Let’s Talk About Specific CE’s in the Rissien Report: II. White River Forest Health and Fuels Management Project

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A high-density stand of young lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta) that regenerated following a 2003 wildfire in Montana’s Bob Marshall Wilderness, pictured here in 2015. CREDIT: ANDREW LARSON
(couldn’t find a photo of dense LPP regen on the White River).

What’s interesting about this project on the list is that it appears to involve neither what we would call “logging” nor “burning”. I haven’t contacted the Forest yet to find out the current status. There are ten pages in this proposed action that, again, go into a great amount of detail about what is proposed. Here’s the link.

The purpose and need is:

The purpose of the proposed action is to:
Improve forest health:
o Improve individual tree growth, vigor and resiliency through reducing densities in young stands of lodgepole pine.
o Improve or maintain forest health by reducing the extent of insects or diseases present in regenerating lodgepole pine stands.
Maintain past management objectives:
o Maintain existing fuel breaks with the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) through managing live and down fuels.
o Continue to enhance diversity through maintaining and protecting young Engelmann spruce trees planted in areas affected by past spruce beetle outbreak.

Actions:
Hand Treatments – Lop and Scatter
Thinning treatments would be conducted by hand crews utilizing chainsaws or similar hand operated equipment. Activity slash would be bucked into lengths less than 6 feet and scattered to a depth less than 18 inches.
Hand Treatments – Pile and Burn
Thinning treatments would be conducted by hand crews utilizing chainsaws or similar hand operated equipment. Activity slash piles would be created by hand and burned by the Forest Service.
Mechanical Treatment – Mastication or Chipping
Thinning treatments would be conducted using ground based mechanical equipment that may be wheeled or tracked. Activity slash would be chipped, mowed or masticated and left on site. Desired fuel depth would be less than 3 inches.
Mechanical Treatment – Removal
Thinning treatments would be conducted using ground based mechanical equipment that may be wheeled or tracked. Activity slash would be removed.

I suppose that you could read into this that some material might be commercial. Based on the descriptions it seems unlikely (they have specific prescriptions and examples in the text). They do have an acreage limit (1000 acres per year).

They also have an implementation plan that tells about how they are going to handle each site:

Implementation Process
The Proposed Action does not identify specific treatments areas, is based on the condition of the forest stand and not on specific identified treatment areas, and a well-defined process for
implementation is needed. The following steps have been identified for implementation:

Prior to implementation the forester or silviculturist will identify areas for treatment and prepare draft silvicultural prescriptions that document the chosen prescription, the
desired residual stocking levels, and the preferred implementation method.
Treatment areas and silvicultural prescriptions are presented to an interdisciplinary team (IDT) of resource specialists for completion of any necessary field surveys, such as cultural resource inventories or wildlife habitat surveys.
The IDT will meet to discuss field survey findings and resource specialist recommendations. A pre-implementation checklist will be completed, documenting the resource review and compliance with design features. Silvicultural prescriptions are finalized.

A news release will be prepared to inform the public about upcoming treatments.
Feedback from the public concerning the specific treatment areas, or input concerning future treatment areas would be welcome.
Projects will be implemented through appropriate mechanisms which may include service contracts, Forest Service employees or stewardship contracts. Whichever mechanism is chosen to implement the silvicultural prescription, an employee would oversee implementation to ensure compliance with design features and contract provisions.

Post treatment surveys that monitor compliance with the silvicultural prescription will be conducted. Findings may be used to inform future treatments approved by the Decision. Annual monitoring results would be published on the forest’s project webpage.

To me this addresses the question of site-specificity pretty thoroughly. What do you think of this approach?
I don’t think this is “using CE’s to avoid the public process normally required by law.” I think there are two key ideas 1) rounding up some activities that people (especially people who litigate) generally have no problem with, and 2) giving people a chance to comment on each site, that I think makes sense. It gives the forest the flexibility to talk to the public about an annual workplan without having an individual CE for each project, which makes sense to me, unless there is a trust issue. If there is a trust issue, I think more sideboards and open discussion of the issue makes more sense than making folks do individual CEs for each project.

I suppose they might have been more specific about not selling trees, but otherwise I don’t see any “logging” or PB here.

