[Senate Hearing 118-283]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 118-283
THE FEDERAL RESPONSE TO ESCALATING
WILDFIRES AND REFORMS TO LAND
MANAGEMENT AND WILDLAND FIRE-
FIGHTER RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON
ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
JUNE 8, 2023
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Printed for the use of the
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
55-557 WASHINGTON : 2025
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COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
JOE MANCHIN III, West Virginia, Chairman
RON WYDEN, Oregon JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
MARIA CANTWELL, Washington JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho
BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont MIKE LEE, Utah
MARTIN HEINRICH, New Mexico STEVE DAINES, Montana
MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska
ANGUS S. KING, JR., Maine JOHN HOEVEN, North Dakota
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO, Nevada BILL CASSIDY, Louisiana
MARK KELLY, Arizona CINDY HYDE-SMITH, Mississippi
JOHN W. HICKENLOOPER, Colorado JOSH HAWLEY, Missouri
Renae Black, Staff Director
Sam E. Fowler, Chief Counsel
Bryan Petit, Senior Professional Staff Member
Richard M. Russell, Republican Staff Director
Justin J. Memmott, Republican Chief Counsel
James Willson, Republican Counsel
C O N T E N T S
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OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
Manchin III, Hon. Joe, Chairman and a U.S. Senator from West
Virginia....................................................... 1
Barrasso, Hon. John, Ranking Member and a U.S. Senator from
Wyoming........................................................ 3
WITNESSES
Rupert, Jeff, Director, Office of Wildland Fire, U.S. Department
of the Interior................................................ 4
Hall-Rivera, Jaelith, Deputy Chief of State, Private, and Tribal
Forestry, USDA Forest Service.................................. 14
Norris, Kelly, Interim State Forester, Wyoming State Forestry
Division....................................................... 22
Johnson, Cardell, Director, Natural Resources and Environment,
U.S. Government Accountability Office.......................... 29
ALPHABETICAL LISTING AND APPENDIX MATERIAL SUBMITTED
Barrasso, Hon. John:
Opening Statement............................................ 3
Letter from the Wyoming Congressional Delegation addressed to
Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and U.S. Forest
Service Chief Randy Moore, dated March 15, 2023............ 41
Wall Street Journal editorial entitled ``Wildfires and
Progressive Climate-Change Deniers'' published June 7, 2023 45
Cantwell, Hon. Maria:
National Interagency Fire Center Significant Wildland Fire
Potential Outlook maps from Summer 2023.................... 53
Hall-Rivera, Jaelith:
Opening Statement............................................ 14
Written Testimony............................................ 16
Responses to Questions for the Record........................ 88
Johnson, Cardell:
Opening Statement............................................ 29
Written Testimony............................................ 31
Kelly, Hon. Mark:
Satellite image of smoke on the Eastern Seaboard from the
Canadian wildfires of 2023................................. 64
King, Jr., Hon. Angus S.:
Chart entitled ``Timber Sold and Harvested, 1905-1921''...... 73
AirNow Fire and Smoke Map from June 7, 2023.................. 75
Lee, Hon. Mike:
Photograph of wildfire-related smoke in downtown Salt Lake
City....................................................... 50
Manchin III, Hon. Joe:
Opening Statement............................................ 1
Norris, Kelly:
Opening Statement............................................ 22
Written Testimony............................................ 24
Outdoor Recreation Roundtable:
Letter for the Record........................................ 106
Rupert, Jeff:
Opening Statement............................................ 4
Written Testimony............................................ 7
Responses to Questions for the Record........................ 80
THE FEDERAL RESPONSE TO ESCALATING
WILDFIRES AND REFORMS TO LAND
MANAGEMENT AND WILDLAND FIRE-
FIGHTER RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION
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THURSDAY, JUNE 8, 2023
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:00 a.m. in
Room SD-366, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Joe Manchin
III, Chairman of the Committee, presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOE MANCHIN III,
U.S. SENATOR FROM WEST VIRGINIA
The Chairman. The Committee will come to order.
This morning we are here to discuss the federal response to
escalating wildfires. As it so happens, wildfire smoke from the
wildfires burning right now in Canada has been affecting the
skies, as you can see outside, and if you have been outside,
you can sure taste it. Some of my colleagues on the Committee,
particularly those from the western states, have much more
firsthand experience with the impact of wildfires than some of
us. Those impacts are numerous and range from devastating loss
of life and property to air pollution. For example, the
Government Accountability Office recently reported that smoke
from U.S. wildfires now makes up 30 percent of the United
States emissions of particulates, and things are not improving.
In fact, in the last two decades, the top four largest
wildfires in human history have occurred in both the Northern
and Southern Hemispheres. In the U.S., more than half of the
most destructive wildfires in our history have occurred since
2018. Also, the acres burned annually have doubled in the past
30 years and are forecasted to double again in the next 30
years.
Our Committee has discussed at length the impacts of
climate conditions and past mismanagement of forests that have
ushered in a new era of fuels and wildfires. We have
essentially created a perfect storm. And as a result, we have
witnessed an increase in the occurrence of megafires, with
communities across the West suffering from tragic loss of life
and property. While agency leaders have talked about correcting
this course for some time, it unfortunately seems that with
each passing year we continue to slip further behind. Because
most of our Committee members are now intimately familiar with
the causes and impacts of wildfires, we are going to spend much
of our time this morning focusing on the firefighter workforce.
As we are at the beginning of fire season for a large part
of the U.S., let me first take a moment to thank all of the
federal wildland firefighters for their service. These men and
women bravely serve our country day-in and day-out, working
long, grueling hours in a dangerous job. Despite the risk, they
choose to continue to serve, and we all owe them a debt of
gratitude and our support. My staff and Ranking Member
Barrasso's staff have been talking directly with wildland
firefighters and their family members, as well as several
firefighter organizations to ensure that we fully understand
what federal wildland firefighters are experiencing and how we
can improve the federal capacity. We are particularly grateful
to the Grassroots Wildland Firefighters and the National
Federation of Federal Employees for working with us to ensure
that we understand the issues permeating the workforce, as well
as the pros and cons of potential solutions.
Over the last two years, Congress has provided record
levels of funding--over $10 billion--to help the federal
agencies achieve a paradigm shift in the way they manage the
wildland firefighting workforce and our public lands. So I look
forward to hearing from our witnesses today about the
bottlenecks the agencies are facing, because we must get to
work changing the status quo. Not only is the safety of our
communities and health of our forests at stake, but also the
lives of the men and women who serve in our fire service. There
are several proposals existing today that offer some creative,
common-sense solutions for addressing the problems facing our
firefighting workforce. For example, last year, Ranking Member
Barrasso and I introduced the Promoting Effective Forest
Management Act, which directs the agencies to undertake a range
of activities aimed at reducing fire risk on federal lands. The
bill also significantly modifies a current federal policy
related to retirement benefits for firefighters.
In previous hearings, we have discussed how if a federal
firefighter has longer than a three-day break in service over a
20-year career, he--or more often she--unconscionably must
forfeit previously made retirement contributions. This is a
policy that is impacting our workforce, and we must fix it.
Also, I wanted to acknowledge that the Administration submitted
a legislative proposal with its Fiscal Year 2024 budget request
that would reform the way federal firefighters are paid. While
this is a complicated issue, it is clear a great deal of
thought and effort went into this proposal. I greatly
appreciate that, and we believe we need to work to ensure that
we get whatever the solution is right. I am sure we will
discuss both of these in more detail this morning as our
Committee looks at ways to increase retention in our shrinking
wildland firefighting workforce.
I want to thank our witnesses for being here today, and I
look forward to hearing your perspectives on the situation that
we find ourselves in with wildfires and our firefighters, as
well as your perspectives on the potential solutions that we
need.
With that, I am going to turn it over to Ranking Member
Barrasso for his opening statement.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN BARRASSO,
U.S. SENATOR FROM WYOMING
Senator Barrasso. Well, thanks so much, Mr. Chairman.
Thanks so much for holding this hearing today. Wildfires in
Canada have ushered in smoke and poor air quality right here in
Washington, DC this morning. This is what we have been
experiencing far too frequently in Wyoming and throughout the
West, and it is a sobering reminder that we must manage our
forests to make them more resilient to catastrophic fires. In
recent years, our western states have endured wildfires of
unprecedented scale and destructiveness. These fires ravage
forests, destroy communities, and upend lives and livelihoods.
On average, roughly eight million acres burned each year
between 2017 and 2022. Now, that is more than double the
average annual acreage burned in the 1990s. Western states are
again bracing for what will likely be another devastating
wildfire season this summer.
As fire seasons have become longer and more destructive,
fire suppression costs have increased dramatically. Over the
last five years, suppression costs averaged $2.86 billion a
year. In 2021, agencies spent a record of over $4 billion on
suppression activities. It is unsustainable to keep throwing
more and more money and resources at suppression without
dramatically increasing mitigation. Waiting for our forests and
communities to burn is not a defensible strategy. America's
wildfire crisis will continue to escalate until our forests are
properly managed. Our forests are overgrown and they are
unhealthy. This is due to decades of misguided policies,
including a hands-off approach to management and associated
declines in sawmill infrastructure.
Between Forest Service and Department of Interior lands,
over 100 million acres are at elevated risk to high-intensity,
catastrophic fires. Mr. Chairman, that is more than six times
the size of West Virginia. Fires on federal lands are typically
much larger and much more destructive than fires that ignite on
state or private lands. In a report from last summer, the
Congressional Budget Office concluded that fires on federal
lands are five times larger than those on non-federal lands.
And that is why, in this Committee, we have heard time and time
again that federal agencies need to increase the pace and scale
of fire mitigation. These increases cannot be incremental.
Mitigation needs to increase by orders of magnitude. This
includes the removal of hazardous fuels through mechanical
thinning and prescribed burn projects.
We have heard from both the Forest Service and the
Department of the Interior that a paradigm shift is needed.
Congress has given agencies billions of dollars in additional
taxpayer funding. And we have heard ambitious rhetoric. We have
seen lines drawn on maps. What we have yet to see is progress
at the pace necessary to actually address the problem. We know
that too often such progress is stopped by regulatory red tape
and by harmful litigation that prevent critical fire mitigation
projects from moving forward. This Committee has considered
legislative solutions to cut red tape and stop frivolous
lawsuits. They include Senator Daines's bill to undo the
disastrous Cottonwood decision, which has tied up important
fire prevention in the courts, and Senator Risch's FIRESHEDS
Act, which would enhance collaboration and cut regulatory red
tape in high-risk, fire-prone areas. And Mr. Chairman, the bill
you mentioned earlier, the bill that you and I have together,
the Promoting Effective Forest Management Act, would increase
agency transparency and require the use of streamlined
authorities. And I am hopeful that in this Congress we can
actually act on these badly needed reforms.
One of the major consequences of the wildfire crisis is the
effect it has had on brave firefighters. A recent Government
Accountability Office report concludes that increased wildfire
activity across the West is straining the federal wildland
firefighting workforce. Factors such as low pay, poor work/life
balance, and mental and physical health challenges from
fighting longer and more brutal fire seasons, all are hurting
the firefighting workforce. For years, our firefighters have
been asked to do too much for too little in return. The only
way to ensure that we have enough firefighters to defend our
forests into the future is to ensure that they are fully
supported and compensated. These are the issues we need to
address.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to today's hearing
and testimony.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Barrasso.
We have a great panel assembled this morning. Today, we
have Mr. Jeffery Rupert from the Department of the Interior's
Office of Wildland Fire.
