Outdoor Life Magazine Looks at MOG

Nick Smith has this in his Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities email today. Interesting that it’s from Outdoor Life, which says it “has been the go-to publication of America’s diehard hunters, shooters, and anglers since 1898. Our stories are written by hunters, for hunters. We value experience in the field, at the range, and on the water above all else. Our mission is to deliver stories about success in the field, cutting-edge gear, and adventures in far-off wildernesses and close-to-home woodlots. We inspire America’s outdoorsmen and women to chase the critters they’re passionate about and fight for the wild places they love.”

Here’s Why No One Can Agree on How to Manage America’s Old Growth Forests

The Biden administration’s plan to climate-proof old growth and mature forests generates mixed opinions from the conservation community

PNW Forest Plan Revision Update and LSR Trends

The USFS press release today: “The initial comment period for the USDA Forest Service’s Northwest Forest Plan concluded Feb. 2. The Forest Service had been accepting comments on a Notice of Intent that the Agency will prepare an Environmental Impact Statement to evaluate the effects of proposed amendments to the Northwest Forest Plan.” Info here.

There’s an interesting Powerpoint presentation here, “Information Winter Webinar, January 2024.” Lots of stats and trends. This slide, for example, on LSR trends. Steady until recent wildfires.

This is compelling evidence that simply setting aside older forests with little or no active management is a losing proposition.

 

Horses, Mules Still Vital to Forest Service Meeting its Mission and the Rocky Mountain Region Horse Whisperer

crosby davidson
Elaine Collins/Special to The Daily Sentine lCrosby Davidson with the Shoshone Specialty Pack String is shown on a pack trip into the Eagles Nest Wilderness in Colorado in 2022 with materials for a bridge.
Interesting article from the Grand Junction Sentinel

U.S. Forest Service employees who gathered for a training in Rifle earlier this month weren’t there to learn about how to make use of newfangled things such as drones or artificial intelligence to do their jobs.

Rather, they were learning more about a resource that was vital to the Forest Service getting work done even in its early days and remains important today. And there to lead the lesson was Crosby Davidson, appropriately attired in chaps, boots and a cowboy hat.

“We affectionately call Crosby the horse whisperer for the Rocky Mountain Region” of the Forest Service, said Scott Woodall, lead rangeland ecologist for the White River National Forest.

Davidson is the lead packer for what’s called the Shoshone Specialty Pack String, a team of horses, mules and packers based out of the Shoshone National Forest in Wyoming. By virtue of its high level of experience and expertise, the team serves as a regional resource for the Forest Service when it comes to both higher-demand forest packing projects and training in the skills of horsemanship and packing.

In Rifle, Davidson was leading horsemanship instruction for employees from various parts of the White River National Forest with a range of experience, or lack thereof, in the subject.

He said that traveling around the Forest Service’s Rocky Mountain region, he occasionally runs into people who are surprised and interested to learn that the Forest Service has always had a pretty robust horse program, especially in areas with large areas of wilderness or roadless areas where vehicle access can’t be used to get materials and people into them.

“People seem pretty excited sometimes when we pull into the trail head and explain it to them,” Davidson said.

Woodall, whose job includes managing what the White River National Forest calls its livestock program, said 55% of the forest’s 2.3 million is wilderness or roadless acreage.

“Our livestock is the main means of transportation into our high country,” he said.

He said the program currently consists of 15 horses and mules, with animals based out of Rifle, Meeker and Eagle County. The animals can be used for carrying in materials for things such as trail, bridge and fencing projects, and for ferrying out old materials, as well as other things such as trash left behind by forest visitors.

Woodall said the animals are valuable in helping agency ecologists, biologists, foresters and other scientists and specialists access the high country more easily than on foot, while also bringing along all the tools, equipment, food and other supplies they might need for perhaps a week-long trip.

“The first thing in land resource management is getting to where you need to go to see the land,” he said.

He said scientists need to do things such as dig into soils, examine plants and insects up close, and sometimes even employ senses of touch, smell and taste to do their jobs, and using something like a drone can’t replace being there in person.

“I don’t think anything will ever take the place of actually being on the ground,” he said.

