there’s that.
Footnote 11, for those of you less familiar…
WILDLAND-URBAN INTERFACE.—”The term ‘‘wildland urban interface’’ means—(A) an area within or adjacent to an at-risk community that is identified in recommendations to the Secretary in a community wildfire protection plan; or (B) in the case of any area for which a community wildfire protection plan is not in effect—(i) anarea extending 1⁄2-mile from the boundary of an at-risk community; (ii) an area within 11⁄2 miles of the boundary of an at-risk community, including any land that—(I) has a sustained steep slope that creates the potential for wildfire behavior endangering the at-risk community; (II) has a geographic feature that aids in creating an effective fire break, such as a road or ridge top; or (III) is in condition class 3, as documented by the Secretary in the project-specific environmental analysis; and (iii) an area that is adjacent to an evacuation route for an at-risk community that the Secretary determines, in cooperation with the at-risk community, requires hazardous fuel reduction to provide safer evacuation from the at-risk community”. (Healthy Forests Restoration Action of 2003; 16 U.S.C. 6511 (16)
I heard different things about processes for boundary modifications in the 2001 Rule, one is that you could do it (i.e., there is a formal process) but no one does, and the other you can’t do it. Maybe someone here knows more. It seems important.
Here’s what Alternative 3 does:
This alternative also includes provisions to make modifications and administrative corrections to inventoried roadless area boundaries, responding to comments about issues with inaccurate national mapping. The following procedures are included in this alternative allow site-specific boundary modifications or corrections:
a. Modifications to boundaries. Responsible officials, working with local government, Tribes, and interested parties, may propose boundary modification to the Chief. Modifications and additions approved by the Chief will be reflected in the set of maps maintained at the national headquarters office of the Forest Service. Modifications of inventoried roadless area boundaries may be made to correspond with geographic features, land management plan management areas, or for other reasons. A boundary modification is not required to perform work done under an exception pursuant to §§ 294.12(b) or 294.13(b). Public notice with a minimum 30-day comment period will be provided for any proposed boundary modifications.
b. Administrative corrections to boundaries. The Chief of the Forest Service may issue administrative corrections. Administrative corrections to the maps of any inventoried roadless area are adjustments to correct clerical errors, to conform with new statutory or regulatory requirements, or to correspond with changes based on improvements in mapping technology.
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There are some issues that we had in Colorado that alternative 3 doesn’t touch.. bringing in equipment to fix dams, roads to help manage vegetation along powerlines, and other relatively small issues that could be helped by restricting access on the roads. But I think this alternative, for the most part, has the greatest potential.
This brief 08/20/2026 letter to the Curry Coastal Pilot left me wanting to hear more from Mr. McCall. I agree with him. FWIW, on my private property in the northern Cascades, the Doug-fir that sprouted after a ~1903 fire are now up to 30 inches DBH and 170 feet tall — still spike tops. The stand is thinning itself via laminated root rot…. I’ve made some fine lumber out of the ones I’ve felled….
Proposed change coming to the Northwest Forest plan
Op-Ed by Ken McCall US Forest Service, Retired
The United States Forest Service is proposing to amend the Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP) to allow cutting older trees across the western portion of Washington, Oregon, and Northern California. As a hunter, fisherman, recreationist and fifth generation native of the west coast, I have spent a lifetime in these forests as a private citizen and a 40 plus year career as a U.S. Forest Service employee specializing in forestry and forest engineering.
The primary proposed change in the 19.4 million acres of forestlands is to allow cutting trees up to 120 years old compared to the current cutting age limit of 80 years. Conservatively speaking, 90 or more percent of the old growth forests in the NWFP area were clearcut in the logging and road building boom from 1950 to the mid 1990’s. The result leaves those same acres of forest as predominantly single species conifer tree plantations lacking in diversity that is beneficial for wildlife.
A “false-color” after image taken from a NASA satellite of the Cottonwood Fire burn area on June 29, 2026. (Photo: NASA Earth Observatory by Michala Garrison)
8. Priorities and Design Op-ed on Cottonwood Fire.
The Cottonwood Fire burnt nearly 100,000 acres east of the city of Beaver despite multiple recent Forest Service decisions implementing thousands of acres of treatments to reduce fire risk and produce timber in that area. As part of this effort, the Forest Service collaborated with Utah’s Watershed Restoration Initiative and spent millions of dollars between 2021 and 2026 to reduce the risk of fire and protect streams. Yet the area burned and flooded.