We have Deputy Chief Jaelith Hall-Rivera from the Forest
Service.
We have Ms. Kelly Norris, the Interim State Forester of
Wyoming.
And we have Mr. Cardell Johnson from the Government
Accountability Office.
And Mr. Rupert, we will start with you.
STATEMENT OF JEFF RUPERT, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF WILDLAND FIRE,
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Mr. Rupert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Good afternoon Chairman Manchin, Ranking Member Barrasso,
and members of the Committee. Thank you for the opportunity to
appear before you this afternoon to provide testimony on the
federal response to escalating wildfires and Interior's efforts
to reform land management and wildland firefighter recruitment
and retention. The discussion today will convey Interior's most
pressing wildland fire needs and our efforts to support
compensation for our wildland firefighting workforce as well as
to reduce risk and effectively manage wildfire response now and
into the future. The climate continues to play an oversized
role in the extreme fire weather we are experiencing across the
nation and across the continent. A drier and hotter climate
results in low field moisture that frequently leads to extreme
conditions that produce these large and intense wildfires and
megafires.
The June 2023 National Significant Wildland Fire Potential
Outlook assesses fire potential throughout the country for the
next four months. Portions of Alaska, Oregon, Washington,
Nevada, Idaho, Montana, the Great Lakes, and the Northeast are
predicted to have above normal significant wildland fire
potential over the next four months. And I would just make the
obvious observation, as Chairman, you and the Ranking Member
opened, the smoke that we are having and the impact that tens
of millions of us are experiencing right now, are an extension
of that fire potential across eastern parts of North America
and what is occurring in Canada right now and that our friends
and fellow citizens in the West have frequently experienced in
recent years. We are tackling this climate crisis and working
to improve the wildfire resiliency of our nation's lands with
the help of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL). It
provides Interior with nearly a billion and a half dollars of
funding over five years. So this support is being used
collaboratively with our partners to increase the pace and
scale of fuels management, treatments to rehabilitate lands
damaged by wildfires, fund wildland fire related research, and
to increase wildland firefighter pay.
With this funding, and annual appropriations, Interior is
accomplishing risk reduction. Last year, we accomplished 1.9
million acres of priority reduction treatments, which was a 20
percent increase over 2021. And this year, our goal is to treat
2.1 million acres. These longer, more intense fire years and
the need to actively manage and reduce fuels across
increasingly flammable landscapes has increased the demand and
pressure on our workforce. It is widely recognized that a new
model is needed to address wildland firefighter recruitment and
retention and provide better pay, more career stability, better
upward mobility, and much better work/life balance. With the
passage of the BIL in 2022, Interior and the Forest Service
implemented temporary special pay supplements for federal
wildland firefighters. In Interior, over 3,800 wildland
firefighters received support last year. This year, that
support is going to more than 4,000 Interior wildland
firefighters.
To further advance these wildland firefighter pay reforms,
this year's budget proposal includes an increase for Interior
of $72 million to raise the base pay of DOI and tribal wildland
firefighters. To implement these reforms, the Administration
has also proposed legislation that would establish a new
special base pay rate for firefighters, create a new premium
pay category, as well as propose a new annual pay cap. The
budget also includes funding to hire additional Interior
firefighters as well as tribal firefighters. Without the
additional funding and reforms, we are facing a pay cliff, as
the bill funding is estimated to run out at the end of this
fiscal year. That could have a devastating effect on not only
our firefighter morale, but certainly, our ability to recruit
and retain firefighters.
We are working closely with the Forest Service to provide
much-needed mental health support as well. We know that mental
health is affecting firefighters. They are at elevated risk.
And we just held a behavioral health and well-being summit in
Boise that is being used inform the development of a joint
program moving forward. No single entity can solve the crisis
alone. The Wildland Fire Leadership Council has recently
updated the National Cohesive Wildland Fire Strategy that
reinforces the need to collaborate. And we very much appreciate
Congress's willingness to support these efforts and help
Interior effectively address this wildland fire crisis so that
we can continue to work with our federal, tribal, state, and
local partners to protect communities, people, and resources.
This concludes my statement. I am happy to answer any
questions. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Rupert follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Thank you, sir.
And now, we will have Ms. Rivera.
STATEMENT OF JAELITH HALL-RIVERA, DEPUTY CHIEF OF STATE,
PRIVATE, AND TRIBAL FORESTRY, USDA FOREST SERVICE
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Thank you.
Chairman Manchin, Ranking Member Barrasso, and members of
the Committee, thank you for this opportunity to testify on the
upcoming 2023 fire year, the ongoing wildfire crisis, and how
we are working to improve forest health and protect
communities. I have seen firsthand the destruction that
wildfires have on communities, infrastructure, and our natural
resources, and, of course, today, we can look right outside
here in Washington, DC and see those impacts. Wildfire risk has
reached crisis proportions and wildfires are having more and
more impacts each year.
I want to personally thank our partners who answer our call
for assistance to bolster our capabilities. We are grateful for
all of our partners around the country and around the world,
who continue to pitch in to help our nation through each
difficult year, as we are doing this year in Canada. As the
size and severity of fires has grown, so too has our need for
fire personnel. As we approach the busiest part of the 2023
fire year, the Forest Service aspires to hire 11,300 wildland
firefighters nationwide. As of May 30, we have hired 10,068
firefighters, or about 89 percent of our goal. We are
cautiously optimistic we will reach our hiring goals. We know
that that is still not enough. That is why the President's FY24
budget proposes funding to hire 970 additional firefighters in
the Forest Service. In addition, for the 2023 fire year, the
Forest Service will have up to 24 next-generation air tankers,
more than 200 helicopters, and more than 900 engines available
to manage wildfires.
Wildland firefighters are the backbone of our ability to
protect communities and vital infrastructure from wildfires.
The only way that we are going to attract people to this
challenging and hazardous work is to pay them fairly. Federal
wages for firefighters have not kept pace with wages offered by
state, local, and private entities. The workforce reforms
proposed in the President's FY24 budget request in supporting
legislation will increase federal and tribal firefighters' pay,
invest more in their mental and physical health and well-being,
improve their housing options, and expand the number of
permanent firefighters. These reforms build on the temporary
pay increase provided by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs
Act. And thanks to that legislation, more than 14,000 Forest
Service firefighters received a temporary pay increase.
However, the funding for that pay supplement will be spent by
the end of September 2023 unless Congress intervenes to avert
the pay cliff.
To ensure pay continuity in the FY24 budget, we are
proposing a permanent base pay increase for all firefighters.
Our budget proposal includes a request for $180 million in the
Forest Service in support of a special base rate salary table
for firefighters and incident standby pay for all responders
that are mobilized to an incident. This new pay table was
calculated to increase the total annual compensation to a level
commensurate with state and private-sector wildland
firefighters. For example, an entry-level firefighter would
receive at least a 34 percent increase in pay under the new pay
table. And unlike the temporary increase in BIL, a permanent
base pay increase is an investment in our firefighters' future,
as an increase in basic pay leads to an increase in retirement
benefits. We will need Congress to pass special legislation
that authorizes this new pay table, and I look forward to
working with all of you on that. We are working to make a
difference and improve the lives of Forest Service
firefighters. Together, we can make a difference in the quality
of life for our firefighters who protect our own quality of
life.
In addition to paying firefighters fairly, we must support
their mental and physical health. Our FY24 budget proposal
calls for an increase of $10 million to enhance support for our
firefighters' mental and physical health and well-being. The
budget also proposes a $50 million investment in housing. We
recognize that addressing the housing crisis must happen now,
as it impacts our ability to recruit and retain our workforce.
Together, these efforts would help address longstanding
recruitment and retention challenges. These investments,
totaling $569 million for the Forest Service, will help us
ensure we can continue meeting evolving mission demands, as
both the frequency and intensity of catastrophic wildfires are
expected to increase.
Long-term, we must address work on the ground to ultimately
address the wildfire crisis. Over the last two decades, we have
witnessed what has become a new normal--bigger and more
destructive wildfires that are extremely costly and challenging
to suppress. The growing wildfire crisis created the need for a
new land management strategy, and we are in the second year of
carrying out our 10-year Wildfire Crisis Strategy in the Forest
Service. The strategy aims to increase science-based fuels
treatment by up to four times previous levels, calling for up
to 20 million acres to be treated in the National Forest System
over the coming decade and working with partners to have 30
million additional acres to be treated in the next decade. The
Forest Service is very grateful to Congress for providing the
resources through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act
and the Inflation Reduction Act to seed our initial work and
put the wildfire crisis strategy in motion.
In closing, I want to reiterate the agency's commitment to
keeping our communities and firefighters safe as fire seasons
grow longer and more severe. The dedication, bravery, and
professional integrity of our firefighters and support
personnel is second to none. We greatly appreciate the
significant resources Congress has provided to take the initial
steps to address the wildfire crisis and we look forward to
working with the Committee to continue providing world-class
suppression response and reducing the severity of wildfires in
our country.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Hall-Rivera follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Senator Barrasso.
Senator Barrasso. Well, thanks so much, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to introduce Kelly Norris, who is here from
Wyoming. And Kelly, I am so pleased you could join us today
with such short notice.
Kelly is currently a resident of Cheyenne, Wyoming. She has
lived around the state in her work with the Forestry Division.
Kelly has worked for the Wyoming State Forestry Division for
more than 13 years. She has a degree in forestry from the
University of Wisconsin, and in January, Governor Gordon
appointed her to serve as our Interim State Forester for the
State of Wyoming. Kelly has incredible experience working as a
forester for both the State of Wyoming, and before that, the
U.S. Forest Service. So she has years' worth of critical on-
the-ground knowledge and is a valuable resource for the many
issues that we are going to be discussing here today.
Kelly, congratulations, again, on your appointment. Thanks
so much for joining us today from Wyoming, in Washington.
STATEMENT OF KELLY NORRIS, INTERIM STATE FORESTER, WYOMING
STATE FORESTRY DIVISION
Ms. Norris. Thank you.
Thank you, Chairman Manchin, Ranking Member Barrasso, and
members of the Committee for the opportunity to testify on
behalf of the Wyoming State Forestry Division. My name is Kelly
Norris and I am the Interim Wyoming State Forester.
The integration and cooperation of federal, state, and
county cooperators has been a success for Wyoming. Our
firefighter entities have adapted and evolved over decades to
become a more effective and efficient alliance whose main focus
is protecting life and our valuable communities,
infrastructure, grasslands, and forests. Wyoming State Forestry
is tasked with wildfire suppression and management on 3.5
million acres of state trust land and coordinating suppression
on 29 million acres of private land. Forty-eight percent of the
state is federally owned. The BLM manages 18 million acres, the
Forest Service manages 9 million acres, and the BIA manages 2.2
million acres, each having their respective suppression
responsibilities.
Wyoming State Forestry is an extremely small organization.
We depend almost exclusively on local county volunteers and our
federal partners for initial attack. State Forestry supports
the state's initial attack response with our helitack single-
engine air tankers and the inmate conservation crew. In
Wyoming, we believe in the ``closest resources response''
concept. Typically, that means our county cooperators will be
the first firefighters arriving to the wildfire. Other times it
might be the BLM or U.S. Forest Service firefighters who are
responding first to a wildfire. Everyone coordinates to
suppress wildfire, no matter the jurisdictional responsibility.
A great example of interagency cooperation is our aviation
program. We contract our helicopter and manage our program with
one permanent and four seasonal employees. The Medicine Bow-
Routt National Forest and Thunder Basin National Grasslands
support our helitack program by providing a trained employee to
assist us in managing it. Two detailers are also provided by
the local national forest to help support the program.