But it’s also important to get there and back safely, which is a major reason for providing horsemanship training and certification for employees. During the three-day class at the Garfield County Fairgrounds, Davidson and a second instructor led students through fundamentals of saddling and bridling horses, and the basics of riding them, steering them, getting them to speed up and slow down, and so on.

“It’s a lifetime of learning,” Davidson said. “You can’t get it done in three days, but you can get the building blocks started.”

Davidson has spent a lifetime himself being around horses and learning from them. As a youth he packed with his parents into the Wind River Range in Wyoming for their outfitting business. He started packing as a seasonal employee for the Forest Service right after high school and got his first permanent job on the Shoshone forest as a trail crew foreman, doing a lot of packing to get materials on-site. He has had his current job for several years.

“I can’t get enough of horses and mules, so I’ll tolerate the trail work in order to be able to be around horses and mules. I don’t like swinging a pick quite as much as I like riding a horse but they’re both really good jobs and just being in the woods is really nice,” he said.

As he spoke, he occasionally stroked the head of one of his team’s horses named Slim, while Slim occasionally champed at a bit the horse was still getting used to.

“I really like Slim. Slim’s very curious. He’s very willing. He’s always willing to try to get the job done,” Davidson said. “He’s always searching for the right answer. He’s the kind you want; he’s one of the good ones for sure.”

He said other horses can be harder to communicate with, but all horses have their strengths and weaknesses.

“That’s the fun part, is when you get to something that’s challenging you, you’re really having a hard time communicating with your horse and getting your point across to them, it’s usually the horse that teaches you how to get through that,” Davidson said.

He said he loves participating in trainings because no matter how long he’s been doing them, there’s always something to learn from other people and the horses.

“My hope is that some folks will take stuff away from this but I know for a fact that I will,” he said. “I always do. I always learn something.”

He said that while he spends the winter and spring teaching, when the snow is melted the Shoshone Specialty Pack String keeps busy traveling around the Forest Service Rocky Mountain Region doing projects. It fills in in areas where the Forest Service doesn’t have a local stock program, or for larger projects, which can involve things such as blasting or bringing in larger materials for things such as bridge construction.

As one example, the Shoshone outfits’ mules are more used to safely packing long timbers than often is the case for other animals.

“We can pack 8- to 10-foot timbers, which is kind of a scary thing for a horse or mule to do for the first time,” he said.

Woodall said the Shoshone pack string is scheduled to carry a big load out of the Flat Tops this summer; he said he thinks the load will involve old fencing. He said some local forest employees also will be there to learn from the experience.

Leeann Veldhuis, district ranger for the Eagle-Holy Cross Ranger District, participated in the recent training and said her previous experience riding horses was limited to a couple of tourist-type rides while on family trips as she was growing up. She appreciated the fundamentals she learned in Rifle.

“I’ve learned a ton. A lot of it is understanding the horse and the horse’s mentality and how I as the person have to approach the horse and interact with the horse to get him or her to do what I’m looking for them to do,” she said. “They’re another living creature and it requires a communication style that we’re not used to because they’re an animal.”

Veldhuis views the ability to ride a horse as helpful in being able to get out with her range permit administrator to meet grazing permit holders in range allotments that just in her district cover about 450,000 acres, some of it in wilderness.

“That’s obviously a lot of ground to cover and learn about, and understand what’s happening out there on the ground,” she said.

She appreciated the opportunity to learn from experts from the Shoshone pack string.

“It’s been a really unique and I think meaningful experience for all the staff here who got to participate in one of the oldest Forest Service activities that there is,” Veldhuis said.

“Horsemanship, horse riding — it’s been here since the beginning.”

**********
Please feel free to add your own FS horse or mule stories below, or email them and I will post on Story Saturdays.

Forest Service warns of budget cuts ahead of a risky wildfire season

From The Conversation: “Forest Service warns of budget cuts ahead of a risky wildfire season – what that means for safety.” By a pair of professors from Colorado State University. Excerpt:

Staffing is still a concern

Doing this work requires staff, and the Forest Service’s challenges in recruiting and retaining qualified firefighters may hinder its ability to accomplish all of its objectives.