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The Forest Service did what was legally required. The issue was these assessments never discussed the possibility of a future conflagration across private land or the types of treatments that might have altered that kind of fire’s behavior. Instead, these documents focused on discussing timber harvest away from the private land boundary, maintaining vegetation diversity and restoring the historic fire regime.
Landowners who build houses in forested areas assume a greater risk of their properties being destroyed by fire. That does not negate the Forest Service’s responsibility to design alternatives that might mitigate some of the fire risks as they are the agency with expertise.
The Forest Service seems focused on meeting targets measured in acres treated. The question that needs to be answered is whether the status quo is the right approach, or whether the Forest Service should also be working with the local public to design vegetation projects that are more likely to stop the progress of fires near human habitation, even if such treatments are costly.
Now many of us would read that and say “what’s up with that? don’t some funding sources prioritize WUI (was that HFRA or something more recent?) Didn’t the communities and FS work together to design projects that would help protect private lands?” Or did the communities not want cutting near them (I’ve heard that from homeowners in Colorado)?
Or, as Zeke Lunder said about the fire.. maybe it got to the point where any fuel treatments might not have worked.
Suppression is extremely difficult in areas with heavy dead timber (snags) from previous burns; direct attack is often not possible, and retardant is less effective in dense, downed fuels.
Criticism of firefighting efforts is common, but extreme conditions and landscape limitations often make suppression impossible once fires are this large.
As I drive around, I see prescribed fire treatments right next to communities. Plus in some places, communities strongly agitate for the FS to do work in specific areas. The op-ed makes it sound like the FS does the right thing in the wrong place, more or less everywhere (of course, that’s a click-inducing headline and not what Roper wrote.) Which is not my observation. What does that look like in your neck of the words?
9. Fuel Treatments Held Up by Litigation. We’re familiar with the “we planned it but it got stuck in litigation” as documented by the folks at PERC and Breakthrough, as well as others. Here’s one from a few days ago (from AFRC):
The Grasshopper Fire is burning through forests on Oregon’s Mt. Hood National Forest that were identified and prioritized years ago for hazardous fuels reduction through a collaborative effort involving local communities and the U.S. Forest Service. Yet much of that work remains unimplemented after years of litigation and administrative delays slowed or prevented the projects from moving forward.
These forests are located in one of the High Priority Landscapes identified in the Biden Administration’s 2022 Wildfire Crisis Strategy that targeted “high risk firesheds” to improve resilience to wildfire.
Years before the current wildfire, the Wasco County Forest Collaborative worked with the U.S. Forest Service to develop the Grasshopper Restoration Project, the 27 Road Fuel Break, and the Hootnanny Project to reduce hazardous fuels, meet the intent of the Wildfire Crisis Strategy, and improve forest conditions across more than 11,000 acres.
The Grasshopper Restoration Project became the subject of litigation brought by Oregon Wild under the National Environmental Policy Act challenging the paperwork supporting the project. The Forest Service ultimately settled the case by removing less than two percent of the proposed treatment areas, reducing management in others, imposing additional project restrictions, and paying Oregon Wild $55,000 in attorney fees under the Equal Access to Justice Act.
We also know that sometimes there aren’t the people to plan, and the bucks may not arrive at the right time in the right color to move forward. Given all that, I thought this WaPo article was interesting..but extraordinarily predictable.
10. Fuel Treatments Held Up by Trump Admin.. WaPo
Last year, the Trump administration delayed a $10 million grant that was supposed to help Minnesota thin out about 4,000 acres of dense, dry forest at high risk of burning. Most of that work never got started, according to five people familiar with the situation and a document reviewed by The Washington Post. And now, some of those areas are on fire.
We were shovel-ready,” said Aaron Kania, who was a U.S. Forest Service district ranger with the Superior National Forest for six years and a law enforcement ranger with the Bureau of Land Management for two decades before retiring last December. “Had that work been implemented, it would have been effective in stopping or slowing down these fires.”
And the WaPo seems not very careful with numbers…
In the following months, the agency would lose about one-third of its employees, including those who managed timber reviews and grant administration programs — critical components in getting wildfire mitigation projects like the Superior National Forest’s up and running.
In 2024, there were 18,700 federal employees who could fight fires. Now there are a little over 17,000, according to the U.S. Forest Service and Interior Department. In a recent June report, the Government Accountability Office noted that the U.S. Forest Service’s workforce “decreased by about 20 percent in response to a February 2025 executive order for large-scale workforce reductions.”
