April 2008

Land management agencies have broad discretion in determining the best techniques to fight wildfires and the courts can’t second guess those decisions, said U.S. District Court Judge Donald Molloy in a decision last fall.

Last week, a three-judge Ninth Circuit of Appeals panel affirmed the Molloy opinion that gave the U.S. Forest Service sovereign immunity in a lawsuit over a backfire that some southern Bitterroot Valley residents claimed destroyed their homes.

In 2002, 114 families filed a $54 million lawsuit against U.S. Forest Service under the federal Tort Claims Act alleging a backfire lit at the height of the catastrophic fires of 2000 caused a fire that destroyed a number of homes.

The backburn was set August 6 - the same day the southern end of the Bitterroot Valley erupted in flames.

On that afternoon, a large fire was burning in Gilbert Creek south of Dickson Creek as well as elsewhere in the valley. There were spot fires in Spade Creek at the same time. By midafternoon, the temperature was 92 degrees, the humidity was very low and the wind was coming up.

Firefighters set the backburn near the mouth of Spade Creek.

The families who filed the lawsuit claimed the backburn destroyed their properties. The government claimed the Spade Fire caused the damage.

Molloy said it didn’t matter which fire did what or whether the government employees’ actions were “wise, foolish or negligent.”

Instead, Molloy said the firefighter’s decision was protected under the discretionary function exception of the federal Tort Claims Act, which offers federal employees who exercise discretion within the scope of their employment immunity.

“Congress created the land management agencies and granted authority and broad discretion to fight wildland fires on public lands,” Molloy wrote. “How federal agencies fight wildland fires and balance the concomitant dangers to lives and property on public and adjacent lands constitute the exercise of discretionary social, political and economic policy.”

Without the backfire, the Spade Fire may have jumped the highway or trapped firefighters on other fires or spread to other areas and threatened other people and their property, Molloy said.

“Firefighters must consider a course of action that best provides for the public good, not which course of action exposes them to the least tort liability,” Molloy said in his decision.

“The Forest Service’s decision to set backfires was a policy judgment in that it ‘involved a balancing of considerations, including cost, public safety, firefighter safety, and resource damage,’ and “these considerations reflect the type of economic, social and political concerns that the discretionary function is designed to protect,” said the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision.

Bitterroot National Forest Supervisor Dave Bull said the agency was “pleased” with the Ninth Circuit’s decision.

Firefighters need to be able to be able to make decisions based on the best information they have at the time without having to second guess themselves over potential liability concerns, Bull said.

If the decision had gone the other way, it could have created a precedent that would have made it difficult for firefighters to do their job, he said.

“If a firefighter has to start worrying about liability when they are having to make critical tactical decisions, they could end up standing there with their hands in the their pockets instead of fighting the fire,” he said.

The recent court decision left many families in the southern Bitterroot Valley disappointed.

Carter Giles of Darby lost everything in the firestorm that ensued up Dickson Creek.

“Our house imploded,” Giles said. “The fire burned that hot. They figured it was 2,400 to 2,500 degrees. Everything I owned - my home and barn - was taken away in a small dump truck.”

Giles is bitter about the agency’s decision to light backfires that day.

“If it had been a natural fire, it would be one thing,” he said. “There were some serious errors made that took us all out.”

He’s upset with the court’s decision to throw out the case.

“Our attorneys did a great job for us,” Giles said. “This case just shows that the Forest Service can do whatever they want and God help you.”

Editor Perry Backus can be reached at 363-3300 or editor@ravallirepublic.com

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Fire resources are slim again

Jason Pesick, Staff Writer
The Sun (San Bernadino)
April 20, 2008
http://www.sbsun.com/sanbernardino/ci_8996713

Fewer fire engines may be available to fight fires in the Angeles and San Bernardino national forests this season because of staffing problems.

When the season begins next month, many fire engines will not be operating seven days a week, U.S. Forest Service officials said.

Instead, the San Bernardino National Forest will have eight of its 25 engines operating five days a week. And the Angeles National Forest will idle one of 28 engines and operate 15 only five days a week.

"As the season progresses and more and more fires happen, there's going to be fewer and fewer resources available," said Robert Ethridge, president of the local chapter of the National Federation of Federal Employees overseeing the two area forests.

The reduced engine coverage comes in the midst of staffing challenges for the federal agency charged with keeping national forests healthy and putting out fires.

A federal report released earlier this month acknowledged that 47 percent of a class of Forest Service employees that includes junior firefighters have bolted Southern California forests in 2007. The report has been criticized for whitewashing concerns about firefighters leaving the agency.

"The idea that more than half of the engines in Angeles National Forest will not be available on a full-time basis this fire season is just unacceptable," U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-California) said in a statement.

The numbers are preliminary. The forests may be able to fill some positions but also may lose a number of firefighters to other, higher-paying fire agencies looking to hire.

There will be 19 to 21 engines on the San Bernardino National Forest on a typical day, which is well above the minimum number of 12 that must stay in the forest at all times, said spokeswoman Valerie Baca.

"What it really means, I guess, is we're going to have fewer to share," she said, referring to the forest's inability to send engines to other forests during fires.

Those projections are better than what the forest started with last season - 17 to 19 were operating every day then - but officials are concerned they could lose more firefighters to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or CDF.

"It is always a concern to us. Ideally, we would like to be fully staffed," Baca said.

In fact, the California region of the Forest Service is considering using retention allowances to keep firefighters who plan to leave.

Doug Lannon, a battalion chief with CDF, said he did not have information about CDF's plans to hire firefighters.

Sherry Rollman, a spokeswoman for the Angeles National Forest, said the reduced engine coverage is not unusual.

"That's something that we've done for the last few years," she said.

Last year, the Angeles National Forest left three engines unstaffed, nine on five-day coverage and 16 on seven-day coverage, she said.

The staffing problems and reduced engine coverage will not only endanger firefighters but also make putting out fires more expensive because higher-paid state and local firefighters will be called in to fill the gaps, according to Ethridge, who represents union firefighters locally.

"If you've got engines sitting in stations and they're not being staffed, you can't respond to the one fire that's going to be the event that makes the newspaper," said Richard Halsey, director of the Escondido-based California Chaparral Institute, and a seasonal firefighter on the Cleveland National Forest.

"In the Santa Ana-wind-driven events, minutes really count," he said.

At a Senate hearing earlier this month, Department of Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, who oversees the Forest Service, told Sen. Dianne Feinstein that every position will be filled by the start of the fire season.

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Wildfire victims see nature's recovery

Tours offered at Lake Hodges

By Scott LaFee
UNION-TRIBUNE
April 13, 2008
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/northcounty/20080413-9999-1mc13walk.html

RANCHO BERNARDO – The analogy was inescapable: A guided tour around part of Lake Hodges, across scrubland struggling to rebound from October's devastating fires, organized in part for residents who were struggling themselves to recover.

“We lost almost everything in that fire,” said Oscar Lopez, a retired FBI agent. “We went to bed with the (Witch Creek) fire 30 miles away. We woke up with it right outside. There was no time to save anything.”

Like dozens of neighbors on his Rancho Bernardo street, Lopez's home was a complete loss. Everything's gone now, even the house's foundation and swimming pool. But Lopez and his wife, Norma, say contractors will begin re-creating they’re four-bedroom house next month. In the meantime, they rent and, on this day at least, look at how nature is faring.

Organized by the county's Wildfire Recovery Project, yesterday's 2-mile walk was headed by Rick Halsey, a biologist, wildland firefighter and director of the California Chaparral Institute in Escondido.

Leaving from Rancho Bernardo Community Park, Halsey took two dozen people west up a dirt trail into San Dieguito River Park, where great chunks of land had been scorched bare just seven months ago.

No more. A warm and gusting wind – the kind that was so terrifying in October – rippled across hillsides of green grass and shrubs. Turkey vultures drifted lazily overhead. A California gnatcatcher, a small and endangered bird, made its distinctive, meowing call.

But much of the visible vegetation is not native. Invasive species such as cheatgrass, mustard and filaree have effectively squeezed out most of native coastal sage scrub and chaparral.

“Many native species need fire – or more precisely, heat – to germinate and reproduce,” Halsey said. “They've learned how to live with fire. But there have been too many fires. The natives have burned too often, leaving open the door to invasive species that are very, very good at taking up space, fast.”

Still, Halsey pointed again and again to patches of proof that the natives have not left completely: Clumps of buckwheat and California sage, yellow buttercup and magenta owl's clover.

