[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 134 (Thursday, September 17, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H6126-H6130]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
WILDFIRES AND FOREST MANAGEMENT
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 6, 2015, the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman) is
recognized for the remainder of the hour as the designee of the
majority leader.
General Leave
Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks
and include extraneous materials on the topic of my Special Order.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Mooney of West Virginia). Is there
objection to the request of the gentleman from Arkansas?
There was no objection.
Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to draw attention to
wildfires and forest management.
Recent headlines show that our forests are in terrible shape: 8.8
million acres have burned this year; $250 million was recently
transferred from forest management accounts to fight fires, announced
last week.
Emergency fire spending has already topped $700 million this year and
is still growing. We have a problem that is greatly decreasing and
impairing the value of our forest for the next generation.
I worked with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to pass H.R.
2647, the Resilient Federal Forests Act, back in July. This bill was
supported from Maine to Alaska by Democrats and Republicans. The bill
ends the destructive practice of fire borrowing in a fiscally
responsible manner. It creates a subaccount under the Stafford Act for
wildfire. This ensures that resources to put out major fires are
available when necessary.
This week, the Obama administration publicly called on the Congress
to fix fire borrowing. While I appreciate the President's interest, I
agree with him that we need to fix fire borrowing. I applaud the 19
Democrats who voted for H.R. 2647 that fixes fire borrowing.
Fixing fire borrowing alone won't solve the problem. Fixing fire
borrowing alone simply is treating a symptom instead of a disease. It
is like putting on a bandaid without cleaning out the wound.
Again, the House passed this bipartisan legislation back in July. We
could be fixing these problems now, but
[[Page H6127]]
the Senate hasn't acted. It is time for the Senate to act. It is time
to stop playing politics with our Nation's forests, one of our most
treasured resources. The House offered a solution. Let's embrace
constructive governance and make H.R. 2647 the law of the land.
I want to take a moment and look at what the Resilient Federal
Forests Act does. We already talked about fire borrowing, but it also
prevents future fires.
H.R. 2647 gives the Forest Service the tools it needs to better
manage our national forests immediately after its passage. Our forests
are overgrown, and therefore, they are fire prone. Fighting fires
doesn't prevent future fires. That is why we need better management.
Scientific thinning helps prevents future fires.
I would like to show some photographs from a forest in my home State
of Arkansas. To some, this may look like a healthy, thriving forest
because you see trees and you see a lot of greenery, but I am a
forester, and when I look at that, I see an overstock stand of trees. I
see too much undergrowth. I see too much dead and dying material on the
forest floor. This is not a healthy forest, but this happens to be a
control site in the middle of a healthy forest.
Next, I want to show how we get to a healthy forest on this
particular side.
This area has been thinned, and there is controlled burns taking
place. These burns take place on intervals of 3 to 5 years. They not
only make the forest better to withstand potential forest fires; they
also create better wildlife habitat. The biodiversity in this forest
goes through the roof when these kind of management practices are put
in place. We get healthy trees. We get an early successional habitat
that is good for wildlife. It also is good for the soil; it is good for
water quality, and it is good for air quality.
This last picture shows what a healthy forest in my district looks
like. These trees are thriving. This is an early growth not too long
after a fire. This is a great wildlife habitat. The biodiversity of
wildlife and plant life is much higher in this photograph than what we
saw in the previous photograph. This creates a win-win situation.
Now, this isn't the solution for everywhere across the country; this
is what works in the forests in my district, but there are forest
managers across this country that know how to manage their forests in
their particular climate and in their particular setting to create
healthy forests and forests that can withstand a fire. It would be
almost impossible for a forest fire to destroy these trees.
The next thing that the Resilient Federal Forests Act does is it
stops frivolous lawsuits. You may ask: Why do we need to stop frivolous
lawsuits?
Well, frivolous lawsuits hinder forest plans that are developed
locally, using science, best management practices, and collaborative
efforts that represent stakeholder values. The end result is a forest
that is decreased and impaired in value for our next generation.