In 2023, over 18,000 people were employed as federal wildland firefighters. While the Forest Service and Department of the Interior have not specified precise staffing targets, Moore has mentioned that “some crews have roughly half the staff they need.”

A recent Government Accountability Office report found that low wages and poor work-life balance, among other challenges, were barriers commonly cited by federal firefighting employees. The government boosted firefighters’ pay in 2021, but that increase is set to expire unless Congress votes to make it permanent. So far, firefighters have kept the same level of pay each time Congress pushed back acting on the 2024 budget, but it’s a precarious position.

The agency has started many initiatives to recruit and retain permanent employees, but it is too early to assess the results. A recent study involving one of us, Jude Bayham, found that highly qualified firefighters were more likely to remain with the agency after active seasons, during which they earn more money.

Where Will We Put All the Powerline Corridors?

This article may be of interest from Smokey Wire folks….

Explore this gift article from The New York Times. You can read it for free without a subscription.

The Planet Needs Solar Power. Can We Build It Without Harming Nature?

Today’s decisions about how and where to set up new energy projects will reverberate for generations.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/02/11/climate/climate-change-wildlife-solar.html?unlocked_article_code=1.U00.n-mx.vSGlqqnyJPuL&smid=em-share

Some perspective: I live about 250 yards from a Bonneville Power Administration power line corridor that runs from The Dalles, Oregon, to Troutdale, known as Big Eddy–Troutdale No. 1. The corridor cuts across the Mt. Hood National Forest and a bit of private land for about 43 miles (measured via Google Earth Pro). Most of corridor was cleared of timber when it was built in the 1950s; these days, BPA crews regularly cut seedlings and shrubs and/or use herbicides on the brush before it grows tall enough to interfere with the lines. At roughly 375 feet wide, this section of the corridor is essentially a clearcut that covers about three square miles.

This article reports that, according to a National Renewable Energy Laboratory 100% clean electricity study, 91,000 miles of new high voltage interregional transmission lines are needed by 2035 to carry “affordable, reliable clean energy.”

Reimagine Recreation Workshop Summary

Here’s a link to the planning effort.

Here’s a link to the report.

We had an offer from the FS to answer questions about the effort, so if you have questions please put them in the comments. It’s at a pretty strategic level. It would be interesting to compare this with the BLM Blueprint for 21st Century Outdoor Recreation. Apparently BLMers participated in the FS effort and vice versa.

I took some bullets out of the report. I don’t think there are many surprises, and many similarities to other FS programs.

The purpose of the workshop was to:
• Share knowledge and learn from one another’s experiences working on complex recreation challenges and opportunities on lands the Forest Service manages.
• Inspire solution-focused brainstorming on recreation issues ripe for national-level action by both partners and the Forest Service.
• Create a space for partners and staff to dissolve barriers to collaboration, illuminate shared interests, and improve communication

*******

Different styles of communication are needed to reach different generations and backgrounds.
• Working with partners to communicate data or other information can be beneficial because partners can typically share information faster than agencies due to the specific focuses of each organization.
• In addition to quantitative data, qualitative or story-telling data is important to gather, understand, and share.
• Consolidate and streamline public communication to create a “one-stop shop” for trip-planning information and data.
• Identify communication strategies and tools that have worked well for the Forest Service and partner organizations to serve as a model for recreation programs moving forward.
• Create a web-based communication platform for partners to share information.

*********************

• Representation plays an important role in increasing the diversity of the collective recreation workforce.
• Pursue creative recruiting methods and tools in collaboration with partners and local organizations instead of relying only on traditional approaches.
• Remote work options for recreation positions have increased access to recreation careers.
• Limited housing and high cost of living in areas with high recreation demands has caused ongoing workforce and capacity challenges.
• Recreational employment is increasingly seen as a solid career path rather than a temporary job.

********************

• The stories that are told on public lands should be inclusive to all, well-informed, and developed, with input from the people who the stories are about.
• Clear and consistent communication between partner organizations and the Forest Service is vital to successful, long-term partnerships.
• Equity-centered work is not going to be comfortable.
• Telling diverse stories is not the role of the Forest Service alone and should be done in partnership with other stakeholders, organizations, communities, and individuals.