The Committee is aware of the immediate issue with
recruitment and retention of federal firefighters. This is also
a challenge for our state and county fire districts. As veteran
firefighters retire, they are not being replaced at the same
rate. The need to effectively recruit within our county
volunteer fire districts is a big concern that Wyoming is
looking to address. We need to work together to find solutions
that meet the needs of our wildland fire community. There will
not be a one-size-fits-all solution, as the need will have to
be addressed at all levels.
I would like to transition the conversation to proactively
managing for the health of Wyoming's forests. A recent study
from the Nature Conservancy found that Wyoming's forests
provided approximately $26 billion of economic value every
year. Our forests are the headwaters to four of the nation's
main river basins and provide more than just board-feet sold.
They should be managed appropriately for the values they
provide, such as water supply and storage, wildlife habitat,
recreation and tourism, and carbon storage. Wildfire and forest
health threats know no boundaries and there is an urgent need
for active forest management. Last year's Fish Creek Fire,
located in the Black Hills, was stopped in a fuel break
treatment area. The fuel break saved multiple homes while
helping bring the fire down in intensity and gave our
firefighters the opportunity to control the wildfire safely and
effectively.
State agencies must be a part of the solution to getting
more management done on the ground with our federal forests.
Wyoming State Forestry has increased its Good Neighbor
Authority (GNA) program successfully, and sold 11 million
board-feet of federal timber in our 2022 Fiscal Year. However,
GNA can be more than assisting federal partners with timber
sales. GNA can provide flexibility needed through our state
contracting systems to complete a wide variety of projects for
our federal partners.
In conclusion, thank you for the opportunity to appear
before the Committee today. Wildland fire response continues to
be one of the most challenging problems our agency faces. This
primary mission is further complicated by the persistent
challenges with recruitment and retention of our wildland
firefighters. The other side to the wildfire response problem
is long-term, as it relates to the health of our forests. We
need to address how we continue to manage our forests by making
strategic investments in them. We must continue to implement
more active forest management on all ownerships.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Norris follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Johnson.
STATEMENT OF CARDELL JOHNSON, DIRECTOR, NATURAL RESOURCES AND
ENVIRONMENT, U.S. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE
Mr. Johnson. Thank you.
Chairman Manchin, Ranking Member Barrasso, and members of
the Committee, good morning and thank you for the opportunity
to provide testimony on this important topic. My statement
today will provide the Committee with insight and context on
the barriers to hiring and retaining federal wildland
firefighters. Firefighting is demanding work, and to better
understand these barriers and the demands they place on the
firefighters, GAO met with several organizations that represent
the men and women that do this work. Our analysis of these
barriers is informed by their perspectives, as well as our
examination of information from the land management agencies.
The barriers identified in our November 2022 report include low
pay, remote or expensive duty stations, poor work/life balance,
and career advancement challenges, among others. Low pay was
cited as the top barrier, despite federal actions to increase
firefighter pay. Low pay impacts recruitment and retention
because other industries, such as food service, offer equal or
better pay for less dangerous work.
Our analysis identified three concerns with some of the
recent federal pay actions. The first concern being, pay does
not reflect the hazardous physical and mental demands of the
job. Second, that pay may not be competitive with non-federal
entities, and the third concern being that appropriated funds
supporting recent base salary increases will likely run out
this fiscal year. Related to low pay is the issue of remote or
expensive duty stations. It has been reported that some
firefighters are living out of their cars because they cannot
afford housing. Duty stations that are more remote may not
always provide easy access to basic services such as grocery
stores or even broadband coverage, which helps firefighters
stay connected with their families while they are away. Agency
officials and stakeholder groups told us that raising pay, as
well as giving further consideration to incentives, could
mitigate this barrier.
Low pay and expensive duty stations are also poor drivers
of work/life balance. This is another barrier cited by nearly
all of the stakeholders we met with. Poor work/life balance
impacts retention because it drives firefighters to take a
break from service or leave the workforce entirely. And if that
happens, agencies lose valuable firefighting knowledge and
experience. Some stakeholders said that federal agencies would
be better positioned to recruit former firefighters back to
service if they were eligible to return to the special
retirement system available to firefighters who worked more
than three years in certain positions. However, eligibility for
that special retirement system is governed by statute. So any
changes to that eligibility would need to be made by Congress.
Career advancement challenges pose another barrier to hiring
and retaining firefighters. Without career advancement
opportunities, firefighters may find it difficult to maximize
their career earning potential. But some progress is being made
in addressing this barrier. Agencies worked with OPM to develop
a new occupational series aimed at providing a clearer career
path for firefighters. However, implementation of this is
ongoing and it really is too early to determine the outcomes.
In conclusion, we want to recognize that land management
agencies are actively addressing the barriers identified in our
November 2022 report. The barriers are complex and interrelated
and they require long-term solutions that may need support from
Congress. Addressing temporary pay actions before they expire
and changing retirement eligibility requirements to make it
easy for firefighters to return to work without being penalized
for a break in service may go a long way to support
firefighters who risk their lives to protect our communities,
such as from the smoke that we are experiencing today, as well
as our critical infrastructure and natural resources.
This concludes my oral statement, and I am happy to respond
to questions. Thank you, Chair.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Johnson follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Let me thank all of you for your insight and
your addresses. I will start my questions with Ms. Norris.
I understand you previously worked for the Forest Service,
and I am curious to hear why you decided to leave the Forest
Service and instead work for the great State of Wyoming's State
Forestry Division. And Mr. Johnson, in your testimony, you
mentioned that the current retirement system might affect the
agency's ability to attract former firefighters to return to
the federal service. So this question is for both of you. Can
you tell us more about the issues, Mr. Johnson, you are
referring to, and Ms. Norris, tell us why you left.
Senator Barrasso. And you can't have her back.
[Laughter.]
Ms. Norris. Thank you, Chairman.
That is correct. I did leave the Forest Service. That had
to do with the fact that my husband and I, at the time, found a
position at the base of the Bighorn Mountains, and that is
where I wanted to be. And so I took the State Forestry job.
Now, I stayed with State Forestry for multiple reasons. State
Forestry offered me a great opportunity to make a difference
for the State of Wyoming. We are in the communities. We are
helping do management across private, state, and federal lands.
We are fully a part of every aspect when it comes to wildland
fire, to planting trees in our communities and creating
orchards, to helping a landowner learn how to actively manage
their timber. Outside of that, the pay is just as good as the
Forest Service, and when it gets to the point, I have a great
group of people I get to work with, top notch.
The Chairman. You are getting more satisfaction because you
have more flexibility than you did with the Federal Forest
Service?
Ms. Norris. Yes, and I have a great culture to work with.
The Chairman. Have you basically given any of your input
back to the former agencies or the changes that need to be
made? Because we have to find a working environment that
basically enriches our Forest Service employees now, as you
have been enriched by the State of Wyoming.
Ms. Norris. Yes, and I agree with you, and I think it is
all about the culture and support. I have top notch people I
get to work for and work with.
The Chairman. Great.
Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Johnson. Thank you. So with the retirement system,
firefighters who serve in a primary firefighting role are
eligible for a special retirement system that is similar to law
enforcement, where after 20 years of service, they are eligible
to retire. And so, after spending that three years in that
primary firefighting role, they are able to move on to other
roles, so, for example, a support or fire management role. If
they take a break in service, and let's say they want to come
back seven years later, they have to start back over in the
primary firefighting role, which we all recognize is a very
stressful----
The Chairman. That is common sense. Why hasn't that been
changed?
Mr. Johnson. Well----
The Chairman. They have the ability to change it, I am
sure.
Mr. Johnson. Yes, so changes for that are governed by
statute, so that would require legislative action.
The Chairman. Thank you. Say no more.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Yes, I think we heard you loud and clear.
So your opinion is basically that we have to basically give
you the direction, give you the code to do that with.
Mr. Johnson. Yes, that is what we have heard.
The Chairman. Have you made that request to us before
today?
Mr. Johnson. This is something that we have identified in
our November 2022 report, and it is one of the things that I
wanted to highlight in our testimony for you.
The Chairman. Okay. Thank you for doing so. And we will--
Martin, you get right on that, okay?
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Mr. Rupert and Ms. Hall-Rivera, I understand
that prior to the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law being enacted,
recruitment and retention among federal firefighters was
waning. But let's look at, as an example, an imaginary
employee, and let's follow the money. In this example, a
firefighter quits federal service to go to work for a state
agency or private contractor. When a fire comes, I understand
that when we do not have enough federal firefighters, federal
appropriations are used to reimburse a state agency verbatim
for their rate of pay as firefighters, or appropriations are
used to pay the private contractor at whatever rate it wishes
to charge. Now, with that, does that mean the firefighter is
receiving increased pay and the Federal Government is paying
for it? Is it better for them to work from an outside group
than from within?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. I will start. Yes, Senator, that is
accurate. We, of course, depend on our cooperators and our
contractors. They are an important part of our system. But if
we are not able to compensate our firefighters, and they leave
and go and work for those entities, the Federal Government is
still going to be paying for that, you know--
The Chairman. Is that a code thing? Is that our fault, too?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. No, it's just how the system works, right?
We all cooperate together, but you know, it's an expensive
endeavor for the Federal Government to reimburse.
The Chairman. We are going to pay the contractor whatever
it costs.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Right. In a busy year--for example, take
2021--the Forest Service paid over $470 million to state
cooperators.
The Chairman. Mr. Rupert, real quick.
Mr. Rupert. I would just add two quick points to that. One,
exactly as said, when wildfires are occurring, we must respond.
The Chairman. Right.
Mr. Rupert. So the response is going to occur, and two, if
you look at structurally how that contractor support is paid
for, it is with suppression funds. And in the case where that
is more expensive, that is one of the direct threats to the
``fire-funding fix'' which has functioned very well up to this
point. And so we do have these complex relationships as well
that are important and mean something.
The Chairman. As I close, I will just say that basically,
you know, we have invested $10 billion. We would like to know
where it went to and what we are doing to prevent these
outrageous fires that we are having that are harming so many
people and if we have done enough there, but we are going
through the money. I understand why Grant took Richmond, and it
doesn't give us very good hope right now that it is being used
as effectively as it could.
Senator Barrasso.
Senator Barrasso. Well, thanks, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Norris, so the Forest Service has come out with a 10-
year strategy to combat the wildfire crisis, and they announced
significant spending across 21 designated areas. The dollars
fund projects critical for reducing wildfire risk and defending
America's forests. They are going to protect people's lives and
livelihoods. Now, unbelievable to me, Wyoming is the only state
located on or west of the Rocky Mountains that has not received
any of the funding of these 21 designated areas under this
strategy. Could you just outline the challenges that Wyoming is
facing with respect to fire risk, as well as why you think it
is so critical that the Forest Service works to protect
national forests in our state?
Ms. Norris. Thank you, Senator.
Wyoming's forests have the same wildfire risk as any other
forest in the western states. Our forests are overstocked. They
have insect and disease outbreaks. We have areas of high
mortality. And our forests are primed to burn due to drought.
Wyoming's forests need to be protected because of the values
they provide to our communities and also to the rest of the
West. Our forests provide timber supply, critical wildlife
habitat, water storage and supply. Our forests are considered
the headwater forests because they contain the headwaters of
four major river basins in the West. A catastrophic wildfire
would substantially impact our communities as well as many of
the communities further down the stream.
Thank you.