This bill discourages frivolous lawsuits by requiring those suing to
stop collaborative projects to post a bond. If the plaintiff loses,
they pay the taxpayer's legal bills. If they win, they get their money
back.
This bill also aids in better land management planning. In the words
of former U.S. Forest Service chief Dale Bosworth: ``We do not have a
fire problem on our Nation's forests; we have a land management
problem. And it needs to be addressed quickly.''
Delayed decisionmaking or, even worse, no decisionmaking at all, is
hurting our forests. Forests are dynamic. They are a living, growing
organism. When we say no action, we are actually taking action. Since
forests are not static, scientific analysis should not be static.
This bill requires the Forest Service to critically analyze the
impacts of no action, which often are overgrowth, increased wildfire,
and diseases. Increases in future wildfire problems are often caused
because of poor land management. It makes it difficult for
reforestation, ultimately decreasing and impairing the value of
forests.
This bill sets up requirements for salvage plans in response to
catastrophic events. It requires environmental assessments for salvage
projects to be completed within 90 days so that timber can be removed
while it is still commercially valuable.
The USDA completed post-Hurricane Katrina NEPA on the De Soto
National Forest within 90 days. They expedited it. They were successful
at that. As a result, 80 percent of the timber was salvaged that was in
moderate to heavily damaged areas.
The management actions laid out in this bill must comply with forest
plans. It is not taking a shortcut. Despite what some folks say, this
doesn't mean thousands of acres clearcut. It doesn't mean destruction
of snag habitats that often become available after a large fire.
In my home State, clearcuts are restricted to 180 acres, at most. We
are talking about thousands of acres of land that still have to follow
forest management practices.
This bill rewards collaboration. It incentivizes collaboration and
speeds up the implementation of collaborative projects. It safeguards a
strong, timely environmental review process through categorical
exclusions for forest management projects.
You may ask: What are collaborative projects? This is simply where
local land managers, environmentalists, citizens, and industry
representatives come up with a plan. These groups spend hundreds if not
thousands of hours working on a plan that is best for their local area.
Why wouldn't we encourage this sort of compromise?
This bill encourages more collaborative projects. Passing this bill
shows that we endorse commonsense plans that tend to local and
ecological needs.
This bill creates greater reforestation after natural disasters. As a
forester, this statistic is really disturbing to me. On average, less
than 3 percent of an area is reforested after a catastrophic event on
our national forests. This bill requires that 75 percent reforestation
takes place within 5 years. This will revitalize our forests that are
destroyed by fire or other natural events.
When we reforest an area, we have young trees that grow fast and
sequester carbon faster than older, fully grown trees. If we want to
sequester more carbon, then we should be planting more trees. We should
demand that we reforest our land after the timber is destroyed in one
of these catastrophic events.
We have to stop playing politics, and we need to pass this bill.
This bill creates greater roles for the tribes. Oftentimes, the
Federal Government does not collaborate and work together with those
who have expertise in forest health. This bill brings in State and
tribal governments as strong partners in forest management.
It gives the Forest Service the authority to accept assistance from
States willing to put money toward forest management.
{time} 1815
It also reinforces existing tribal authority to assist in the
management of national forest land adjacent to reservations.
The Resilient Federal Forests Act modernizes secure rural schools.
This is an issue that is very important in my district. We have many
rural areas near our national forests, and the schools are hurting
because of the decreased funding because we are not keeping our forests
healthy.
Rural communities not only depend on our forests for their
sustenance, but they also provide emergency services, education, and
support for the forests and residents who live near the forests. As
forests lose value, communities suffer, and they will only suffer more
in the future.
This bill gives counties flexibility to spend secure rural schools
funding. It allows them to spend money on emergency services on Federal
lands, and it puts 25 percent of stewardship contracts into the county
treasury where the projects occurred.