**********

Making connections between recreation, the economy, resource protection, and long-term vision spur momentum when working with partners and organizations.
• New projects can generate interest among industries and create reciprocal relationships between different entities.
• Focusing on long-term, tangible culture changes rather than short-term successes in an industry or agency can create sustainable change.
• Acknowledging the importance of and building transparent communication builds trust, furthers relationships, and leads to successful projects and endeavors.

*************

Sharing small successes on the way to achieving a broader vision can help maintain momentum to complete long-term projects.
• Cross-boundary collaboration can occur across roles, skill sets, and entities.
• Using a more strategic approach would be beneficial around (1) the types of resources that are being dispersed and (2) where resources are shared to decrease competition between agencies.

************

• Visitor use management data can be leveraged to make informed decisions about improving recreation and other infrastructure. This type of data should be part of infrastructure investment conversations.
• Informing and educating visitors before they arrive at recreation sites is crucial. Conservation messaging can be woven into visitor communications before visitors arrive.
• Recreation and conservation organizations need to consider the perspectives and voices of Native American Tribes and respect Tribal wishes on how to use and manage public lands.

Recreation is part of a larger ecosystem and should be woven together with other issues and interests, from wildland fire and fire management to economic development.
• “Everyone who steps into the natural world has the tool to develop an environmental ethic.”
• Agency and organizational culture matters! Forest Service staff need to be consistently supported to show up as a great partner. This includes fostering a culture of transparency and willingness to share responsibility from the highest levels of the agency.
• Cross-boundary collaboration requires that we depend on one another’s strengths and engage partners and organizations to fill the gaps.
• Agency staffing levels and turnover negatively impact relationships. The Forest Service should invest in “professionalizing” the recreation workforce, streamline hiring processes using private partners, engage in transition planning, and coordinate with local governments on shared issues such as limited housing.
• Recreation funding is challenging and requires stability, flexibility, and streamlining.
• Data can convey great meaning, especially when framed as part of achieving
collective goals.
• Equity-centered work is not easy work. We must commit to take up this challenge
together, embrace tough conversations, and deepen our relationship with the
history of the land.
• The Forest Service should base recreation planning and stewardship work in
community, place, and relationships.
• “Recreation management is an all-hands-on-deck situation.”

 

From The Hotshot Wakeup: The Story of the Beachie Creek Fire and Team Prescribed Fire Tabletop

OK, I get it.. permitting reform is not everyone’s favorite topic.  So I thought I’d highlight some interesting stuff on Wildfire, before I get back to permitting.

The Hotshot Wakeup Person had a couple of interesting items on Substack.  If you’re interested in this stuff, please consider subscribing to The Hotshot Wakeup Substack. I always learn something from his posts and often I find myself laughing out loud as well.

The Story of The Beachie Creek Fire: Put It Out, Or Let It Burn? Both Have Consequences.

I know some TSW readers are very interested in Oregon fires.  I  like how Tim explains to us non-Fire folks some of how pre-planning is done and MIST techniques and what I like best of all is that he can see both sides.  I do think we get better reporting from people who can understand different points of view. Anyway, I recommend it.  The PG&E part is a little depressing, especially since, as I’ve pointed out before, the Princeton study say to meet net zero by 2050:

“The current power grid took 150 years to build. Now, to get to net-zero emissions by 2050, we have to build that amount of transmission again in the next 15 years and then build that much more again in the 15 years after that. It’s a huge amount of change,” said Jenkins.

And PG&E can’t afford to bury the lines they have..  oh, well.

Here’s his summary of the podcast contents.

  • The story of the Beachie Creek Fire in Oregon.
  • Multiple lawsuits on how the fire was handled by the Forest and $1B demanded from the power company.
    The Beachie Creek Fire
  • MIST tactics V.S. full suppression. Safety V.S. engaging. What’s the cost in the end?
  • PG&E come to a settlement on the Dixie Fire trial.
  • Did PG&E just pay itself as a result? Where does the money actually go?

I’ve never heard anyone report on this PG&E stuff before..

Team Prescribed Fire Tabletop Exercise

A lot of Region 5 folks were involved in the large-scale Team Prescribed Fire out on the Stanislaus National Forest last year, as California’s weather allowed for it. It was a live-action “sand table” that a lot of people in the D.C. office were watching. A full ICP was brought in, caterers, loads of crews, and drones.