Senator Barrasso. So Ms. Hall-Rivera, in April, I sent a
letter, along with Senator Lummis and Representative Harriet
Hageman. We sent it to Chief Moore and to Secretary Vilsack.
You may have seen it, and Mr. Chairman, I will put it in the
record.
[The letter referred to follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Barrasso. The letter details our concern over
Wyoming's exclusion from this 10-year strategy to address the
wildfire crisis. Later that month, Chief Moore was here. I
asked him directly why Wyoming was excluded. I am still waiting
for answers. So Ms. Hall-Rivera, does the Forest Service plan
to protect Wyoming's forests under the 10-year strategy?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Thank you for that question, Senator.
As you probably know, we have invested $13 million in the
State of Wyoming in the past couple of years in a variety of
different funds, including the Joint Chiefs' Landscape
Restoration Partnership, the Collaborative Landscape
Restoration Program, and others. But I understand your concern
about the wildfire crisis strategy investments. There are many,
many places at risk in the West, as you know. The funding that
we have received, we are very grateful for, but we have said
multiple times that it is a down payment on all the work that
needs to be done in this country. And as we look at further
announcements or get additional resources, we will take a hard
look at Wyoming.
Senator Barrasso. Well, I believe this is an egregious
omission, and I would ask that you continue to work to correct
this omission.
Ms. Norris, this morning, the Wall Street Journal published
an editorial about the impact of forest fires on the
environment and the need for active forest management to
prevent catastrophic wildfires. The editorial, ``Wildfires and
Progressive Climate-Change Deniers,'' it says, ``Government
land management policies that prevent wildfires from spreading
out of control, such as prescribed burns, would actually reduce
CO2 emissions more than offshore wind or electric
vehicle mandates. Alas, this doesn't fit with the climate
left's book of Revelation.''
[The editorial referred to follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Barrasso. Do you agree that active forest
management such as cutting trees that are at higher risk of
burning is not only critical to saving lives and property and
our forests, but also helps combat climate change?
Ms. Norris. Thank you, Senator.
I agree. That is an easy question. Yes, active management
is needed. It is needed to help us with our mitigating the
negative impacts from wildfire. A great example was in my
testimony, which was in the Fish Creek Fire fuel break, where
we were able to control that fire and stop it from burning down
homes and affecting people's lives. So yes, active management
is the answer.
Senator Barrasso. So then, Ms. Hall-Rivera, I see you
shaking your head yes. I know that the Forest Service, though,
is spending time and money on policies like your old-growth
inventory that promise to make active management more
difficult, it seems to me, when clearly, increasing forest
treatments should be the top priority.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, Senator, we absolutely agree with
you. That is why we are focusing on significantly scaling up
our treatments as a result of our wildfire crisis strategy. We
absolutely need more active management in our forests if we are
going to combat this wildfire crisis.
Senator Barrasso. And then, Mr. Chairman, my final question
for Ms. Norris is, we have heard today Congress will need to
act in order to ensure the federal agencies can recruit and
retain a wildland firefighter workforce. Can you elaborate on
how much Wyoming depends on partnerships with wildland
firefighters to help defend our forests in terms of how vital
it is for Wyoming to be fully staffed?
Ms. Norris. Thank you, Senator.
It is vital. The Federal Government owns 48 percent of the
state and is responsible for 48 percent of that to suppress.
Our wildfire community is interdependent, and any reduction in
capacity will substantially impact our ability to respond.
Wyoming simply does not have the resources to respond to an
additional 48 percent of the state. And we need our federal
partners to be a dependable partner in the wildfire response.
Senator Barrasso. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator.
And now, we have Senator Heinrich.
Senator Heinrich. Thank you, Chairman.
I want to start out and just say it would be irresponsible
to have this hearing and not consider the role that climate
change is playing in the fires that we are experiencing in the
West, in particular, and now in Canada as well, of course. Due
to climate change, some of the things that have changed are
that we used to have these historic reservoirs of moisture in
both forest soils and in standing timber. And one of the things
we have experienced in New Mexico is that during these long
drought periods driven by the changes we are seeing in our
climate, there are times when there is more moisture in a two-
by-four at Home Depot than there is in a standing, live
ponderosa pine in our forests in New Mexico.
So for Mr. Rupert or Ms. Hall-Rivera, can you talk a little
bit about the role that climate change is playing in the kind
of seasons and fire behavior we are seeing, and then two, the
issue of active management, because one of the things that I
have seen in successful treatments where we are managing our
forests is that the treatments we need remove the small ladder
fuels. They oftentimes leave the large standing timber that
sequesters most of the carbon. So if you could respond to that
with respect to what Senator Barrasso was asking, and the
relationship there.
Mr. Rupert. Well, sure, I think, as you point out on the
effect of climate, more extreme swings in how climate affects
weather, so we go through these periods of extreme drought--
lengthy, extreme drought, and that has an effect on that fuel
moisture that absolutely is a huge part of driving these
catastrophic megafires that we are experiencing. Active
management is important because another factor along with
climate that does affect the current status of wildfire in the
nation is related to, largely, our past practice of fire
suppression, active fire suppression. We are really good at
putting out fires, and granted, we have these megafires that we
are unable to initially respond to and suppress, but in the
average year there are between 60 and 70,000 wildfires in this
nation. The vast majority of those fires, we put out. And
again, the result of that is we have this accumulated fuel that
is now drying.
And active management is an important part of addressing
that--all the tools in the toolbox. I would point out, to your
point, those fine fuels, there is really good, solid scientific
support at this point that in addition to mechanical treatment,
in addition to all the biomass approach, we have thinning,
grazing, prescribed fire, reintroducing fire to really address
that point you make--those fine fuels are an important piece
that can't be left out in these fire-adapted systems.
Senator Heinrich. Generally agree, Ms. Hall-Rivera?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, I do. I don't think I have anything I
could add.
Senator Heinrich. I am running out of time, so I want to
ask both of you to--you know, we have seen proposed from our
colleagues in the House of Representatives potentially double-
digit cuts across many government agencies. What would those
kinds of reductions in budget do to our wildland firefighter
force?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Well, that, coupled with the pay cliff,
would be pretty catastrophic for our fire workforce. We know
that if we are not able to get a change in pay status for our
firefighters that we are going to see many of them go to
higher-paying jobs where they can make a living wage and
support their families. You know, we are hearing from our
firefighting union that we could lose 30 to 50 percent of our
firefighting workforce. In the Forest Service, that would be
devastating.
Senator Heinrich. Thirty to fifty percent?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes.
Senator Heinrich. Yes.
Talk a little bit about the temporary pay increase and how
important it is going to be to make that a permanent pay
increase.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, we absolutely need that, Senator, so
that we can keep our firefighting workforce so we can retain
them and recruit new folks into this work, take care of them,
help them have a healthier work/life balance, and pay them what
they deserve to be paid for the hazardous work that they are
doing.
Mr. Rupert. I would just really briefly add to that. So we
know that we have seen firefighters who have made the choice
not to retire as a result of the pay support that we have been
able to provide over the last two years. We have also had
success expanding our capacity. We are seeing more firefighters
come in. If we lose the ability to provide that pay support, as
Jaelith points out, we recognize we are going to be impacted on
both the recruitment and the retention side.
Senator Heinrich. Okay. Thank you, both.
The Chairman. Thanks, Senator.
Senator Lee.
Senator Lee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Smoke from wildfires in Canada has blanketed the
northeastern United States, including here in Washington. I
checked the air quality index this morning, and it's 313, which
is considered hazardous. This is rarely seen in the United
States and is not healthy, to put it mildly. And I am sure many
of us have seen pictures of the thick smoke in New York City
over the last couple of days, which yesterday had the very
worst air quality among all of the world's major cities. Now,
most Easterners are not used to dealing with this level of
smoke, and by Easterners, I mean, basically anybody to the east
of Colorado, but----
[Laughter.]
Senator Lee. This is an unfortunate recurring reality for
us in the West. This is picture of downtown Salt Lake City.
[The photograph referred to follows:]
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Lee. Now, Salt Lake City doesn't look like this
normally, but from time to time we have these neighbors, I
mean, here we have Canada to deal with. We have California and
Utah, hundreds of miles apart, and yet, they have fires. And
when they have fires, this is what those fires do to us. They
blanket us in this thick oppressive layer of smoke. And it can
create dangerous air quality levels, just as this has done in
the eastern United States this week. But that is just an August
day when wildfires burn in places like California and then the
smoke blows over to us.
But western fires usually do not cause quite the national
stir that we have seen in the last few days, even though this
is something we deal with with some regularity. But they ought
to be of concern to all of us because they do happen, and for
us, they happen quite frequently. The reason these fires have
become so severe and so frequent in the West is because of
unwise forest management practices on land that is owned and
controlled by the Federal Government. The reality is that over
the last century or so, we have had this paradox unfold in
front of us in which federal land managers have, in some ways,
gone too far in aggressively suppressing the naturally
occurring wildfires, leading to overgrown and unhealthy
forests. And so, in that respect, it's overaction. In other
areas, it's underaction--failure to undertake aggressive forest
management practices that could control some of this. So we
have these western forests that are dense and dehydrated, yet
federal land managers are often prohibited from dealing with
the situation in the way in which it requires because of
restrictive federal land designations and permitting processes
for active management activities.
Ms. Norris, I would like to start with you, and as a
Wyomingite, you are familiar with many of these problems. There
seems to be a really stark difference between forest health on
federal forest land and other categories of federal land
compared to private and state-owned land with trees on it. From
your experience in Wyoming, why is there this stark difference?
Why is it so stark? Why do private and state-owned forests fare
so much better in this area?
Ms. Norris. Thank you, Senator.
I believe it has a lot to do with the states' and private
landowners' flexibility and being able to get things done on
the ground quickly, and it appears sometimes our federal
partners, through the NEPA process, through certain processes,
it takes them much longer to get the work done on the ground,
and things do not necessarily always end up in the desired
condition, maybe, that they had intended.
Senator Lee. And by flexibility, you mean it's not the
quality of the personnel, it's the legal restrictions by which
they are bound--what they are allowed to do is different than
it is on federal land, is that right?
Ms. Norris. Correct.
Senator Lee. Now, Ms. Hall-Rivera, I suspect we can agree
that active management--active forest management--should be a
part of any conversation on permitting reform. What reforms do
you think would be helpful to streamline active management
activities like mechanical thinning and controlled burns?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, thank you, Senator. We absolutely
agree that active management it is a critical part of the
conversation. That is what we are focused on in our wildfire
crisis strategy. We are taking advantage of every tool that we
have in the tool box right now, every flexibility that we have,
including the Secretary recently declaring emergency
authorizations for us to use those provisions in BIL, and we
are using those. We have six projects in so far. I have no
doubt we will get more. If there are additional tools that you
would like to give us in the tool box, we would be happy to
work with you on those.
Senator Lee. And we would love to, and my time is running
out, but just considering the wildfire crisis in the West and
that it is an ongoing, recurring, severe problem, do you think
that the current approach to forest management by federal
agencies is sustainable?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Well, what we do know is, we certainly
need a paradigm shift and we need to significantly scale up
that work on national forests, but also on state, private, and
other lands as well.
Senator Lee. Although on state and private lands, we don't
have the same problem. It's not----
Ms. Hall-Rivera. No, but we do need to work across
boundaries and work in partnership, as we have talked about
today. So we know we need to scale up. We appreciate the
resources we have been given to start doing that. And we will
need to continue to have resources invested in this problem in
the future.
