As part of Thanksgiving, I am going to thank all the federal employees who have been working under stressful conditions, including during the shutdown.
This post is a public service announcement. When I attended the Retirees’ Reunion in Missoula, it happened that I spent an evening with former coworkers. A topic of discussion that came up was getting Social Security Benefits and how that interacted with OPM pensions. It turns out that the rules have changed. I’m a widow and was told by the Social Security folks when my husband died in 2012 that I couldn’t get his Social Security because I was getting a federal pension at a certain level. I accepted this and went on.
Thanks to my former coworkers (many, many thanks!), I found out that the rules had changed, but the Social Security Administration did not notify people impacted.. you had to figure it out by paying attention- which I clearly hadn’t. When you reapply, they go back six months, not the whole time period, so it pays to get your application in as soon as possible.
As it happens, I did all this during the shutdown and even visited the local Social Security office to turn in forms. The employees there were great.. acknowledged that things had slowed down and some things weren’t being done, but were very helpful nonetheless. Finally, somehow Social Security and OPM communicated (without help from me) and changed it so that Medicare payments are switched from my pension to Social Security without a period of double payments.
Anyway, if you are in this situation or know of someone who might be, it would be worth it to check. Maybe it’s highly unusual. Maybe it’s an artifact of the CSRS system which is not used by newer employees. But it can make a serious difference in peoples’ income, so there’s that.
Don’t blame me.. I’m not the person who appointed a Senior Advisor at the Forest Service who has written a book.. Given that Ken Verheyen has, inquiring minds want to know “what can we tell about what value he will bring to the Forest Service based on this book?” Just so you know, I’ll be moderating the comments carefully.
I’m going to address his book in three parts: 1) a very brief summary translated into generic spirituality, 2) some interesting stories in the book, and my ideas for how they may be related to the question above “what of value does Ken bring to the FS table, and if he asked us, what would be our advice to him?” Finally there is 3) a deeper theological dive for the one or two people out there interested in that- that can be skipped for most folks.
I. Summary: I know Bible Christian terminology can be off-putting to many, so I translated into Generic Spiritual language.
Life is better if you align with the Source, and have an open heart. Success is not about money, power and possessions, but about how loving you are to each and every human being and how you treat them.
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II. Stories that Ken tells about himself.
It’s fairly unusual for an appointee to write a book that includes their personal struggles, but here it is. Ken started at his Dad’s company and worked his way up. He’s pretty open about mistakes he made.. what we might call “over-marketing” and working too much, and how he realized what was wrong through prayer and the support of his spiritual community. Of course, if being with your family is one of your principles, perhaps you can’t take particular kinds of jobs like wildland firefighting. There are also stories about treating employees well, forgiving them for betraying the company, and giving them options to stay on when they are old and not performing well. I think these are all stories that resonate with us to some degree. At the same time, what a corporate board might agree to in terms of generosity might not be a good use of taxpayer resources.
One story he tells is how people wanted coaching and mentoring from him, and how he felt having a desk he felt interfered with that.
“One weekend, I dropped by a Pottery Barn and purchased two identical expensive and oversized leather chairs for my office. from then on, whenever someone asked to “have a word” with me, I led him or her to the comfy leather chairs situated in the corner of my office. I wanted to talk as equals, as fellow travelers down this road called life.
And this is what I have been doing for the last fifteen years. I listen to whatever is on people’s minds and in their hearts. Then I encourage them to find their purpose in life, how to handle their business or navigate their marriage and family. When the opportunity presents itself, I share one, two or three, or all of the Super Six verses God gave me.”
This reminded me of the character Deanna Troi on Star Trek: The Next Generation, the ship’s counselor. But Feds don’t have an equivalent position, and Deanna wasn’t upfront about her own spiritual values as I recall. I also imagined a new political trying to “drop by Pottery Barn” and buy something without layers of approvals. Maybe they have special rules or lack thereof.. I don’t know.
In the book, he talks about his spiritual gift being encouragement. Certainly after the last few years (beginning with the budget-no temps problem of 2024, layoffs, the shutdown and proposed reorganization) employees could use some encouragement. But as a cog in the Administration machine, what could he do? The ultimate quandary of a middle manager.. which he was once. I’d be interested in how he handled those situations as a middle manager.But I wonder what employees would trust a member of the Admin? Then there is the question of “Evangelophobia” which my Progressive Christian friends seem to have, so I would expect many others do. Could that wall be broken down with goodwill on both sides?
Of course, I have an idea how he could be helpful. He could find some employees and lead a listening tour of FS units (not online, no recordings) organized somehow so that people felt safe. We used to do that on Forest reviews, meet with employees separately. They could then write a report on what employee concerns were and how they could be addressed or not, and give feedback to the employees on what would be done or not done. Since I would guess that most employees are affiliated with Ds more or less, they would take a great deal of partisan flack, but beyond that and deeper would come ideas for improvement.
Anyway, that’s how I’d use a person with that particular talent. At the end of the book, he has a list of 100 values to live by, based on the Golden Rule. I wish he would publish those for free online somewhere (maybe it is) because they are so specific that they challenge us in ways that maybe we haven’t previously considered. One relevant example comes to mind, #38 “I will respect your religious beliefs because I want you to respect mine.”
In federal service, we don’t talk about the specifics of our religious beliefs except when we leave “work” space and enter “friend” space. Most political appointees have always understood this. I think it’s absolutely inappropriate for Secretary Rollins to quote scripture in her X feed.
How would she feel if the next Sec of Ag quoted the Quran or the Book of Mormon, or the Upanishads?