A lot of kinks were worked out during this operation. It was new to a lot of those involved, and things like overtime limits, R&R issues, people on crews timing out before others, and more arose. It wasn’t expected to go off without a hitch, and plenty was learned from this operation. Now they can implement those lessons learned going forward.

Just last week, the Forest Service put out their Strategy to Expand Prescribed Fire Training in the West. This new report lines out what federal firefighters, contractors, NGOs, tribes, and tech folks can expect as policy and money flow into prescribed fire across the nation.

The announcement, made by Alex Robertson, Director of Fire and Aviation Management, looks to expand the National Interagency Prescribed Fire Training Center into the Western United States.

The National Interagency Prescribed Fire Training Center is currently operating out of Florida; however, this new policy and working group aims to expand its operation and reach into the western United States.

The three key elements for building out PFTC-West include:

  • increasing staffing
  • establishing focus groups to explore new curriculum and prescribed fire modules, including unmanned aircraft systems (UAS)
  • expanding the PFTC Steering Committee.

The current committee is comprised of national leadership from the USDA Forest Service, DOI agencies, TNC, the Florida Forest Service’s State representative for the National Association of State Foresters, and a Tall Timbers Research Station representative. The committee is looking to add representatives from the western states into the mix.

While there are many stated goals, one is to increase training and qualifications for prescribed fire across the West and bring in operators from the private, state, and local sectors.

They are also looking to create a new “drone division” in this expansion, bringing on new tech, pilots, and operators.

The National Interagency Prescribed Fire Training Center is currently operating out of Florida; however, this new policy and working group aims to expand its operation and reach into the western United States.

The three key elements for building out PFTC-West include:

  • increasing staffing
  • establishing focus groups to explore new curriculum and prescribed fire modules, including unmanned aircraft systems (UAS)
  • expanding the PFTC Steering Committee.

The current committee is comprised of national leadership from the USDA Forest Service, DOI agencies, TNC, the Florida Forest Service’s State representative for the National Association of State Foresters, and a Tall Timbers Research Station representative. The committee is looking to add representatives from the western states into the mix.

While there are many stated goals, one is to increase training and qualifications for prescribed fire across the West and bring in operators from the private, state, and local sectors.

They are also looking to create a new “drone division” in this expansion, bringing on new tech, pilots, and operators.

**************

So what does this all mean for the future?

It means lots of new positions, career paths, large-scale Team ignitions, completely new divisions for UA S platforms, pilots, and operators, and hopefully, plenty of good quality acres burned across the American West.

Creating Fire-resilient Landscapes 2004

Rainy day, so I’m cleaning out my office — I do so every decade or so. Found a flier for a 2004 conference in Medord, OR, sponsored by OSU’s College of Forestry: “Creating Fire-resilient Landscapes: Improving Our Understanding and Application.” A decade later, we’re still working on it….

James Burchfield: A view from inside forest collaborative groups

Thanks to Nick Smith of Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities for including this item from The Missoulian in today’s email list….

GUEST VIEW
James Burchfield: A view from inside forest collaborative groups

I applaud the Missoulian for publishing various views on forest management and the role of citizen-driven forest collaborative groups in decisions regarding public lands.

With the wide-ranging disruptions of climate change, forward looking, science-based management of our forests will be critical in sustaining social and environmental health. Yet too often characterizations of collaborative groups by Missoulian contributors miss the mark, erroneously claiming that these voluntary associations are captured by profit-driven representatives of timber industry to advance exploitation of forests at the expense of other values.

For the past 13 years, I have been a participant in the Lolo Restoration Committee and the Southwest Crown of the Continent Collaborative. I have found them to be steadfastly independent, thoughtful, and focused on outcomes that will benefit forests for the long term. Each of these groups has a written charter that identifies principles of inclusion, diverse representation, deliberation, and fairness.

In each, federal or state land management agency representatives are encouraged to join our meetings but are enjoined from voting on the group’s recommendations, which are typically generated through consensus. These and other collaborative groups convene their own meetings, design their own agendas, and are beholden to no one other than themselves.