“There's phaecelia,” he shouted, plucking at a gray-green bush tipped in pale purple flowers. “This is a plant you might never see except after a fire. Its seeds will sit underground for 100 years, just waiting for wildfire smoke to germinate them.”

Halsey's audience nodded appreciatively. “Doing this gives me a better understanding of what happened,” said Coleen Huang, a 10-year Rancho Bernardo resident whose home suffered smoke and ash damage.

Oscar Lopez agreed. For 20 years, he has walked and biked the trails around Lake Hodges.

“I just love this area. It's good to see nature coming back.”

Or rather, that it never left.

Just like him.

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Firefighting consumes U.S. Forest Service's budget

2 bills would create fund for emergency wildfire coverage

By Suzanne Struglinski
Deseret News
April 12, 20008
http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695269735,00.html

WASHINGTON — Fighting the wildfires has become a huge drain on the U.S. Forest Service's resources, and two pending House bills propose a way to fix it.

House Resources Committee Chairman Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., and Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., the top Republican on the House Agriculture Committee, each have bills to create a federal fund specifically for fighting emergency wildfires, separate from money normally set aside for firefighting activities.

"Our Forest Service is turning into the fire service, to the detriment of the rest of its mission," Rahall said at a House Resource Committee hearing on the bills Thursday. "For the past several years, we have witnessed tragic fire seasons that have put American lives and our treasured public lands in harm's way. Fire seasons are getting long and more intense due to climate change, drought and other factors."

The increase in major wildfires has created a "rob Peter to pay Paul" situation for the Forest Service and the Interior Department by borrowing other funds — including fire prevention — from other agencies to cover the higher costs, Rahall said, with other witnesses and lawmakers using the same analogy.

Rahall's bill, the Federal Land Assistance, Management and Enhancement Act, known as the FLAME bill, would require a supplemental funding source to fight major, "catastrophic" wildland fires as well as a call for an overall wildland fire management plan a year after the bill would become law. The bill creates a specific FLAME fund for "catastrophic, emergency wildland fire suppression activities," according to a summary of the bill.

Rahall said that in 2007 the Forest Service spent $741 million more and the Interior Department spent $249 million more than was budgeted for firefighting.

Goodlatte's bill, the Emergency Wildland Fire Response Act of 2008, also creates an emergency fund and requires the Interior Department to develop a national map of areas at the most risk for wildfires. Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, is a co-sponsor of Goodlatte's bill.

Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, who testified on behalf of the Western Governors Association, said she supported the FLAME act because range and wildland fires are "a growing phenomenon in the western United States."

"Arizona's experiences are not unique," she said. "Last year, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Texas and other states across the West saw fires burn hundreds of thousands of acres of wildlands. These fires all have one thing in common — an unhealthy landscape due to poor or insufficient prevention efforts and the lack of adequate manpower and resources to fight fires. These megafires are not going to go away."

Napolitano said it is "time to face reality" with new funding ideas so fighting megafires does not come from funds set aside for fire prevention or other portions of the agencies' budgets.

"We cannot afford to let this dangerous trend continue," she said.

The bill still needs to be approved by the committee before it would move to the House floor and over to the Senate for an additional vote.

Bishop and Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, sit on the House Resources Committee, which would take up the bills.

"Both pieces of legislation to remedy this shortfall have merit," Cannon said. "I am hopeful we can harmonize the two to balance the need for forest management and wildfire preparation. Creating a rainy-day fund for fire suppression and forest management is a good idea that both bills hope to achieve."

E-mail: suzanne@desnews.com

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Napolitano: Permanent source of wildfire-fight funds needed

By Eric Swedlund
Arizona Daily Star
April 11, 2008
http://www.azstarnet.com/news/233922

With much of the West on the doorstep of another potentially devastating wildfire season, Gov. Janet Napolitano on Thursday urged Congress to approve a permanent federal funding stream specifically for fire suppression efforts.

In her testimony before the House Natural Resources Committee in support of the Federal Land Assistance, Management and Enhancement Act, Napolitano said Western forests are in a "perfect storm" of conditions that promise more of the costly "mega-fires" such as 2002's 467,000-acre Rodeo-Chediski Fire and 2003's 84,000-acre Aspen Fire, which burned through the heart of Summerhaven on Mount Lemmon.

"Decades of fuel accumulations and acres of beetle-killed timber, the rapid expansion of the wildland-urban interface, and the overarching presence of drought and climate change have now combined to dramatically increase the number and size of mega-fires," Napolitano told the committee.

Testifying on behalf of the Western Governors Association, Napolitano said the bill, known as the FLAME Act, would relieve an enormous burden on the U.S. Forest Service's budget and end the practice of redirecting wildfire prevention and forest restoration funds to pay for fire suppression.

The bill — introduced by the committee's chairman, Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., and co-sponsored by a bipartisan group of 40 other representatives that includes Democrat Ra�l Grijalva of Tucson — would create a fund to pay for catastrophic wildfires that is separate from other appropriations to agencies that manage forests and other federal lands.

The bill has the support of five Forest Service chiefs who led the agency from 1979 to 2007. R. Max Peterson, F. Dale Robertson, Jack Ward Thomas, Michael P. Dombeck and Dale N. Bosworth jointly submitted a letter to the committee last month that argued the funding of fire suppression was putting the Forest Service in "an untenable financial position."

"Our nation must find a way to fund the increasing costs of protecting these lands from fire without decimating the organization needed to protect and manage them for the American people," the former chiefs wrote.

Fire suppression costs of roughly $200 million a year consumed about 20 percent of the overall Forest Service budget in the 1990s. By contrast, six of the last eight years have seen fire suppression costs top $1 billion, and the increased cost of fighting wildfires now takes up more than half the Forest Service's budget.

Even in a relatively light fire year, as 2007 was for the Southwest, fire-suppression costs were nearly $50 million just for national forest land in Arizona, New Mexico and West Texas, said Cathie Schmidlin, a spokeswoman for the Southwest Region of the Forest Service.

"In the Southwest area, generally it wasn't real active like it has been some other years," she said.

The FLAME fund would be equal to the average federal wildfire suppression costs over the last five years, and although the committee hasn't calculated the precise amount, the fund would likely top $1 billion in its first year, said Natalie Luna, a spokeswoman for Grijalva. The next step for the bill is a full-committee vote, which is not yet scheduled but could come within the next two weeks, she said.

According to the latest regional forecast, the potential for significant wildfire activity during April is above normal for Southern and Southeastern Arizona, including Coronado National Forest lands and most or all of Pima, Santa Cruz, Cochise, Pinal, Graham and Greenlee counties.

The National Interagency Fire Center defines a significant fire as a fire that requires resources from outside the area.

The rest of Arizona is facing normal fire potential, but most of southern and eastern New Mexico and West Texas also have elevated risk of significant fires in the near term.

Abundant fuels and persistent drought across most of the state are leading to above-normal fire potential starting in May. The elevated fire danger will follow the typical pattern in the state throughout the summer until the monsoon moisture and rain decrease fire potential, according to the federal assessment.

So far this year, there have been 295 reported fires covering 124,235 acres in the Southwest Region, which includes Arizona, New Mexico and West Texas.

Most of the fires have been in New Mexico, with the Stiles Complex burning 67,000 acres of grassland near Hobbs in the southeastern part of the state.

In Arizona, 78 fires covering 4,362 acres have been reported in 2008. The National Interagency Fire Center's projection for the entire fire season is for 607 fires covering 167,141 acres.

The Southwest region has ranged from a low of 183 fires in 2005 to a high of 1,129 fires in 2002, and from a low of 7,690 acres in 2001 to 258,107 acres in 2006.

Contact reporter Eric Swedlund at 573-4115 or at eswedlund@azstarnet.com.

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Forest Service Attempts to Remove Protections for Wildlife Across the Country, Meets With Lawsuit

http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2008/nfma-04-11-2008.html
Paul Spitler, Center for Biological Diversity, (541) 848-7538
Pete Frost, Western Environmental Law Center, (541) 543-0018

SAN FRANCISCO— A coalition of 14 conservation groups filed suit today in federal court to block the U.S. Forest Service from implementing a new rule that would remove protections for fish, wildlife, and other resources throughout the 192-million acre National Forest System. The rule represents the Forest Service’s third attempt to weaken the nationwide regulations.

“The Forest Service violated the law in preparing new rules in 2000 and 2005, and the 2008 rule is also fatally flawed,” said Paul Spitler, attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity. “The Forest Service should stop wasting resources and develop a rule that ensures protection for the fish, wildlife, and other resources in our national forests.