This bill means more money for our schools and other public services,
along with the benefits of a healthy and resilient forest.
One more time, I want to look at the fire borrowing issue. This is
one of the worst fire seasons we have seen. We know what good
management practices are. We know how to implement those practices on
the land.
The House has acted by passing H.R. 2647, the Resilient Federal
Forests Act. It solves fire borrowing. It completely reforms current
bad management practices. And this is isn't just me saying
[[Page H6128]]
this. We have letters from hundreds of groups that have endorsed this
bill. Here is a list of just a few of them: the Forest Products
Industry National Labor Management Committee, the Congressional
Sportsmen's Foundation, the National Association of Counties, the
National Association of Forest Service Retirees, the National Water
Resources Association, the International Association of Fire Chiefs,
the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America. There are
hundreds more that have supported this legislation because it is good,
commonsense legislation that is good for our country; it is good for
our forests.
The House has acted. It is time for the Senate to act. It is time for
the administration to stop playing politics with wildfire. It is time
to make H.R. 2647 the law of the land.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Pearce).
Mr. PEARCE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding and for
bringing this subject up. It is a subject that all of us in the West
deal with every year.
A couple of years ago, we had Tom Tidwell in New Mexico. He was there
at a time when the Forest Service was in the process of burning down
255 homes in Ruidoso. The fire almost burned completely out of control
and burned the entire town down. That is what the agency was surprised
and frightened by.
These fires are caused by a lack of management. And instead of
addressing the problem by reducing the number of trees in the forests,
the Forest Service is saying, and Tom Tidwell himself said, that our
policy is going to be to reintroduce fire into its natural habitat.
Introducing fire into the forest at this stage, with the years of no
attention, with the years of fuel buildup, with the decades of drought
that have put them in an explosive position in much of the West, is
absolute lunacy. And yet this was the highest ranking Forest Service
employee saying that we need to reintroduce fire into the wild.
I am sorry, but we need to clean up the forest first, then the fire
can keep the forest healthy--but not until then. These raging wildfires
are a natural conclusion to the management policies for the past
decades, and so we can't start and act like that policy has not been in
place.
Another policy that the Forest Service is engaged in is letting fire
achieve management objectives. If I were to take a look at, say, one of
the large fires out in Grant County, in the Gila Wilderness area of New
Mexico, you can see the daily reports where they are talking about,
well, the fire is 300 acres, it is 600 acres, and it is achieving its
management objective.
Well, there is one truth about New Mexico: If the wind is not blowing
today, it is going to blow tomorrow. Letting those fires go, while they
are supposedly monitoring them, and the fire then gets the push from
the wind and grows from 300 or 800 acres to 10,000 to 30,000 acres is,
again, a natural conclusion to the management policies of this Forest
Service.
It is time for us to revise the way our forests are managed. Mr.
Westerman has a bill that is exactly right, H.R. 2647, and we should
pass that bill, and that process should go forward.
Let's start cleaning the excess timber out of our forests. It is much
simpler than what everybody wants to make it. It is much simpler than
the Forest Service would allow.
So again, I appreciate the fact that you are bringing this issue up.
I appreciate the fact that you have yielded time.
Mr. WESTERMAN. I thank the gentleman from New Mexico.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. LaMalfa).
Mr. LaMALFA. Mr. Speaker, I wish to express thanks to the gentleman
from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman) for leading this discussion tonight. It
is very important to many of us in rural America.
Of course, my district, which includes seven national forests, has
experienced increasingly devastating forest fires caused by overgrown,
mismanaged, or even nonmanaged forests, and has been economically
strangled by restrictions on forest management.
Our Nation has already lost over 8\1/2\ million acres to wildfire,
and the year isn't yet over. We are on pace to exceed the record of 10
million acres burned back in 2006, and that is not a record we want to
break.
Our rural communities, public lands, and the environment are being
destroyed through neglect. The habitat is gone, erosion into our lakes
and waterways goes unchecked, and the people's asset, the value of the
trees, is wasted.