Anyway, my advice would be for the new appointee to practice being helpful to people without the specifics of his own religious beliefs.
III. Ken has six go-to Bible verses that he calls the Super Six. He talks about them in the Christian context, but remember Jesus was a Jew, and so were his followers during the early periods so it’s not particularly surprising that they are Jewish ideas.
1. Matthew 6:33 NASB (that’s the Bible version he uses). “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and everything will be added unto you.” That’s what Ken uses, but the same idea is found in the Hebrew Bible Psalm 37:4 “Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart.” It seems likely that most spiritual traditions have some form of this alignment with the Divine, in whatever form or formlessness that tradition defines.
2. Matthew 20:26-28 (NASB) “whosoever will be great among you shall be your servant.” Some of us may remember the concepts of Greenleaf’s Servant Leadership book in 1977. Based on a quick search on Amazon, it appears that there have been quite a few books written on the topic. According to this website (who knows if it’s true?)
The idea of servant leadership came to Robert K. Greenleaf, a retired AT&T executive, after reading Hermann Hesse’s novel Journey to the East. The storyline is simple: A group of men heads out on a mythical journey accompanied by their servant Leo, who sustains the group with his song and spirit. After Leo disappears, the group falls apart, and the journey is abandoned. Years later, the narrator of the story finds out that Leo was in fact the head of the order that had sponsored the journey. He wasn’t just a servant—he was the guiding spirit, their great leader.
I know Forest Service folks who took these ideas to heart and spoke of them in the workplace, but got to them via Greenleaf instead of (or in addition to, I never asked) Matthew.
3. Colossians 3:17 (NASB) Whatsoever you do in word and deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to him through God the Father.” Regardless of who wrote Colossians (which scriptural scholars contest). I wonder what it means to “do it all in the name of”. I would prefer maybe “align yourself with the Divine and be grateful.” It could seem a little repetitive of 1, but adds the “as you do everything” part.
4. 1 Chronicles 29:11-13 (NIV). It’s longer, but the point is that God is the head over all and God is the ruler of all things. While again, Chronicles is part of the Hebrew Bible that Christians call the “Old” Testament, so again it’s not a uniquely Christian idea.
5. Malachi 3:10-12 (NIV) This is about tithing, and the point is that blessings will happen, and your crops will do better, if you tithe. Once again, this is from the Hebrew Bible, is post-exilic and is generally focused on improving the behavior of the Jewish community.
Which brings us to #6, Luke 6:31 (NASB): “Treat others the same way you would want them to treat you”. This reminds me of a Hillel story (remember Hillel predated Jesus)
When someone challenged Hillel the Elder (b. 110 BCE) to teach the entire Torah while his listener stood on one foot, he famously replied, “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the entire Torah, and the rest is commentary. Now go and study.
Now there have been many interesting discussions about the negative vs. the positive formulation (do treat others as you want to be treated, don’t treat others as you don’t want to be treated). Still for me, at least, it’s very hard work either way it’s formulated. And of course, the Golden Rule idea is common across almost all traditions, regardless of variation in other beliefs.
To summarize, I think “both things are true” about these spiritual values. Each expression of these truths (say, Ken’s) is unique and valuable, and, at the same time, there are underlying commonalities across traditions. If we are to welcome this new person to our world (in the spirit of the Golden Rule) as we would want to be welcomed, we shouldn’t be distracted by his language or beliefs (or currents of Evangelophobia in our society). At the same time, he should be respectful of others’ beliefs and of the culture of federal agencies that has served us well these many years.
The proposed project includes Variable Density Thinning, which was at issue in a court decision of a 2020 project on the Mt. Hood National Forest, the Crystal Clear Restoration Project, which we have discussed before, such as here. A significant portion of the Crystal Clear project area burned not long after the 9th Circuit’s decision, in the 2020 White River fire. I’ve heard anecdotal info on the specific areas of the Crystal Clear project that burned, and at what intensity/severity, but haven’t seen documentation. Anyone have access to such info?
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Dear friends and neighbors of the Willamette National Forest,
The McKenzie River Ranger District on the Willamette National Forest, in collaboration with the Oregon Department of Forestry using the Good Neighbor Authority (GNA), is beginning the planning process for the Tie Project. The project area encompasses 36,982 acres and is located on the McKenzie River District of the Willamette National Forest, about 5 miles east of McKenzie Bridge in Linn and Lane Counties (see attached vicinity map). The project website is located at: https://www.fs.usda.gov/r06/willamette/projects/68829.
The purpose and need for this project includes, (1) Providing a sustainable timber supply to support local economies, (2) Reducing wildfire risk through strategic thinning and shaded fuel breaks, (3) Improving forest health and resilience by enhancing forest structure, species diversity, and stand density, and (4) Maintaining and improving road systems for management, recreation, and wildfire response.
To meet the purpose and need, the proposed action would treat up to 7,898 acres (6,108 acres of variable density thinning, including 772 acres of roadside shaded fuel breaks overlapping with thinning units; and 1,790 acres of roadside shaded fuel breaks) within the McKenzie River Ranger District through:
Variable Density Thinning: This treatment meets objectives by improving wildlife and plant habitats, increasing structural and compositional diversity, boosting resilience to insects, disease, or other stressors, and enhancing aesthetic values in stands that are currently lacking spatial variability. The “skips and gaps” method of variable density thinning is flexible, allowing for the preservation of unique habitat features leading to greater landscape diversity. Areas that are not thinned (“skips”) will protect existing features by excluding logging activity. “Gaps” are created to closely approximate natural disturbance regimes, like landslides and fires, through harvest of small patches of trees. Gaps create diversity and increase growth and crown lengths of neighboring trees. Furthermore, gaps may be created in locations that favor underrepresented tree species that are either already present or may be planted after treatment to increase landscape diversity. Areas that are not within skips or gaps, are thinned to encourage growth and development of the overstory trees and understory plants.