During the 1980s and ’90s, the Forest Service operated under nationwide regulations that provided mandatory protection for forest resources, including a requirement to ensure the viability of fish and wildlife species. These regulations governed all proposed projects — such as timber sales, livestock grazing, and road construction — throughout the National Forest System. The Forest Service first attempted to weaken these nationwide regulations in 2000, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit found that the agency had violated the National Environmental Policy Act.

Under the Bush administration, the Forest Service attempted to remove essentially all environmental safeguards for the national forests with a new rule in 2005. In March 2007, however, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California threw out the 2005 rule based on violations of the National Environmental Policy Act, Endangered Species Act, and Administrative Procedure Act. Unfortunately, the new 2008 rule is in most respects identical to the 2005 rule. The 2008 rule continues to significantly weaken protection for forest resources, including the elimination of the long-standing requirement to ensure viable populations of fish and wildlife species.

“Thankfully the Bush administration is coming to an end, as it continues to push forward with woefully inadequate protection for our national forests,” said attorney Pete Frost of the Western Environmental Law Center.

In addition to weakening substantive protection, the new rule also decreases public participation in forest planning by allowing the Forest Service to “categorically exclude” entire forest plans from public review and environmental analysis requirements.

The Forest Service has previously been found in violation of the National Environmental Policy Act for its refusal to analyze and disclose the environmental impacts of its attempt to weaken the nationwide regulations. For the 2008 rule, while the agency prepared what it purports to be an “environmental impact statement,” it simply states there will be no environmental impacts. For close to a decade, and despite two losses in court, the Forest Service still refuses to acknowledge that the elimination of nationwide environmental safeguards will result in adverse impacts on the environment.

“The elimination of mandatory standards that protected our national forests for decades will of course result in increased environmental harm to fish, wildlife, and other natural resources in the National Forest System,” said Fink. “The courts have recognized this, the general public can see this, but the Forest Service has chosen once again to keep its head in the sand.”

The 14 plaintiff conservation organizations in the lawsuit are: Citizens for Better Forestry, Environmental Protection Information Center, Center for Biological Diversity, Wild West Institute, Gifford Pinchot Task Force, Idaho Sporting Congress, Friends of the Clearwater, Utah Environmental Congress, Cascadia Wildlands Project, Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center, Wild South, The Lands Council, Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, and Oregon Wild. The groups are represented by Marc Fink and Lisa Belenky of the Center for Biological Diversity, and Pete Frost of the Western Environmental Law Center.

A copy of the complaint can be found here:
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/ancient_forests/pdfs/nfma-complaint.pdf

A copy of the new rule can be found here:
http://www.fs.fed.us/emc/nfma/includes/planning_rule/08_planning_rule.pdf

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Stop hatching secret, closed-door plan, Tester tells Forest Service

Senator says Montanans need to weigh in on controversial decision

Clark Fork Chronicle
April 11, 2008
http://www.clarkforkchronicle.com/article.php/20080411155932984

Sen. Jon Tester today told the U.S. Forest Service to stop hatching a secret, closed-door plan that could alter the landscape of Western Montana without local input.

Tester demanded that the agency let Montanans in on the decision-making process before moving ahead with the controversial agreement, which would grant the Plum Creek Timber Company more leeway to cross Forest Service land—even for non-logging purposes.

Several commissioners in Western Montana counties worry the agreement will allow Plum Creek to sell its forestry land for housing development. Plum Creek, the nation’s largest private land owner, owns 1.3 million acres of land in Montana. The company has announced plans to sell up to 2.5 million acres of its land nationwide for residential and business development.

“Montana’s local leaders deserve a seat at the table when major decisions are made about their communities’ future,” Tester said. “No Washington agency should make deals in secret about Montana without our say so.”

Tester is concerned that selling off and developing timber land will prevent Montana hunters from accessing some of the state’s best hunting grounds. Tester also noted that as more timber lands are taken out of production, logging and timber mill jobs are lost.

“The conversion of this land will lead to increased housing density in the wildland urban interface, leaving local and county governments with higher firefighting costs, fragmented habitat and increased road maintenance and infrastructure costs,” Tester wrote to Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey in a letter sent today.

In his letter to Rey, Tester called on the Forest Service to immediately release its draft agreement. He also asked for an opportunity to allow Montana and local governments a chance to weigh in. And he asked for a review of its cost within six months.

“I look forward to your response and would gladly help facilitate the involvement of local and state government officials in working on access issues in their jurisdictions,” Tester wrote.

Tester’s letter to Rey appears below.

###

April 11, 2008

The Honorable Mark Rey
Undersecretary for Natural Resources and the Environment
United States Department of Agriculture
1400 Independence Ave., S.W.
Washington, DC 20250

Dear Undersecretary Rey:

This letter is to express my concern that local officials from Montana communities have been left out of a road use agreement being facilitated by your office that would have substantial impact on my Montana constituents. I understand that the Forest Service has negotiated a reciprocal easement agreement with Plum Creek for road access that may precipitate the sale of remote timber land for housing and business development. This proposal would change cost-share road easements with the Forest Service for timber and forest management to include rights to subdivision, sales and development of lands for commercial, industrial, or residential uses. I am very concerned about the implications of this agreement and its impact on county governments.

It is my understanding that a final agreement is imminent, but has been negotiated behind closed doors. In a meeting on April 9th, 2008 I was denied a copy of the agreement, but was given an outline of its intent. I respectfully request that all negotiations on this agreement cease until there is an adequate process for the public and interested parties to be fully involved in this matter.

As you know Plum Creek is the largest private land owner in the United States, owning over 8 million acres of timber land in 18 states—including 1.3 million acres in Montana. Plum Creek has announced that in coming years it plans to sell up to 2.5 million acres of land for the purposes of residential and business development. That land is valued in excess of $5.7 billion. The conversion of this land will lead to increased housing density in the wildland urban interface, leaving local and county governments with higher firefighting costs, fragmented habitat and increased road maintenance and infrastructure costs.

Additionally, as more timber lands are taken out of production, ancillary jobs and infrastructure in the timber industry are lost. Private land owners should have flexibility in the use of their land, but the Forest Service should not facilitate the conversion of these timber lands to houses by changing road easements without cost. The magnitude of this agreement—and the precedent it will set for much of the West—requires careful scrutiny.

I strongly oppose any agreements that are hatched without the input from Congress and state and local stakeholders. I respectfully request that all negotiations be placed on hold and that the Forest Service meet several conditions before proceeding:

1. The Forest Service must immediately release the draft agreement for review by Congress, and provide for the opportunity for comment by the state of Montana and local governments that would have jurisdiction over development on Plum Creek’s lands.

2. The Forest Service and the Office of Management and Budget must initiate a review of additional costs placed on federal, state and local governments due to this agreement, including increased wildland fire suppression costs--and potential road maintenance costs—and report to Congress within 6 months.

The process used to hatch these agreements is completely unacceptable and has shut the public out of a proposal that will hurt county governments and leave the American public with increasingly larger firefighting bills.

The Forest Service has a lengthy history of working with Plum Creek and other large land owners and timber companies to define access easements. Changing this access right, in this manner, sets a dangerous precedent that breaks from the historical uses of these roads and the Congressional intent of the laws under which the Forest Service should be operating.

I look forward to your response and would gladly help facilitate the involvement of local and state government officials in working on access issues in their jurisdictions. Please don’t hesitate to contact me with any questions or comments on this issue.

Sincerely,

(s) Jon Tester
U.S. Senator

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Fighting dangerous wildfires

By Sally Applegate
Georgetown Record
April 10, 2008
http://www.wickedlocal.com/georgetown/homepage/x1148170635

Georgetown-The problem with fighting wildfires is that they can go anywhere, suddenly and unexpectedly surrounding you. When you’re fighting a fire in a building you can run outside to safety. When you are already outside, there is no limit to how far or how fast that wildfire can go.

Veteran wildfire fighter David Bogdan of Georgetown, who has been fighting fires for the National Park Service since 1986 and working for the service since 1974, shared stories of his adventurous job last week. His attentive audience was composed of the men attending the Council on Aging’s monthly Men’s Breakfast at the Trestle Way Housing complex.

The meeting room was filled with the enticing smell of bacon, eggs and pancakes as Bogdan prepared his presentation and enjoyed breakfast with his audience. Bogdan emphasized the training given wildfire fighters, which emphasizes keeping one’s eyes open to one’s surroundings rather than simply concentrating on the ground.

“There is no stationary safety zone in a wildfire,” says Bogdan. “You have to keep your heads up and your eyes open.”