I wish reporters would link to the section of the story with the numbers when they cite numbers.. I still don’t get the 1/3. If the FS lost the same 6K that they gained 2022-2024, then that would be 1/3 of 18K which is not the total. But maybe it’s just fire folks?
But that earlier story also quotes Colorado Governor Jared Polis:
In an interview Thursday, Governor Jared Polis (D) and several fire and public safety officials said that while Colorado may have its hands full right now, they are managing. It’s what could come next that worries them. Decades of falling behind on fuel treatments and climate challenges have made their forests tinder boxes, they said.
That’s “decades” of falling behind, not spring of 2025. Oh well, losing 1/3 is a lot, maybe someone can figure out where that number came from.
Essay from High Country News. An experienced trail crew leader argues that, in today’s forests, the rigidity of the regulation buries what it’s designed to protect.
“As we sawed through yet another fire-scarred fir that had fallen across a backcountry trail, my trail crew and I would sometimes hear a hiker, pause our work and brace for the inevitable question: “What, they don’t let you use chainsaws?” ”
IMHO, the use of chainsaws would be less intrusive than the constant sounds of aircraft, which one hears on or off trails, in meadows, on the shores of remote lakes, etc.
Apologies for how long this is.. but what was so obvious to me as I read this AP story while breathing Aspen Acres fire smoke.. is that part of the reason for disagreeing and partisanship is that we get “arguments that sound vaguely plausible from carefully chosen sources” over “trying to understand why people think what they think, and how we think differently.” Ironically, while I was trying to find this story, I had a banner across the screen asking me for support for AP calling it “news without an agenda.”
Reporters Martha Bellisle and Matthew Brown combined their expertise on changes to federal land agencies since U.S President Donald Trump retook office with their deep knowledge of the west and wildfires to deliver an accountability story examining how the new Wildland Fire Agency was promoting a widely discredited policy. The pair had been reporting out the story when three wildland firefighters died last week.
Through aggressive reporting and beat expertise, they quickly pivoted the story’s focus to explain the impact of the administration’s shift to an old, discredited firefighting policy, which says all fires must be extinguished in the first 24 hours – a policy many experts believed was dangerous for firefighters, communities and public lands.
I get that this is marketing, but full suppression is not the 10 AM policy. It’s just not .. true.. does that matter? Perhaps ironically, while I was trying to find this story, I had a banner across the screen asking me for support for AP calling it “news without an agenda.”
My understanding is that the people interviewed for the story did not realize that their observations would be tied to firefighter deaths. We actually have processes to figure out what goes wrong on wildfires- and we can wait to find out. It’s at least mildly creepy to me that the reporters chose to make that link, but I’ll leave moral judgments on that to others. The AP story was run in the Denver Post and around the nation, so many who read this article don’t get the impacted community’s side of the story.
Martha Bellisle is actually “global investigative reporter” and you can get an idea of her areas of expertise (she is in Washington State) Matthew Brown (from Billings MT). He has a strong background in environmental journalism, but now has a broader scope according to this link at AP.
Trump administration seeks to stomp out all fires quickly, reviving policy that has been discredited
At first it sounds like the 10AM policy, but here’s what the story actually says:
And the administration’s focus on “full suppression” of new fires marks a sharp reversal from a decades-long trend toward embracing flames as a tool — to burn off old vegetation and growth that acts like fuel and lessen the risk of catastrophic blazes being stoked by a warming planet.
Let’s look at what the USWFS and the FS said in their documents. Here’s what the FS said:
The safety of firefighters and the public is always first. Every unplanned ignition on National Forest System lands is managed under a full suppression strategy, and we will use best management practices for smoke. Guided by our safety principles and our risk assessment process, we will use direct tactics when conditions allow and indirect tactics when necessary. Our tactics may change with circumstances on the ground, but the goal to protect people, communities and important resources never does.
Here’s what USWFS said:
Given the Department of the Interior’s responsibilities to safeguard communities, landscapes, habitat and critical infrastructure, we will enter this season with the presumption of a full suppression strategy applied to every wildfire under DOI management.
Suppression actions must be prompt, decisive and based on values at risk—balanced with firefighter safety and a clear assessment of probability of success. Until conditions permit, all unplanned ignitions will receive a suppression response, using direct or indirect strategies as conditions dictate.
While indirect approaches may occasionally be warranted, direct suppression should remain the default. DOI firefighters are empowered to assess and mitigate risk while responding to wildfires and have the full support of Department leadership in carrying out this mission.
