Wildland Fire Management: Federal Agencies Lack Key Long- and	 
Short-Term Management Strategies for Using Program Funds	 
Effectively (12-FEB-08, GAO-08-433T).				 
                                                                 
The nation's wildland fire problems have worsened over the past  
decade. Recent years have seen dramatic increases in the number  
of acres burned and the dollars spent on preparing for and	 
responding to wildland fires. As GAO has previously reported, a  
number of factors have contributed to worsening fire seasons and 
increased firefighting expenditures, including an accumulation of
fuels due to past land management practices; drought and other	 
stresses, in part related to climate change; and an increase in  
human development in or near wildlands. Recent GAO reports have  
identified shortcomings in the approach to wildland fire	 
management taken by the responsible federal agencies--the	 
Department of Agriculture's Forest Service and four agencies	 
within the Department of the Interior. GAO was asked to testify  
on agency efforts to (1) develop a cohesive strategy for	 
preparing for and responding to wildland fire, (2) contain	 
federal expenditures related to wildland fire, and (3) improve	 
the processes used to allocate funds for reducing accumulated	 
fuels and to select fuel reduction projects. GAO also is	 
providing preliminary findings from its ongoing review of an	 
interagency budget allocation and planning model known as fire	 
program analysis (FPA). This testimony is based on issued GAO	 
reports, reviews of agency documents related to the development  
of FPA, and discussions with agency officials.			 
-------------------------Indexing Terms------------------------- 
REPORTNUM:   GAO-08-433T					        
    ACCNO:   A80690						        
  TITLE:     Wildland Fire Management: Federal Agencies Lack Key Long-
and Short-Term Management Strategies for Using Program Funds	 
Effectively							 
     DATE:   02/12/2008 
  SUBJECT:   Disaster planning					 
	     Disaster recovery					 
	     Disaster recovery plans				 
	     Emergency response plans				 
	     Forest fires					 
	     Natural disasters					 
	     Risk assessment					 
	     Risk factors					 
	     Risk management					 
	     Strategic planning 				 
	     Wildfires						 
	     Program goals or objectives			 

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GAO-08-433T

   

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GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-08-433T, a testimony before the Subcommittee on 
Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies, Committee on 
Appropriations, House of Representatives 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

The nationï¿½s wildland fire problems have worsened over the past decade. 
Recent years have seen dramatic increases in the number of acres burned 
and the dollars spent on preparing for and responding to wildland 
fires. As GAO has previously reported, a number of factors have 
contributed to worsening fire seasons and increased firefighting 
expenditures, including an accumulation of fuels due to past land 
management practices; drought and other stresses, in part related to 
climate change; and an increase in human development in or near 
wildlands. 

Recent GAO reports have identified shortcomings in the approach to 
wildland fire management taken by the responsible federal agenciesï¿½the 
Department of Agricultureï¿½s Forest Service and four agencies within the 
Department of the Interior. GAO was asked to testify on agency efforts 
to (1) develop a cohesive strategy for preparing for and responding to 
wildland fire, (2) contain federal expenditures related to wildland 
fire, and (3) improve the processes used to allocate funds for reducing 
accumulated fuels and to select fuel reduction projects. GAO also is 
providing preliminary findings from its ongoing review of an 
interagency budget allocation and planning model known as fire program 
analysis (FPA). This testimony is based on issued GAO reports, reviews 
of agency documents related to the development of FPA, and discussions 
with agency officials. 

What GAO Found: 

In recent years, GAO has recommended a number of actions federal 
wildland fire agencies should take to better diagnose the extent of the 
nationï¿½s wildland fire problems and develop a strategic approach for 
addressing them. The agencies have taken some steps to respond to GAOï¿½s 
recommendations, but have not completed other needed steps. 
Specifically, the agencies should 

* recommit to developing a cohesive strategy that identifies options 
and associated funding to reduce fuels and address wildland fire 
problems. In several reports dating to 1999, GAO recommended that a 
cohesive strategy be developed that identifies the available long-term 
options and associated funding for reducing hazardous fuels and for 
responding to wildland fires. Such a strategy would assist Congress and 
the agencies in making informed decisions about effective and 
affordable long-term approaches to addressing the nationï¿½s wildland 
fire problems. As of January 2008, the agencies had not developed such 
a strategy and, in fact, had retreated from earlier commitments to do 
so. 

* establish clear goals and a strategy to help contain wildland fire 
costs. In 2007, GAO reported that the agencies had taken several steps 
to contain wildland fire costs, including developing new decision 
support tools to help officials select the most appropriate strategy 
for fighting wildland fires, but lacked clearly defined cost-
containment goals and a strategy for achieving them. As a result, we 
believe managers in the field lacked a clear understanding of the 
relative importance agency leadership placed on containing costs and 
were therefore likely to select firefighting strategies without duly 
considering the costs of suppression. Although the agencies have 
continued to implement individual cost-containment steps, they still 
have not developed clear goals or a strategy for achieving them. 