Senator Lee. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Cantwell.
Senator Cantwell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I think
America is waking up, at least on the East Coast, to this
problem, and we certainly have known all about it on the West
Coast for some time now. I think it's time, because there is an
opportunity for us to really break down the barriers that are
prohibiting us from having a faster response and for us to work
more quickly on the faster response. Unfortunately, for us, the
latest map of the wildfire forecast for this summer, I think
the last time we showed this at our last hearing, Mr. Chairman,
there was a little bit of Washington in the red, but now my
whole state is red in the forecast for this summer--being the
epicenter of this. We know this already because we have been
affected by the British Columbia fires that are affecting our
state with smoke, but we also have small fires already burning
in central Washington and a small fire in Yakima County, which
grew to 150 acres last night.
[The maps referred to follow:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Cantwell. So first and foremost, I believe that we
need better cooperation between the Forest Service and the
state to break down any barriers that are preventing us from
having a quick aviation response, that is, being able to--on
the ground, we have something that is very effective in having
people work collectively on identifying fires and responding.
So one, we need to break down those aviation barriers to get a
faster response. Second, we need to implement the technology
communication tools that we asked the Forest Service about
during the last hearing that give us, again, communication
directly to where the fire is and what we are doing in
response. And third, I think it's really time to engage with
the Canadians. We can't just be sitting here thinking that we
have solved this problem, because our continent knows no U.S.-
Canadian barrier. And if we are going to have forest
management--and I have been a huge supporter of cross-laminated
timber as a fire break issue. I have been a huge supporter of
moving the time period for when we do prescribed burns. There
is probably hardly any time now to do prescribed burns in the
middle of summer. It just doesn't happen.
Mr. Chairman, I think some of my colleagues probably get
this, but literally the reason why people didn't do prescribed
burns in the springtime was because people were like, well,
there will be some smoke. Well, because we are not doing
prescribed burns, we are now getting a whole lot of smoke,
okay? So the point is, let's change our management system and
response system so that we can reduce fire risk. This summer is
telling us, we need to do that now.
So Ms. Hall-Rivera, please respond on both the
implementation of breaking down barriers on aviation response
and getting the communication technology network up as soon as
possible.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, Senator, thank you for all those
points. I would agree with all of them. We absolutely need to
break down barriers with all of our partners--states, tribes,
counties, even between the federal agencies. We are challenged
at times with some interoperability issues, maybe some
different qualification standards, but we are all on the same
team, and fire doesn't know any boundaries. We have already
heard that today. So we absolutely need to work to break down
those barriers. I think we are. We are absolutely committed to
that, and we can certainly bring some attention and focus to
that in Washington State, if need be.
As far as the need to scale up prescribed fires and some of
the challenges in doing so, I think you captured that very
well. Prescribed fire is absolutely critical to getting our
landscapes back to a place where they can receive fire in a
healthy way. It can be challenging to get windows to do that,
especially in the summertime, as you pointed out. So we need to
scale up that workforce, and we need to scale up the skill sets
across, not just the Federal Government, but across partners so
that we can get more prescribed fire on the ground.
Senator Cantwell. On the technology front, the U.S. Border
Patrol recently equipped 19,000 agents with this gear without
being obligated to do so. So if the U.S. Border Patrol can do
it, why can't we upgrade people right away with this gear?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, thank you for that question, Senator.
We are focused on getting tracking systems out. We have done a
lot of pilot testing as a result of the Dingell Act, and we
appreciate the focus and attention on this technology. We are
going to be equipping our fire fleet with tracking devices this
year, and we have a request for proposals coming out very soon
so we can take advantage of those technology companies and what
they have out in the marketplace, like you just mentioned, with
Border Patrol.
Senator Cantwell. Well, I think my former colleague from
Colorado and I worked very hard on this, and we think it's long
overdue to be implemented. I think this fire season we will
really want it to happen. And I certainly--I don't know if I am
being followed by my colleague from Idaho, but this good
neighbor concept, in general, is about how do we get the front
line--we actually have maps where we can see right up to where
the federal line is. Why? Because the county or the community
provided a response, but then all of a sudden could not cross
the federal lines. I think we need to think about how we are
going to empower local communities to help us when these kinds
of conditions are so drastic. And so, I know my colleague from
Idaho was working on that, and we will continue to dialogue
with this Committee.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator.
And Senator Risch is next.
Senator Risch. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's really
appropriate to be holding this hearing. For those of you who
live on the East Coast, welcome to our air in the West. This is
common. I don't remember a summer in Boise when we haven't had
smoke. Sometimes it's much worse than others. We have had some
summers that were really catastrophic in this regard. But this
is what we live with, I mean, this is just the way it is.
So for me, from that standpoint, this is an important
hearing. It is an important issue. On a personal note, my
undergrad was in forestry, specifically forest management.
Probably not many in Congress have actually worked on the fire
line, but I have, a number of times. In addition to that, we
had some catastrophic fires when I was Governor that we had to
deal with. And so, this is an issue--and of course, Boise is
home to the National Interagency Fire Center, so if you get a
fire, you are going to get a visit from some Idahoans to try to
help you put it out. So this is really important.
Look, for years, we have focused on putting out fires. And
we were very, very successful at it, and by being successful at
it, we have caused the problem that we have got, and that is
that the West, particularly, burns every year. It is part of
the natural process, but if it doesn't burn because we put the
fires out, we control the fires, then what you get is
catastrophic fires. Okay, so we understand that. Now, you have
got to manage it. And that is, you have got to remove fuel or
you have got to handle it in such a way that fuel is in places
where, if it's in the wilderness or something like that, that
they can let it burn. But we have got to stop wasting limited
agency resources to needlessly redo and relitigate projects
that have already undergone extensive environmental and public
processes.
Senator Daines and I have worked for quite some time to get
the Cottonwood fix passed. I was glad to see it passed again
through our Committee, but now it's time to get the thing
across the finish line. We also need to make significant
headway with fuels reduction projects. It's good to hear that
the agencies are putting together plans, but without additional
consistent work, we will continue to feed the flames. I
recently introduced the FIRESHEDS Act with Ranking Member
Barrasso and Senators Daines and Crapo to address landscapes at
extreme high risk of catastrophic fire. My bill will allow
states to work closely with federal agencies across the
boundaries to conduct management projects on firesheds which
constitute the highest risk to communities, wildlife, and
quality management. These projects will cut through red tape
while instituting a proactive, responsible collaborative
process.
Now, I think what people need to understand is, every
landscape is different. Every acre is different. And they all
need different attention. We are next to my friends in Colorado
who have a roadless rule. We, in Idaho, have a roadless rule. I
wrote it when I was Governor. And one of the things that we
really focused on in there was that we have a lot of back
country communities, small towns. And so, we really concentrate
on removing fuel in a circle around those towns, and it has
been very successful. There has been at least one dramatic save
of an entire community because they did fuel removal. So these
are all things we can focus on. We are getting a lot better at
it. We are getting smarter at it. My state is home to probably
the most famous forest fire ever, the Big Burn, back in 1910. I
was not there. My kids think I was.
[Laughter.]
Senator Risch. But we learned a lot of lessons from that,
not the least of which was that we had been so successful in
fire suppression that we just thought that if you just
suppressed the fires, that is the end of it. That is not the
end of it. The fuel is going to go. It's either got to be
burned out or it has got to be removed. And that is the way we
have got to approach these things.
So with that, thanks for the hearing. We need to all pull
the wagon----
Senator Cantwell. But, my colleague, you do support cross-
laminated timber as one of the ways to reduce that?
Senator Risch. Clearly.
Senator Cantwell. Thank you.
[Laughter.]
Senator Risch. I am not going under oath though. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator.
And now, we have Senator King.
Senator King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First, Ms. Norris, I want to welcome you, particularly, and
share with you that one of my dearest friends in Maine is a
woman named Sue Bell. And Sue Bell was the first female state
forester in America in the early 90s. So you owe something to
my friend Sue Bell. We are delighted to have you with us here
today.
Also, Senator Lee talked about where the West started and
ended in Colorado. In New England, the Midwest starts at
Springfield, Mass, just so you know where those lines are. At
least that's the way we view it in Maine.
It seems to me that the key words today that I have heard
over and over are overstock and drought. And drought is a
climate issue, as Senator Heinrich pointed out. And that is
something we are working on, on a whole lot of different fronts
in terms of reducing CO2 in the atmosphere and
reducing the drastic effects of climate change, one of which is
wildfires.
The overstocking though is something we can address
directly. Between 1965 and I think 1990, the average annual
amount of wood taken out of the federal forest was about 12
billion board-feet. Since 2001, it has been on average 2.2
billion board-feet. That is the problem. There is too much junk
wood and understory in forests. And Mr. Rupert, I don't want to
embarrass you, but you talked very proudly about how 2.1
million acres were going to be treated next year. I figured
that will get us to the full forest in 60 years. Come on. And
the solution is right in front of us--there are people that
want to harvest wood in the forest, and we should figure out a
way to let them do so in an environmentally sound manner. I am
convinced that can be the case because the disparity between 12
to 13 billion and two billion, there has to be a right number
somewhere between those two.
So how do we significantly increase harvesting? And I think
the testimony is accurate that we have a lot lower fire risk on
private land and on state-owned land because it is more heavily
managed. Mr. Rupert, how do we break through and get to the
point where we are taking out the understory and the junk wood
and the fuel so that we can really get at the bottom of this
problem, and then a whole lot of other issues can become much
more manageable?
Mr. Rupert. Yes, thank you, Senator. And I do very briefly
want to make the point that in Interior, we are administering
about a half billion acres across the nation. Maybe one in five
of those acres is forested. Four in five are not forested.
Senator King. Yes, I understand that. My calculation was
your forestry plus U.S. Forest Service.
Mr. Rupert. But to your point, I think, how do we have
more? I think if you look across the country, where we are
having success is where we are collaborating, coordinating, and
partnering at scale. So we talk about landscapes. We talk about
watersheds. That is a scale where individual parties on the
ground, local communities, local landowners, local interested
parties, have a seat at the table to share in a strategy to
identify shared values to protect. And I think the key is that
scale piece.
Senator King. But part of the shared value ought to be
CO2 in the atmosphere. And these fires are giving us
a lot of CO2 in the atmosphere that can be offset.
And there are environmental issues surrounding cutting, I
understand that. I am from the most forested state in the
country. And when I was Governor, we passed a very strong
Forest Practices Act. I get that. However, we are not taking
cognizance of the big picture, which is the CO2
released by these catastrophic fires. It may be that we need to
have more cutting in order to prevent that CO2 being
released by fires.
Do you see? I think I can make a strong environmental case
for this argument.
You are nodding.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, we agree, Senator.
Senator King. Nods don't go in the record.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Right. Yes, we agree. We need to scale up
all kinds of treatment. Hazardous fuels treatment, but also
timber management. That is one of our critical tools in the
tool box.
Senator King. One of the bills I have submitted, which goes
along with the list that Senator Barrasso gave about different
bills addressing this is one that would say that the Forest
Service can allow less than eight-inch trees to be removed for
free. And it would incentivize reducing, again, the fuel load
in the forest, because a lot of this is the smaller undergrowth
or dead and dying trees that ought to be gotten out. So I hope
that the Forest Service can really look at this and come back
to us and say, okay, why did we go from 13 to 2, and how do we
change that in an environmentally sound manner? Can you take
that as a question for the record?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, we will absolutely do that, Senator.
Senator King. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator.
Senator Murkowski.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you
all for being here this morning. Obviously, a very, very timely
meeting.