Roadside Shaded Fuel Breaks: This treatment creates fuel breaks along key roads and corridors to provide firefighters with opportunities to improve their effectiveness and safety, prevent further wildfire spread, and protect resource values at risk from wildfire. A shaded fuel break selectively removes vegetation in the treatment area to a specified spacing that allows safe firefighting operations while maintaining an overstory. This treatment favors the growth of large native species by removing the understory, ladder fuels (fuels that enable a wildfire to climb to an overstory tree or canopy), and invasive species to improve fire suppression capabilities and reduce risk to firefighters. Shaded fuel breaks favorably modify wildfire behavior while providing the foundation for a healthy and resilient forest.
Road System Improvements: These improvements will provide maintenance of existing roads for safe access and will build temporary roads to support harvest operations. Temporary roads will be decommissioned after use to reduce environmental impacts.
An Environmental Assessment will be prepared in accordance with the Interim final rule issued on July 3. 2025 (Federal Register: National Environmental Policy Act) to guide planning, inform decision-making, and ensure transparency with the public. The assessment will evaluate potential environmental, social, and cultural impacts of the proposed actions, providing a solid foundation for determining how the project should proceed. By taking a focused approach to this analysis, we can concentrate on the most critical issues, streamline the planning process, and increase the efficiency and effectiveness of project development.
A community meeting will be held to provide information and gather feedback about the project:
Date: December 4, 2025
Time: 6- 8pm
Location: McKenzie Fire and Rescue Training Center 42870 McKenzie Highway Leaburg, OR 97489
Your input is a vital part of our planning process. It helps us consider alternative approaches to achieving the project’s purpose and need, as well as determine the scope of our Environmental Analysis. When submitting comments, please focus on the potential effects of specific proposed project activities. We are interested in your thoughts on how the project may impact natural, cultural, and community resources and which issues should be prioritized in our analysis.
Comments received by December 26th, 2025, will be most helpful as we finalize the design of the project and evaluate its potential effects. Comments should be site-specific and directly related to the proposed activities and project area. If you reference supporting materials, please include the source and explain its relevance to the project.
Comments may be submitted through the project website, by mail, or in person during the community meeting. Comments received, including the names and addresses of those who comment, will be considered part of the public record for this project and will be available for public review.
Mailed to McKenzie River Ranger District, Attn: Jessica Eves, 57600 McKenzie Highway McKenzie Bridge, OR 97413
A field trip may be scheduled when analysis and project design are further developed prior to the close of the comment period on a draft Environmental Assessment. If you are interested in attending a potential future field trip to view sites within the proposed project area, please express interest in your scoping comment or by contacting the project lead below.
You will have an additional opportunity to comment when the draft Environmental Assessment is prepared. A decision regarding this project is expected to be made in the Fall of 2026 with implementation following shortly afterwards.
For more information, please contact Jessica Eves, NEPA Planner at [email protected].
Thank you for your interest in the management of the McKenzie Ranger District of the Willamette National Forest.
I’m always entertained by how “media outlets” use quotes nowadays..
You might have run across this story in which a Forest Supervisor was quoted as saying that the Forest was going to switch from email lists for notification of projects to folks having to check the website.
This seems like it lies at the intersection of “what the FS is required to do” vs. “what the FS should do to make life easier for the public.” But there is more information in this later story in the Hungry Horse News.
The Forest confirmed Tuesday that few people were notified of a proposed timber project near Blacktail Mountain that was released during the government shutdown.
Flathead National Forest spokeswoman Kira Powell said the Forest Service had switched over to a new third-party vendor for bulk email distribution and it was unavailable during the government shutdown.
So just a few people on an email list that the Swan Ranger District had were notified of the timber harvest project.
The Forest Service has about 13,000 emails on a database that’s used to notify people of projects.
That database was not used in this instance, but will be moving forward, Powell noted, making it clear that the Forest Service is interested in public comments.
People can also still sign up for email notifications on projects if they haven’t done so previously.
Having said that, Powell noted that the primary source of information on Forest Service projects is still on the Flathead National Forest website, www.fs.usda.gov/r01/flathead. Click on “projects” at the top of the page.
The West Truman project is a logging and timber harvest project on the Swan Lake Ranger District near Blacktail Mountain.
It was released in mid-October during the government shutdown and the comment period ended Nov. 1 before the shutdown was over.
The shutdown ended just last week. It was the longest shutdown in U.S. history.
Powell said the intent is notify people of most projects, but not all projects will see a notification under a new executive order by President Donald Trump issued in July.
Inquiring minds would want to know… “if I’m on the email list, what kind of projects should I look for on the website?” Does this new EO say “you can’t” or “you don’t have to.”
Another thought, in the ancient times when I worked in NEPA and on E-Gov, keeping up mailing lists was enough of a workload that it was on our list to address making it easier via some national application.
Finally, I do think that there is a middle way.. conceivably there are nuggets of info that might not be in the info and maps presented during scoping that people think are important to give them context to comment. These could potentially be identified and included in scoping documents.
FS Retirees Don’t Want the Forest Service to Move to Interior
The NAFSR folks wrote this letter.I don’t think that this is surprising to anyone.