Mt. Hood (lack of) science loses in 9th Circuit

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The way courts approach scientific controversy is a common thread on this blog.  We happen to have a perfect example from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (link to the opinion included) last week.  And it happens to involve the science of “variable density thinning” to reduce wildfire threats, another popular topic here.

The Project is the Crystal Clear Restoration Project on the Mt.  Hood National Forest.  The stated primary purpose of the Project is to reduce the risk of wildfires and promote safe fire-suppression activities.  It would use “variable density thinning” to address wildfire concerns, where selected trees of all sizes would be removed.  According to the plaintiffs, it  would encompass nearly 12,000 acres and include almost 3000 acres of logging of mature and old-growth forests along with plans to build or re-open 36 miles of roads.  The court held that an EIS was required because of scientific controversy about the effects of variable density thinning on what plaintiffs characterized as “mature, moist forest.”  The court also found that the Forest failed to show that cumulative effects would not be significant.

In both cases, the court found that the Forest “did not engage” with the information provided by the plaintiffs after, “The plaintiffs, especially Bark, got people out into the landscape and spent thousands of hours collecting information about what was going on in the land and gave that information to the Forest Service,” said attorney Brenna Bell, who spent four years on the case.  Failing to engage is a common reason for the Forest Service failing to win in court, especially when under pressure to meet “timber volume targets imposed by President Donald Trump’s administration.”

The EA stated that the Project would assertedly make the treated areas “more resilient to perturbations such as . . . largescale high-intensity fire occurrence because of the reductions in total stand density.”  Plaintiffs had provided “substantial expert opinion” that disputed that outcome.  As plaintiffs point out in their victory notice, here is how the court viewed it:

“Oregon Wild pointed out in its EA comments that “[f]uel treatments have a modest effect on fire behavior, and could even make fire worse instead of better.” It averred that removing mature trees is especially likely to have a net negative effect on fire suppression. Importantly, the organization pointed to expert studies and research reviews that support this assertion

Oregon Wild also pointed out in its EA comments that fuel reduction does not necessarily suppress fire. Indeed, it asserted that “[s]ome fuel can actually help reduce fire, such as deciduous hardwoods that act as heat sinks (under some conditions), and dense canopy fuels that keep the forest cool and moist and help suppress the growth of surface and ladder fuels . . . .” Oregon Wild cited more than ten expert sources supporting this view.”

Even the fuels report by the Forest Service acknowledged the possibility of increased fire severity. The court held (emphasis added):

“In its responses to these comments and in its finding of no significant impact, the USFS reiterated its conclusions about vegetation management but did not engage with the substantial body of research cited by Appellants. Failing to meaningfully consider contrary sources in the EA weighs against a finding that the agency met NEPA’s “hard look” requirement as to the decision not to prepare an EIS. This dispute is of substantial consequence because variable density thinning is planned in the entire Project area, and fire management is a crucial issue that has wide-ranging ecological impacts and affects human life.”

The opinion is short and worth reading as a good example of how not to approach NEPA effects analysis (i.e. “let’s make this fit into an EA instead of an EIS”).  The court cited 9th Circuit precedent for this requirement: “To demonstrate a substantial dispute, appellants must show that “evidence from numerous experts” undermines the agency’s conclusions.” The court is not choosing the science; only faulting the Forest Service for ignoring conflicting views that it found rose to a level of scientific controversy.  Under NEPA, evidence of scientific controversy requires an EIS to fully explore how the use of that science may be important to determining environmental impacts.

Let’s Talk About Specific CE’s in the Rissien Report: I. Ecotonal Habitat Restoration Project

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It seems to me that the Forest Service does projects in a variety of ways, and they are criticized for the way they do them. This is particularly interesting with CE’s, because you can criticize 1) their use in a given situation, 2) the amount of public involvement and/or 3) the level of analysis 4) probably other things. But I think it would be more useful, perhaps, to look at the use of specific CE’s in specific places and ask the question “what would you have done instead?”. We have all kinds of people, from all kinds of backgrounds, on The Smokey Wire and so I think it will be interesting to see how much we agree, or not. I wrote to Adam Rissien, the author of the report, and he gave me information on five projects he highlighted (he will send us the report when it’s available). One more point that I think is important. The Missoulian story as posted by Jon here, said:

Rissien used Forest Service postings to tally all the logging and/or burning projects proposed for the past quarter – January through March – where forest managers had applied a “categorical exclusion” to avoid the public process normally required by law.