In light of Forest Service surveys finding that over 12 million
Sierra Nevada trees have died in the last year, we cannot afford to
wait another year.
That is why we need Mr. Westerman's bill, H.R. 2647, which will
return active management to our forests by increasing flexibility,
cutting red tape, and, most importantly, acting to manage forests
before fires occur, not afterwards.
Streamlining review process means that forest management can occur
when it is actually needed to address dangerous conditions, not after
years of legal roadblocks.
Allowing categorical exclusions for post-fire salvage and
rehabilitation hastens forest recovery and prevents fuel buildup that
can contribute to future fires.
Expanding local involvement in forest management will improve the
data and know-how available for planning and also respect local
priorities.
Finally, the budget impact of forest neglect can no longer be
ignored. Just this week, the Forest Service diverted yet another $250
million from forest management to fighting fire. That brings the
Federal spending total so far this year on firefighting to $700
million, money that, though we agree, needs to fight fire this year,
could surely be used better if we properly managed forests in the
future.
This bill will end the borrowing by funding fires, as we do
hurricanes, earthquakes, and other disasters, making them eligible for
FEMA disaster funds.
In California, over 1,000 homes have burned. Tens of thousands have
been evacuated from their homes or communities. Firefighters have lost
their lives, as well as some residents now. This is a needless loss of
life, needless suffering in rural America.
Let's start by keeping H.R. 2647 moving in the process through the
Senate and on to the President's desk.
I again thank Mr. Westerman for his leadership and allowing me to
speak on this important topic here tonight.
Mr. WESTERMAN. I thank the gentleman from California.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Montana (Mr. Zinke).
Mr. ZINKE. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support to remind my colleagues in the Senate
that the Western United States is on fire. We don't have time for
inaction and more political pandering.
The House has passed the Resilient Federal Forests Act, which
includes vital reforms that can be implemented tomorrow if our
colleagues in the Senate take the bill up.
So why don't we do what is right for America? Why don't we come
together and move the bill?
This wildfire season has been one of the worst in the last 10 years,
and it has had enormous cost. Despite the cooler conditions in Montana,
we have 35 fires that are continuing to burn, a total of 334,000 acres
gone. That is equivalent to 522 miles, square miles. Two-thirds of this
acreage belongs to the public, our national forests.
And it is not just the physical damage. We lost four firefighters in
Washington, four that paid the sacrifice fighting forest fires, and we
have to remember that.
I was at a fire in Glacier National Park. It was a reburn from a fire
that occurred in 2003. The reburn happened to occur because of a threat
of a lawsuit which prevented the Forest Service from doing the right
thing. What they wanted to do was salvage timber. But because there was
standing timber, ground crews couldn't get at it. And when ground crews
couldn't get it, that means they had to fly aircraft at $3,000 an hour
to put out the fire. That is wrong. It is wrong for Montana, and it is
wrong for America.
I know the firsthand value of our natural resources. I am a
conservationist. But I also know the value of tourism in Montana. I
also know the value of clean air. And when the smoke in Montana--which
people travel all the way from across this country and
[[Page H6129]]
the world to go to--is worse than Beijing, it has an impact.
It also has an impact on the elderly, the asthmatic. It is unhealthy.
Worst of all, it is preventable.
The problem is real. Not only does the Forest Service lack the
resources to adequately fight fires, it has a land management problem
at the source.
Former Chief of the Forest Service, Dale Bosworth, his quote before
the hearing was: ``We do not have a fire problem . . . we have a land
management problem.''
This isn't from a political member. This is from a scientist. And
yes, we need more scientists in the woods and less lawyers.
That is why I am proud of what we did in the House on H.R. 2647. We
passed it back in July because we saw this problem coming, and so we
crafted a solution. That is what we are all sent here to do. We were
sent here for solutions, to look at the challenges ahead and make a
difference.