* continue to improve their processes for allocating fuel reduction 
funds and selecting fuel reduction projects. Also in 2007, GAO 
recommended several improvements to the agenciesï¿½ processes for 
allocating fuel reduction funds to field units and selecting projects. 
Specifically, GAO recommended that the agencies use a more systematic 
allocation process, improve the information they use to make allocation 
decisions, and clarify the relative importance of the various factors 
they consider when allocating funds. The agencies are currently taking 
steps to implement these improvements, although none have yet been 
completed. 

In addition, GAOï¿½s ongoing review of FPA suggests that the current 
model, which the agencies expect to complete in June 2008, may not 
allow the agencies to meet all of the key goals established for FPA. 
Specifically, preliminary results from GAOï¿½s review suggest that the 
model will not allow the agencies to analyze long-term trade-offs 
between annual fuel reduction treatments and future expected 
suppression costs for large fires. GAO intends to conduct a full 
assessment of FPA once it is completed. 

To view the full product, including the scope and methodology, click on 
[hyperlink, http://www.GAO-08-433T. For more information, contact Robin 
M. Nazzaro at (202) 512-3841 or [email protected]. 

[End of section] 

Testimony: 

Before the Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies, 
Committee on Appropriations, House of Representatives: 

United States Government Accountability Office: 

GAO: 

For Release on Delivery Expected at 10:00 a.m. EST: 

Tuesday, February 12, 2008: 

Wildland Fire Management: 

Federal Agencies Lack Key Long-and Short-Term Management Strategies for 
Using Program Funds Effectively: 

Statement of Robin M. Nazzaro, Director Natural Resources and 
Environment: 

GAO-08-433T: 

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee: 

I am pleased to be here today to discuss key actions that we believe 
the federal wildland fire agencies--the Forest Service within the 
Department of Agriculture and four agencies within the Department of 
the Interior (Interior)--should take to improve their management of 
wildland fires and help contain the rising costs of preparing for and 
responding to fires. Our nation's wildland fire problems have worsened 
in the past decade. Appropriations for wildland fire management 
activities tripled from about $1 billion in fiscal year 1999 to more 
than $3 billion in fiscal year 2007, while, on average, the acreage 
burned annually by wildland fires has increased by approximately 70 
percent since the 1990s. As we have previously reported, a number of 
factors have contributed to worsening wildland fires and the increasing 
cost of managing fires, including an accumulation of fuels due in part 
to past fire suppression policies; severe weather and drought in some 
areas of the country, related in part to climate change; and growing 
numbers of homes built in or near wildlands, an area often called the 
wildland-urban interface. Concerns about the increasing cost of 
managing wildland fires, along with growing recognition of the long- 
term fiscal challenges facing the nation, have led Congress, GAO, and 
others to focus attention on ways to contain growing fire expenditures 
and to ensure that the agencies' wildland fire activities are 
appropriate and carried out in a cost-effective and efficient manner. 

My testimony today summarizes findings from several of our recent 
reports, which identified key weaknesses in the agencies' management of 
wildland fires and recommended actions the agencies should take if they 
are to respond effectively. Specifically, I will focus on the agencies' 
efforts to (1) develop a cohesive strategy for preparing for and 
responding to wildland fires, (2) contain federal expenditures for 
preparing for and responding to wildland fires, and (3) set priorities 
and allocate funds for fuel reduction treatments. I will also discuss 
preliminary results from our ongoing work on the agencies' efforts to 
complete the interagency budget allocation and planning model known as 
fire program analysis (FPA), a key component of a cohesive strategy. 

To evaluate these issues, we reviewed selected reports we have issued 
since 1999, and interviewed agency officials to identify recent actions 
the agencies have taken in the areas discussed in these reports. We 
also reviewed pertinent agency plans, policies, reports, and other 
documents, and interviewed federal and nonfederal officials, to obtain 
information on the development and status of FPA. The previous reports 
we reviewed, and our current performance audit--which was conducted 
from September 2007 to February 2008--were conducted in accordance with 
generally accepted government auditing standards. Those standards 
require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, 
appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and 
conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence 
obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions 
based on our audit objectives. 