You know, it's interesting following my colleague. We are
co-chairs of the Arctic Caucus, and it has been interesting
that as I visit with fellow Arctic Parliamentarians about the
issues of the day in their respective countries, in these
Arctic nations, on everyone's radar now is what is happening
with these fires in Arctic environments. We never used to have
to worry about that on tundra. We are just seeing significant
changes. And as I look at the wildfire outlook, once again,
Alaska has got way more red than we want. It's interesting,
though, that as we speak and we are receiving the impact from
the Canadian fires, some of our Alaska hotshot crews are
helping out in Canada. We have sent some aircraft in Canada.
Typically, this time of year, we can't afford to send anybody
anything, in fact, we are asking for support, whether it's
support from the Lower 48, from our friends in Idaho, or from
our friends in Canada. We have got a later season. That is
good.
I am going to be asking you a question, Mr. Rupert, as to
whether or not you think the late breakup that we are seeing in
Alaska and the snowmelt indicate that we are going to see a
lighter fire season or whether it's just going to be pushed a
month later. But before I get to that question, I want to ask a
little bit more about the coordination, if you will, or
cooperation between the United States and Canada. As you know,
in Alaska, we have a significant northern border with Canada.
This is an area that is prone to wildfire. In fact, if you look
at that map, that whole border is in red. How are we doing with
just the level of coordination internationally? What more do we
need to be doing? And then, Mr. Rupert, if you can just answer
my question about what you see--is Alaska going to be late or
are we going to be light? We would really like to be light
because we are always pretty heavy.
Mr. Rupert. Well, in terms of the relationship of Canada,
there is a bilateral agreement in place. It has been in place
for many years. To your point, we regularly share resources
back and forth. We pay it forward----
Senator Murkowski. Right.
Mr. Rupert. All the time. So right now, fortunately, it is
at a period where providing that support to Canada has been
very manageable. We have had, up to this point, over 600
personnel that have been mobilized to Canada. I think today
there are right around 350 folks there. We have additional
requests, additional mobilizations that are coming through
right now, including with support specifically to eastern
Canada, Quebec. Again, talking about all the smoke impact that
the eastern U.S. is experiencing. Canada has provided support
to us during really difficult times.
Senator Murkowski. Right.
Mr. Rupert. For example, during the pandemic, that was not
easy. Also, 2019 was a big year of sharing resources. That was
a hard year for all of us. So there is a great relationship and
a great history there, and I think there is every reason to
expect that is going to continue to be the case.
Senator Murkowski. Good.
Mr. Rupert. Specifically, in Alaska, I was just in Alaska a
couple weeks ago, spent time at Fairbanks at AFS, at Wainwright
there, and preparations are very much ongoing. AFS is very
squared away and they are preparing. We have seen a fairly
dramatic shift in the outlook in Alaska, to your point. A month
ago, all that red was not there. We did talk with predictive
services while we were up there. The point they made is that
with precipitation over the winter and early spring in Alaska,
at that time, just a couple weeks ago, it was really sort of
uncertain how that was going to go. Now, fast forward just a
couple of weeks, and it's pretty clear that as things are
starting to dry, now there is a real likelihood of above-normal
activity in Alaska.
Senator Murkowski. So above normal, a little bit later in
the season, but is this going to extend us later? You don't
necessarily know? Are we going to be above normal is what I am
saying.
Mr. Rupert. Yes, so the outlook looks four months forward,
and over that time period, you know, we are, at this point,
anticipating there is going to be the potential for above
normal fire activity.
Senator Murkowski. Well, we will get ready.
I am probably going to have to take this for the record,
Ms. Hall-Rivera, but I have asked this question a couple times
in the last couple months within the Interior Appropriations
Committee and here in the Forest Service budget hearing. I
haven't received a response yet from Forest Service on this,
and I talk about how the tribes in Alaska are leaders in self-
governance and really want to have more opportunities for
tribal management, specifically with the 638 contracts and the
compacts. So the Farm bill had authorized a 638 compacting for
Tribal Forest Protection Act projects, but the authority is
limited to projects on federal lands that border or are
adjacent to the Indian Forest or rangeland. So we got some
technical assistance from USDA that may help, but we also want
to do what we can in expanding the 638 contracting and
compacting to additional activities. So we are hoping that you
will be willing to work with us and explore that further.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, absolutely, Senator.
Senator Murkowski. Great, thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator King [presiding]. On behalf of the Chairman,
Senator Kelly has agreed to defer to Senator Daines.
Senator Daines. Senator Kelly, thank you, by the way.
Senator King, thank you as well.
When you woke up this morning in Washington, you might have
opened your windows up and heard the birds coughing outside.
It's no secret that wildfire season is upon us. My guess is
that folks on the East Coast are already sick of the smoke. We
are already hearing about ground stops at Philadelphia Airport,
slowdowns at LaGuardia because of visibility issues with the
smoke. Look, this is what we deal with out west virtually every
summer. I keep beautiful pictures of the landscapes of Montana,
my hometown there in the Gallatin Valley, so that when we have
our friends during tourist season and family that come out to
Montana, I can show them the picture of what the mountains look
like, if you could see them, but they are covered up in smoke
oftentimes when we turn the corner in July and August and into
September.
We are sick of that smoke. I know the folks on the East
Coast are, and we need to do something to try to reduce the
risk of these fires. What happens in Montana is that we have
environmental groups who litigate and stop forest treatment
projects with a sympathetic judge or two within the Ninth
Circuit Court, and we end up tying some 130 million board-feet
of timber in Montana--tied up in litigation. Look, this is not
about trying to make ideological points at the moment. I am
focused on solving this problem. There is no doubt we have
longer fire seasons. We have warmer summers. So what is the
mitigation strategy going to be as we try to address this core
problem? And forest treatment projects should be one of our
deployed strategies. We have got to cut the red tape. We have
got to combat the fringe litigation. We have got to solve this
problem.
If we don't act, these catastrophic wildfires will continue
to threaten lives. They will burn millions of acres a year,
spending untold millions of dollars in fighting these fires,
putting firefighters at risk. Tragically, lives are lost with
our firefighters every fire season. Billions of dollars of
infrastructure are destroyed and our forest communities are put
at risk. They are getting harder to fight. They are getting
more dangerous to fight because we haven't addressed reducing
fuel loads. These fires get hotter, and frankly, they are even
more catastrophic.
The Forest Service and DOI together now have over 100
million acres at high risk of wildfire. These are a tinder box.
They are waiting to burn if we do not make some changes on how
we manage our public lands. On May 17th, my bipartisan Ninth
Circuit Cottonwood fix legislation passed out of this Committee
by a voice vote. I am thankful, grateful for my colleagues on
both sides of this dais who unanimously supported the voice
vote to move that forward out of Committee. Getting this fix
signed into law by the President is vital, because needed
forest management needs to continue versus being delayed by
litigation. You talk to anybody who is close to this problem,
they'll tell you, get that Ninth Circuit Cottonwood fix signed
into law and we suddenly have reduced one of the major barriers
to treatment and forest management.
And by the way, forest management yields some very
important benefits--wildlife habitat improvements by getting
more sunlight on the forest floors to provide for better feed;
watersheds, because we have massive wildfires, of course, you
have big erosion in the spring that gets into the streams that
harms trout habitat in Montana; and of course, reducing the
risk of wildfires. But let's not forget the importance of
getting workers back in the forest. These public lands don't--
there is no revenue coming off of them because the radical
environmentalists have shut down the industry. We get workers
back in there, getting revenues back to some of my impoverished
counties, getting our loggers back in the forests versus right
now, it's a bunch of lawyers.
Forest Service Chief Moore and Deputy Chief French have
both testified that the reconsultation requirement on the 87
forest plans will negatively impact the Forest Service work to
prevent wildfires. It ties right back to that Ninth Circuit
Cottonwood problem. Deputy Chief Hall-Rivera, do you agree with
them that the Ninth Circuit Cottonwood reconsultation
requirement will delay landscape-scale management that is
needed to help combat catastrophic wildfires?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, Senator, I would concur with what the
Chief and Deputy Chief French have already put on the record.
Senator Daines. Thank you for that response. Over the past
two decades, wildfires have become hotter, longer burning, more
damaging, and let's not forget that a catastrophic wildfire is
a carbon emitter. A healthy, vibrant forest is a carbon sink.
We now talk about having a fire year versus a fire season. This
puts strain on wildland firefighters year after year as they
battle more complex, dangerous fires for longer. In 2021, I
worked in a bipartisan manner with Senator Feinstein to secure
recognition of the work the wildland firefighters do by passing
our bill to create a title that reflects their actual job of
fighting fires and getting them a badly needed pay raise.
Director Rupert and Deputy Chief Hall-Rivera, could you talk
briefly, because I am out of time, about how the title change
and the pay increase has impacted recruitment and retention of
wildland firefighters at the agencies?
Start with Mr. Rupert.
Mr. Rupert. Yes, thank you. Really briefly, it certainly
helped. We are--I am aware that we have seen firefighters that
have made a decision or delayed retirement as a result of the
increased support as well as on then the recruitment side. We
have had success recruiting additional firefighters and have
continued to focus on expanding our capacity and recognize that
an important part of that effort is not only the pay support,
but also the support for a full career that goes along with all
of the work, for example, that has been done to establish the
new series.
Senator Daines. Director Rupert, thank you.
Any additional comments there?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, Senator. I would just say that we
know that the temporary bill pay increase has helped us retain
some of our workforce who might have left otherwise. It
certainly has brought some new workers into our firefighting
workforce, and that is why it's absolutely critical that we
avert the pay cliff and put something permanent into place.
Senator Daines. Thank you. And that pay cliff is September,
by the way, where this pay raise expires.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes.
Senator Daines. Unless we take action here in Congress.
Thank you.
Senator King. Thank you, Senator.
Senator Kelly.
Senator Kelly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
So we are currently experiencing the worst drought in 1,200
years in the West. The forest is dry. Every fire season it
seems these fires get worse and worse. And now we are seeing
this in other parts of the continent with the fires going on in
Canada today. Here is the satellite image, and I will show this
for the record.
[The satellite image follows:]
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Kelly. And you can clearly see, you know, the smoke
over the Eastern Seaboard. New York City yesterday had reported
the worst air quality in the world. Though, when I check the
air quality index for New York today, it is currently 199, and
in DC it's 273. So I would argue maybe here in Washington it's
possibly the worst or at least close to the worst on the
planet.
Well, this is something we see in Arizona year after year,
especially in the northern parts of the state. Wildfires are
just burning hotter, and it's a challenge to fight them. So
last Congress, Senator Romney and I added legislation to the
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law that created a Wildfire
Mitigation and Management Commission that is meeting today--18
members who are going to report out in September with their
recommendations. You know, how do we do a better job fighting
wildfires? I have been in the U.S. Senate just a short period
of time, and through a few fire seasons, and what I have seen
is, we basically do the same thing each year and hope for a
better result. Well, we are not going get a better result
unless we make some changes.
Senator Daines said if we do not act this will continue to
be a problem, and I do agree with that. And he spoke about
healthy forests. We have a project in Arizona, the Four Forest
Restoration Initiative. The biggest ponderosa pine forest in
the world just burns every year because it is just not a
healthy forest. So we have got to move that forward. We have
got to act. We have got to be more proactive and come up with
some new ideas. So I am looking forward to these
recommendations that we should see in September and possibly
get these implemented. But also in the Bipartisan
Infrastructure Law, there was a requirement of a new
classification, a distinct classification of a wildland
firefighter job classification. And it is my understanding that
the Forest Service and the Interior Department are in different
places regarding the implementation of this. Well, that was
required under the law.