Interestingly, they have a section about how wildfire and the rest of land management need to be together. I think that that ship has sailed in Interior.
Our experience with government reorganization efforts shows them to be disruptive, costly, and often ineffective at achieving desired efficiencies. Fully implementing transfer of the Forest Service to DOI would likely take years, necessitate Congressional action and agreement about modifying multiple existing legislative mandates, cost taxpayers a lot of money, and distract from accomplishing important work on the ground.
We fail to see the compelling need driving this voluntary acceptance of disruption, cost, and distraction. Any objectives for which the proposed transfer is aimed would seem to be better achieved, through a much shorter path, by working within existing structures.
FWIW I am totally against moving the Forest Service to Interior. At the same time, I’m not so against reorganization in general. I actually worked in a recently combined agency (CSREES, now NIFA, which was formerly CSRS and Extension), and I could give advice on how not to do it. Still, my observation was that once folks were hired who had never worked in the old agencies, it was as if the reorg had never happened. Was it more “efficient”? I don’t know. Did it get extramural extension and research to work together better? Maybe. But to my mind, it could have been improved by simply funding joint (research and extension) projects over independent projects. Anyway, those two agencies are not at all like the FS and BLM, for a host of reasons. Perhaps the most relevant one is that there are 30K or so employees who would have to adjust instead of a handful. And the work of the FS is highly visible to the public. On the other hand, combining staffs within one agency different than moving a whole agency in toto to another department.
My basic point is that in my experience, not all government reorganizations, at the end of the day, are ineffective and make things worse. They have to be carefully thought out and carefully managed, neither being easy to do.
In fact, it would be nice if folks who worked on reorgs would do a lessons learned, and the US Government either kept or granted a consortium of public administration schools to keep, analyze and generate reports about them. Like the Wildfire Lessons Learned Center. I don’t know how many USG “lessons learned centers” there are…public and animal health responses? Rebuilding after emergencies? If states are the laboratories of democracy, then comparing state responses would be of interest.
All this reminds me of a post by Jennifer Pahlka this week, which is absolutely worth reading for Government Improvement types.. which I think should be all of us including Rs (if we’re spending the bucks, it should be worth it) Ds (let’s turn more things over to the government) and libertarians (I suppose if you’re going to get the government to do it…), but maybe not.
Outcomes Review for the National Forest Management Act ?(and FLPMA?)
To summarize:
The problem the Speaker’s office hopes to address is that California passes a lot of bills, but those bills aren’t necessarily solving the problems their authors are targeting. Between 2016 and 2022, for example, more than 100 bills to stimulate housing production were signed into California law, but even today permit numbers in the state have barely budged. This is the problem that sits at the heart of the Recoding America Fund’s work: government’s poor track record of delivering on policy intent.
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The problem the Speaker’s office hopes to address is that California passes a lot of bills, but those bills aren’t necessarily solving the problems their authors are targeting. Between 2016 and 2022, for example, more than 100 bills to stimulate housing production were signed into California law, but even today permit numbers in the state have barely budged. This is the problem that sits at the heart of the Recoding America Fund’s work: government’s poor track record of delivering on policy intent.
Outcomes Reviews are an experiment in closing that gap. They’re essentially a process that starts with a legislator announcing that they’re going to review the outcomes of a bill they previously championed. The member coordinates with the relevant policy committee and identifies stakeholders who’ll be part of the work. Then, over the course of a legislative year, the legislator and their staff, working with committee experts and direct stakeholders, hold a series of roundtables and hearings. They listen to the people actually affected by the law. They dig into what’s working, what’s not, where implementation has stalled, where unintended consequences have emerged. Finally, they announce what they’ve learned and what they’re doing about it. This might be a fix-it bill, an executive action request, or public coverage celebrating the law’s success—whatever the evidence suggests is needed. The work helps close the feedback loop between policy intent and real world outcomes.
Wouldn’t that be interesting to try for NFMA? And maybe, ask the question (instead of reorganizing the FS and BLM) in what ways should those two statutes be harmonized and or updated to meet the needs of the 21st Century? And not just lawyers talking about laws.. but practitioners and the public, who can be exasperated by the end result of how policy intent (whatever it was in 1976) is delivered.
Despite this long tradition of bipartisan support for sustainable off-road vehicle use, the Trump administration announced in September that the Forest Service intends to repeal the Travel Management Rule. Doing so would open the door to uncontrolled use of off-road vehicles on national forests — undoing decades of thoughtful policy designed to maintain access on designated trails, prevent erosion, water pollution and habitat destruction.
I couldn’t find the link to the announcement.. would someone please share? I know many TSW folks follow this closely.
More than a month after the Senate confirmed Michael Boren as an Agriculture Department undersecretary overseeing the Forest Service, the Trump administration won’t say when he’ll actually step into the job. Instead, USDA said, Boren remains in a temporary position at the Interior Department as an acting assistant secretary for policy, management and budget that doesn’t require Senate confirmation.
I thought “what’s the problem? Chief Schultz seems to have a good handle on what’s going on and much work got done during the shutdown. Does he need political oversight? Would Boren be an asset (representing the FS to USDA) or a political shifter with the wind, or just lead to Secretary-Chief miscommunication and confusion? Boren is no Jim Hubbard, experience-wise. Maybe it’s better this way.