Summary: 

In recent years, GAO has recommended a number of actions the federal 
wildland fire agencies should take to better understand the extent of, 
and address, the nation's wildland fire problems. These actions could 
also help contain the rising federal expenditures for responding to 
wildland fires. However, the agencies have not completed all needed 
actions. Specifically, we believe the agencies should: 

* recommit to developing a cohesive strategy that identifies options 
and associated funding to reduce fuels and address wildland fire 
problems. Despite our repeated calls for a cohesive wildland fire 
strategy, the agencies have not developed one--and do not intend to do 
so. In 1999, to address the problem of excess fuels and their potential 
to increase the severity of wildland fires and cost of suppression 
efforts, we recommended that a cohesive strategy be developed to 
identify the available long-term options for reducing fuels and the 
associated funding requirements.[Footnote 1] By laying out various 
potential approaches for addressing wildland fire, the approximate 
costs associated with each approach, and the trade-offs involved among 
the various approaches, such a strategy would help Congress and the 
agencies make informed decisions about effective and affordable long- 
term approaches to addressing the nation's wildland fire problems. Six 
years later, in 2005, we reiterated the need for a cohesive strategy 
and broadened our recommendation's focus to better address the 
interrelated nature of fuel reduction efforts and wildland fire 
response.[Footnote 2] However, although the agencies had consistently 
concurred with our recommendation to develop such a strategy, the 
Department of Agriculture's Under Secretary for Natural Resources and 
Environment testified in 2007 that he did not think completing these 
steps would be beneficial because it is too difficult to predict future 
vegetative conditions and agency priorities. Agency officials told us 
in January 2008 that they have no plans to develop the cohesive 
strategy we have called for. 

* establish clear goals and a strategy to help contain wildland fire 
costs. In 2007, we reported that the Forest Service and Interior 
agencies were taking a number of steps intended to help contain 
wildland fire costs, including improving their decision support tools 
for helping officials select strategies for fighting wildland fires, 
but had not clearly defined their cost-containment goals or developed a 
strategy for achieving those goals--steps that are fundamental to sound 
program management.[Footnote 3] In commenting on a draft of that 
report, the Forest Service and Interior identified several documents 
that they argue provide clearly defined goals and objectives that make 
up their strategy to contain costs.[Footnote 4] However, these 
documents lack the clarity and specificity needed by officials in the 
field to help manage and contain wildland fire costs, and we therefore 
continue to believe that our recommendations, if effectively 
implemented, would help the agencies better manage their cost- 
containment efforts and improve their ability to contain wildland fire 
costs. 

* continue to improve their processes for allocating fuel reduction 
funds and selecting fuel reduction projects. Also in 2007, we 
identified several shortcomings in the agencies' processes for 
allocating fuel reduction funds to field units and selecting fuel 
reduction projects, shortcomings that limit the agencies' ability to 
ensure that funds are directed where they will reduce risk most 
effectively.[Footnote 5] The agencies have begun to take steps to 
improve the processes they use to allocate fuel reduction funds, but 
these efforts are incomplete and not fully coordinated. For example, 
several agencies are developing and implementing computer models to 
assist them in making allocation decisions, rather than relying 
primarily on historical funding patterns and professional judgment. Not 
all of the agencies have models, however, and none consistently uses 
models at national, regional, and local levels. The agencies also are 
taking steps to improve the information they use in allocating funds 
and selecting projects--including information on wildland fire risk and 
fuel treatment effectiveness--and to clarify the relative importance of 
the various factors they consider when making allocation decisions. We 
urge the agencies to continue their efforts to improve their funding 
allocation and project selection processes so that they can more 
effectively use their limited fuel reduction dollars. 

In addition, preliminary results from our ongoing work indicate that 
the FPA budget allocation model, which the agencies expect to complete 
in June 2008, may not allow the agencies to meet all of the key goals 
established for it. Specifically, our preliminary results suggest that 
FPA will not allow the agencies to analyze long-term trade-offs between 
annual fuel reduction treatments and the estimated costs of suppressing 
future large fires. GAO intends to conduct a full assessment of FPA 
once it is completed. 

Background: 

Although its effect on communities can be devastating, wildland fire is 
a natural and necessary process that provides many benefits to 
ecosystems, such as maintaining habitat diversity, recycling soil 
nutrients, limiting the spread of insects and disease, and promoting 
new growth by causing the seeds of fire-dependent species to germinate. 
Wildland fire also periodically removes brush, small trees, and other 
vegetation that can otherwise accumulate and increase the size, 
intensity, and duration of subsequent fires. Over the past century, 
however, various management practices--including fire suppression, 
grazing, and timber harvest--have reduced the normal frequency of fires 
in many forest and rangeland ecosystems and contributed to abnormally 
dense, continuous accumulations of vegetation, which can fuel 
uncharacteristically large or severe wildland fires. Federal 
researchers have estimated that unnaturally dense fuel accumulations on 
90 million to 200 million acres of federal lands in the contiguous 
United States place these lands at an elevated risk of severe wildland 
fire. 