It seems to me that logging probably needs a definition (usually commercial, so selling of trees), but I don’t know that many people who are against prescribed burning. I’m sure folks want to be involved in reviewing PB projects, sure, but I wonder how many PB projects without mechanical treatment have actually been litigated? So that’s probably worth looking at also- what activities are actually included in the project. Since Rissien had added up acres, and some projects did not mention acres, this was a problem for him.

So let’s start with the Ecotonal Habitat Restoration Project on the Custer Gallatin National Forest in Region 1. Here’s a link to the scoping notice, it’s seven pages and has a great deal of concise information in tables. They took public comment via the scoping notice, and expect a decision in May or June. Many folks who use CE’s write a short response to comments, but we don’t have that nor the analysis documentation yet.

Purpose: Bringing ecotonal communities toward NRV

What activities?

Management options (Figure 2) that would be available to maintain or restore ecotonal ommunities across the CGNF could include but are not limited to:
* Removal and/or piling and burning of small conifers with hand crews
* Using mechanical equipment to cut and pile conifers: followed by pile burning. Alternately, mechanical equipment could be utilized to masticate(chip) conifers
*Girdling (killing the tree but leaving it standing) larger conifers –
*Prescribed fire (preceded by cutting down conifers where allowed but leaving them
laying within the stand for fuel to carry a fire)
* Patch cutting or thinning; this could include piling and burning or removal of commercially sized conifers using a service or timber sale contract
* Cutting hardwoods to stimulate suckering, daylight, and/or provide physical barriers protecting hardwoods from browsing where needed
* Root separation (break up lateral roots at some distance from the parent aspen trees using mechanical equipment and a single shank ripping attachment run along the contour on
suitable sites)
* Protection from browsing (including, but not limited to fencing or directional felling) –
* Re—activating floodplains and elevating water tables in waterways using natural materials and accepted methods to restore or enhance riparian vegetation, floodplain function, and
stream bank stability (6.g. simulated beaver dams (beaver dam analogs), large woody debris introduction, and bioengineering techniques).

Project implementation would be ongoing and could span 10to 15 plus years. We expect this management decision will result in 6-10 specific projects implemented annually across the
forest. Projects would typically range in size from several acres to a few hundred acres. It is anticipated some projects could cumulatively exceed a thousand or more acres for the following
reason(s):
* Lower intensity habitat management activities could be pursued over a larger area versus higher intensity treatments within smaller areas.
* Topography, aspect,or the existence of natural barriers enables prescribed fire to accomplish multiple treatments/objectives over a larger area.
* Funding opportunities make it possible to pursue larger restoration efforts.

In the scoping notice, they quoted the CE category:

36 CFR220.6(e)(6)
“Timber stand and/0r wildlife improvement activities which do not include the use of
herbicides or do not require more than one mile of low standard road construction”.
Examples include but are not limited to:
a. Girdling trees to create snags.
Thinning or brush control to improve growth or to reduce fire hazard including the opening of an existing road to a dense timber stand
c. Prescribed burning to control understory hardwoods in stands of southern pine.
d. Prescribed burning to reduce natural fuel build—up and improve vigor.

And mentioned extraordinary circumstances:

If it is determined that the degree of potential effects of approving this programmatic would result in the existence of extraordinary circumstances, further environmental analysis and documentation may be warranted.

What would you do differently? Are your concerns about the acreage (seems to be open for prescribed burning opportunities)? Having PB or commercial timber harvest as a part of this decision? Which activities? Programmatic nature? Amount of public involvement? What do you think is “just right” analysis and public involvement? Do you think it would be OK to use this CE for these projects, but not as programmatic? Do you think the activities should be grouped differently for analysis? Or different activities should be analyzed at different spatial scales? Do you think it would make sense to standardize the way these analyses are done, by district, forest, region, FS and BLM or ??