Uncertainty around Boren’s status continues to swirl within the Forest Service, two current employees told POLITICO’s E&E News. The ambiguity comes as USDA faces a reorganization that might ultimately pull some or all of the forest agency into Interior and make it more political in nature. Employees who discussed the situation at the Forest Service were granted anonymity because they’re not authorized to speak with reporters. Asked whether Boren has been or is scheduled to be sworn in as undersecretary, a USDA spokesperson said in an email, “Mr. Boren is currently serving on a temporary basis within the Department of Interior.”
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Outside organizations that work with the Forest Service said they’ve seen no indication Boren has taken on the USDA duties.
Republican lawmakers were eager to see Boren step into the USDA position as wildfire season was settling in and the administration was seeking to increase the pace and scale of forest management. At the nomination hearing, committee Chair John Boozman (R-Ark.) said lawmakers would look to Boren to quickly implement the “Fix Our Forests Act,” a forest management bill that’s passed in committee and awaits action by the full Senate. “Your leadership and background will be critical in ensuring the Forest Service is efficient and effective in carrying out the critical job of the mission area,” Boozman said at the hearing.
“His leadership and background will be critical”.. those are just political buzzwords. The FS has been following and testifying on FOFA since long before Boren was a gleam in whomever’s eye.
The delay leaves the Forest Service without the political appointee who would typically be the direct channel to the Agriculture secretary. Kristin Sleeper remains deputy undersecretary for natural resources and environment, a position not subject to Senate confirmation.
Kristin has worked for the Forest Service, BLM and the State of Montana as well as NAFO, but perhaps doesn’t carry the political weight of a contributor like Boren. Still, last Trump Admin we had Jim Hubbard (former State Forester), and there have been several Undersecs who worked in States (Harris Sherman, DNR Director) or came from Congressional Staffs.. Mark Rey, Jim Lyons. Seems like there is potentially a deep field to choose from.
As undersecretary for natural resources and environment, Boren’s responsibilities — once sworn in — will be solely over the Forest Service. A reorganization during the first Trump administration switched conservation programs from the NRE mission area to a farm programs mission area.
The Trump administration has sought to blur the lines between the Interior Department and the Forest Service, although the two agencies have long cooperated on wildfire management, for instance. The administration has proposed moving wildfire management entirely into Interior, and there’s narrow support in Congress — mainly from Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chair Mike Lee of Utah — for moving the entire Forest Service there. Having Boren in place at the Interior Department could help facilitate the migration of the Forest Service, either in pieces or wholesale, according to former senior USDA employees.
I’m not sure that I agree that “the Trump Admin has sought to blur the lines”. Some R’s want to move the FS to Int, but then so do some D’s like Megafire Action. I totally understand where they are coming from, it’s very rational. At the same time, there’s only so much change people can handle at once, and much low-lying fruit of coordination that would only take some focused attention to achieve.
Just like the last Admin, there are varying forces with varying druthers battling it out for dominance. And forces in Interior have always had eyes on the FS, either by piecemeal action (e.g. Great Basin National Park) or wholesale.
Babbitt also said he is the first secretary of Interior who doesn’t harbor an ambition to snatch the Forest Service back into Interior.
It is an interesting story, how much has changed in the last 30 years and how much.. not.
This statement of Babbitt’s seems a bit hyperbolic..
At his press conference, Babbitt told the reporters, “The most under-reported story is how the Forest Service and Interior came together to make the Northwest forest plan. Compare it to the 1980s, when the Forest Service, the BLM and the Fish and Wildlife Service were standing in separate corners in Judge Dwyer’s courtroom blaming each other for gridlock. Now, the federal boundaries have literally been erased in Washington, Oregon and northern California.”
Perhaps this is the first use of the term “literally” to mean “not literally?”
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Back to the story..
All leadership roles at the Forest Service are presently considered nonpolitical, career jobs. But the administration in September announced that President Donald Trump had appointed two people to the agency with the open-ended title of “senior adviser.”
Like I said, I do remember political folks showing up in the WO during the Clinton Admin, don’t remember any in the Bush Admin (but perhaps they were there and I wasn’t interacting with them). I’m curious as to whether there were any during the Obama, Biden or Trump I Administrations. Anyone remember?
Welcome to two new political appointees at the Forest Service! Here’s a link to the announcement and below are the new Senior Advisors to the Forest Service.
Ken Verheyen Appointed as Senior Advisor, U.S. Forest Service
Ken Verheyen serves as Senior Advisor for the U.S. Forest Service. Ken spent over 40 years building a values-driven, industry-leading, world-class technology service company. Leveraging his operational expertise, Ken led the company to build a strong reputation of excellence in customer service and innovation across the life science, aerospace, food and beverage, and multiple government sectors. Ken is an avid outdoorsman and enthusiastically supports responsible stewardship of our amazing national forests.
Layne Bangerter Appointed as Senior Advisor, U.S. Forest Service
Layne Bangerter serves as Senior Advisor for the U.S. Forest Service. Layne created and operates a successful farm and ranch operation in Utah, Nevada, and Idaho. He previously worked on the first Trump campaign and in the Administration, serving at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as Deputy Associate Administrator, and later serving at USDA as the Idaho Rural Development State Director. Layne has an extensive federal service résumé and policy experience, having worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, USDA-APHIS, and 14 years with the U.S. Senate. He holds a degree in Wildlife and Range Resource Mana
I guess there are two obvious questions.. 1) who are these people? and 2) is having politicals at the Forest Service unusual?
I’ll take the last one first. Certainly politicals are not unusual after all there are designated political jobs, like Undersecretary and that person’s support.