In response to the growing wildland fire problem, the five federal 
agencies responsible for managing wildland fires--the Forest Service in 
the Department of Agriculture and the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Bureau 
of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, and National Park 
Service in the Department of the Interior--adopted the 1995 federal 
wildland fire management policy, which formally recognized the 
essential role that fire plays in maintaining natural systems. This 
policy was subsequently reaffirmed and updated in 2001. Two important 
implications of the new policy are that the agencies recognized that 
(1) they needed to reduce accumulated vegetation that could fuel 
intense wildland fires and (2) it was not appropriate to continue 
attempting to suppress all fires. 

Acknowledging the problem caused by accumulated fuels, Congress 
substantially increased appropriations for fuel reduction treatments-- 
appropriating more than $3.2 billion to the Forest Service and Interior 
since 2001--and, in 2003, passed the Healthy Forests Restoration 
Act,[Footnote 6] with the stated purpose of, among other things, 
reducing wildland fire risk to communities, municipal water supplies, 
and other at-risk federal land. After receiving its annual 
appropriation, the Forest Service allocates funds to its nine regional 
offices, which in turn allocate funds to individual national forests 
and grasslands. Interior, upon receiving its annual appropriation, 
allocates funds to its four fire management agencies--with the Bureau 
of Land Management receiving the largest share, about 50 percent of 
Interior's funding. Interior's agencies then allocate funds to their 
regional or state offices, which in turn allocate funds to individual 
field units, such as national parks or wildlife refuges. Forest Service 
and Interior agency field units are generally responsible for selecting 
individual fuel reduction projects to undertake, which are typically 
conducted through mechanical treatments (using chainsaws, chippers, 
mowers, and the like) or by using prescribed fire (which land managers 
deliberately set to restore or maintain desired vegetative conditions). 
The agencies used the tools and fuel reduction funding provided by 
Congress to treat more than 18 million acres from 2001 through August 
2007. 

Over the last decade, Congress, the Office of Management and Budget, 
federal agency officials, and others have expressed concerns about 
mounting federal wildland fire expenditures. These concerns have led 
GAO, the Department of Agriculture's Office of Inspector General, the 
Forest Service, Interior, and others to conduct numerous reviews of the 
federal wildland fire program. These reviews identified many issues the 
agencies needed to address if they are to contain costs--issues 
generally related to reducing accumulated fuels, acquiring and using 
firefighting personnel and equipment, and selecting firefighting 
strategies. 

Land managers and incident management teams (specialized fire-response 
teams that include personnel to handle command, planning, logistics, 
operations, and finance functions) have a wide spectrum of strategies 
available to them when responding to wildland fires, some of which can 
be significantly more costly than others. These strategies range from 
having a few personnel monitor a fire while allowing it to burn to 
achieve ecological benefits--a practice known as wildland fire use--to 
mobilizing all available personnel and equipment to try to control the 
entire perimeter of a fire or otherwise suppress it as quickly as 
possible. In selecting a strategy for a particular fire, land managers 
are required to consider the cost of suppression, the value of 
structures and other resources threatened by the fire, and the 
potential ecological effects of the fire. The agencies use the term 
"appropriate management response" for a strategy that considers these 
factors. Recent reports by GAO and others, however, have identified 
barriers to the agencies increasing their use of less aggressive 
strategies, which often cost less. 

Agencies Need a Cohesive Wildland Fire Strategy to Manage Limited 
Resources Effectively, but Have Retreated from Their Commitment to 
Develop One: 

If the agencies and Congress are to make informed decisions about an 
effective and affordable long-term approach for addressing wildland 
fire, the agencies need a cohesive strategy that identifies the long- 
term options and associated funding for reducing excess vegetation and 
responding to fires. We first recommended the development of a cohesive 
strategy for addressing excess vegetation in 1999. By 2005, the 
agencies had yet to develop such a strategy, and that year we 
reiterated the need for such a strategy and broadened our 
recommendation's focus to include options not only for reducing fuels 
but also for responding to wildland fires when they do occur, in order 
to better address the interrelated nature of the two activities. We 
repeated our call for a cohesive strategy in 2006 and 2007.[Footnote 7] 

Although the agencies had consistently concurred with our 
recommendation to develop a cohesive strategy, in 2007 they retreated 
from their commitment to develop one. The Department of Agriculture's 
Under Secretary for Natural Resources and Environment testified before 
the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources in January 2007, 
and before the House Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public 
Lands in June 2007, that he did not think it useful to provide specific 
funding estimates for fuel treatments years into the future because 
conditions on the ground change over time and may change priorities in 
future years. Forest Service and Interior officials subsequently told 
us in January 2008 that they have no plans to develop a cohesive 
strategy that identifies long-term options and associated funding 
requirements. 

