Issue: Conservation Funding, Land Protection
Subject: USFS, Wildfire
Despite the Trump administration’s pledge to aggressively clear overgrowth from national forests, the U.S. Forest Service is falling significantly short on wildfire mitigation work. By mid-September, the agency had only treated about 2.2 million acres through thinning and prescribed burns. That’s far short of the over 4 million acres treated during the last year of the Biden administration, and it’s also behind the agency’s annual average over the past decade.
Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz blamed “operational challenges” and said agency resources were diverted to help battle blazes in Canada. However, Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon is blaming the slowdown in fuel treatments on the Trump administration firing thousands of Forest Service employees earlier this year.
Adding fuel to the fire, the government shutdown has stopped wildfire prevention efforts across the country’s entire 193 million acres of national forest land. This is terrible timing, as the fall season is the ideal time for the agency to conduct safe prescribed burns across the West.
“We were told, ‘No ignitions,’” a Forest Service fire management officer told High Country News. The region where he works has upward of 10,000 acres the agency could burn this fall when weather conditions allow safe controlled burning. “Windows are few and far between,” he said. “When you’re missing windows, it’s super disappointing.”