So this bill addresses both the fire borrowing problem and the
practices that have created the crisis that we now, unfortunately, have
to bear. It does address lawsuits that are frivolous. The number one
expense in the Forest Service is fighting forest fires, Number two is
litigation, and if they have any money left, then that is what they use
for management.
Why are we spending, this fire season, over $600 million in August
alone? Don't we all agree that $600 million can be better utilized by
preventing forest fires, by restoring habitat, by providing better
public access, better recreational activities and opportunities on our
public lands?
Unfortunately, we have lost this fire season, and still it burns.
Unfortunately, the Senate won't take up the bill. My fellow Montanan
Senator Steve Daines has been a loud and vocal advocate of this bill.
He understands, and I am asking his colleagues to stand and do the
right thing: Take the bill up. If you don't like a provision in the
bill, then show leadership and put an amendment on it and we will work
together to fix it. That is what leadership does. But to sit there and
not take up the bill and have no action is unacceptable.
Mr. WESTERMAN. I thank the gentleman from Montana.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to add that when we passed this bill in the
House, we put amendments on it that were offered by Democrats. We were
open. We listened. We wanted to do what is best for the forest.
I encourage the Senate to take up this bill. If there is something
you don't like, let's talk about it. But let's do what is best for the
forest. Let's make this bill the law of the land.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Wyoming (Mrs. Lummis).
{time} 1830
Mrs. LUMMIS. I join in thanking Representative Westerman for this
legislation and this Special Order tonight, explaining the extent to
which these catastrophic wildfires are destroying the West and other
areas of our country.
This year, over 9 million acres have burned in the West. It is a new
record for catastrophic wildfires. This year, most of the damage has
been in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and northern California.
You heard the gentleman from northern California earlier talk about
the number of houses that have been destroyed; the lives that have been
disrupted; the wildlife that has been destroyed; the habitat that has
been destroyed; the carbon that has gone up in the air and the illness
that that has caused; the watersheds that are destroyed; the oxygen
that is destroyed when you have ash running down hillsides into
streams, choking the oxygen out of the water, killing the fish.
The habitat destruction, the effects on people and ungulates and fish
and resources, it is irresponsible. We have a stewardship obligation
for these lands. We know how to manage these lands. This doesn't need
to be happening.
Representative Westerman is a professional forester and an engineer.
He has spent his career studying the science of doing this right.
I have a photograph here of an example of how to do this right. He
showed us some earlier from his State of Arkansas. I want to show you
how his methodology works in the Black Hills that straddle the border
between South Dakota and Wyoming.
You can't see this terribly clearly, but if you look at this vibrant
green in the middle and compare it to the browns and yellows that you
see down here--Black Hills National Forest--that has been thinned, that
has been forested, that has been conservation logged.
It has created sunlight in places that were clogged and choked from
sunlight. It has created healthy underbrush, as opposed to a clogged
underbrush that burns. It has allowed wildlife to graze. It allows snow
to be stored and held longer in the forest into the spring and very
early summer before it melts and goes downstream, thereby preventing
flooding downstream. It is a natural hedge against flooding.
We know all of this. All we have to do is pass and implement
Representative Westerman's bill, and we can start preventing this.
The day to save a tree is yesterday, but this summer, because we have
ignored this problem for so long, we let 9 million more acres go up in
smoke in the West.
I spent the entire August work period in my State of Wyoming.
Although Wyoming, thank God, wasn't on fire this summer--it has been in
the past--but I can tell you, every day, when I woke up on the western
side of the State of Wyoming, my eyes were burning from fires that were
burning hundreds of miles west of me in Idaho, in Oregon, in
Washington, and in northern California.
To ignore science, to ignore management practices, and to allow this
to continue is abominable.
The gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman) has the answer. The House
passed it. I urge the Senate to take it up.
I thank the gentleman from Arkansas for his thoughtful contribution
to the Congress of the United States by serving here.
