COSTLY LAWSUITS PROVIDE KINDLING FOR FOREST BLAZES

The Arizona Republic ^ | June 25, 2002 | Rep. Jeff Flake(AZ)

[madfly]

Driving through evacuated Show Low last night, an illuminated sign at a vacant fast food restaurant reading "Everything's Peachy" was hard to miss. That phrase may have described the restaurant's new product line, but it is a far cry from the situation here in the White Mountains.

Having grown up in the area, I thought I would be prepared for the devastation as I toured the fire's perimeter. The destruction is much more complete than I thought possible. As of Monday, more than 300,000 acres have burned in "Rodeo-Chediski" fires alone, with the lightning season yet to come.

As serious as these fires have been, they only serve to warn of heightened fire devastation in the future.

While the fire still burns, it is not too early to take stock of how we got into this situation and consider what we must do to decrease the likelihood that these conditions will exist in the future. The current drought conditions are out of our hands, as they will be in the future. What is not out of our hands is the condition of our forests, and how conducive they will be to devastating fires when the next drought occurs.

Over the years, fire suppression coupled with a reduction in logging on the national forests and public lands have resulted in previously spacious forests now crammed with trees and dense underbrush. An acre of forest that used to hold only 50 trees now contains up to one hundred times as many. The increase in trees, combined with dry, hot weather and the drought, has made all of these trees and brush into a fuel load waiting to ignite. Due to the increased load, fires burn hotter and destroy more old-growth trees than if there had been smaller, more frequent controlled burns.

The Ecological Restoration Institute (ERI) of Northern Arizona University is working to restore the forest and prevent crown-burning wildfires not indigenous to ponderosa pine by providing sound science to land managers for implementation.

Research by the ERI and Dr. Wally Covington shows that Southwestern ponderosa pine forests were open and parklike before Anglo-European settlement (approximately 1880).

Until the 1870s, natural light surface fires occurred every two to five years. Along with grass competition and regular drought, these fires helped to maintain an open and parklike landscape dominated by grasses, wildflowers and shrubs, with scattered groups of ponderosa pines.

After settlement, intense livestock grazing, fire suppression, logging practices and climatic events enabled dense pine regeneration and caused the previously open parklands to become denser. Consequently, fire behavior changed dramatically. These forests are increasingly vulnerable to unnatural stand-replacing crown fires.

Over the last 40 years the number, size and severity of fires has increased in the Southwest.

Forest thinning must occur to create a healthier forest that won't become a tightly knit pack of fuel for what otherwise could be a controllable fire. Prescribed burns can remove some of the fuel load, but it is necessary in some instances to cut and remove smaller trees mechanically.

It goes without saying that the funds generated from forest thinning will offset the funds needed to treat more of our forests.

The problem is, all you have to do is mention the words "commercial" and "forest" in the same breath and the local pseudo-environmentalist will file a lawsuit before you can finish your sentence.

The uncertainty caused by such lawsuits has decimated the logging industry in Arizona, and that has contributed heavily to the situation we find ourselves in today. It has been estimated that nearly 40 percent of our Forest Service's budget is swallowed up just fighting lawsuits filed by "environmentalists."

The bottom line is this: If we want to save what remains of our forests in Arizona, we've got to get a handle on the frivolous lawsuits that prevent us from doing so.

U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake represents Arizona's 1st Congressional District. He was born and raised in Snowflake.

[madfly]

bump for Forest Hearing July 11th

[Grampa Dave]

Good when they chain themselves up, start the equipment to thin out the forest. Nice of them to provide chains!

[MP5SD]

Thats why my ol pappy always told me to drain my motor oil into the storm drain....He was ahead of his time. I will always be a recycler :)

[Angelique]

Excellent information. Jeff Flake is from AZ, and I have heard all good things about him.

[backhoe]

Reply #31 is very telling. I am wondering if we should ask Jim Robinson to temporarily re-open the bump list to add a "firestorm!" ( or similar semantically-loaded keyword ) for a category for these stories so reporters, commentators, and researchers can locate them easily?

Speaking as an old-time citizen-activist, I believe the "forest mismanagement issue" has great potential to undermine both the Left in general and the more radical environmentalists in particular.

All living things fear and abhor wildfire--
It is easy to frame in terms favorable to our side ( sensible management of parks, woods, and forests... jobs for working Americans... public access to publically-purchased lands, etc. )--
And more generally just "doing the right thing"--

[backhoe]

Hi, I've been out for a while and am working my way up the chain of missed replies to me. You know my general list:

Ignorance Making You Ill? Cure It!

and while it may take some research to find committee members, it should be do-able.

[Jackie222]

BTTT

[Libertarianize the GOP]

thanks for the pings

[Paulus Invictus]

My strategy: Counter-sue the enviros! Make sure that every one of their law suits is countered with a massive class action suit brought by all the people that have lost jobs, lost their homes, lost everything, thanks to the fires the enviros are responsible for.

[Libertarianize the GOP]

bttt

[madfly]

thanks. It took awhile, but I got half of their addresses from your list. And I finally figured out what I was doing wrong to make a Group in OE.
Progress.

Thanks Backhoe and Happy 4th!

DBacks just whooped the Giants!!!! WooooooHOOOOOOO

[fella]

Greenies, trial lawers and ativistic democratic appointed judges. What a combination.

[madfly]

Speaking as an old-time citizen-activist, I believe the "forest mismanagement issue" has great potential to undermine both the Left in general and the more radical environmentalists in particular.

I am sorry for the loss of our beautiful pine forests, but this can have great side-effects. I will be looking for statistics for the number of domestic and wild animals that died in this fire. I want to see a list of every red ant, yellow jacket, cricket, bird, spider that was killed by the firestorm; endangered and thriving. Maybe going overboard, but I think, not only did a huge population of wildlife perish, 450,000 acres of forest is uninhabitable for years. It's not nice to mess with Mother Nature. I have some links to AZ humane societies who took in animals. The race track in Phoenix is off season, open for OTB only. The folks there offered boarding for 2200 horses.

[DLfromthedesert]

When you invent that chainsaw, let me know. I have a great use for them; I just need some "Forest Guardians" to bend over.

[mafree]

Will try to do it tomorrow.

[backhoe]

I was wondering how that worked out- appreciate your informing me.

[FReethesheeples]

Bump!

E-wackos and excessive Federal Lands which are systematically mismanaged and subject to the jck-boot of enviro-wacko lawsuits and other forms of political subversion of wise & rational, scientifically defensible policies & practices

(like forest thinning, opposed by marxist, anti-human, anti-property, e-wackos),

are the root causes of most of the fires in the West

( not to mention the two Federal Government employees who deliberately set such fires in AZ and Colorado!)

[madfly]

bttt