Western Governors Ask Forest Service and BLM for Covid Help/ A Look at Prep for Pandemic Response

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From E&E news:

The Western Governors’ Association, in a letter sent today to Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Pete Gaynor, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, raised concerns that the spread of the virus could overwhelm rural communities that have “limited staff capacity.”

But the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service have “thousands of federal civil servants with relevant experience to assist with emergency response,” according to the letter signed by North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum (R), WGA’s chairman, and Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (D), the vice chairwoman.

Many of these thousands of employees “are Incident Command System qualified and have experience rapidly responding to forest fires, mobilizing critical resources, and managing information flow in times of crisis,” they wrote.

“Likewise, Federal Emergency Management Agency personnel are fully qualified to support local communities with organizational and logistical needs during an emergency,” they added. “Collectively, your personnel are an enormous asset that could be of invaluable assistance to local communities in this time of great need.”

The request for Gaynor to coordinate with Bernhardt and Perdue to mobilize BLM and Forest Service officials mirrors a letter sent last month to all three Cabinet members from a group of 24 senators (E&E Daily, March 18).

That bipartisan letter, organized by Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet (D), requested assistance from BLM and the Forest Service to help rural communities that are “working to set up local emergency operation centers to help manage their response” to the coronavirus.

For people familiar with organizing wildfire suppression efforts, I thought it would be interesting to post this news story from the Colorado Sun on preparations for pandemics. The writer, John Ingold, looks at the Crimson Contagion exercise from last October, and what was found in the after-action review. You get the feeling that the public health community was doing its best, but it is as if there were fires once every decade or so..it would be exceedingly difficult to organize across state, federal and local levels. In addition, you might have trained up for wildfire and found out at the last minute that it wasn’t the kind of fire you had been trained for. Here’s an excerpt, but the whole article gives a glimpse into the difficulties.

The nationwide Crimson Contagion exercise this past summer was the kind of regular training that used to provide reassurance the nation would be ready should a pandemic ever hit our shores. The training pulled together 19 federal departments and agencies, 12 states including Colorado, 74 local health departments, 15 tribal nations and 87 hospitals. And it gave each of those entities an early — and eerily prescient — chance to practice how to respond to the situation they all now face.

But, in retrospect, the training also revealed the flawed assumptions that informed state and national preparedness for decades and have now made the United States a global epicenter for the coronavirus pandemic. The country was not prepared to scale up testing fast enough for a new virus. Its national stockpile of medical supplies wasn’t equipped to handle large requests from many states at the same time.

Colorado health leaders are now speaking more bluntly about how the nation’s pandemic planning did not anticipate the challenges of the coronavirus.
“None of this is built around the fact that we’re all going to get hit at once and there is no federal support,” said Scott Bookman, CDPHE’s incident commander for the response to COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. “The federal system has failed us here.”
There is another reason that the state and federal governments developed blind spots in pandemic planning, a simple theme that ties together many of the problems that have hindered response to the coronavirus: We were preparing for the wrong virus.

The Department of Interior E-bike Rules: the Next Step, Public Comment on BLM, FWS and BoR

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Thanks to Brian Hawthorne for this link to an E&E News story.

The proposed rules unveiled today by NPS, BLM, FWS and Reclamation come in response to an order Interior Secretary David Bernhardt signed last August directing the agencies to develop policies for e-bike usage as part of a strategy to increase access to public lands.

Bernhardt clarified his intent in a second order issued last fall that directed BLM, FWS and Reclamation to follow the National Park Service’s lead and allow e-bikes where appropriate (E&E News PM, Oct. 22, 2019).

The proposed rules unveiled today would not allow e-bikes where they are already prohibited, such as in wilderness areas.

