[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 63 (Friday, May 7, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5039-S5040]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             FOREST FUNDING

  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to discuss an 
issue that has enormous importance for the West and other parts of the 
country, and that is the funding, critically needed funding, to protect 
our forests.
  I believe we are going to have an extraordinarily difficult time in 
the next few months coping with these forest fires that are causing 
such devastation in the West. I was part of a coalition, a member of 
the Budget Committee which saw the Senate accept unanimously by voice 
vote a measure that would fully fund essentially what we were trying to 
do, again on a bipartisan basis, in the Healthy Forests Restoration 
Act.
  I come today because I have heard unofficially that possibly the 
amendment I authored and which was accepted unanimously in this Chamber 
is not going to make it out of the budget conference. I think this 
would be a grievous mistake given the reports we are getting now about 
the prospect of an extraordinarily difficult fire season.
  The amendment I authored would increase the budget authority to boost 
investments in the Healthy Forests Restoration Act to benefit our 
national forests, the environment, local communities, and local 
economies. My amendment would add $343 million to last year's $417 
million for hazardous fuel reduction so as to be able to reach the $716 
million authorization in title I of the Healthy Forests legislation.
  Now, we have talked a lot during this session about the importance of 
hazardous fire reduction projects. We have talked about it in the 
Budget and Appropriations Committees, in the Healthy Forests 
Restoration Act, and my colleagues have heard me repeatedly talk about 
how important this funding would be. But every year these hazardous 
fuels projects go underfunded or unfunded, and that means another year 
with little or no warning thousands of people in fire-prone communities 
end up tossing everything they can into their cars and fleeing their 
homes without knowing if anything is going to remain when they return.
  The Forest Service's inability to do all of the hazardous fuels 
reduction projects that needs to get done leads to real-life danger on 
the ground in these small western communities.
  It leads to danger in the backyards of our citizens, in their 
recreation areas, and the places they gather in their communities.
  Two years ago, in July of 2002, the Associated Press reported that 
17,000 people faced evacuation in Oregon. Here is just a bit of this 
report:

       Firefighters went door-to-door deciding which homes they 
     could save (in Cave Junction, Oregon) as an explosive 68,000-
     acre wildfire nearby fed off heat, wind and timber.

  These folks were evacuated, and a month later they were still 
evacuated. Another article from one of our publications, the Medford 
Mail Tribune, noted the very personal nature of the disruption. It said 
the Josephine County Sheriff's Office was beginning to reunite an 
estimated 400 evacuated animals, including livestock and even family 
pets, with evacuated owners.
  The Associated Press, that same news outlet, reported just yesterday 
that an early fire season is expected in eastern Oregon. We are hearing 
about this all over the West. There are going to be lots of fires. They 
are going to be very early. They, in my view, are going to cause 
enormous pain and hardship for our communities.
  I implore my colleagues, both in the Senate and in the other body, to 
protect what we have been able to do in a bipartisan kind of fashion, 
and that is to properly and fully fund this critical aspect of the 
Healthy Forests legislation.
  For years there has been this budgetary sleight of hand with respect 
to forest fires, where the Forest Service takes from one account and 
goes to another. When it is all done, it is clear there are not enough 
resources, and that is what I tried to change in the Healthy Forests 
legislation. We had bipartisan support. Senator Domenici, for example, 
has done yeoman's work on this for years and years. Senator Crapo, 
another colleague in this body, has been so supportive of this effort.
  I will take a few minutes to talk about what I think is ahead and why 
I hope that if the conference has not fully acted that we can protect 
that amendment to fully fund the effort to deal with this huge fire 
risk that we are facing.
  Just yesterday, the San Francisco Chronicle reported:

       California's fire season, off to an ominously early start, 
     could be exacerbated by increasing numbers of dead trees, 
     frozen funding for fuel-reduction projects and the implacable 
     expansion of the suburbs into wildlands. Federal officials 
     moved Wednesday to address one of those concerns, freeing 
     $240 million for removal of dead trees in San Diego, San 
     Bernardino and Riverside Counties, after Senator Feinstein 
     complained about restrictions on the funds. Still, State and 
     national officials say the trend in recent years of extremely 
     destructive wildfires in California and throughout the West 
     is likely to continue this season.

  From the CBS Associated Press story entitled ``Early Start For 
California Fires,'' which came from Corona, CA, on May 5, just days 
ago:

       As acrid smoke for more than 18,000 acres of charred brush 
     curled skyward, California officials feared the earlier-than-
     usual start of the summer wildfires season could make it the 
     most dangerous ever. Just months after the most devastating 
     wildfires in State history . . . thousands of acres from San 
     Diego to Santa Barbara are ablaze. Thousands of 
     firefighters are on the line, and once again residents are 
     fleeing advancing flames.

  The same day, the Associated Press said:

       It's like gasoline. More than 1,000 people were evacuated 
     in the northeastern Lake Elsinore area as the Cerrito Fire 
     was whipped up by winds.

  Tuesday, the Los Angeles Daily News:

       It was the explosive end to the State's worst fire season, 
     from which the region still hasn't recovered. And this year, 
     authorities say, could be worse. Much, much worse.

  To those thousands of folks across the country, particularly those 
whom I represent in Oregon who have been pounded by these devastating 
fires year after year, the bickering and the back and forth in Congress 
on fully funding forest health, this is not a theoretical thing to 
those Oregonians. It is not some kind of policy discussion. It is a 
danger to their families, a danger to their communities, every single 
day.
  By working in a bipartisan fashion, after more than 25 years the 
Congress came together, passed a landmark

[[Page S5040]]

piece of wildfire legislation, which was signed into law by the 
President on December 3 of last year. It is going to protect 
communities from catastrophic forest fires, preserve old-growth trees, 
restore unhealthy forests, and protect the involvement of our 
communities in discussing these issues.
  I was very pleased that because of the bipartisan cooperation, we 
were able to get the Senate to pass a balanced practical approach to 
Healthy Forests legislation, and it authorized the $760 million that is 
essential for hazardous fuels reduction projects, and it made possible 
my budget amendment that would have provided the funding room necessary 
for the landmark legislation.
  Without the help of the budget amendment that was adopted earlier, 
the issue that is now being debated in Congress, the Healthy Forests 
Restoration Act is not going to be able to live up to the full promise 
that folks in Cave Junction, OR, or Corona, CA, are counting on. The 
amendment in the budget resolution will take us a step closer to 
fulfilling the vision that people have in the rural West of this law. 
They deserve an approach and critical response from the Federal 
Government, starting now with the prospect of a devastating fire 
season.
  This body agreed that hazardous fuels reduction projects, the 
National Fire Plan, and the Healthy Forests Restoration Act should be 
given complete and bipartisan support. I am hopeful that the budget 
conferees will see the importance of keeping intact the unanimously 
accepted Senate position to fight these fires with the resources 
necessary.
  It is critical that we not disappoint people in these small rural 
communities across the West. They are counting on the Congress to 
ensure that they have the resources that are going to be essential to 
save their homes and safeguard their lives.
  I do not want to see these families evacuated again this year and 
next year because the Congress did not do its job.
  I urge our colleagues, at a time when we are about to go to the 
budget conference, to support the effort to fully fund forest fires, to 
promote the healthy forest effort that we enacted on a bipartisan 
basis.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.

                          ____________________