What is a “full suppression strategy”? Here’s what Google AI says (and I hope people will correct it if it’s wrong)
A “full suppression strategy” (or full perimeter containment) is a wildland fire management response aimed at extinguishing a fire as efficiently as possible, stopping all spread. It relies heavily on constructing direct and indirect firelines to halt the fire’s advance and cooling hot spots to protect human life, property, and resources. [1, 2, 3]
Alternative fire management strategies—collectively known as Strategies Other Than Full Suppression (OTFS)—allow fire managers to manage the fire in a way that minimizes firefighter exposure while achieving ecological benefits. These are defined by the U.S. Department of the Interior and the National Wildfire Coordinating Group: [1]
Point or Zone Protection: Protects specific assets or high-value resources (such as structures or critical infrastructure) without directly trying to stop the broader spread of the wildfire. [1, 2]
Confine: Restricts the wildfire to a defined area primarily by utilizing natural or pre-existing barriers (e.g., rivers, roads, and ridges), intervening only to tie these barriers together. [1, 2]
Monitor: Involves continual assessment of the fire’s progression, weather conditions, and fire behavior without taking direct physical suppression actions, allowing the fire to run its natural course under favorable conditions. [1]
I would argue almost everyone in this currently impacted part of Colorado is not really interested in point protection, confining or monitoring right now- June in a very dry year. Not the many evacuated people. Not the many people at risk of losing their homes. “Stomping out” or even better “having previously stomped out” actually sounds terrific.
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So let’s look deeper into the arguments in the story..
The consolidation of thousands of personnel into the fire service has sown confusion among some firefighters about who their bosses are and what their responsibilities should be, according to former government officials.
I thought the ICS was fairly straightforward and time-tested. What “former government officials” exactly? If they’re “former” they must not be afraid of blowback, so why not let us be the judge of sources?
And the administration’s focus on “full suppression” of new fires marks a sharp reversal from a decades-long trend toward embracing flames as a tool — to burn off old vegetation and growth that acts like fuel and lessen the risk of catastrophic blazes being stoked by a warming planet.
Changes to US wildfire policy in 2009 blurred the distinction between fires managed for resource benefits and fires with primarily suppression objectives, making management strategies difficult to track. Here, qualitative text is coded from a sample of 282 Wildland Fire Decision Support System Relative Risk Assessments completed on wildfires between 2010 and 2017 to examine the prevalence of different strategies and their associations with risk. Suppression is used most, associated with high risk. Managers discuss intent to suppress even when it is untenable. Monitoring, confine, or point protection are used much less commonly and when risk is low.
It kind of sounds like the “decades-long trend” was more conceptual than in practice.
The changes benefit private fire aviation companies that are key to hitting blazes fast.
Again that sounds like it might be true, but I live in a county where aggressive initial attack is the thing (think grass and high winds) and I’m not sure I care if the helicopter is owned by the county or a contractor. Of course, this might be a jab at Sheehy and Bridger, but I think they probably have plenty of work. If I don’t know that this is true (about aviation), how can the reporters just make a blanket statement?
“The question is, why were they attacking that fire in the first place?” asked Timothy Ingalsbee, a former federal firefighter and cofounder of the advocacy group Firefighters United For Safety, Ethics and Ecology. “What was actually at risk? If it was a bunch of shrubs on remote mountaintops, what was the real risk that justified putting those firefighters at risk?”
What Ingalsbee seems to be saying is that firefighter safety (albeit #1 in both agency’s policy) was compromised in this case, because of the full suppression strategy. But would this have been a fire that would have lent itself to other strategies? In June, in a notoriously dry year? How does he know that?
It’s kind of second-guessing the judgement calls of the IC s to strategy and tactics around that fire, based on the change in policy. Which are the same folks we would be trusting to pick another a non-suppression strategy instead. And firefighter safety is still the #1 policy, so..
But critics say the administration is trying to fix something that isn’t broken: The four agencies the firefighters were drawn from — the Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs and National Park Service — have a record of extinguishing 98% of the fires they handle.
That’s lovely, but how many watersheds, communities, wildlife and forests are damaged in the process (and from ensuing floods and so on)? And why are we funding suppression at all then, since winter, according to this metric would do better (at 100%) for free. It did make wonder about the FS, though.
Under Trump, federal officials have been bringing in aircraft more quickly once fires ignite, said Austin Moeller, an aerospace analyst for the investment firm Canaccord Genuity.