  • BLM’s proposed rule would add e-bikes to its off-road vehicle regulations. Doing so would allow individual bureau land managers to authorize, or prohibit, the use of e-bikes on BLM lands.”We want all Americans to have a chance to create life-long memories exploring and enjoying the great outdoors,” BLM acting Director William Perry Pendley said in a statement.
  • The Fish and Wildlife Service’s proposed rule would open the door to allowing e-bikes at the nearly 200 national wildlife refuges it manages that already allow non-motorized bicycling. The wildlife refuge managers would be required to determine that e-bikes are “a compatible use on roads or trails.””If approved, the rule will make it easier for visitors to explore these amazing places, with a bit of added assistance, if they need it,” FWS Director Aurelia Skipwith said in a statement.
  • The Bureau of Reclamation’s proposed rule would, like BLM’s proposal, add a definition of e-bikes to off-road regulations on Reclamation sites.”This is an important rule that will give more Americans access to lands that they may not have been able to access before,” Reclamation Commissioner Brenda Burman said in a statement.
  • NPS did not release a copy of its proposed rule, as the other three agencies did. But in a press release announcing the rule, the park service said the rule would “define the term ‘electric bicycle’ and allow superintendents to authorize e-bike use — generally “where traditional bicycles” are already allowed. That would include “public roads, parking areas, administrative roads and trails,” it said.

 

I looked at the BLM proposed regulation for an explanation of what it does and found this:

This proposed rule would not, on its own, change the existing allowances for ebike usage on BLM-administered public lands. In other words, no additional e-bike use would be allowed on BLM-administered public lands as a direct result of this proposed rule becoming effective. Rather, the proposed rule directs the BLM to specifically consider e-bike usage in future land use planning or implementation-level decisions. This new paragraph also provides the authorized officer with discretion to determine whether e-bike use generally, or the use of certain classes of e-bikes, would be inappropriate on certain roads or trails. While the BLM believes that increasing public access to public lands through the use of e-bikes would generally be appropriate on roads and trails upon which mechanized, non-motorized use is permitted, there are certain instances where that is not the case. For example, some trails may be particularly steep or narrow and the use of an e-bike at speeds higher than originally intended could present a danger to some users. In some situations, legislation or a presidential proclamation may restrict motorized use of a trail. Another example of where e-bike use might be limited is a non-motorized trail that originates on BLM public land and feeds into a trail system under the jurisdiction of another agency that does not allow e-bike use on that trail.

Proposed paragraph (d) of this section would allow the BLM the flexibility to utilize local knowledge and determine the propriety of e-bike use on site-specific basis.

It appears to be a rule that defines the categories of e-bikes, and gives e-bikes their own definition outside of other motorized vehicles, generally encourages them where bikes are allowed, and leaves the ultimate discretion to the local official. There are four separate rules, NPS, BLM, FWS, and Bureau of Reclamation. It will be interesting to see if they come out differently. What do you think, is it better to a) have a rule like this that makes distinctions between classes of bike, and between them and other motorized vehicles and encourages local officials to incorporate them, b) have a rule like this (with definitions) that is neutral or discouraging, or c) not have a rule at all, like the Forest Service (I guess?). Not sure what FS policies are currently vis a vis e-bikes. I wonder if it would make sense to try to harmonize the FS somewhat with BLM, at least in western States. Here’s a Dec 19 story about e-bikes on the White Mountain in New Hampshire.

Science Friday: When is Research Useful and Who Decides? Uncertainty and Current Decisions

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A pretty view of picnic grounds on Homestake Road (1890) Library of Congress https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2004665560/

Jon made a comment yesterday that I think is worth exploring in detail. He said:

If this is just a compilation of existing data, that’s one thing. If this will be their basis for future planning, and they are saying they are going to ignore future climate change, it might be hard to argue that’s the best available science.

I’m sure that no one wants to “ignore climate science.” On the other hand, how exactly should specific pieces of climate science be applied to a decision? Who makes that call? In the past, when the topic was less adversarial (say reforestation practices), the National Forests hired experts who would make that determination and decide what Forests should do. Now, I’m sure it won’t surprise you that even with these less-charged kinds of decisions, there was sometimes disagreement between practitioners and researchers (as well as within each community). But most of the time these did not boil over into public spats as it was taken for granted that the authority to decide lay with the local technical expert. Researchers were content to publish, and practitioners were content to pick the best approaches based on experience. Many times FS researchers and National Forests worked closely together in what we might call today “co-design and coproduction”. Today, though, we have broader questions, with more disciplines involved, so that there may not be one “expert,” and the public wants to understand the scientific questions where they have policy relevance. Both of those changes present challenges.