Bogdan shows a slide from Big Cypress National Park in Florida, showing the small dirt path through thick green foliage the firefighters’ trucks had to use as a road. One of the breakfast guests has a question for him.

“If you drive in, how do you get out?”

“Our trucks are turned around with the fronts facing in the direction we would need to escape in, and all keys are always left in the vehicles,” answered Bogdan. “That green stuff does burn. Fire uses the moss on trees to climb them, just like a ladder. Smoke comes and goes as it is blown by the wind, and it obscures the view as you head for an intersection.”

Close calls

Bogdan has experienced several close calls over the years, with the worst one being a wildfire in McCall, Idaho, when a rapidly spreading fire jumped their fire break, racing for nine miles after crossing the road over their heads. As trained, Bogdan and his crew rapidly escaped by heading away from the fire at a 90 degree angle on foot, then boarding buses a mile away.

“There was only 8 percent humidity. It was incredibly dry,” says Bogdan. “The fire went right over our heads. We got on the bus and the fire was raging behind us. The next day we traveled nine miles and started fighting the fire again.”

Bogdan explained that fire crews meet every day for a planning session before going out to the site of a fire. They discuss the action plan for that day, their schedule, and maps showing the fire’s location.

“We look at where the fire was yesterday, and where it is expected to be located today,” says Bogdan. “There are radio reports on the status and location of the fire. We have a remote weather station reporting on weather conditions up to two hours away. I sometimes act as a human weather station using my own radio. We always have a backup plan.”

A man has a question for Bogdan.

“If you’ve got guys all over the place, how often do you check to make sure no one is down?”

“We use radios, two to a crew, and during a fire there can be 1,500 people on 14 radio channels,” says Bogdan. “There’s a lot of chatter going on. We have six to eight helicopters flying in and out, in and out, and one plane coordinating the helicopters. “

“Kind of like the infantry?” asks a man.

“Except you know who the enemy is,” smiles Bogdan.

Another man asks, “Do you use respirators?”

“No, they are too heavy to carry in, and we have 1,500 people fighting the fire,” says Bogdan.

“How’s your lungs?” asks the man.

“Not so good,” replies Bogdan.

In response to a question on who foots the bill for fighting all these fires, Bogdan says the taxpayers do.

When a man asks why fight simple grassland fires in unpopulated areas, Bogdan explains that local cattle ranchers have contracts with the government for grazing rights for their herds.

“So we have to put out those fires as well,” says Bogdan.

Bears and alligators

Some of the other hazards in fighting wildfires come from the local residents. Bogdan came face to face with a very large alligator while fighting a fire in Great Cypress National Park in Florida. At another fire, Bogdan spotted bear tracks between his location and where his crew was up ahead.

Another hazard comes from large heavy trees that are still standing after being hollowed out by fire. He shows a slide entitled “How not to take a lunch break.”

“Once my crew took a lunch break surrounded by tall trees like that,” says Bogdan. “We got up from lunch and a minute later a large tree fell in the exact place where we had just been sitting.”

Fire crews sometimes heat their lunches up over hot spots while taking a break, says Bogdan. Those crews will return to put out all the hot spots since they can reignite days later if they are not dealt with.

“How much progress has been made during your years with the Park Service?” asks one man.

“When I first started, there wasn’t a lot of emphasis on safety,” says Bogdan. “Now there is more emphasis on it. In the old days you would work on a fire for 14 days, get one day off, and then go back to work for seven days. They were having too many accidents, so now we work two weeks and they bring in a fresh crew. We get a two-week rest.”

“Did you work with the smoke jumpers?” asks a man. Smoke jumpers skydive from airplanes into a fire zone in areas where there is no other access to a fire.

“I did work with smoke jumper crews, but I don’t like to jump out of perfectly good planes to reach a fire,” laughs Bogdan.

He notes that fire crews have to load and unload their own fire gear onto airplanes and show up already dressed to fight the fire — in his case this includes the yellow shirt of a crew boss.

That gear can weight 40 pounds and end up being carried eight miles.

“Only 55 pounds of gear per man are allowed on a plane,” says Bogdan. “We have a 74-year-old firefighter, Bob Bury, who still works the fires with us. He was a world class wrestler.”

Asked about the turnover rate for firefighters, Bogdan said many of them stay for two years.

“In order to do this, you’ve got to love living in the dirt and having no showers for 15 days.”

The Men’s Breakfast at Trestle Way is held on the first Thursday of every month, in the housing complex’s community building.

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Separate Account Needed for Funding Catastrophic Wildfire

Partitioning accounts would protect vital Forest Service programs

Michelle Robbins
American Forests
Found April 10, 2008
http://www.americanforests.org/news/display.php?id=183

Creating a separate spending account to fight catastrophic emergency wildfires would allow the U.S. Forest Service to address this critical need and maintain funding for other vital programs in its mission, Gerry Gray, vice president of policy for American Forests told the House Committee on Natural Resources Thursday.

Speaking as a member of the Rural Voices of Conservation Coalition (RVCC), Gray said Congress must craft an effective response to the wildfire suppression funding crisis as a first step in investing in the whole of the Forest Service’s mission. The RVCC, a coalition of western rural and local, regional, and national organizations, promotes balanced conservation-based approaches to ecological and economic problems facing the West.

As wildfire suppression costs have escalated, other program funds have been reduced. The proportion of the Forest Service’s total budget devoted to wildland fire management has increased from 13 percent in 1991 to 48 percent in the Administration’s Fiscal Year 2009 budget proposals. Increasing wildfire suppression costs—which have exceeded $1 billion in six of the last eight years—have been the major reason for these increases. As a result, funding has decreased significantly for prevention, restoration, and community capacity-building activities, Gray said. Some of these now-underfunded programs build community capacity to address wildfire threats, thus reducing the chances for large, uncharacteristically severe fires. Likewise, programs that invest in efforts to restore forest health and help those who care for and maintain forests reduce fire’s impact and the cost of fire suppression.

“Funding for these types of programs is essential to solving our current forest health crises and the associated threats to communities over the long term,” Gray warned.

About 1 percent of wildfires account for 95 percent of all acres burned and consume 85 percent of total suppression funds. These “one percent” of fires are true emergencies and should be treated and paid for differently, through a separate account, Gray said.

In considering a separate account Gray urged Congress to:

* ensure funding is designated as “emergency” to protect agency budget caps

* maintain robust annual wildfire suppression budgets for the other 99 percent of fires

* redistribute monies back into agency programs that have been severely cut by increasing suppression costs

These programs include recreation and wilderness, vegetation and watersheds, wildlife and fisheries, and roads and trails.

Any separate account should include minimum criteria for accessing its monies, incentives for not spending the funds unnecessarily, year-end accountability, and a demonstrated commitment to cost containment, Gray added.

A copy of Gray’s testimony is available from American Forests’ website: www.americanforests.org

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Federal firefighters feel no love from DC

By J.P. Crumrine, Assistant Editor
Idyllwild Town Crier
April 10, 2008
http://www.towncrier.com/stories/story.3.20080410.html

Within hours after the U.S. Forest Service (FS) released a report to Congress on April 1, firefighters were calling the day “Black Tuesday.” The report has gained no support within the firefighting ranks. They have lost confidence in several senior agency officials.

“I’m appalled by it. Nothing has changed. They’re manipulating figures. It’s equivalent to lying to Congress,” said Norm Walker, former San Jacinto Ranger District fire chief, who retired only days before the report’s release.

The FS submitted a report to the Senate Appropriations Committee on its ability to recruit and retain firefighters. Firefighting rank and file have been anxiously awaiting the study for months.

Issues of pay, training and work environment are part of the fabric of every public and private workplace. But Southern California appears to be the epicenter for these issues affecting federal firefighters. Region 5, which is all of California, is often considered the black sheep of the Forest Service family.

The report’s authors found no data substantiating the “perceptions around recruitment and retention in Southern California.” The findings concluded that the region’s recruitment rate is greater than its attrition rate.

More people want to join the FS fire ranks than are leaving, is the sum of the report.

This is in stark contrast to Walker’s and others’ experiences. During summer 2007, for instance, several FS fire stations in the San Jacinto Ranger District were only open five days per week instead of seven days because of difficulty in recruiting firefighters.

Preliminary indications are that three of the district’s seven stations will be open only five days a week once fire season starts in a month. A year ago, the Anza station was completely closed except for California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE) staff.

A third of the engines on the entire San Bernardino National Forest will be staffed only five days, according to Forest Fire Chief Mike Dietrich.