Despite the agencies' retreat from their commitment to develop a 
cohesive strategy, a strategy of this sort nevertheless remains 
fundamental if the agencies and Congress are to fully understand the 
potential choices, and associated costs, for addressing wildland fire 
problems. We also believe the agencies have mischaracterized our 
recommendation to develop long-term options, and associated funding, 
for reducing fuels. Our intent was not to have the agencies identify 
the specific areas they would treat each year into the future, but 
rather that they develop broad options for reducing fuels, including 
estimated costs, and analyze the effects of the different options on 
the predicted costs of preparing for and responding to wildland fires 
in the future. One such analysis was developed in 2002 by a team of 
Forest Service and Interior experts, who produced an estimate of the 
funds needed to implement each of eight different fuel reduction 
options for protecting communities and ecosystems across the nation 
over the next century.[Footnote 8] The team determined that effectively 
reducing the risks to communities and ecosystems across the nation 
could require an approximate tripling of fuel reduction funding, to 
about $1.4 billion annually, for an initial period of several years. 
These initially higher costs for fuel reduction would decline after 
fuels had been sufficiently reduced to allow less-expensive prescribed 
burning methods in many areas. More importantly, the team estimated 
that the reduction in fuels would allow the agencies to suppress more 
fires at lower cost and would reduce total wildland fire management 
costs and risk after 15 years. Alternately, the team concluded that 
maintaining the then-current level of investment in fuel reduction 
would increase costs as well as risks to communities and ecosystems in 
the long term. However, the Office of Management and Budget raised 
concerns about the accuracy of the long-term funding estimates used by 
the study; as a result, agency officials told us in 2006 that they 
needed to improve the data before they could develop a cohesive 
strategy. Now, however--and despite agency efforts to improve their 
data--this concern appears to be moot, as the agencies have abandoned 
their commitment to develop the strategy. 

Lack of Clear Goals or a Strategy Hinders Federal Agencies' Efforts to 
Contain the Costs of Fighting Fires: 

We reported in 2007 that although the Forest Service and Interior 
agencies had taken several steps intended to help contain wildland fire 
costs, they had not clearly defined their cost-containment goals or 
developed a strategy for achieving those goals--steps that are 
fundamental to sound program management. As we reported, the agencies 
are implementing a number of steps designed to help them contain 
wildland fire costs--such as improving how they acquire and use 
firefighting assets, updating policies to require officials to consider 
the full spectrum of available strategies when selecting a firefighting 
strategy, and developing new decision support tools that help officials 
select the most appropriate strategy. However, we also found that the 
agencies had neither clearly defined the goals of their cost- 
containment efforts nor developed a clear plan for how the various 
steps they are taking to help contain costs fit together. Without such 
a strategy, we believe the agencies will have difficulty determining 
whether they are taking the most important steps first, as well as the 
extent to which the steps they are taking will help contain costs. 

As a result, we recommended that the agencies take several steps to 
improve the management of their cost-containment efforts, including 
establishing clearly defined goals and measurable objectives and a 
strategy to achieve them. Because of the importance of these actions 
and continuing concerns about the agencies' response to the increasing 
cost of wildland fires--and so that the agencies could use the results 
of these actions to prepare for the 2008 fire season--we recommended 
the agencies provide Congress with this information no later than 
November 2007, a step they have yet to take. The Forest Service and 
Interior, in commenting on a draft of that report, generally disagreed 
with the characterization of many of our findings, but they neither 
agreed nor disagreed with our recommendations. In particular, they 
identified several agency documents that they argue provide clearly 
defined goals and objectives and that make up their strategy to contain 
costs. Although the documents cited by the agencies provide overarching 
goals and objectives, they lack the clarity and specificity needed by 
land management and firefighting officials in the field to help manage 
and contain wildland fire costs. Agency policy, for example, 
established an overarching goal of suppressing wildland fires at 
minimum cost, considering firefighter and public safety and the 
importance of resources being protected, but the agencies have 
established neither clear criteria by which to weigh the relative 
importance of the often-competing elements of this broad goal nor 
measurable objectives by which to determine if the agencies are meeting 
the goal. As a result, despite improvements the agencies continue to 
make to policy, decision support tools, and oversight, we believe that 
managers in the field lack a clear understanding of the relative 
importance that the agencies' leadership places on containing costs, 
and--as we concluded in our 2007 report--are therefore likely to 
continue to select firefighting strategies without due consideration of 
the costs of suppression. We continue to believe that our 
recommendations, if effectively implemented, would help the agencies 
better manage their cost-containment efforts and improve their ability 
to contain wildland fire costs.[Footnote 9] 