As I’ve argued before, we don’t have a clue as to how microclimates perceived by trees will change due to climate change, and we also don’t know how those changes might affect living trees, nor do we know how those changes might affect their offspring. Remember, climate models as used for projecting future conditions have economics as an input. I think, reading the views of experts right now, they have no clue how much the Coronavirus may set back worldwide economies and emissions. If you run out this string of cumulative cluelessness about the future, it becomes a decision question for stakeholders and decisionmakers- we don’t know, so how should that uncertainty affect our decisions? We also don’t have a clue as to whether trade policies will let an invasive diseases or insects into the US which will decimate the ponderosa pines on the BH. The future, is indeed, unknown and uncertain. In fact, there are decision sciences that research how best to decide under conditions of uncertainty.

So, what to do about our cluelessness about future tree growth? I belong to what I might call the Pete Theisen school. He was the R-6 Regional Geneticist who said that additional growth due to tree improvement would come out in future measurements, so we shouldn’t try to model it in growth and yield models. Applying that to climate change, we would measure tree growth every ten years or so (or whatever the cycle is today) and incorporate that into future decisions. What we might call “monitoring the forest plan.” As we would then instances of insects, diseases, and fires.

But as Jon points out, we also have the question of what is the “best available science?”. We’d have to ask “who decides what is best? Based on what criteria?”. Peter Williams has spoken of the concept of “research utility.” I like that approach because it involves practitioners and stakeholders in determining whether a study is useful or relevant to the decisions that, at least on public lands, are essentially public decisions.

For me, the “best science” of tree growth in the Black Hills is what people have recently measured, knowing that it could change due to climate change or a variety of other factors, unknown, uncertain or unknowable.

The popularity of categorical exclusions

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WildEarth Guardians noticed that the Forest Service is approving more and more vegetation management projects using categorical exclusions from NEPA procedures:  “a category of actions which do not individually or cumulatively have a significant effect on the human environment.”  They decided to do a little research, and found someone to report on it.

Rissien used Forest Service postings to tally all the logging and/or burning projects proposed for the past quarter – January through March – where forest managers had applied a “categorical exclusion” to avoid the public process normally required by law.

For just those three months, 58 national forests– that’s three-quarters of the forests in the West – proposed 175 projects that would affect around 4 million acres.

Rissien found, during the past quarter, USFS Region 4 – which covers southern Idaho, Nevada and Utah – proposed four projects that exceeded 100,000 acres each. One was 900,000 acres alone.

USFS Region 1, which includes Montana, northern Idaho and North Dakota, proposed 30 projects with CE’s last quarter, totaling more than 215,000 acres.

Logging projects intended to reduce insect or disease infestation or reduce hazardous fuels can be as large as 3,000 acres with some limitations. One CE created by the Forest Service for “timber stand and/or wildlife habitat improvement” has no acreage limit. Rissien found the Forest Service uses that for a majority of projects, and doesn’t even give a reason for others.

(There is also the “road maintenance” CE that has been the subject of litigation, including EPIC v. Carlson, here.)

There are some things to question in the article, but the slant of the article is not so much that what the Forest Service is doing is illegal, but that it is being done without much public information or awareness.  The article also points out that the Forest Service just seems to be following its marching orders from the president.  Tracking through the links gets you to this letter from the acting deputy chief, which says:

Consistent with this direction, Regional Foresters are to ensure that the Agency meet minimum statutory timeframes for completion of National Environmental Policy Act documentation and consultation with regulatory agencies. Categorical exclusions to complete this work should be the first choice and used whenever possible. I encourage you to explore creative methods and set clear expectations to realize this priority effort.

There’s a few points to make here.  I’m not aware of any “minimum statutory timeframes” for NEPA or consultation (the consulting agencies do have a deadline for providing a biological opinion).  I would translate “explore creative methods” into “take legal risks.”  Artificial deadlines aren’t creative, but they also result in legal risks.  Last is the implication that the use of categorical exclusions somehow avoids the need for an administrative record that shows that the use of the categorical exclusion isn’t arbitrary – that it fits the requirements of the category and does not have any extraordinary circumstances that could result in significant effects.  The lack of public review or an administrative objection process may save time, and it forces an opponent to sue, but it increases the risk of losing the case on an issue that could have been resolved before the decision.  (But if it gets points on the board during the game, does it matter what happens after?)  WEG said, “But we have to take their word for it since there is no supporting analysis we can review.”  If that’s what is really happening, it would eventually be a problem for the Forest Service in court.