“There is a very high rate of turnover on the San Bernardino, “ he said. “We’ve raised it as a problem and challenge.”

The new captain of Engine 57 left the FS last summer for a better-paying job with CAL FIRE. He had served less than a year. His replacement accepted a position with CAL FIRE in December. So far, the station does not have a new captain.

But FS officials argue that no hiring or retention problems exist. They claim, “The attrition rate in Southern California is below national averages.”

The FS firefighter attrition rate is 9.4 percent annually in Southern California — Angeles, Cleveland, Los Padres and San Bernardino national forests — compared to 13.4 percent nationwide for the entire federal government. The entire federal government includes the FS, National Parks and the Bureau of Land Management. The FS Region 5’s attrition rate is 7.2 percent and the agency’s nationwide rate is 6.3 percent. The attrition rate in Southern California is 50 percent higher than the whole FS.

Furthermore, 46.6 percent, or nearly half, of entry-level firefighters leave the FS in Southern California. As Walker has noted in the past, the FS’ investment in these people approaches $100,000 per person for training.

For the entire FS the attrition rate at this level is half the local rate. While the captain and district chief attrition rates appear low at 1.1 percent, they are still higher than FS-wide attrition at the same grade levels.

Wildlandfire.com, a firefighter Internet discussion group, was full of thoughts and reactions to the report. Most commentators only used their blog name. The agency had quickly passed the word that all press inquiries should be submitted to public information officers at regional offices.

Since the report submitted to Congress is quite different than the draft reportedly prepared in this region, firefighters are aghast at headquarters’ behavior.

“The Black Tuesday announcement was a complete betrayal to the federal wildland firefighting community,” said Kenneth Kempter, Southern California Chapter director of the Federal Wildland Fire Service Association (FWFSA). “After being promised that recruitment and retention would be factually looked at ... it was put back to the field that there were no recruitment and retention issues in California.”

The draft report addressed sensitive issues such as “portal to portal” pay. In other words many states, including California, do pay firefighters for their complete time working an emergency. But the FS firefighters’ pay doesn’t start until they arrived on the scene.

The anguish and anger were exacerbated when senior Agriculture official, Under Secretary Mark Rey, indicated that “mission creep” was contributing to the Southern California disgruntlement. He was referring to FS responses to emergency medical calls, something unique in Southern California. But FS firefighters say this isn’t correct, that FS firefighters in other states also respond to medical calls. This mistake set the scene; firefighters believe that changes in the report were intentional distortions.

Some changes were made to ensure that salary comparisons to CAL FIRE reflected appropriate comparisons. For example, state shifts have overtime built into them, according to Lenise Lago, Forest Service budget officer.

The report concluded the Forest Service pays a higher hourly wage, although CAL FIRE staff may earn a greater annual salary. But one discrepancy that might skew these figures occurs when both agencies respond to a fire, such as last October’s fire siege.

CAL FIRE firefighters receive pay for 24 hours each day at the fire, including nights. Forest Service firefighters receive only 15.5 hours of pay. This would lower the CAL FIRE firefighters’ hourly wage but raise their total annual salary.

Meanwhile, FWFSA believes Congress is skeptical of the report’s conclusions and willing to listen to new voices about the problem.

“The report is just a bump in the road,” said Casey Judd, FWFSA executive director. He is organizing several visits between firefighters and Congressional representatives during the May district work period.

Rey and Forest Chief Abigail Kimbell left the hearing promising to fill vacant firefighting positions, according to Lago. Idyllwild will know the results within weeks.

J.P. Crumrine can be reached at jp@towncrier.com.

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Feinstein criticizes Forest Service firefighting vacancies report

By ERICA WERNER Associated Press Writer
April 10, 2008
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_8881047?nclick_check=1

WASHINGTON—A U.S. Forest Service report on federal firefighters in Southern California "fails to acknowledge serious challenges that the Forest Service faces in staffing its firefighting corps in the state," Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Thursday.

The report on firefighter recruitment and retention, issued last week, said that entry-level federal firefighters in Southern California leave the force at nearly twice the level as in the Forest Service as a whole. But it also said that recruitment levels statewide in California are higher than attrition levels.

The report downplayed concerns from lawmakers about vacancies in Southern California's federal firefighting force, and concluded: "Perceptions around recruitment and retention in Southern California are hard to substantiate based on data."

In a letter to Forest Service Chief Gail Kimbell and Agriculture Department Undersecretary Mark Rey, Feinstein said she took issue with that statement.

Their report didn't address how many firefighter positions were unfilled during fire season because of employee attrition and other factors, she wrote, and failed to acknowledge the fundamental problem that Forest Service salaries in Southern California lag behind pay at state and local agencies.

Feinstein, D-Calif., who chairs the Senate Appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over the Forest Service, asked for another report by April 30 with details on planned staffing levels for this fire seasons, current vacancies and specific details on retention plans.

Janice Gauthier, Forest Service communications director for California, said the agency has received Feinstein's letter and would be developing a response and working to provide the information Feinstein is seeking.

The Forest Service report also has been criticized as misleading by the Federal Wildland Fire Service Association, an advocacy group.

Last fall devastating wildfires raced across Southern California, destroying nearly 2,200 homes.

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Angels on Lookout

By MELANIE LADON
The Press-Enterprise
April 5, 2008
http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_B_bspot06.44265f0.html

Last fall Brittaney Khong, 16, of Beaumont, created Operation Fire Angel, a charity that helps families of fallen firefighters.

She said she decided to help because she was moved by the firefighting during the 2007 fire season and a fire near her home.

With help from family, friends and members of the National Honor of Society chapter at Beaumont High School, Brittaney assembled Fire Angel kits with brochures and pamphlets from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection with information to raise fire-safety awareness.

Each kit costs $5 and features a Fire Angel pin that Brittaney and her mother designed.

The funds received will be donated to the Wildland Firefighter Foundation.

Five hundred fifty kits made will be available at Beaumont High School, the Noble Creek Recreation Center, TK Automotive in Banning and at fire stations in the area.

"I feel like I'm really making a difference," Brittaney said. "Seeing the firefighters and how much they did for everyone ... we're saying 'thank you' to them."

Information about the kits: e-mail bkhong09@gaggle.net

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Burning questions: U.S. firefighter report raises concerns

Jason Pesick, Staff Writer
The Sun (San Bernadino)
April 5, 2008
http://www.sbsun.com/sanbernardino/ci_8826666

Federal lawmakers from California think Washington doesn't know how to put out fires.

"With a fire, for God's sake, you've got to be able to respond and respond effectively and have that response led by people who understand the forest," said Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Redlands.

Last week, the U.S. Forest Service, which manages the national forests and fights wildland fires, responded to federal legislation requesting a report on federal firefighter pay and personnel policies with proposals to increase recruitment and retention in the Southern California national forests.

The report, released two months late at a U.S. Senate subcommittee hearing, had little in common with a draft produced by agency officials in California.

"The upshot of the new report is that - `Problem? What problem?' It seems to be disconnected from the situation on the ground," said Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Pasadena, who served a stint as a seasonal firefighter with the Forest Service in the '80s.

According to the final report, the idea that there is a recruitment and retention problem in Southern California is "hard to substantiate based on data."

The eight-page report - trimmed down from a 22-page draft originally crafted by California-based Forest Service officials - also said recruitment is more than making up for attrition and was scant on specific recommendations.

In their draft, officials painted a very different picture, recommending that firefighter pay, facilities, leadership, training and communications be improved and that perks such as providing day care and more government houses be considered. They also recommended examining job titles for the firefighters, who are classified as forestry technicians.

"This is a critical issue. The lives and property of many Californians are at stake," Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who requested the report, said in a statement, "and we must have a competent, professional and adequate firefighting force."

She said she'd send the draft to a senior-level Agriculture Department official to get further feedback.

According to the report, the Forest Service in Southern California lost 9.4percent of its firefighters in 2007. The rate was 46.6 percent for a certain class of junior firefighters.

"When you're losing half your people in the first year, I think you're delusional not to realize you've got a problem," Schiff said.

The attrition rates for the San Bernardino and Angeles national forests were the worst in Southern California, according to the report, with 61percent of those departing last year going to state and local fire departments, which pay higher salaries.

"There have to be incentives that show people a future within the Forest Service," Lewis said.

The numbers don't tell the whole story because they don't include all of the temporary firefighters, who make up almost half of the firefighting force, said Casey Judd, business manager for the Federal Wildland Fire Service Association.