Mr. WESTERMAN. I thank the gentlewoman from Wyoming for her comments,
and I also thank her for pointing out that forest management is
different in different parts of the country.
We have trained forestry professionals all over this country. We have
good people working for the Forest Service that know how to do the
right job, but their hands are tied. They can't use the things that
they have learned in forestry school. They can't use the things that
they have learned through practice. They can't practice the art of
forestry and the science of forestry because of policy here in
Washington, D.C.
We need to untie their hands so that they can implement these
management procedures on the land to make it healthier.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr.
McClintock).
Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by thanking Congressman
Westerman for organizing this Special Order tonight and for his
indispensable work on the Natural Resources Committee and its
Subcommittee on Federal Lands.
Mr. Westerman is a professional forester, schooled at Yale
University, which the founder of the U.S. Forest Service, Gifford
Pinchot, did so much to shape.
Mr. Westerman's H.R. 2647 represents the first step toward restoring
the sound, well-established, scientifically validated, and time-tested
methods that, for generations, produced healthy, thriving, and vibrant
forests.
These forest management practices prevented vegetation and wildlife
from overgrowing the ability of the land to support them. Not only did
this assure robust and healthy forests capable of resisting fire,
disease, and pestilence, but it also supported the prosperous economy.
Revenues from the sale of excess timber provided a steady stream of
revenues to the Treasury which could, in turn, be used to further
improve the public lands.
About 45 years ago, we replaced these sound management practices with
what can only be described as a policy of benign neglect. In 1970,
Congress adopted the National Environmental Policy Act that opened a
floodgate of ponderous and Byzantine laws, regulations, and lawsuits,
with the explicit promise that they would ``save the environment.''
Well, after 45 years of these policies, I think we are entitled to
ask: How is the environment doing?
[[Page H6130]]
Well, according to every scrap of evidence submitted to our
subcommittee by a broad cross-section of experts, the answer is that
these laws have not only failed to improve the forest environment; they
have catastrophically harmed that environment.
Surplus timber harvested from our national forests as a result of
these laws has dropped dramatically since the 1980s, while acreage
destroyed by forest fire has increased concurrently and concomitantly.
Wildlife habitats that were supposed to be preserved are now being
incinerated.
Precipitation that once flowed to riparian habitats now evaporates in
overgrown canopies or is quickly claimed in the fierce competition of
densely packed vegetation. We have lost vast tracts of our national
forests to beetle infestations, as weakened trees can no longer resist
their attacks.
The U.S. Forest Service reports that in the Tahoe Basin in my
district, there is now four times the vegetation density as normal, and
trees that once had room to grow and thrive now fight for their lives
against other trees trying to occupy the same ground.
Revenues that our forest management agencies once produced and that
facilitated our forest stewardship have all but dried up. This has
devastated mountain communities that once thrived from the forest
economy, while precious resources are diverted for lifeline programs
like secure rural schools and PILT.
Despite a growing population, visitation to our national forests has
declined significantly. We can no longer manage lands to prevent fire
or even salvage dead timber once fire has destroyed it.
Appeals, lawsuits, and especially the threat of lawsuits have
paralyzed and demoralized the Forest Service and created perverse
incentives to do nothing to manage our lands.
The steadily deteriorating situation is forcing managers to raid
forest treatment and fire prevention funds to pay for the growing costs
of wildfire suppression, creating a fiscal death spiral--the more we
raid prevention funds, the more wildfires we have; the more wildfires
we have, the more we have to raid our prevention funds.
Ironically, our private forest lands are today conspicuously
healthier than the public lands, precisely because the private lands
are free from so many of the laws that are tying the hands of our
public foresters. These laws may be making environmental law firms
rich, but they are killing our national forests.
H.R. 2647 is the first step toward restoring sound, rational, and
scientific management of our national forests. It streamlines fire and
disease prevention programs and assures that fire-killed timber can be
quickly removed to create both the revenues and the room to restore
fire-damaged lands. It protects forest managers from frivolous
lawsuits.