So Director Rupert, I am interested. Where is Interior on
the implementation of this occupational series of wildland
firefighter?
Mr. Rupert. Thank you for the question, Senator.
So the development of the series has very much been a joint
collaborative effort between USDA, Interior, as well as OPM.
The new series was established almost a year ago--0456. In
Interior, we have been hard at work--this has also been
collaborative work--taking the new series and developing actual
position descriptions. The current status of that at Interior
is, we have our standard wildland firefighting positions--
grades GS3 through GS10--with PDs that are ready to go that we
are beginning to use. We still have additional work to do,
especially as you get into some of the more specialized
firefighting positions and the position descriptions that will
go along with it. But we have made real progress with
developing position descriptions and have begun to implement
the use of that.
Senator Kelly. And Deputy Chief Hall-Rivera, has the Forest
Service implemented this occupational series as well?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. So we are in a similar place to the
Department of the Interior, and we have worked collaboratively
together up until now. But we are going on a little bit of a
slower timeline and we have worked with OPM to secure an
extension to the end of the calendar year. The reasons that we
are doing that are a couple. There is significant complexity in
the Forest Service. We have hundreds of position descriptions
that could be going into this new series. And so what we want
to do is make sure that we build in time to get it right. And
what that means is, making sure that we can engage with our
firefighting employees, our union, and our fire supervisors to
make sure we get those details right before we put them into
the new series. So that is why we are in a bit of a timing
difference than the Department of the Interior. We have over
12,000 firefighters, and like I said, hundreds of position
descriptions. So from my perspective, it's a go slow to go fast
and to go right.
Senator Kelly. So worst case, when would you expect that
you would hire somebody new--not somebody that is already an
employee--but your next wildland firefighter, under this
classification?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. I would expect that would happen next
calendar year, Senator.
Senator Kelly. All right, thank you.
And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman [presiding]. I am going to just--one quick
round. Senator Cortez Masto, I think it's your turn.
Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Sorry.
Senator Cortez Masto. Not a problem.
So similar to my colleagues from the West, I don't want to
just beat this to death, but just to put it in perspective--in
2020, the August Complex Fire in Northern California burned
1,032,000 acres. That is an area larger than the State of Rhode
Island.
In 2021, the Dixie Fire burned 963,000 acres, and the
Caldor Fire, at the same time, burned 221,000 acres. Some of
that was man-made, some of that was caused by lightning. And
the reason I bring this up is because, true to what you just
saw in Utah, the smoke there was caused by these fires. We see
that in Nevada. We see that all across the West. It looked just
like that.
And my goal here has been, as I talk with my firefighters
in my state--state, local, and federal. We have had summits--
and thank you very much--Forest Service has been at the table,
so has Department of the Interior. How do we ensure that we are
providing all of the resources we need to combat these fires
that are hotter and longer and to keep our firefighters safe
and our communities safe? One of the things I want to bring up
is--a key part of the firefighting is our Air National Guard in
Nevada. The 152nd Airlift Wing has eight Legacy C-130H aircraft
with the modular airborne firefighting systems. Are you
familiar with this system, Ms. Hall-Rivera?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, I am, Senator.
Senator Cortez Masto. So the Air National Guard is
utilizing these aircraft to fight fires along the West. They
are looking for the C-130Js that have the new system associated
with it. Why is it important to have this new system and the C-
130Js?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Well, it's always important to have the
most modern aircraft that you can get in the firefighting
environment. The C-130J is an excellent aircraft to be used as
an air tanker, either one that is converted, or in this case,
the Modular Airborne Fire Fighting Systems (MAFFS), where it
rolls on, and we have a few of those in our contracted fleet as
well.
Senator Cortez Masto. And the goal here is to give them the
most up-to-date equipment to fight these fires, and my
understanding is it can contain up to 3,000 gallons of flame
retardant to help suppress fires by dropping more of this flame
retardant. And these fires are fought by the Air National Guard
in the western states. It's not just because they are in
Nevada. It's not unique to Nevada. They are out fighting fires.
Is that correct?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes. So the MAFFS program, as we call it,
is a long-time partnership that we have had with the Department
of Defense, and essentially, they are modular systems that roll
on to the aircraft and then are able to drop retardant, and we
work with lots of different units, including Nevada, and we
have units in California and other places that partner with us
and provide those aircraft, the personnel, and the retardant
systems.
Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you.
And I bring that up because I want my colleagues to
understand why the request is coming from Nevada for our Air
National Guard for the newest model, these C-130Js. It's
important for our firefighting in the western states.
Let me jump back to the compensation issue because this
is--again, thank you, Mr. Johnson, for your report--this is
exactly what I am hearing from our firefighters in the State of
Nevada. And clearly, more has to be done to provide permanent
and better compensation. We also have to provide the affordable
housing opportunities that are so necessary, for the reasons
that we have just talked about. The Bipartisan Infrastructure
package provided over $600 million--about $480 million to the
Forest Service and then $120 million to the Department of the
Interior, to temporarily increase that base firefighter salary
for the reasons we were hearing. But let me ask you this, it's
falling off. The money is no longer going to be there after a
certain period of time. So for purposes of, I guess, DOI and
the U.S. Forest Service, if Congress does not pass a bill to
extend the pay increase by the time these funds run out, what
happens?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Well, I think it would be absolutely
catastrophic, Senator. I stated earlier, and I will restate it,
our union is telling us they would expect that 30 to 50 percent
of our firefighting workforce would leave our service and go
elsewhere, as they should, to make a living wage and the right
kind of compensation that they deserve to be paid. We are
starting to see some resignations now. People are not going to
wait until September 30.
Senator Cortez Masto. And does that include--let's talk
about specifics. The hotshot crews, the smoke jumpers, right?
Losing qualified, skilled professionals in this area fighting
fires and wildfires.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes. You make a really important point,
Senator, that we would lose those folks who are leaders in the
fire service, who have the most institutional knowledge, and
that would be incredibly difficult for us to replace because it
takes years and years of experience to get that kind of
knowledge and expertise.
Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you.
And I know my time is up. I am going to submit this for the
record, Mr. Rupert, because I do absolutely want to hear from
you as well.
But I also have concerns hearing from my firefighters,
particularly Todd Ingalesbee--he is a fellow Nevadan and
President of the Professional Firefighters of Nevada--about the
concerns about the physical and mental health that multiple
deployments have on our firefighters. What does that mean, and
is that having an impact on what we are seeing in the loss of
so many firefighters?
Mr. Rupert. So you are hearing that feedback from
firefighters in Nevada. There is good, solid evidence now from
studies that that is, in fact, the case. Firefighters are at an
elevated and greater risk of PTSD and anxiety as a result of
those repeated deployments and long hours, and it is an
opportunity to highlight. So we have talked about pay. Another
aspect of the proposal we have moving forward is about
capacity. So as we reduce the number of hours that we are
essentially requiring firefighters to work that address that
mental health issue, we also have to have additional capacity
to make up for those hours. And so these things are all
interconnected in terms of how we deal with the wildland
firefighter workforce reforms. Pay, capacity, mental health
support, housing, all of it, all of it together is important.
Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you.
The Chairman. Senator Hawley.
Senator Hawley. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to the
witnesses for being here.
I want to start with a shout-out to firefighters in my
state, the State of Missouri. Earlier this year, in March of
this year, the Forest Service began a prescribed burn in the
Mark Twain National Forest, down at the southeastern part of my
state, and it was led--this prescribed burn was led--by a new
all-veteran firefighting crew, which is just tremendous. There
have been great reports on it throughout the state. And I think
that this is a great model for what we could do. I see you
nodding along, Ms. Hall-Rivera. So I am very proud of those
firefighters. Very proud of these vets and proud of the model
that they are, I think, showing for the rest, or setting up for
the rest of the country.
Ms. Hall-Rivera, let me ask you about the Forest Service
role in a different regard when it comes to mining approvals
for essential critical minerals. Would you agree with me that
critical minerals are vital to our energy security?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, I would agree with that, Senator.
Senator Hawley. The International Energy Agency estimated
earlier this year that lithium demand is expected to grow by
400 percent by 2040. Cobalt and nickel, between 200 and 250
percent by 2040. Copper demand is supposed to go up more than
double by 2040. Now, here is the thing that worries me. One
nation in the world is currently refining 68 percent of the
world's nickel. Would you care to take a guess who that might
be?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. I would presume China.
Senator Hawley. It is China.
One nation is refining 40 percent of the world's copper.
Want to guess who that is?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. I would presume the same.
Senator Hawley. It's China.
One nation has 59 percent of the lithium and 73 percent of
the cobalt. Want to guess?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. I am going to say China.
Senator Hawley. It's China. You got it. It's China. So
given that, would you agree with me that it's important that we
do everything we can to develop our domestic critical mineral
mining here in this country?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, I would agree with that, Senator.
Senator Hawley. Great. Okay. Then let me ask you about the
Superior National Forest in Minnesota. Earlier this year,
partly at the behest of the Forest Service, the Biden
Administration withdrew 225,000 acres of critical mineral
mining in northeastern Minnesota. This is the largest reserve
of cobalt and nickel in the United States, perhaps, and I am
told maybe even in the world. And yet, your Administration shut
it down. Your agency recommended that it be shut down,
depriving us of these minerals, making us dependent on other
nations that mine them in a completely unsafe and unsustainable
way, and also making us more dependent on these foreign
nations. Why?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Well, Senator, I do want to say, I am not
an expert on that process. That is not a part of the Forest
Service that I oversee. I know we have a lot of values to
balance there, especially with the Boundary Waters Wilderness
Area, but I am sure that we could get back to you with more
details on the specifics of that decision.
Senator Hawley. Would you? That would be helpful, if you
would. I would really appreciate it.
Because here is my view. My view is, we shouldn't be making
China richer and America poorer. My view is, we have the best
technology in the world to mine and develop these minerals. We
know how to do it in a safe and responsible manner. We should
be doing it. And listen, I have heard from people all over the
country, but particularly people in this part of the country,
who have said that this decision is devastating to their region
economically, but I just submit, it's devastating to our energy
security and our national security. And at a time when I hear
from this Administration, ``climate change, climate change,
climate change,'' we need to have reliable, sustainable sources
of energy. Why would we want to tie our own hands and make us
and the world more dependent on China, who've got to have the
worst environmental record of any nation in the world? If they
are not the worst, they've got to be close.
So I just don't get it. And I would appreciate you getting
back to me on that.
With my few remaining seconds here, Mr. Johnson, let me
just ask you, in your testimony, your written testimony, you
talked about barriers that federal agencies face when they are
trying to recruit and retain firefighters. I agree with you
that this is critically important. I want to highlight a bill
that Senator Ossoff and I introduced last year called the Fire
Station Improvement Act, which would cut red tape, expand the
Assistance to Firefighters Grant, allow new funds to improve
facilities, and protect the health and safety of our
firefighters.
Do you think an effort like that is necessary, number one,
and number two what else do we need to do?
Mr. Johnson. Yes, thank you, Senator.
All efforts to help build capacity to address the wildfires
would be very helpful. And also, as we have heard today, any
efforts that we--because a lot of these barriers are
interrelated--so dealing with some of the poor work/life
balance, some of the mental health challenges, all of these
will go a very long way to addressing the barriers.
Senator Hawley. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Hickenlooper.