Politicals located at the Forest Service? From the Clinton Admin, I remember Chris Wood and Mark Gaede, who seemed to be around the Yates Building.. I don’t know if they had offices there, nor the details of their appointment. During the Obama Admin, I was called in to the Chief’s section of the Yates 4th floor and in the corner office (one of the few with walls). I was supposed to meet someone from information at USDA who was apparently stationed there to keep an eye on the FS and who was going to dress me down about this blog. Note: I would have stopped doing this at the time if anyone had listened to me and been helpful about getting a glide path out.
Point being, I’m not sure how unusual it is to have politicals imbedded with career folks in the WO. I don’t know the exact details of their appointments, but they were certainly around and influencing policy and probably learning about the work and the career folks. I’d be interested in hearing from folks who worked in other Admins in the WO.
So it’s not particularly new or unusual to have politicals in the Yates mix.
That leaves us with “who are these people?”
Years later, Carl’s son, Ken Verheyen, became the CEO of Astro Pak and set his sights on an enormous feat – to guide Astro Pak to a position of industry leadership through delivering excellence. Mr. Verheyen built a leadership team to scale the business and position it for its next phase. In January 2025 The Stephens Group purchased Astro Pak and looks to continue to build on the amazing legacy of the company. Astro Pak is one of the largest and most respected precision cleaning & surface treatment technology contractors in North America. Astro Pak hopes to sustain its growth while never losing sight of our most important purpose – delighting our customers with excellence.
There’s probably more info about him at Bloomberg if anyone has a subscription.
He apparently lives in southern California (Costa Mesa?)
He wrote a book (I’m going to read it and report back here.)
Layne Bangerter seems to be more “one of the usual suspects”, more recently the USDA Rural Development Idaho State Director.
Layne Bangerter comes to the United State Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Development (RD) with 33 years of federal service, most recently from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). At the EPA Bangerter served as the Deputy Associate Administrator for Intergovernmental Relations, where he facilitated interactions with state and local governments, and coordinated those activities with 10 EPA regional offices around the nation.
He also previously served as State Director for Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Environment for U.S. Senator Mike Crapo of Idaho from 2003 to 2017. In this capacity, he represented Senator Crapo on various issues involving federal agency oversight and legislation. Additionally, he worked various roles for the Fish and Wildlife Service, and the USDA from July 1985 to April 2003 as a Wildlife Biologist.
Layne was the Donald J. Trump Campaign Director for the State of Idaho. He was a valuable member of the Trump campaign team throughout the West, orchestrating efforts and traveling with Vice Presidential Nominee, Mike Pence. He was also a Donald J. Trump Delegate to the Republican National Convention. Following the election, he served on the Trump/Pence Transition Team from November 2016 to January 2017.
Layne initially was sworn into the Administration on January 21, 2017 as a member of the President-Elect’s Transition “Beachhead Team” for EPA. He led this team at the EPA for the Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Relations and the Office of Water.
Layne was born to American parents in Sao Paulo, Brazil. He grew up in Alpine, Utah and attended college at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah where he received his Bachelor’s Degree in Wildlife and Range Resource Management. He has had a passion for hard work from a young age. He has worked in home construction, farming, ranching, and agribusiness. His love of family, natural resources, sports, agriculture and private property rights are what drives him.
Layne and his wife, Betsy, have been married for 34 years; they have eight children, and 10 grandchildren. He is the owner of a Farm, Ranch, and Land Company in Melba, Idaho. The Bangerter family focus their lives on service to their church and country.
Layne is fluent in Portuguese and Spanish. He is an avid outdoorsman and conservationist. His interests include camping, hunting, fishing and horses.
As State Director, Layne will use his leadership experience to oversee RD programs in a customer-focused manner to restore prosperity in rural Idaho.
Here’s an AI summary of a meeting (I am skeptical of AI in this case, but you can also watch the full meeting if you are interested.)
In a recent government meeting in Utah, discussions centered around the challenges facing rural America and the role of government in supporting local communities. Layne Bangerter, a prominent voice in the meeting, emphasized the need for a shift in focus towards preserving rural livelihoods and addressing the burdens of excessive regulation.
Bangerter expressed concern over the increasing complexity of federal regulations, which he described as “regulatory slavery.” He argued that these regulations, while intended to protect the environment and public interests, have instead made it difficult for rural residents to maintain their farms and ranches. He noted that many small dairies have been replaced by larger corporate operations, leading to a loss of community and family-run businesses. “If you don’t allow rural America to stay on land, they are going to split it up,” he warned, highlighting the urgency of the situation.
The discussion also touched on the importance of government support in rural development. Bangerter, who previously held a position with the USDA, shared his experiences in providing grants and assistance to small communities facing infrastructure challenges. He underscored the necessity of affordable housing and reliable water systems to sustain rural populations. “We could go in and remedy that,” he said, advocating for a government role that prioritizes the immediate needs of local residents.
Moreover, Bangerter called for a reevaluation of the government’s responsibilities, suggesting that many functions should be delegated to state authorities. He argued that the federal government should focus on essential services like maintaining infrastructure and protecting individual liberties, while allowing states to handle other matters.
The meeting highlighted a growing concern among community leaders about the future of rural America. As discussions continue, the emphasis remains on finding solutions that empower residents to thrive on their land and preserve the unique character of their communities.
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The concerns of someone who used to work in USDA Rural Development are not surprising. If we are looking for signals, we might think that this is a way of encircling the Forest Service in the broader USDA mission.. something like the common argument for not moving the FS to Interior.
What else can we say? They are both older white guys, so no fiery young true-believer types.
One is from California and one from Utah, so there’s spatial and some cultural diversity.