Feds and States and Parks and Forests and Visitors and Coronavirus.. Oh My!

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March 31, 2020 Colorado’s Mueller State Park
I’ve been trying to piece together coverage of the challenge to “get outside” but “stay at home,” including the specifics about the reasoning behind different State/Federal management of outdoor activities..

It’s hard to pick apart. There have been a variety of stories about why the National Parks should all be closed. Basically the story seems to be that the Interior Secretary should close them all, whereas the current policy appears to be decided locally (with some exceptions: for example, Rocky Mountain was closed early based on local concerns, Grand Canyon just a few days ago, despite the Secretary having been asked earlier).

Bill Gabbert in Wildfire Today had an explanation for why they should be closed:

Most of the NPS visitor centers are closed, but parks that are still open while entrance fees are suspended can still attract visitors to trails and viewpoints. Unless a park is physically closed by gates, park law enforcement officers still have to patrol in order to avoid the mayhem that occurred when employees were prevented from working during the government shutdown last year.

There has been much pushback to making Parks free during this time, but it does seem that would limit contact (not collecting fees). I would tend to think that some parks tend to have visitor problems and others not. I haven’t seen a report (yet, though it may be out there) of a park by park estimate of damage due to the government shutdown. As I said then, we have millions of acres of federal lands without regular law enforcement patrols on trails -FS and BLM- and I still wonder what it is about people who go to which National Parks and why they behave badly. With appropriate social science studies at the time, we might have learned more about this.

Outside Magazine ran this piece (which adheres to the same thinking as during the government shutdown):

Writing about all of this now is eerily reminiscent of writing about the shutdown’s impact on national parks last year. Then, we had reports of overcrowding and damage, followed by calls from various lawmakers and conservation organizations for a total closure. And then people started dying. Now, we have reports of social distancing measures not being followed, confusion over which services may or may not be available, and everyone from staff within the parks to lawmakers calling for a closure. At least people haven’t started dying in the parks, yet.

I’m not confused over whether services might be available.. I just look on the Park or Monument’s website. Again, are people who go to Parks less able to use the internet?
They argue that all should be closed for the safety of employees and gateway communities. And many, but not all, are closed. And many are big “destination” parks or monuments, but many are not. And some are close to communities. Two examples in Colorado are Florissant Fossil Beds and Colorado National Monument. So we might think it’s OK for locals to walk around (as long as they obey distancing guidelines) but not those from afar. But how far afar? And how would that be enforced?

Here’s what Florissant Fossil Beds says..

Give Some Space to Keep Safe
The trails at Florissant Fossil Beds are currently open. The park continues to monitor the COVID-19 situation and maintains high standards related to the health and wellness of staff and visitors. There is a pit toilet located in the visitor center parking lot which is currently the only restroom facility. It is being cleaned once a day M – F.

There’s the crowding concern (people not keeping their distance), the toilet concern (someone, employee or contractor, is cleaning them; people are going into them) and the travel concern. I think the idea is that people shouldn’t be traveling certain distances for fear of spreading or acquiring the virus at gas stations, bathrooms or other sites they otherwise wouldn’t go to. But suppose you have an electric car and don’t use inside toilets? Here’s a thought piece in High Country News about the ethics of getting outside.

Meanwhile, our Colorado State Parks are open:

Park visitor centers and CPW Area Offices also remain closed to the public at this time.
All Colorado State Parks non-campground outdoor areas of parks, including trails, boat ramps, marinas and shorelines remain open.
Please use cpwshop.com or the park’s self-service stations to purchase passes for day use.

Restrooms remain open and are regularly cleaned at this time.
Please bring your own hand sanitizer. There may be no running water available.