Since October 2006, the San Bernardino National Forest has lost 62 of its 210 firefighters, spokeswoman Valerie Baca said.

Last fire season, one engine was down for a month because of staffing issues, she said.

The report also said talk that Forest Service firefighters are paid far less than state and local firefighters is overblown, in large part because federal firefighters don't work as many hours.

But that's because state firefighters get more overtime and are paid for the entire time they are deployed to a fire, say firefighters who did not want their names printed. Federal firefighters at a fire aren't paid for one-third of the time they are deployed.

"This was a slap in the face," a captain in the Angeles National Forest said of the report.

Five of the forest's 28 engines likely won't be staffed in the coming fire season, he said.

That's because the Forest Service is losing people in key spots and replacing them with less-qualified people, the captain said.

"We're bringing them off the street with no experience whatsoever, and we're filling those slots."

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Prevention cheaper than wildland firefights: Ark. expert to senate panel

By Alex Daniels
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (Little Rock)
April 3, 2008
http://www.firerescue1.com/wildfire-prevention/articles/394012-Prevention-cheaper-than-
wildland-firefights-Ark-expert-to-senate-panel/

WASHINGTON — The federal government is spending too much money on putting out fires, the director of The Nature Conservancy in Arkansas testified Tuesday. Instead, it should spend more on forestry techniques that minimize the risks of a blaze.

Scott Simon appeared before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in support of the Forest Landscape Restoration Act of 2007, which would direct $400 million over 10 years to clearing forests of small trees or dead trees that can dry up and ignite huge forest fires.

Such supporters as Simon think that's money well spent, when compared with the $1 billion a year spent on fighting fires after they've already started.

He told the committee how the conservancy, a nonprofit conservation group, teamed up with local and federal agencies and private organizations to create the Oak Ecosystem Restoration Team. Years of overgrowth in the Ozark National Forest had led to uncontrolled fires and insect outbreaks.

By clearing the forest, whether through prescribed burns or by using saws, the group restored 110,000 forest acres.

"There's a significant decrease in the wildfire risk," Simon said. "It's a much healthier forest." Members of the administration and the logging industry, as well as environmental groups, testified in favor of the bill. But they warned that it wasn't perfect.

Gail Kimbell, chief of the U.S. Forest Service, cautioned in her written testimony that the term "restoration" in the bill would have to be clarified, to focus on "healthy, sustainable, productive ecosystems for the future, as opposed to a return to a historic condition." She touted stewardship contracting, in which organizations, including private industry, local governments and utilities, agree to thin forests in certain areas.

Simon questioned the success of the stewardship program. He said thinning must be done on a "landscape" scale larger than the current contracts in effect to have a real impact. And a market-based approach doesn't take into account forests where fire is the greatest hazard, he testified.

Responding to a question from Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., he said potential contractors under the current program "are not bidding" because the application process is viewed as burdensome.

Nathaniel Lawrence, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, a New York environmental group, said there was a strong "intuitive" basis for thinning forests to reduce fires, and that he supports the forest thinning on an "experimental" basis.

But, he cautioned, the practice had not been thoroughly tested.

Increased sunlight resulting from pruned forests and the ability of wind to travel through cleared areas without being blocked can dry wood into an ignitable fuel and spread fires more quickly, he warned.

"Thinning forests can actually increase fires."

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Senators rap Forest Service cuts

By NOELLE STRAUB
Star-Tribune Washington bureau
April 2, 2008
http://www.jacksonholestartrib.com/articles/2008/04/02/news/wyoming/
3112ad3b29110aa08725741e007fa002.txt

WASHINGTON -- Senators on the powerful Appropriations Committee vowed Tuesday to reverse proposed budget cuts to the U.S. Forest Service and toyed with the idea of moving the agency from the Department of Agriculture to the Department of Interior.

President Bush's proposed 2009 budget would reduce funding for firefighter readiness, hazardous fuels reduction work, law enforcement, construction and maintenance, recreation and research, said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who chairs the Interior subcommittee.

"I don't know how anyone could really consider this a serious budget proposal," she said.

The administration requested $4.1 billion for the Forest Service, a full 8 percent below 2008 levels, Feinstein said. But she added that the cuts are actually much deeper because the budget did not fully account for increases in fixed costs including salaries and higher firefighting expenses.

"The way we look at it, the Forest Service is being cut nearly 15 percent," she said.

Feinstein pledged to work with the top Republican on the subpanel, Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., to undo the cuts.

Allard said the Forest Service was targeted more than other agencies, which was "not justified." He said escalating firefighting costs shouldn't come at the expense of the agency's other programs.

"With fire seasons becoming worse each year, I can't understand why we would reduce the funds that go to train and equip our firefighters," he said. "This will lower the agency's initial attack ability and lead to more catastrophic fires."

Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey said the budget request did decline, but that last year's levels were historic highs.

He said the lower request for fire preparedness funding in part reflected cost savings the agency has achieved. He also said the cuts to state and local forestry programs are made up for by increased funding for them in the 2008 farm bill.

The Forest Service will maintain the same number of fire crews and equipment, Rey said, and its rate of extinguishing 98 percent of fires on initial attack.

But asked whether the agency would have enough money to pay for fire suppression without raiding its non-fire programs for funds this year, Rey said, "Past experience would say that that's not likely."

Forest Service Chief Abigail Kimbell said the funding request reflected some "very difficult strategic decisions" at a time of tight budgets and that the agency continues to be a good investment.

Allard said the unequal treatment of the Forest Service's budget made him think that moving the agency into the Interior Department might "be worth some serious thought."

The Government Accountability Office has begun a study on the subject, as requested by House appropriators. Rey said the study will likely be done late this year, leaving it to the next Congress to consider.

Rey said the variety of issues brought up by senators at the hearing aren't ones that lend themselves to a structural fix.

"No matter where the Forest Service is, it's still going to have problems that we've been discussing, and those problems aren't going to change if we change the structure of the agency or who it reports to," Rey said.

He also argued against establishing a separate firefighting agency.

"Doing that then separates the firefighting function from the land management function and probably doesn't buy you much in the way of program reforms or advantages," he said. "The issue of appropriate funding for firefighting would still remain even if that kind of change was made."

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Group files new suit against toxic retardants on forest fires

Jeff Barnard, Associated Press Writer
Tahoe Daily Tribune
April 2, 2008
http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/article/20080402/NEWS01/814610424/-1/NEWS

A watchdog group is keeping the heat on the U.S. Forest Service to change the way it fights wildfires, particularly the use of fire retardant that kills fish when it is dumped in streams.

The Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, based in Eugene, Ore., filed a new lawsuit Wednesday in U.S. District court in Missoula, Mont.

It claims environmental reviews that allow the Forest Service to continue using toxic fire retardant violate the Endangered Species Act and other laws.

In an earlier lawsuit from the group, a federal judge recently stopped short of finding Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, the Bush administration official in charge of the Forest Service, in contempt for dragging his feet on an environmental review of fire retardant.

Andy Stahl, executive director of the group, said the new suit is phase two of a campaign to force the Forest Service to give up its war on wildfire, despite knowing that forests are burning at a record pace primarily due to drought and a buildup of dead wood from a century of putting fires out.

“This war is bankrupting the Forest Service, costing almost 50 percent of their entire budget,” said Stahl. “And it’s an unwinnable war. What we have learned is that the harder and the more money we spend on putting out fire, the more intense the fires become, because there is more brush that just grows up.”

Specifically, the lawsuit challenges the Forest Service finding of no significant environmental impact from using toxic fire retardant, despite findings by scientists at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and NOAA Fisheries Service that the survival of dozens of threatened and endangered species is jeopardized, particularly fish.It also challenges the decisions by the Fish and Wildlife Service and NOAA Fisheries to allow fire retardant use to go on, as long as the Forest Service takes steps to test and monitor its use, without any explanation about how laboratory testing and monitoring will prevent fish and wildlife deaths.

“What happened here is the scientists did an excellent job of laying out the risks and harm, but the politicians stepped in at the end, saying, ‘You get a free pass, just keep doing everything you’ve been doing and you’ll be fine,’ “ Stahl said.

Spokesmen for Fish and Wildlife and NOAA Fisheries said they had not seen the lawsuit and could not comment on it. The Forest Service did not immediately respond to an e-mail request for comment.

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Battle lines shift for war on fire

By John Cramer
The Missoulian
March 24 2008
http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2008/03/23/news/local/news03.txt

Using the northern spotted owl as a surrogate, environmentalists took eight years to win a legal victory and the public's attention in the decade-long effort that stopped old-growth logging in the Pacific Northwest's national forests by the early 1990s.