Better Information and a Systematic Process Would Improve Agencies' 
Approach to Allocating Fuel Reduction Funds: 

In 2007, we also identified several shortcomings in the agencies' 
processes for allocating fuel reduction funds to field units and 
selecting fuel reduction projects, which the agencies should correct in 
order to use their fuel reduction funds more effectively. Specifically, 
we noted that the agencies (1) did not consistently use systematic 
allocation processes--that is, processes that are based on criteria and 
applied consistently--in all agencies or at all levels, often relying 
instead on historical funding levels and professional judgment to 
allocate funds and select projects; (2) did not consistently consider 
the potential risk from wildland fire or the potential effectiveness of 
fuel reduction treatments when allocating funds and selecting projects; 
and (3) had not clarified the relative importance of the numerous 
factors they consider when allocating funds and selecting projects, 
including factors (such as funding stability or the use of forest 
products resulting from fuel reduction treatments) unrelated to risk or 
effectiveness. 

Accordingly, we recommended that the agencies improve their allocation 
processes in three areas. First, we recommended that the agencies 
develop and routinely use a systematic allocation process that is based 
on criteria, applied consistently, and common to all the agencies. 
Second, we recommended that the agencies work to improve the 
information they use to make allocation decisions, particularly 
information on wildland fire risk and fuel treatment effectiveness. 
Third, we recommended that the agencies clarify the relative importance 
of the various factors they consider when allocating funds. Without 
improvements in these three areas, we noted that the agencies would 
likely continue relying on "allocation by tradition"--that is, 
allocating fuel reduction funds on the basis of past funding levels 
rather than on calculated need. 

Some agencies have begun implementing systematic processes for 
allocating funds. In 2007, the Forest Service began using a computer 
model to influence funding allocations to its nine regions, and it 
continues to refine and expand its use of the model, including 
introducing improved data about the likelihood of fire in a particular 
area. In addition, all nine Forest Service regions are required, 
beginning in 2008, to use the model as part of their process for 
allocating funds to national forests. Interior is developing a similar 
computer model for allocating funds to its agencies, in part based on 
the Forest Service's model. For fiscal year 2007, Interior allocated 5 
percent of its fuel reduction project funds to its four agencies using 
the model; for fiscal year 2008, according to an Interior official, 
Interior will use the model to allocate all of its fuel reduction 
project funds to its four agencies, within constraints designed to 
reduce the potential impact of funding changes.[Footnote 10] Officials 
from both the Forest Service and Interior told us that the agencies are 
working closely with each other on model development. Of Interior's 
agencies, the Bureau of Land Management is developing a model similar 
to Interior's for allocating funds to its state offices; the Fish and 
Wildlife Service uses its own computer model when allocating funds to 
regional offices; the Bureau of Indian Affairs allocates funds to its 
regions using a formula that considers past performance and proposed 
work; and the National Park Service allocates funds to its regions 
primarily on the basis of historical funding levels. However, Interior 
is working to standardize the allocation process within these agencies 
as well; a department official told us that Interior plans to use its 
model to allocate funds down to the agencies' state and regional levels 
in fiscal year 2009. 

Although the models some of the agencies are developing represent 
substantial steps forward in systematically allocating funds, these 
steps are incomplete and not fully coordinated. Specifically, not all 
the agencies have models; none consistently uses models at the 
national, regional, and local levels; and the models that are in use 
are not common to all agencies. Further, the models, even where used, 
often exert only a small influence on allocation decisions, partly 
because the agencies do not yet have full confidence in the models' 
data. Until the models serve as the foundation for allocation 
decisions, such decisions will continue to rely mainly on historical 
funding patterns and professional judgment. Accordingly, we urge the 
agencies to continue developing an allocation process that is 
systematic and that is common to all agencies.[Footnote 11] 

The agencies are also continuing to investigate ways to develop and use 
measures of risk and treatment effectiveness. Forest Service and 
Interior officials told us, for example, that researchers are looking 
at areas burned in past wildland fires to assess the extent to which 
fuel treatments altered fire behavior. Although efforts such as these 
are likely to be long-term undertakings and involve considerable 
research investment and activity, developing such measures would 
improve the agencies' ability to assess and compare the cost- 
effectiveness of potential treatments in deciding how to optimally 
allocate scarce funds. Finally, such information could also help the 
agencies address our third recommendation--that is, to clarify the 
relative importance of the various factors they consider when 
allocating funds. Such an effort is already under way at Interior, 
according to an Interior official, and the agency hopes to complete its 
work before the 2008 fire season. A Forest Service official stated that 
the Forest Service is also working to prioritize the various factors, 
but did not provide a timetable for completing this effort. 