The power of these groups is their creativity, as the collision of different points of view and respectful deliberation leads to original ideas and approaches to highly complex, contextually dependent problems within the forest. There has never been an occasion where timber industry has possessed singular influence.

Collaborative groups contain people expressing powerful conservation ideals as well as advocates for environmental protection. A large proportion of participants are retired natural resource management professionals with ample experience in wildlife management, recreation, wilderness management, and public lands administration.

In fact, on multiple occasions the two groups with which I have been involved have struggled to sustain representation from timber industry, since the demands on industry staff can be extreme.

Put simply, the assertion that collaborative groups are captured by timber industry is false.

Sadly, there are individuals and organizations that prefer complaining about collaborative groups rather than joining a group and doing the difficult work of examining potential forest management decisions or resource protection measures.

Along with my fellow collaborative group participants, I have tried to encourage diverse voices to join groups so we can listen to their ideas and incorporate their views. I believe that those who criticize collaborative groups have legitimate concerns and have an honest desire, like the members of collaborative groups, to protect forests so they can provide the remarkable environmental services on which we all depend.

I hope these critics have a change of heart, join a group, and use their influence to help shape better decisions.

The energy behind collaborative groups emerges from a strong American tradition that allows voices with local knowledge to reflect and consider how public issues within their everyday lives might be addressed. This does not mean that these local voices will carry the day, but only that they be heard. There may be larger scale interests or other critical factors that lead to decisions that may not adhere to local demands. Every collaborative group recognizes that their recommendations are simply one set of suggestions across the spectrum of public engagement.

In the case of national forests, the responsible officials rightly make the final decisions on these forests. The significant contributions made by collaborative groups are the original, often well-grounded thoughts and observations that can lead to better plans and actions.

In a world where we feel like we are often victims of forces beyond our control, collaborative groups offer a refreshing opportunity to work together for the common good.

NACs Are Knackered: At Least For Now

Apologies for this long post, but it took awhile to research this proposal. We don’t even have a category in TSW for “financial instruments.”

Well, as most of us can’t help but know, this year is a Presidential election year. For our friends currently in the federal government, we are well in to the “silly season,” characterized by random  flounderings of the current Administration seeking to placate or enthuse various groups whom they consider to be Important, and to avoid doing anything that they might be upset about, or that the Opposition might highlight.  It’s hard to thread that needle and actually accomplish anything, and when in doubt.. don’t is the word of the season.

The image that comes to mind is of a loose hose. As a career fed, my goal was to stay out of the way and not get blasted.

It seems to me that the “natural asset companies” idea of the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange) exhibits some silly season attributes. Just when I felt I had done enough research to come to an opinion on it, the proposal was cancelled. I try to stay away from partisan politics, but perhaps the best thing we can do this year is to show that many policy issues in our area of forests and federal lands do not fit neatly into the R/D divide. It seems like some folks are trying to shoehorn complex political views and ideologies into the “us or them” box prior to the election.  This shoehorning can cut off consideration of obvious policy choices that people of various views agree on, obfuscates honest rendering of within-party disagreements, and makes people seem more divided than we really are.  Yes, we disagree, but not neatly along party lines. After all, political parties are somewhat artificial constructs.

Anyway, back to an E&E News article on the effort being cancelled.

The NYSE withdrew a proposal pending before the Securities and Exchange Commission that would have allowed it to offer the new kind of investment known as “natural asset companies,” or NACs. The investment concept centered on the creation of companies geared toward improving ecosystems, including those on state or federal public lands, in the United States or abroad, as well as privately owned acreage. The companies would then put a dollar figure on the resulting improvements, such as clean air, wildlife habitat and even “sensory benefits” like a nice view.

But the idea, first unveiled in 2021 by the financial services firm Intrinsic Exchange Group and supported by the NYSE and groups like the Rockefeller Foundation, has faced significant opposition from Republican officials and property rights advocates since the SEC began reviewing it last fall. Critics asserted the companies could become a backdoor for stricter management of public lands and waters by limiting extractive industry, as well as uses like grazing. They also asserted it could create an avenue for foreign governments to gain operational control of U.S. public lands. In a statement, the NYSE pointed to “feedback from regulators, market participants and others” for its decision to withdraw the proposal but did not address any specific criticisms.