Senator Hickenlooper. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
You know, the smoke that we are seeing right now in
Washington that is blanketing large portions of America right
now is mostly coming from Canada. It's my understanding that--
and Mr. Rupert, why don't I start with you?
My understanding is there is an argument that for years the
Forest Service had what we called the Smokey the Bear
approach--put out every forest fire, and then the argument goes
that that somehow made the forests overgrown and unhealthy and
more vulnerable to hotter, larger fires. But Canada never
really had a Smokey the Bear policy, right? That's my
understanding.
Mr. Rupert. Thank you, Senator. To be honest with you, I am
not sure what the history in Canada is around the public
outreach that they have in place around firefighters, whether
they have an equivalent or not, but I think to your point, yes,
I mean, fundamentally, what is driving these large,
catastrophic wildfires and megafires, in addition to the
weather that is associated with this changing climate, longer
drought, and more extreme weather, is also fuel for the
wildfires that is related to very aggressive suppression of
wildfires, certainly, across America and even across the
continent over the last century.
Now, as you get farther north, closer to the Arctic, there
are more fundamental shifts having to do with climate with
areas that really have never burned that now are at risk. So as
you get farther north in Canada, some of that, certainly, is in
play.
Senator Hickenlooper. Well, I guess the point is that the
climate change is something you have got to put in your
calculation and that the expenses of air quality at this level
are, you know, when you actually begin trying to itemize them,
it becomes enormous.
I actually had a more specific, pedestrian question--
although air quality is pretty pedestrian, I guess. It affects
each one of us. Affordable housing is obviously an issue, and
certainly many Coloradans are grappling with it, but in terms
of firefighters, it is good to hear that you guys are all
working and recognize that this is something important. What
are--and any of you can answer this. We will start with you,
Mr. Rupert. What are some of the challenges you face in making
housing more accessible for our firefighters and the ways that
you are addressing that issue?
Mr. Rupert. Yes, the real challenge and the real impact, I
think, as you hit on, is the availability of affordable
housing, and really, in many, many places across the nation,
you know, we are asking for additional support, and that
support that we are asking for is focused on renovating
existing housing that we have, modernizing existing housing,
and building additional housing.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, I would echo that, Senator. It's a
multifaceted problem. It's an availability problem. It's an
affordability problem, predominantly, especially in the western
United States. Obviously, you see that in your state in some of
our resort communities, in particular--second home communities.
That is exactly where our firefighters need to live and work.
And not only do we need to increase their wages so that could
help with the affordability issue, as Mr. Rupert said, we have,
as part of the Administration's proposal, a $50 million
investment in employee housing, but I believe we need an all-
of-the-above approach. We need private-sector partnerships. We
need public-private partnerships. We need to look at how we can
work with our communities to keep our firefighters in those
communities.
Senator Hickenlooper. Absolutely.
Ms. Norris. Yes, Senator. We do provide housing for our
seasonal helitack staff so that we can compete with our federal
partners so we can offer a way for them to stay and live in the
area and be able to help us. We also have additional housing we
are looking at trying to build to support that fire community.
Mr. Johnson. Thank you. Multi-dimensional issue here. What
we have heard from the stakeholders that we have talked to is
largely about raising the pay because of the affordability
issue. But one of the other options that came up with many of
the stakeholders that we discussed was considering housing
stipends. That would be a policy decision should the land
management agencies and Congress want to do that, and that
would require authority. The land management agencies would
need authority to be able to issue those.
Senator Hickenlooper. Right. Some of the things we have
seen that are really encouraging are Forest Service and BLM
looking at long-term leases of land that is appropriately
located and not compromising our--I am one of the biggest
supporters you will ever find of public lands, and we do not
want to ever compromise that, but sometimes that real estate
can be in the right place and it can be a public-private
partnership so that we can build housing for the firefighters
that I think you all depend on.
Let me ask you also, you know, you see all this smoke
coming down from Canada, and we--two weeks ago, we saw in
Colorado, you literally could not see from the state capital,
you could not see the mountains because of the smoke that was
coming down from Alberta.
The Chairman. Senator, could I interrupt you just one
second?
Senator Hickenlooper. Sure.
The Chairman. Can you hold that question?
Senator Hickenlooper. Yes.
The Chairman. Senator King has to go----
Senator Hickenlooper. Of course.
The Chairman [continuing]. To preside.
Senator Hickenlooper. I am always--you don't even have to
say another moment. I would be honored to yield.
The Chairman. I will come right back to you.
Senator Hickenlooper. Of course.
The Chairman. Senator King.
Senator King. I just want to submit for the record a chart
of historical harvest levels in the Forest Service from 1905 to
the present.
[The chart referred to follows:]
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Senator King. And the other piece that I wanted to share
was this chart, which is from yesterday. And what is very
unusual is, we talk about climate. Living in the Northeast,
climate always moves west to east. That is where the prevailing
winds are. What is happening right now is something very
unusual where the forest fire is up here, and the smoke is
coming back down. And because of our superior virtue, you will
notice that Maine is not in the shadow at all, but it is an
interesting phenomenon. And it shows that purple is the worst
air, which is in Washington, Philadelphia, New York. I just
thought it was interesting, talking about climate. This is a
very unusual weather pattern that has created the situation
that we are in right now. It is very unusual for the air to be
moving north to south rather than west to east.
[The AirNow Fire and Smoke Map from June 7, 2023 follows:]
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Senator King. So those were my two----
The Chairman. But Senator King, I also wanted to mention
real quick that you made a valuable point. He is saying that
basically the $10 billion we have invested in things you were
supposed to do--basically reducing the fuels for fires, he made
a point that just--let's harvest. Let's harvest it.
Senator King. They'll pay us, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Yes, I am saying, it doesn't cost anything.
We make money. And we solve both problems. I don't know what
the problem is there.
Senator King. Thanks.
The Chairman. A lot of people don't want to cut trees.
Okay.
Senator King. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you, sir.
Senator Hickenlooper, I'm sorry to have interrupted you,
but thank you.
Senator Hickenlooper. I am always glad to yield to Angus
King because you always learn something.
The Chairman. Always.
Senator Hickenlooper. He is always looking at things from a
different perspective, and you know, bringing to the surface
things that might otherwise not be shared.
I will finish that statement on the granular effect of
these devastating fires. In Colorado, certainly, at all levels
of management, we are seeing the planning at the fireshed
level, trying to make us more resilient from future wildfires.
The Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests are a good example
of this work where partners work strategically across the
landscape on figuring out where you can get the best bang for
the dollar in terms of protecting forests and the communities
and people in the wildland urban interface.
So Mr. Rupert, how does Interior think strategically about
where to deploy its wildfire management resources locally in
order to achieve the desired outcomes at landscape scale?
Mr. Rupert. Focusing initially on our response, the very
mature and robust framework that we have in place is focused on
nearest available resource, local response. We have the nation
organized into geographic areas and those geographic areas
coordinate to prioritize operational wildfire response based on
the nearest available resource. I think then transitioning that
to thinking about, okay, what are we doing before the fire,
pre-fire, to reduce risk? Similarly, we have to continue--and
we are making progress here, I am certain--but we have to
continue to have increasingly coordinated, multi-
jurisdictional, cross-programmatic coordination and shared
strategies to do the similar thing at that appropriate scale,
that landscape scale, so that we are essentially developing
these shared strategies to reduce risk before the fire comes,
similar to how, you know, in many ways we respond to wildfires
when they do occur.
Senator Hickenlooper. Right.
Ms. Norris, do you agree with that in Wyoming?
Ms. Norris. Yes, and we completely agree. One of our best
tools is the Good Neighbor Authority agreement, and through
that agreement, State Forestry has really worked hard with our
federal partners to get more work done on the ground. And it is
all different kinds of work. It is timber sales as well as
additional project work. And now, looking at even trying to get
the NEPA done, contracting out assessments, and trying to do
things like that to help our federal partners.
Senator Hickenlooper. I think that is the--even some of the
discussions about copper and mining and a lot of these things,
we are having to look at them in a new light, and our forests,
NEPA, each of these historical, important sets of rules, we
have to examine in the light of climate change and recognize
there is an urgency there that we haven't had before.
Anyway, Ms. Hall-Rivera, do you want to answer that
question too, in terms of that resiliency, the planning for
resiliency within the forests?
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Yes, I would absolutely echo what my
colleague said. We need to focus and prioritize at a larger
scale. That is fundamentally what our 10-year Wildfire Crisis
Strategy is about, and it needs to be cross-boundary. It needs
to be with partners. It absolutely needs to be co-prioritized
with states, with tribes, with local areas, counties, and with
Interior as well. And so that is the paradigm shift we talk
about in our wildfire crisis strategy. And that is what we are
trying to make a reality with the investments that we have been
given from Congress.
Senator Hickenlooper. Right.
Mr. Johnson, anything to add?
Mr. Johnson. Thank you.
So no, I think that it is very important as we are
addressing this issue for the partnerships to continue that are
being formed, you know, with the Federal Government and the
state and local level because I think through those
partnerships is how things will end up progressing and moving
forward and leveraging all authorities that they have. Thank
you.
Senator Hickenlooper. Right.
I am almost out of time. And I think I got extra time by
being interrupted.
The Chairman. No, you are definitely out of time.
Senator Hickenlooper. I'm not now--I'm still--I've got a
clock running, and I have watched enough basketball games to
know that the clock----
The Chairman. I have to go vote.
Senator Hickenlooper. The buzzer hasn't gone off.
I do want to--you each to talk about collaboration, and
that takes more time, more money, more people, and yet it is
crucial, and yet, we are going to likely enter a phase where we
are not going to have more money. And I hope--I will leave you
with this thought, or maybe I will leave the question in the
record, which is how do we get to that more effective
collaborative response in these issues where you have to have
BLM and the Forest Service, everyone has to be working together
at a level we have talked about but never done. How do we do
that efficiently so that we can afford it?
And I will leave you with that.
I yield back to the Chair.
The Chairman. Oh, thank you so much.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Real quick. We want this in the record and
then we have to adjourn.
The National Fire Protection Association recently released
a standard, Standard 1851, regarding best practices to prevent
development of cancers commonly caused by firefighting
activities. They note that for every five degrees of increase
in skin temperature, there is a 400 percent increase in the
absorption capability of our skin, and that firefighters should
prioritize getting soot, which is a carcinogen, off their skin
as soon as possible.
Mr. Rupert and Ms. Rivera, what are agencies doing to
comply with the standard, and are they informing their
firefighters of this information?
Mr. Rupert. Yes, so thank you very much. Hugely important
to the health and safety of wildland firefighters. Those
standard operational procedures are very much a focus and
priority across the entire interagency community. A specific
example I would offer to illustrate that focus--the interagency
community established a medical and public health advisory team
during COVID. It was really impactful in terms of how we
coordinate.
The Chairman. Do the firefighters know about this? Have
they been notified?
Mr. Rupert. Yes, and that group is picking up on these
things.
The Chairman. Good.
Mr. Rupert. And very much focusing on how do we more
effectively----
The Chairman. Let us know how we can help. Okay?
Mr. Rupert. Thank you.
Ms. Hall-Rivera. Thank you, Senator.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Members are going to have until close of business tomorrow
to submit additional questions for the record.
And I want to thank each and every one of you. It was very
enlightening. It was very good. We have got a lot of work to
do. There are a lot of common-sense solutions up here. Let's
start basically using best practices to cut and sell the timber
and solve two problems. Okay, thank you.
Meeting adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:58 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
APPENDIX MATERIAL SUBMITTED
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