Today, environmentalists are ahead of that pace in what they anticipate will be another decade-long forest campaign, having scored victories in the courtroom and public spotlight five years into an effort to force the U.S. Forest Service to overhaul its firefighting mission and practices.

Rather than using an endangered owl as their icon, environmentalists this time are spotlighting aerial fire retardants, saying the chemical red slurry is an environmental hazard - not a critical firefighting tool, as the Forest Service maintains.

“Stopping the war on fire won't be as sexy as saving God's ancient forests - that's like saving Yosemite or Grand Canyon - but everyone knows the Forest Service's whole war on fire is ecologically and financially bankrupt,” said Andy Stahl, executive director of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics and a former Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund resource analyst who helped end old-growth logging in the Pacific Northwest.

FSEEE, an Oregon-based watchdog group, contends a century of aggressive wildfire suppression has drastically changed the health, structure, characteristics and fire behavior of Western forests, resulted in thousands of injuries and hundreds of deaths and wasted billions of dollars.

The group wants the Forest Service to stop putting out wildfires unless they threaten people and property, and to focus on fire prevention around communities.

That will create healthier forests, safer conditions and allow the agency - which devotes nearly 50 percent of its budget to fire suppression - to spend more on recreation, wildlife habitat and other needs on national forests, FSEEE says.

The group also wants local and state governments and insurance companies to enact tougher standards for new construction in the West's fire-prone forests, just as they have restricted building in the East's floodplains.

But the Forest Service says its stop-all-fires policy ended long ago, giving way to a more sophisticated strategy that reflects the latest in fire science, land management and public expectations.

George Weldon, deputy director of fire, aviation and air for the Forest Service's Northern Region, said managing fires as a natural force has to be balanced with protection of people, property, infrastructure and natural resources.

“It's more complicated than people think,” Weldon said. Depending on fuels, weather and topography - the three primary drivers of fire behavior - “a fire that's 30 miles from a community can be more dangerous than one that's a quarter of a mile away.”

In recent decades, Forest Service officials have come to agree that fire is essential for America's ecosystems, where frequent low-intensity and occasionally severe blazes once maintained a mosaic of open and dense woodlands.

When the Forest Service went into the firefighting business in 1911, a year after the “Big Blowup” charred 3 million acres of western Montana and north Idaho in 48 hours, the agency adopted a “10 a.m.” fire policy that aimed to extinguish all blazes by the morning after they started.

But agency officials say that aggressive policy began changing 40 years ago when land managers and scientists started to realize that excluding fire from fire-dependent ecosystems creates unhealthy, fuel-laden forests.

Since then, officials say, they have adopted fire suppression as one tool in a larger policy that balances fire's natural function, hotter and drier conditions wrought by climate change, and the growing number of people building houses in Western woodlands.

Today, the National Fire Plan and the Bush administration's Healthy Forests Initiative are intended to get the federal government out of the fire suppression business, the Forest Service insists.

It's a process that employs thousands, from scientists in the laboratory to firefighters on the ground to air tanker crews overhead; that uses tools from computers to bulldozers; that analyzes fuels, weather, topography, safety and other factors.

The reason fire suppression costs have skyrocketed, Forest Service officials say, isn't because the agency is fighting every little fire but because it's trying to limit catastrophic fires.

“There's this notion that Smokey Bear has driven our fire policy,” said Ed Nesselroad, director of public and governmental affairs for the Forest Service's Northern Region. “But the fact is our approach has evolved greatly over the years.”

Perry Brown, dean of the College of Forestry and Conservation at the University of Montana, said fire management has become far more complex.

“The world is changing socially and ecologically, so we have to have a serious discussion on how we can adapt,” he said.

Since the 1970s, dozens of studies have shown that chemical fire retardants are toxic to fish and more recently that they promote the spread of invasive weeds.

The retardants, which are about 85 percent water, slow wildfires by cooling and coating the fuels, robbing the fire of oxygen, and slowing the rate of fuel combustion with inorganic salts that change how the fire burns.

Starting in 1992, the Forest Service contracted with the U.S. Geological Survey to conduct field and laboratory studies on the ecological effects of ammonia salts, cyanide compounds, and other chemicals in fire retardants and fire suppressant foams.

Results showed the formulas were extremely toxic to aquatic organisms, including fish, algae, insects and crustaceans, although the kill rate depended on the amount of retardant that enters the water, the streamflow and other factors.

The Forest Service has stopped using slurry containing a cyanide compound because studies showed it was highly toxic to fish when exposed to water and sunlight.

Results also showed that retardants acted like a short-term fertilizer on vegetation, increasing its growth, decreasing native plant diversity and invigorating weeds.

In the mid-1990s, a few years after the old-growth logging tumult in the Pacific Northwest, FSEEE decided to target the federal government's fire policy because of a growing number of large, so-called “catastrophic” fires in the West.

In 2003, FSEEE sued the Forest Service in federal court in Missoula, a year after a retardant airdrop killed 20,000 fish in a central Oregon stream.

In the first legal challenge to the Forest Service's firefighting policy, the suit said the agency had never conducted an ecological review of aerial fire retardants, and that their use violated the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act.

In 2005, U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy agreed, ruling that the Forest Service had failed to properly analyze the environmental harm from ammonium phosphate, the primary ingredient in retardants.

Last month, the Forest Service finally presented its environmental review - a general evaluation rather than a more detailed environmental impact statement - after Molloy threatened to hold the agency in contempt of court.

That threat, which drew national attention, included the possibility of jailing Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, the Bush administration's top forest official, and grounding the nation's firefighting air tankers until the judge's order was obeyed.

During several days of testimony, Forest Service officials defended their use of retardant airdrops and said an environmental impact statement wasn't needed. They painted a dire picture of a Western landscape ablaze and virtually undefended if retardant airdrops were banned.

The agency's review, signed by Forest Service Chief Gail Kimbell, said aerial retardants have no significant impact on public health, safety, firefighters or the environment.

“Because a limited number of effective firefighting tools exist, it is essential that firefighters are able to utilize every available means - including retardant - to fight wildland fires,” Kimbell wrote. “All firefighting tools help contain and control fires, as well as prevent damage to human life, property and valuable natural resources.”

Kimbell rejected the options of using only water airdrops or stopping all retardant airdrops until a less toxic formula is found.

Instead, she chose to stick with current federal retardant use guidelines, which prohibit drops within 300 feet of waterways unless people or property are threatened, although she said studies show that a 3-meter buffer zone is adequate.

But the Forest Service also made a concession when it agreed to expand its testing and monitoring of aerial retardants - before and after they are dropped near waterways - because of concerns of two sister agencies.

In their biological opinions, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service said the Forest Service's review had seriously underestimated the ecological impact from the accidental delivery, drift and surface runoff of fire retardants into waterways.

Those agencies said retardants jeopardize 45 endangered or threatened fish, plant, insect, mussel and amphibian species and their critical habitats. And they said retardants have caused massive fish kills in the past, and will cause even more in the future as the use of slurry increases.

But the two agencies also said the Forest Service could follow “reasonable and prudent alternatives” to lessen the ecological impact of firefighting retardants, ranging from field inspections to lab tests to making a concerted effort to keep the slurry away from waterways.

The Forest Service agreed to those measures but refused to change its operational guidelines for using retardants, saying it must be free to make airdrops near waterways if people, property or natural resources are threatened.

FSEEE, which considers the “reasonable and prudent alternatives” inadequate, plans to file another lawsuit soon in Missoula - the second half of its original legal strategy - to challenge the validity of the Forest Service's environmental review.

Stopping the war on fire, Stahl said, will only succeed if federal courts enforce environmental laws, local governments restrict development in the so-called wildland-urban interface, and public schools teach fire ecology.

“This issue doesn't have an easy answer,” he said. “It's not a case of all fires should burn or we should fight all fires. It's do we approach fire with a war-like mentality in which cost is no object, or do we address fire as part of a larger land-use issue?”

From the 1930s to the 1980s, the Forest Service built a massive firefighting complex that was aided by a generally wet climate cycle in the West, both of which resulted in fewer large wildifires.

The resulting fuel buildup, drier climate and population shift will take a partnership between government agencies and local communities so that people can live safely in the new West, said Weldon, of the Forest Service.

“After all those years of putting out fires, we still struggle sometimes with the concept of ‘Holy cow, we can't put all of them out anymore,' ” he said. “We have to learn how to live with fires because fire will be with us, like it or not. As a society, we're still coming to grips with that.”