To be fair, critics included recreationists who were concerned about access. We can also wonder about how Tribes might be involved.

Earlier this month, a coalition of 25 Republican state attorneys general inked a letter opposing the investment scheme, and the House Natural Resources Committee’s Republican members opened an inquiry on the development of the proposal.

“Innovation is the lifeblood of our economy and we are always open to ideas in the area of sustainable finance and elsewhere that have the potential to further strengthen our U.S. capital markets,” an NYSE spokesperson said. IEG Chair Douglas Eger said the firm does not intend to abandon its idea, noting the investments could still be pursued through private equity or another public exchange.

“We’re moving ahead. This is just too important for conservation, sustainability, for the farm economy,” Eger said. “These are fundamental things that need to be addressed at a capital market scale. IEG is committed to bringing this to the markets, private and eventually public.”

Ah.. private equity.  They did so well with nursing homes.. not.

Anyway, this got my political spidey sense tingling.. a NY financial fellow proclaiming what is important to the “farm economy.” Farmers are often Republicans. Republicans, by and large, were not fans of this proposal. Maybe farmers are not fans of novel capital markets; maybe they’re happy with the current USDA structure that has been built and working for over one hundred years. The old “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”  IMHO, it takes some hubris for people in one sector to simply claim we need them involved in our sectors.  Perhaps this is the sectoral equivalent (sectoral encroachment) of scientific disciplinary encroachment that I posted about on Monday.

Then there are a few issues around trust and the Wall Street folks. Not that long ago, it was a progressive thing to mistrust Wall Street. Remember Matt Taibbi’s reporting in Rolling Stone.. not on Fox News?  It wasn’t that long ago that our financial friends and their regulators caused the Great Recession. In fact, many progressive Democrats, including Bernie Sanders, have questioned various things about Wall Street’s behavior patterns.

Since irritating Republicans seems a feature, not a bug, of many current Admin policies (think Monumentizing in R States), my hypothesis is that this was ultimately a D vs. D decision; that the former Bernie-ites were not thrilled by handing conservation and food over to a sector which notably screwed up the entire world not that long ago. And who can blame them? Maybe that’s something we can agree on.  Perhaps this switcheroo is due to the flailing firehose effect.

On the other hand, at least some of our libertarian friends, usually considered to be right-wing and Republican-adjacent, see this as another example of “willing buyer and willing seller.” So I don’t see people lining up in any traditional R/D lines here.

Then there’s your average citizen who reads newspapers, who may have internalize the lesson “if a financial instrument is developed that is really difficult to understand, the people involved probably doesn’t have your best interests at heart.” If only.. we had a Good Governance Party, one of the principles would be: “we don’t give regulatory agencies any more responsibilities until they have proven accountable for the regulations they already enforce.” And..SEC would not be on that list.

If I were in the business of building trust for new ideas, I’d be really clear on what  the needs is and why current solutions aren’t working. Also, I’d give  people time to understand it, including public meetings and so on.  From Federal Newswire

After SEC issued their proposed rule to approve NACs, they initially allowed only 21 days for comment and 45 days for review. After major concerns were raised by ASL and its partners, the decision-making time was extended to January 2.

To paraphrase the expression “great claims require great evidence’, I’d say “novel interventions require great explanation and public involvement.”

What this reminds me of is the “conservation lease” idea in the proposed BLM Rule- retirees and common sense tell us we can already restore degraded landscapes and we don’t need new financial arrangements.  If there were policy referees, they might give a penalty for “inadequate need for change.”

As always, in the absence of rational arguments, we must consider- partisan politics. From CNBC:

“Year in and year out, this torrent of money gives Wall Street an outsized role in how we are governed, while driving and protecting policies that help this industry’s super wealthy amass even greater fortunes at the expense of the rest of us,” Lisa Donner, executive director of Americans for Financial Reform, told CNBC in a statement.

The report says that individuals and campaign entities linked to the financial sector contributed just more than $1.9 billion toward backing candidates running for federal office, including over $74 million that went to supporting President Joe Biden’s run for president.