Agencies Plan to Complete the FPA Model in 2008, but the Extent to 
Which It Will Help Ensure Cost-Effective Fire Management Decisions Is 
Uncertain: 

Agency officials plan to complete the FPA model by June 30, 2008, but 
preliminary results from our ongoing review raise questions about the 
extent to which the current model will be able to meet all of the key 
goals established for FPA. FPA--a common interagency performance-based 
system for program planning and budgeting for the full scope of fire 
management activities, including preparedness, large fire suppression, 
and fuel reduction treatments--was proposed and funded to address 
shortcomings that Congress, GAO, and the Office of Management and 
Budget identified in the agencies' existing budget allocation 
frameworks. FPA also is critical to developing and implementing a 
cohesive strategy,[Footnote 12] and to the agencies' efforts to contain 
wildland fire costs. Development of FPA commenced in 2002. According to 
a 2001 report commissioned by the agencies that serves as the 
foundation of FPA,[Footnote 13] FPA was intended to establish a common 
framework for the agencies to: 

* determine national budget needs by analyzing budget alternatives at 
the local level--using a common, interagency process for fire 
management planning and budgeting--and aggregating the results; 

* determine the relative costs and benefits for the full scope of fire 
management activities, including potential trade-offs among investments 
in fuel reduction, fire preparedness, and fire suppression activities; 
and: 

* identify, for any given budget level, the most cost-effective mix of 
personnel and equipment to carry out these activities. 

In addition, because responding to wildland fires often requires 
coordination and collaboration among federal, state, tribal, and local 
firefighting entities to effectively protect lives, homes, and 
resources, the agencies were directed to develop FPA in conjunction 
with their nonfederal partners and to recognize the availability of 
adjacent nonfederal firefighting resources when determining the 
appropriate amount and location of federal resources. 

FPA program and senior agency officials told us that, when completed, 
FPA will allow the agencies to meet the key goals established for it, 
but preliminary results from our ongoing review have raised questions 
about FPA's ability to do so. In particular, FPA likely will analyze 
only 5 years of fuel reduction treatments when modeling the effect such 
treatments will have on future large fire events, according to FPA 
program officials, although they have not yet made a final 
determination on the number of years to be analyzed. The officials said 
that it is not possible to identify fuel treatment projects more than 5 
years into the future with sufficient accuracy to include in the 
analysis. Such a limited time frame, however, substantially impairs the 
ability of the model to analyze long-term trade-offs between annual 
fuel reduction treatment costs and future expected suppression costs 
for large fires, a key goal of FPA. Officials say that the FPA model 
expected to be completed in 2008 is the first step in an iterative 
development process and can be improved to increase its capability to 
analyze the trade-offs, but they could not provide a time frame for 
doing so. 

In addition, in 2006, after 4 years of model development, the agencies 
initiated substantial changes to the process FPA will use to analyze 
needed firefighting resources and determine where best to locate these 
resources; they are also still deciding how senior officials will use 
the model's output to allocate funds between agencies and geographic 
regions of the country. It is not clear at this time the extent to 
which FPA will meet the key goal of identifying the most cost-effective 
allocation of resources for a given budget level, because the agencies 
are still developing the FPA model and determining how it will be used. 
A full assessment of FPA cannot be conducted, however, until the 
agencies complete the model; at that time, we plan on assessing the 
extent to which FPA will meet the key goals established. 

Conclusions: 

Faced with an incendiary mix of accumulated fuels, climate change, and 
burgeoning development in fire-prone areas, and constrained by our 
nation's long-term fiscal outlook, the federal wildland fire agencies 
need to commit to a more considered, long-term approach to managing 
their resources in order to address the wildland fire problem more 
effectively and efficiently. They have taken an important first step by 
establishing and updating federal wildland fire policy. Development of 
strategies and management tools for agency officials to use in 
achieving the policy's vision, however, has been uneven. The agencies 
are making progress in certain areas, including improving funding 
allocation processes for reducing fuels and requiring appropriate 
management response to fires that occur. In addition, the agencies are 
continuing to develop FPA, which, if implemented appropriately, could 
significantly improve the agencies' ability to allocate their resources 
effectively. But broader efforts have stalled--as in the development of 
cost containment goals and objectives--or even lost ground, as 
evidenced by the agencies' retreat from their earlier commitment to 
develop the cohesive wildland fire strategy we have called for. If the 
agencies are to achieve lasting results in their efforts to address the 
wildland fire problem, they will need a sustained commitment by agency 
leadership to developing both a long-term strategy that identifies 
potential options (and their costs) for managing wildland fires and the 
tools for carrying out such a strategy. 

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be pleased 
to answer any questions that you or other Members of the Subcommittee 
may have at this time. 

GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments: 

For further information about this testimony, please contact me at 
(202) 512-3841 or [email protected]. Contact points for our Offices of 
Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last 
page of this statement. Steve Gaty, Assistant Director; David P. 
Bixler; Ellen W. Chu; Jonathan Dent; and Richard Johnson made key 
contributions to this statement. 

[End of section] 

Footnotes: 

[1] GAO, Western National Forests: A Cohesive Strategy Is Needed to 
Address Catastrophic Wildfire Threats, GAO/RCED-99-65 (Washington, 
D.C.: Apr. 2, 1999). 

[2] GAO, Wildland Fire Management: Important Progress Has Been Made, 
but Challenges Remain to Completing a Cohesive Strategy, GAO-05-147 
(Washington, D.C.: Jan. 14, 2005). 

[3] GAO, Wildland Fire Management: Lack of Clear Goals or a Strategy 
Hinders Federal Agencies' Efforts to Contain the Costs of Fighting 
Fires, GAO-07-655 (Washington, D.C.: June 1, 2007). 

[4] Department of the Interior, Department of Agriculture, Department 
of Energy, Department of Defense, Department of Commerce, Environmental 
Protection Agency, Federal Emergency Management Agency, and National 
Association of State Foresters, Review and Update of the 1995 Federal 
Wildland Fire Management Policy (Washington, D.C.: January 2001). 
Department of Agriculture, Department of the Interior, and Western 
Governors' Association, A Collaborative Approach for Reducing Wildland 
Fire Risks to Communities and the Environment, 10-Year Strategy 
Implementation Plan (Washington, D.C.: December 2006). 

[5] GAO, Wildland Fire Management: Better Information and a Systematic 
Process Could Improve Agencies' Approach to Allocating Fuel Reduction 
Funds and Selecting Projects, GAO-07-1168 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 28, 
2007). 

[6] Pub. L. No. 108-148 (2003). 

[7] GAO, Wildland Fire Management: Update on Federal Agency Efforts to 
Develop a Cohesive Strategy to Address Wildland Fire Threats, GAO-06-
671R (Washington, D.C.: May 1, 2006); and Wildland Fire Management: 
Lack of Cohesive Strategy Hinders Agencies' Cost Containment Efforts, 
GAO-07-427T (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 30, 2007). 

[8] Wendell Hann, et al, A Cohesive Strategy for Protecting People and 
Sustaining Natural Resources: Predicting Outcomes for Program Options 
(a paper presented at the Fire, Fuel Treatments, and Ecological 
Restoration Conference, a meeting on national wildland fire experts 
convened by the Forest Service's Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fort 
Collins, Colorado, April 2002). 

[9] State and local governments also play an important role in 
containing fire suppression costs. As we have noted, protecting the 
increasing number of homes in the wildland urban interface at risk from 
wildland fire has contributed significantly to the increased cost of 
managing wildland fires. See GAO, Wildland Fire Suppression: Lack of 
Clear Guidance Raises Concerns about Cost Sharing between Federal and 
Nonfederal Entities, GAO-06-570 (Washington, D.C.: May 30, 2006). We 
reported that federal officials were concerned, and some nonfederal 
officials acknowledged, that the framework federal and nonfederal 
agencies use to share the costs of suppressing wildland fires affecting 
both federal and nonfederal land--combined with the availability of 
federal emergency funding to reimburse nonfederal agencies for the cost 
of fighting such fires--insulates state and local governments from the 
cost of providing fire protection. A bill introduced in the Senate in 
November 2007, S. 2390, would provide an incentive to local governments 
by allowing for greater federal reimbursement of firefighting costs in 
communities that adopt a model fire ordinance, including requirements 
for fire-safe building materials and maintenance of defensible space 
around homes. 

[10] In order to minimize budget-related disruptions resulting from 
significant funding changes, Interior will limit such changes to no 
more than 15 percent of each agency's budget. 

[11] As we noted in our 2007 report, although we believe the agencies 
should use a common allocation process, the process may need to be 
customized to reflect differences among the agencies, including 
differences in scale, variety of ecosystems managed, agency mission, 
and other factors. 

[12] Other elements critical to developing the cohesive strategy 
include LANDFIRE--a geospatial data and modeling system designed to 
generate comprehensive maps of vegetation, fire, and fuel 
characteristics nationally--and fire management plans, which are local 
plans developed by individual agency management units (such as wildlife 
refuges or national forests) to define each unit's program to prepare 
for and respond to wildland fires. 

[13] U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, and U.S. 
Department of the Interior, Developing an Interagency, Landscape-Scale 
Fire Planning Analysis and Budget Tool (Washington, D.C., November 
2001). 

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