Verheyen would seem to mostly relate to the Forest Service through recreation, so that might be good news for recreation folks, as the Chief also talks about how important that is.
Verheyen probably brings a fresh set of organizational eyes, but may stymied in improvement efforts by government red tape.
Bangerter knows about the way things work and probably has ideas how to change them, which may also run into the usual obstacles.
Other information or direct experience with either of these folks?
Springs Project Are lincold National Forest New Mexico (photo from The Hotshot WakeuppIf you recall, there was a gap between our observations of prescribed burning going on during the shutdown and this predictive news story from the WaPo. It still looks like the totals will be down from previous years, but we’ll have to wait and see how much and where.
I’m profoundly grateful to welcome our furloughed employees back as the government reopens. Your return reflects the resilience and commitment that define the Forest Service. Please know that this interruption was never a reflection of the immense value Americans place on your service.
To those who continued working during this time, thank you. Working without the full team beside you was difficult, and your perseverance deserves recognition. You kept our mission moving forward when it mattered most.
Despite the disruption, we accomplished a great deal together. We advanced timber sales that strengthen local economies, kept recreation sites open and safe for public enjoyment, and carried out critical wildfire response and active management work, including more than 127,000 acres of prescribed fire to improve forest health and reduce wildfire risk to communities.
Our Law Enforcement and Investigations teams patrolled forests and safeguarded visitors, while Business Operations ensured continuity by managing payments, contracts, grants and agreements. These efforts—alongside countless other essential actions—reflect the unwavering dedication across our agency.
I look forward to getting the entire team back together to continue and build upon the work that we’ve begun this new fiscal year. As we resume full operations, the Work Environment and Performance Office is mobilizing resources and organizing sessions for employees and supervisors. We will create space to reconnect, rebuild and support one another through this next phase of change. Stay tuned for invitations in your inbox.
Welcome back and thanks for all you do!
The Hotshot Wakeup has a post with more detailed accomplishments by forest.
There’s also a story in the LA Times which has much of the same info and makes it sound like the FS is behind the State in acres. But note that this shows all treatments not just PF.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom has challenged the federal government to match state investments in wildfire risk reduction work, and in July even sent the White House a draft executive order that Newsom said would accomplish exactly that.
In 2021, the state and U.S. Forest Service agreed to ramp up their yearly fuel treatment work in California to 500,000 acres each by 2025.
In 2023, the most recent year both state and federal data are available, the state reached 415,000 acres, and the Forest Service reached 311,000, according to a state dashboard. From 2021 to 2024, the state invested $4.3 billion to complete that work, whereas the Forest Service invested $3.1 billion.
The State Dashboard is pretty interesting. For one thing, it’s now 2025 and the 2024 info is apparently not available (or is available, but not on the Dashboard)
Another interesting thing is that CalTrans did almost as much as CalFire and Fish and Wildlife plus CalTrans did more than CalFire. Also the pie chart shows the activity acres as Fed 40% and State 25% which doesn’t seem to agree with the totals in the news story. Oh well.
New EPA Guidance on Prescribed Fire
Speaking of prescribed fire, this is good news that I don’t think we covered here before with new EPA guidance. At least I think it’s good news, because the air quality regs are so complicated.
2 Consistent with Section 4(a) of EO 14308, the EPA discourages states from including regulatory provisions that could serve to limit the strategic deployment of wildland prescribed fire conducted for the purposes of land management or wildfire mitigation within SIPs as part of the control strategy for attainment and maintenance of the NAAQS, or the regional haze program.
Maybe someone can explain or point us to an explanation for those who aren’t experts?
You might have run across or heard about this New York Times story on the Sierra Club. Others have called it a “hit piece.” My media watching friends always suggest asking the questions “why them?” “why now?”. As a reader of the Times, it seems that the Sierra Club is often an ally of its editorial and reporting staff, so the story seems a bit out of character. Since my (FS) work has been the target of hit pieces, I’m sympathetic to the Sierra Club here.
My summary: the Sierra Club board and employees decided to expand their list of interests to other topics, because they claim that they are all related. They became a bit of a policy fuzzball. (Some? Many?) volunteers and funders disagreed. I’ll excerpt a few paragraphs that stuck out to me.
Here’s the issue as articulated by the Times reporters.
The Sierra Club calls itself the “largest and most influential grass roots environmental organization in the country.” But it is in the middle of an implosion — left weakened, distracted and divided just as environmental protections are under assault by the Trump administration.
The group has lost 60 percent of the four million members and supporters it counted in 2019. It has held three rounds of employee layoffs since 2022, trying to climb out of a $40 million projected budget deficit.
Its political giving has also dropped. Federal campaign-finance records show $3.6 million in donations from the Sierra Club during the push to defeat Donald J. Trump in 2020, but none as Mr. Trump stormed back to the presidency in 2024.
Sigh. “Stormed back”.. how about “was re-elected?”
As Mr. Trump sought to roll back a broad range of progressive victories, the club’s leaders decided their old strategy was too small for the moment.
“We can’t defend the environment by shutting ourselves up in a big, green box labeled ‘environmental issues,’” the group’s executive director, Michael Brune, wrote to members in 2017. By broadening the mission, they also hoped to recruit more young people, who they thought cared as much about social justice as coal plants.
Hmm. Ignore the customers you have in the hopes of reaching new ones. A delicate balance. But maybe not so delicate here.. I didn’t really understand from the story who was deciding, the Board, the President, the employees? Apparently not this former board president.