Brown, the UM forestry dean, said the Forest Service's fire policy has become more nuanced in recent years as the agency tries to balance ecological, social, financial and safety concerns.

Changing an entrenched bureaucracy takes time, “but some of that momentum has changed,” he said. “It's been slow in coming, but they're taking a broader perspective.”

Reporter John Cramer can be reached at 523-5259 or at johncramer@missoulian.com

Missoula has long played role in conflict over fighting fires

The dispute over America's wildland firefighting policies and practices is playing out in Missoula, which has long had a central role in the nation's firefighting efforts.

In 2003, an environmental watchdog group chose the Garden City - one of a number of Western jurisdictions with conservation-minded federal judges - as the venue to sue the U.S. Forest Service over its use of aerial fire retardants.

For Missoula, the lawsuit is the latest chapter in a story that started in the early 1900s.

Like other Western towns, Missoula was once a place where drunks were pulled off bar stools, handed pulaskis and taken by truck or train to remote firelines in exchange for a few dollars' pay.

But as professional firefighting standards evolved, Missoula became a birthplace of the nation's elite firefighters, the smokejumpers, and a management, operations and research hub for the federal government's firefighting industrial complex.

One of those hubs is the Forest Service's Technology and Development Center in Missoula, one of two such facilities in the nation.

The centers function as think tanks, technical innovators and trouble-shooters, working on up to 300 projects a year for federal land agencies.

“We're the problem-solvers,” said Dave Aicher, the Missoula center's manager.

Created in the 1940s, the two centers develop a range of products, services and techniques used by government agencies and private companies worldwide.

The center's innovations range from timber harvesting equipment, all-terrain vehicles and computer programs to product specifications, which save the federal government $15 million a year, according to the General Services Administration.

Fire-related projects include firefighting chemicals, spark arrestors, smokejumper parachutes and fire shelters, which are credited with saving more than 300 firefighters since they were developed in the 1950s.

While the public image of wildland firefighters is that of foot soldiers in flame-resistant yellow shirts blackened by ash, dirt and sweat, the federal government has a corps of scientists in the field and laboratory who analyze fire behavior and look for ways to contain it.

It's a constant juggling act, trying to find the right combination of tools that stop fires, work consistently and don't harm people or the environment.

“You can never say any product used to suppress fire is going to be nontoxic, but we try to reduce the toxicity value,” said Les Holsapple, MTDC's program leader for wildland fire chemical systems.

The center's physical science researchers evaluate long-term aerial retardants, foam suppressants and water enhancers, or gel-like substances.

Researchers test whether the fire products are effective and can be delivered safely and efficiently without corroding air tankers, nozzles, rubber gaskets and other mechanical equipment, said Ceci Johnson, MTDC's project leader for fire suppression chemicals.

The chemicals are tested at different temperatures, spread on different metals and doused on pine needles and shredded wood in wind tunnels and combustion chambers. They also are field-tested by air tankers and helicopters. The goal is to reduce a fire's intensity and speed by at least 50 percent.

For a half-century, the MTDC has tested a variety of fire chemicals, including borate salts, ammonium and cyanide compounds, nitrogen fertilizers and seaweed gels.

Today's aerial retardants, which are 85 percent water, contain retardant salts made up of ammonium phosphate and ammonium sulfate together or ammonium phosphate alone.

In 2001, the Forest Service decided it would gradually shift to ammonium phosphate-only retardants because it is more effective, less corrosive and requires one-third less ammonium. The decision takes effect for the 2010 fire season.

In 2002, an ammonium-based retardant killed 20,000 fish in an Oregon stream, which prompted an environmental watchdog group to sue the Forest Service in an effort to ban aerial fire retardants.

Ammonium is toxic to fish but less so than cyanide-based slurry, which the Forest Service realized in the late 1990s was deadly to fish when exposed to sunlight and water.

Retardants containing a cyanide compound, which have caused large fish kills in the West, were phased out over the last three years.

Aerial fire retardant alternatives

The U.S. Forest Service recently agreed to “reasonable and prudent alternatives” when it uses aerial fire retardants.

The alternatives were suggested by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service. Under the plan:

The Forest Service will complete toxicity tests within two years on all retardants it intends to continue using beyond 2010.

Retardants that harm protected species will no longer be used.

The agency will conduct toxicological studies on retardants' long-term effects on aquatic species, including anadromous fish.

The Forest Service will assess water quality, fish, insects, soil and other factors whenever retardants enter waterways. And it will tell the National Marine Fisheries Service whether the airdrop was accidental or intentional.

The agency will prepare a summary every two years on retardants' cumulative ecological impact, including whether protected species and their habitats were harmed.

The agency will take into account protected species and their habitat when making decisions about fire suppression and fuel reduction.

Fire incident commanders will try to keep retardant airdrops away from protected species and habitats whenever practical.

The agency will prioritize fuel-reduction projects near protected species and critical habitat to reduce the need for aerial retardants in those areas. Water or less toxic slurry will be used in those areas whenever practical.

The agency will consult with the Fish and Wildlife Service, as required by the Endangered Species Act, if retardants are dropped on protected species and critical habitat. The consultations could include monitoring the direct, indirect and cumulative impacts on protected species, taking steps to restore species populations and removing all non-native weeds in the area.

The agency also agreed to permanently adopt interim guidelines approved in 2000 on fire retardants and foams.

The guidelines, which were created by the Forest Service and other federal agencies, are designed to prevent retardant from getting into waterways.

The guidelines define a waterway as any body of water, including lakes, rivers, streams, ponds, swamps, marshes and other wetlands whether or not they contain aquatic life.

Under the guidelines, aerial retardants should not be dropped within 300 feet of waterways that are visible to the pilot.

Exceptions allow airdrops within the buffer zone if ground crews aren't available or they can't dig fire lines, if people or property are threatened, or if the potential damage to natural resources outweighs the loss of aquatic life.

The agency will consult with the FWS and NMFS if protected aquatic species or their habitats are affected by retardant airdrops within the 300-foot buffer.

The Forest Service says only a few retardant airdrops get into waterways each year, but the NMFS said that number is likely higher.

Timeline of Forest Service firefighting

1876: The U.S. government creates the first of a series of agencies to oversee the nation's forests.

1899: Federal fire research starts when Gifford Pinchot, who becomes the U.S. Forest Service's first chief, authorizes a study on the history of forest fires to better understand their impact.

1905: The U.S. Forest Service is established.

1910: To date, most wildfires are fought by Forest Service workers and nearby residents using wet burlap bags, axes and water buckets, but increasingly severe blazes prompt calls for an organized wildland firefighting system.

1910: The “Big Blowup” burns more than 3 million acres in western Montana and north Idaho in two days.

1911: Congress puts the Forest Service into the wildland firefighting business. All fires are to be extinguished by 10 a.m. the next day.

1920s: After World War I, the Forest Service starts using airplanes to patrol for wildfires.

1930: The Forest Service makes its first waterdrops on wildfires, but most of the water drifts off course or evaporates before reaching the ground.

1940: Smokejumpers make their first leap.

1944: Smokey Bear, one of the most successful public service campaigns in U.S. history, is created to urge Americans to prevent - but also to stamp out - forest fires.

1940s-1950s: Federal land agencies continue to experiment with aerial firefighting, developing chemical retardants and using military surplus planes and helicopters.

Post-1945: After World War II, the nation's population boom expands into more rural areas where fire is a natural part of the landscape.

1955: Water airdrops containing borate salts are effective against fires, but they corrode the air tankers and sterilize the ground.

1963: The Forest Service starts using fertilizer-based fire retardants containing ammonium compounds, which become widely used.

1970s: Federal land managers and scientists realize that excluding wildfire creates unhealthy forests, especially in the West where most fire retardants are applied.

1970s: The Forest Service starts adopting new measures to restore fire-adapted ecosystems. The measures include prescribed fire, thinning fuels and allowing fires to burn if they don't threaten people, homes, infrastructure, natural resources and protected species' habitat.

2000 to date: More people build homes in the West's forests and demand fire protection.

2002: A Forest Service retardant airdrop kills 20,000 fish in an Oregon stream.

2003: Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics sues the Forest Service over its use of aerial fire retardants.

2005: U.S. District Court Judge Donald Molloy rules the Forest Service is violating federal law by not reviewing the environmental impact of retardants.

2008: Molloy dismisses FSEEE's lawsuit when the Forest Service completes a broad environmental review of aerial retardants. The group vows to file another lawsuit challenging the substance of the Forest Service's review.

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