“Anyone that has an air tanker benefits from this more aggressive contracting activity,” Moeller said.
So we don’t want to put fires out before they become unmanageable because… aircraft? Because a Republican Montanan got elected who had a wildfire aviation firm?
Bridger describes itself as one of the nation’s leading aerial firefighting companies. CEO Sam Davis has said the company’s fleet of Super Scooper aircraft, its surveillance aircraft and its fire observation technology make it “uniquely positioned” to respond to the renewed emphasis on attacking fires to put them out.
Of course, Bridger’s marketing uses that term, similarly to how the AP marketing says “deep knowledge of the west and wildfires.”
The aircraft will help the administration’s new full suppression policy, which harkens back to a 1935 policy known as the 10 a.m. rule because it required agencies to put out new fires by 10 a.m. the following day.
Using a full suppression strategy is not the 10AM rule.. that should be obvious to everyone. “Harkens back to ” is carrying a lot of weight. All it is is NOT point protection, confine or monitor.
Scientists who study wildfires say trying to stop all fires is unrealistic since some of the most destructive blazes in recent years have evaded efforts to put them out. Some fires simply grow too fast, are too remote, or result from multiple ignitions that makes them impossible to stop.
If we switch this to the definition of full suppression, we’d get “scientists argue that monitoring, confining and point protection are better strategies.” But that’s not what many scientists are saying- I wonder what scientists the reporters spoke with who said this, that they are “impossible to stop”. Sure, that happens sometimes for days or weeks. And yet, there are thousands of folks in North America today doing exactly that, and we can see their activities and the results on Inciweb and Watch Duty.
“The narrative that if we just try harder, we’re gonna make these fires go away isn’t true,” said former Forest Service wildfire researcher David Calkin. “The fire paradox is not beatable: The more you make fire go away, the more fuel accumulates. The more fuel accumulates, the harder it is to make fires go away.”
On the Aspen Acres fire, we currently have 100,000 acres burned with a full suppression strategy. So there’s that. Then there’s prescribed fire, and mechanical fuel treatment that also reduce fuels. It seems like the way this is said implies that wildfire is the only way to reduce fuels. Then why do the States and Feds spend so many bucks on PF and MT if only wildfires “work”? To be fair, though, this could be a misquote or an out-of-context quote.
If all this wasn’t depressing enough, the comments suggest that (some) people believe the story and agree firefighting doesn’t work, and it’s only done for private profit. It all reminds me of Miles’s Law- “where you stand depends on where you sit” or the evacuees sit in your house or the smoke you’re inhaling..
The next post will address some questions that arose in my mind from observations and reading some of these articles.
I don’t have the full article ($), but here’s an excerpt (thanks to Nick Smith, who included the link in today’s Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities email.
An environmental group’s lawsuit filed Wednesday aims to invalidate decades of logging projects, oil and gas leasing, and numerous other federal land management decisions made over the last 30 years because the federal land plans they were conducted under weren’t submitted to Congress.
Cascadia Wildlands’ lawsuit challenges two Oregon federal land management plans finalized by the Bureau of Land Management since the Congressional Review Act was enacted in 1996. The plans, which were never submitted to Congress for review, authorized logging projects the group says harm wildlife.
The group filed the lawsuit after Congress last year, for the first time in history, began using the CRA to scrap BLM land management plans disfavored by congressional Republicans, including plans for Montana, Wyoming, Alaska, and North Dakota.
The Government Accountability Office in 2025 declared the plans are rules under the Administrative Procedure Act. This gives lawmakers the ability to disapprove of them under the CRA, which requires rules to be submitted to Congress before taking effect.
Land plans were never considered rules prior to 2025, and those that took effect between 1996 and 2025 have never been submitted to Congress. Cascadia Wildlands says Congress’ use of the CRA to scrap the plans invalidates countless public lands management decisions made since the CRA became law.
“If land management plans are subject to the CRA, then no land management plan adopted after 1996 is in effect unless and until it has been submitted to Congress,” Cascadia Wildlands and its legal representation, Susan Jane Brown, an attorney for nonprofit law firm Silvix Resources, said in a statement.
“We used to be able to release specifics about serious accidents and incidents,” complains an employee of the National Park Service who has asked to remain anonymous for fear of retribution. “Now we can’t release any demographics or specifics, just say, ‘the NPS responded to a serious incident’ with no other details. Which basically makes everyone who has someone visiting the park thinking their loved one has died.”