Mr. Mair, who had been the group’s first Black board president, wrote a rebuttal defending the founder. The Sierra Club refused to publish it, and censured him when he published it elsewhere.
“Do we want to still be the Sierra Club anymore?” Mr. Mair said he thought at the time.
In late 2020, the club surveyed its dues-paying members, its most hard-core supporters. The members said they supported racial justice, but when asked to choose among priorities they ranked climate change first, and racism tied for last.
More than half of members also said they were worried that the club’s shift toward social justice “will detract from its core mission of protecting the environment” and alienate conservatives, according to a copy of the survey obtained by The New York Times.
I think the “alienating conservatives” ship may have already sailed. Apparently the Board was not aligned with the members. Perhaps the Board is not elected?
The club said that was meant to address the “problematic lack of diversity and inclusion in the environmental movement and to make the Sierra Club a welcoming and supportive place to work for all employees.”
“I said, ‘We have two F.T.E.s devoted to Trump’s war on the Arctic refuge, and we have 108 going to D.E.I., and I don’t think we have our priorities straight,’” Mr. Dougherty said, using the acronyms for “full-time employees” and “diversity, equity and inclusion.”
Mr. Dougherty said no other board members agreed, and the budget passed.
If the environment is everything..
“Palestine is an environmental issue from our standpoint,” Erica Dodt, the president of the Progressive Workers’ Union, which includes Sierra Club employees, said in an interview. “People are a huge part of our environment.”
Probably not the way to treat volunteers:
After accusations of past sexual misconduct involving current volunteers emerged in 2020, the club re-examined its systems and expanded a mechanism to discipline volunteers. While in some cases this new system empowered staffers to sever volunteer relationships that could not be fixed, it also resulted in a system where some volunteers said they were investigated, without being told why.
Delia Malone, an ecologist and volunteer for the club’s Colorado chapter, said she heard from attorneys hired by the Sierra Club, seeking to interview her as part of an investigation against her.
“I said, ‘What’s the claim, and who made the claim?’ And they said, ‘We can’t tell you that,’” Ms. Malone said.
The story went on to say:
The Sierra Club said it now tells people why they are being investigated.
And ended with
Since he left, the Sierra Club has shown no signs of reverting to its focus on strictly environmental issues.
In recent weeks, supporters who clicked on the group’s website for “current campaigns” were presented with 131 petitions, some out of date, like calls to support clean-energy funding that Mr. Trump has already gutted, or to support a voting-rights bill that died in 2023.
Patrick Murphy, the club’s current board president, who has helped lead the group since 2020, said in an interview that he could not name any decision he regretted.
“I have a hard time pinpointing how I believe we should have made different choices,” Mr. Murphy said. “And I’m happy with where we are today.”
It’s worth reading, and I don’t think it’s paywalled.
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Jonathan Zasloff teaches law at UCLA and posts in Legal Planet and wrote a piece with a tagline
“Its recent implosion over left-wing politics shows a trend that threatens environmental advocacy.” He identified some patterns.. which he says “some of which are old, but many of which are new and figure to get more extreme.”
Liberal founders, Left staff. This trend has occurred elsewhere: donors want to do something good for the world, and found an organization based upon their liberal principles. All very well and good.
But who often works for many organizations? People who are younger, and somewhat more to the Left than the founders. They are very committed to more radical principles – those who are not probably have a harder time putting up with the lower salaries (although that is not the case with high-level staffers; the Times reports that former Sierra Club Ben Jealous awarded his senior staff salaries in excess of $300,000). They push the organization in that direction
The comments on his post were also interesting…
Further, some decisions about endorsements were puzzling to me as a voter. F.e., we support this particular councilperson because they support getting off oil. Well … doesn’t the other candidate also support that? I’m guessing “yes.” I mean, this is California, and they don’t live under a rock, so … ?
Now for the positive – I think that maybe the SC is really a collection of people who are mostly just interested in *their* thing – whether it’s water, CC, or expanding national parks. Or critters. Or what-have-you.
There is a lot of expertise and a lot of dedication – going in a bunch of different directions. (I’m just talking about my impression of members. I never met the big cheeses – and only one staffer.)
And given that, I speculate that maybe people didn’t have the stomach to put a lot of energy and time into fighting off bad central decision-making that may have seemed merely symbolic. Especially if it’s going to get you called names. And remember, there was covid and all of that mess happening.
Focus. It’s a thing. But it seems to me that there is a general tendency in large institutions to go after “broader” issues. I sat in on a webinar on “What Hospice Chaplains Need to Do About Climate’ including a person with a Ph.D. in “climate theology.” Or doctors, or church leaders. As a patient/church member I’d like them to focus on what they are supposed to be doing, and are educated and licensed in, and get better at that. I suppose some Sierra Club volunteers feel the same way.
My colleague Annie Schmidt (cc’d) and I were the staff co-leads for the Wildland Fire Mitigation and Management Commission and have since started the Alliance for Wildfire Resilience. We’re very focused on federal wildfire policy and part of what we do is provide some tracking and analysis of bills in our space. We also host periodic virtual briefings on topics to try to give our community an opportunity to learn more and ask questions, with congressional staff sometimes on hand to help answer them.
We’ve been deeply engaged on Fix Our Forests and just finished our analysis of the bill with changes. More generally, you can find additional analyses on the website through our bill and recommendation explorer. We also post other tools and products on the website if we think they might be of value to the community.
I’m hoping they will track many or most of the bills we’re interested in. Above is a screenshot from their Explorer. The image will enlarge if you click on it and here is a direct link.