Are Colorado State employees calling for park shutdowns, but it’s not being reported?
Are people visiting Colorado’s state parks more well-behaved than people who go to National Parks?
Is the worry employees cleaning toilets, visitors exchanging germs in toilets, employees doing law enforcement, people behaving badly vis a vis social distancing or ?. Most FS trails where I am are not crowded and don’t have toilets, so it seems reasonable to keep them open. Of course, there is the pragmatic problem of how you would “close” a Forest and whether sending people out to enforce it is more unhealthy for employees than letting visitors infect each other. There are certainly many considerations that managers have not had the opportunity to consider before, many unknowns, and I for one would feel uncomfortable second-guessing local folks making the decisions.

Black Hills Timber Growth and Yield Draft General Technical Report- Including Stakeholders/Tribes/Public in Peer Review

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Thanks to the Norbeck Society for posting a link to this recent draft report on the Black Hills as part of the comments on Steve’s post yesterday.

One of the interesting things about this paper is the peer review process- internal, external, and stakeholders and the public- the review period is from 3/15 to 4/15. I think it’s a great idea to have a variety of perspectives. Some of the most rigorous scientific reviews I’ve seen are when people with different opinions, interests, and experiences on the ground review a paper.

A key point from page 4.

These findings are dependent on estimates of standing live volume, tree growth rates, and especially mortality rates disclosed by Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) data. Future climate, weather, mountain pine beetle activity, and wildfire are unknown and potential forest dynamics and growth can only be inferred from past conditions.

These are almost the exact words I used in another thread- perhaps these scientists’ inclination is that the future may not be like the past, but it’s the best data we have. Perhaps that’s a disciplinary perspective, or the effect of watching trees grow and views about the future change over the latst 40 years or so. The reason I’m pointing this out is that scientists from different disciplines or inclination might have chosen to try to predict future impacts of insects, fire, climate and so on, and then claimed that those projections/guesses/assumptions were the “best science.” Since this is an important topic to a wide array of stakeholders, in my experience, concerns about the future might be better dealt with through some group scenario discussion/planning exercise.

The Forest Service in the Stimulus Bill

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I believe it was Bill Timko who found these references to the Forest Service in the Stimulus Bill. So thanks to him for that! It can be found on the NAFSR (National Association of Forest Service Retirees) website here.

Side note: NAFSR started a Twitter feed a while back that is full of interesting information. Here’s a link.

RELATED AGENCIES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE
FOREST SERVICE
FOREST AND RANGELAND RESEARCH
For an additional amount for ‘‘Forest and Rangeland Research’’, $3,000,000, to remain available until September 30, 2021, to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus, domestically or internationally, including for the reestablishment of abandoned or failed experiments associated with employee restrictions due to the coronavirus outbreak: Provided, That amounts provided under this heading in this Act shall be allocated at the discretion of the Chief of the Forest Service: Provided further, That such amount is designated by the Congress as being for an
emergency requirement pursuant to section 251(b)(2)(A)(i) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.

NATIONAL FOREST SYSTEM
For an additional amount for ‘‘National Forest System’’, $34,000,000, to remain available until September 30, 2021, to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus, domestically or internationally, including for cleaning and disinfecting of public recreation amenities and for personal protective equipment and baseline health testing for first responders: Provided, That amounts provided under this heading in this Act shall be allocated at the discretion of the Chief of the Forest Service: Provided further, That such amount is designated by the Congress as being for an emergency requirement pursuant to section 251(b)(2)(A)(i) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.

CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT AND MAINTENANCE
For an additional amount for ‘‘Capital Improvement and Maintenance’’, $26,800,000, to remain available until September 30, 2021, to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus, domestically or internationally, including for janitorial services: Provided, That amounts provided under this heading in this Act shall be allocated at the discretion of the Chief of the
Forest Service: Provided further, That such amount is designated by the Congress as being for an emergency requirement pursuant to section 251(b)(2)(A)(i) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.

WILDLAND FIRE MANAGEMENT
For an additional amount for ‘‘Wildland Fire Management’’, $7,000,000, to remain available until September 30, 2021, to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus, domestically or internationally, including for personal protective equipment and baseline health testing for first responders: Provided, That amounts provided under this heading in this Act
shall be allocated at the discretion of the Chief of the Forest Service: Provided further, That such amount is designated by the Congress as being for an emergency requirement pursuant to section 251(b)(2)(A)(i) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.