Of the $1.9 billion, 47% went to Republicans and 53% went to Democrats. In fact, this report notes that more than $250 million from those working in the FIRE sector went toward supporting Biden, the most out of all the contenders for president. Those contributions were a mix of donations to his campaign and outside groups supporting him.

But back to the proposal from the E&E news story:

Eger also emphasized that the decision to withdraw the rule change pending before the SEC came from the NYSE and not his firm. “They made the decision that they wanted to pull the filing because of the opposition,” Eger said. “They felt there were a number of concerns that had been raised, and they felt it was better to pull it. We were disappointed in that.” Eger also lamented “misinformation” that targeted the proposal, pointing to arguments that the NACs would allow foreign governments to control federal or state lands, and allegations that the firm collaborated with the Biden proposal to further its own conservation agenda.

“It got tied up with a lot of other political agendas,” Eger said. “And unfortunately that got a lot of people upset, and they never were willing to dig down or even have conversations with us about what NACs are intended to do, what they can do, what they can’t do.”

Now even the humble career civil servants at the FS and BLM know that presenting new ideas to the public is their responsibility, and it is the work of the proposer to start the conversations. Transparency and accountability build trust in institutions.

But what is the link between the NACs and the BLM conservation rule? The Center for Western Priorities tells us that there is no connection, and gives some history of the idea. People who are legitimately concerned about access.. like RV folks and others, are accused of being “conservation opponents,” or are concerned about Wall Street taking over more of our lives are now “conspiracy theorists.” For those of you not familar with CWP, it is a project of the Resources Legacy Fund funded by the usual philanthropic suspects, who have ties to D politics.

The BLM’s proposed conservation rule has nothing to do with this theoretical accounting future. It just happens to be moving through the regulatory process at the same time that Wall Street is considering letting some companies voluntarily account for the value of nature. But that alone is enough of a threat to the status quo that conservation opponents are willing to invent new conspiracy theories to try to stop it.

In my experience, “conspiracy theory” has been used by some to discourage people from doing more research and analysis (think Covid origins).

Here’s a link to the SEC proposed rule:

NACs will be corporations that hold the rights to the ecological performance ( i.e., the value of natural assets and production of ecosystem services) produced by natural or working areas, such as national reserves or large-scale farmlands, and have the authority to manage the areas for conservation, restoration, or sustainable management. These rights can be licensed like other rights, including “run with the land” rights (such as mineral rights, water rights, or air rights), and NACs are expected to license these rights from sovereign nations or private landowners.

So the proposal includes “national reserves,” and the BLM proposed rule says conservation leases, and yet from CWP we are to believe that for there to be a connection it must be a conspiracy theory.  So I guess the answer is that agencies are going in random directions that, through happenstance, line up. Not sure that that’s a better argument for the managerial excellence of this Admin.

I don’t know about you, but it sounds to me like a lot of money will be changing hands.. but the more direct method would be “funder or group of funders to willing landowner to manage for specific values.”  Maybe we need a “poor people’s instrument to combine to pay for ecosystem services” that is not publicly traded, without all the regulatory (transaction) costs on both the landowner and SEC sides. More money for conservation, less for counting and watching and paying counters and watchers and possibly investors.

The Exchange and IEG have entered into an agreement pursuant to which IEG has granted the Exchange an exclusive license in the United States to use the Reporting Framework in connection with the listing of NACs on the Exchange (although the Reporting Framework will remain proprietary to IEG). Under the terms of the agreement, the Exchange has acquired a small minority interest in IEG and one seat on IEG’s board of directors. IEG has agreed to seek to identify and develop NACs for listing on the Exchange, in addition to marketing the listing and trading of NACs on the Exchange and providing training with respect to the NAC structure and the Reporting Framework to NYSE personnel and currently listed and potential listed NACs. IEG will be entitled to a share of the revenues generated by the Exchange from the listing and trading of NACs on the NYSE.

So NYSE makes money from NACs, IEG makes money (from license) to NYSE. It all sounds very cozy.

Who is IEG? Here’s some information I could find.

The company’s asset’s primary purpose is to maximize ecological performance and the production of ecosystem services and provide a platform to list these companies for trading, enabling companies to convert natural assets into financial capital.

This sounds very free-market-y indeed to me.