In my district, comprising the Sierra Nevada mountains in California,
two major forest fires are now raging. The Butte fire in Amador County
has already killed two people, left hundreds homeless, and destroyed
72,000 acres of forest land. The Rough fire in Fresno County has
destroyed 141,000 acres, and they are still burning tonight.
We have exhausted our firefighting budget, and, without relief, we
will have to begin stripping funds intended for fire prevention.
Mr. Westerman's bill would allow these catastrophic wildfires to be
funded like every other natural disaster.
Mr. Speaker, we have a very simple choice. We can continue the
misguided environmental laws that, for 45 years, have become
responsible for the destruction of hundreds of square miles of our
national forests every year, or we can restore the sound forest
management practices that will guarantee healthy and resilient forests
for the next generation.
This bill has already passed the House. It is now sitting in the
Senate, and it is essential that the Senate act soon to put it on the
President's desk.
Mr. WESTERMAN. I thank the gentleman from California and would also
like to thank the gentleman for his tireless efforts on the Natural
Resources Committee, the chairman of the Federal Lands Subcommittee.
This is something that--I am a freshman, and I have been working on
for a small amount of time--but he has spent years working on this
issue. I thank him for his tireless efforts and his desire to see
healthy forests not only in his home State but across the country.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Palmer).
Mr. PALMER. Mr. Speaker, sometimes overlooked in the debate
surrounding wildfires is the importance of forestry practices intended
to prevent the wildfires before they start.
The Resilient Federal Forests Act, authored by my friend from
Arkansas (Mr. Westerman), passed the House in July with bipartisan
support. Since then, there have been multiple fires, major fires that
are raging across the country.
This bill would simplify and streamline environmental process
requirements and reduce the cost of forest management projects intended
to prevent catastrophic wildfires. The bill would also allow for quick
removal of dead trees to pay for reforestation after large fires and
prevent the incidence of reburn.
As wildfires continue to burn in the Western United States, with
tremendous costs to people and property, it is important to note that
these fires are literally sending billions of dollars of Federal assets
up in smoke, depriving State government, local government, and the
Federal Government of billions in revenues not just in wood products,
but in recreation revenues.
I am a small forest owner myself. I understand the value of a healthy
well-managed forest.
Mr. Speaker, America has already lost 9 million acres in valuable
forests this year. Our forests continue to burn and more will be burned
unless we act on this legislation. I encourage my colleagues in the
Senate to quickly pass this much-needed legislation and send it to the
President's desk.
Mr. WESTERMAN. I thank the gentleman from Alabama. We are from
Southern States, but good forestry management is very important to us
as well. I have about 2.5 million acres of Federal forest in my
district in Arkansas, and we want to see that land managed properly. We
don't want to see it go up in smoke.
Mr. Speaker, we face a lot of contentious issues in this body and in
Congress, but this shouldn't be one of them.
President Roosevelt, who was the father of our national forests,
along with Gifford Pinchot, said that this is one of our most treasured
natural resources. We need to leave it in better shape for the next
generation than what we received it in.
Right now, we are not doing that. This is not a partisan issue. This
is something that we need to look at the science, we need to work
together, and we need to do what is right for America. We need to do
what is right for forests because healthy forests create a winning
situation on many levels.
We get better air quality. We get better water quality. We get a
better economy. We get better wildlife habitat. We sequester more
carbon.
{time} 1845
There is not a downside to a healthy forest, but we have to get our
act right here in Washington, D.C.
It is with that that I, again, plead with and encourage the Senate to
take up this issue. Let's have a debate on it. Let's fix this and get
ourselves back on the right path to healthy forests. We didn't get here
overnight, and we are not going to fix everything overnight, but we
have to start sometime. The sooner we start, the sooner we can have our
forests back in a healthy condition and the sooner we can enjoy this
national treasure that belongs to all of us in America.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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