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"There is no other federal forest issue that results in more public spending, more damage to forests, or more hardship for people,"

Congressman Scott McInnis (R-CO) on the importance of wildfire management.

Forest Fires in the US
Compiled by Milagros Alvarez

• Table of Contents

The Forest Service has stated that nearly 73 million acres of national forests (61 million in the West and 12 million in the East) are at high to moderate risk of catastrophic fire. Cost estimates of treating this problem are in the tens of billions of dollars. This acreage does not necessarily account for lands off national forests that also have significant problems. Congress and the Appropriations committee recognized the need for a long-term commitment to the fire problems we face.

Last summer's wildfires demonstrated that we are not adequately prepared to deal with wildfire. The National Fire Plan is an excellent first step in becoming better prepared, and now we must sustain funding for its implementation. It took us nearly 100 years to get into this situation; it is going to take more than one year to get out of it; we need a long-term commitment to truly address this management problem. Investments made today in reducing the risks of wildland fire will eventually reduce the need for large emergency appropriations.

PDF version of Evaluating the Effectiveness of Postfire Rehabilitation Treatments Report

For this plan to be successful we must make long-term commitments to funding, remove barriers that prevent success, use all the management tools available, treat fire as a land management problem, involve local decision-making, and strengthen our research efforts. Too often we have searched for short-term solutions. While the challenges may seem huge, there is no doubt that failure will result in major damage to communities, our nation's forests, and our wallets. During the last decade, spending on postfire emergency watershed rehabilitation has increased to over $48 million (Evaluating the Effectiveness of Postfire Rehabilitation Treatments).

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Last summers' fires raged in part because policy gridlock has prevented forest managers from doing what it takes to address the conditions that lead to catastrophic wildfires. A forest manager can take steps to alleviate these conditions by removing combustible material and mechanically removing dead and dying trees from at-risk forests, particularly in the wildland-urban interface, and sensibly reintroducing fire to a landscape that has been starved of it for years.

Fire exclusion has directly contributed to fuel buildup. In addition many forests are currently beyond the natural range of tree stocking, and endemic and exotic pests have reached epidemic proportions. This combination of excessive basal area and increased pests results in fuel loads considerably above what historically occurred. The greatest problems we are facing in regard to wildland fire are high forest density developed from nearly a century of fire protection, lack of active management that can encourage fire adapted species, and the introduction of exotic species. In the FY 2001 appropriations bill Congress provided $401 million for fuel reduction projects in the wildland-urban interface. The Forest Service plans to conduct fuel reduction projects on 1.8 million acres using $205.6 million.

In addition to the development of heavy fuel loads, the jobs of contemporary firefighters have been complicated by the growth of the wildland-urban interface. Developed properties, frequently people's homes, stand in the way of today's wildfires. From last year's fires in Montana, where homes and other property were destroyed in the Bitterroot Valley, to the 1999 Fire Siege in Florida, where firefighters spent a great deal of time "steering" fires around development, the interface complicates firefighting and increases the values that are at stake.

Our Nation's forests cover one-third of the land area of the country and are unequalled in their value to people and our economy. They are far too valuable not to be managed utilizing the best science and experience possible. Forest resource management decisions that we make today will be reflected in the forests of the 22nd century and beyond. We must do it right today if we are to maintain the integrity and productivity of these forests in perpetuity.

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Table of Contents

• National Fire Plan

• Current Law

• Ten Year Comprehensive Strategy

• National Fire Plan Implementation

• Testimony

• Related Links

Last updated July 5th, 2001

Society of American Foresters 5400 Grosvenor Lane Bethesda, Maryland 20814	Phone: 301·897·8720 Fax: 301·897·3690 Email: safweb@safnet.org

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	Articles of Incorporation
	Bylaws and Standing Rules
	Purposes and Goals
	Conservation Policies

Sierra Club Conservation Policies

Fire Management on Public Lands

1. Fire is a natural, integral, and valuable component of many ecosystems. Fire management must be a part of the management of public lands. Areas managed for their natural values often benefit from recurring wildfires and may be harmed by a policy of fire suppression. Long-term suppression of small wildfires may build up conditions making occasional catastrophic conflagrations inevitable.

2. Every fire should be monitored. Naturally occurring fires should be allowed to burn in areas where periodic burns are considered beneficial and where they can be expected to burn out before becoming catastrophic. Human-caused fires in such areas should be allowed to burn or be controlled on a case-by-case basis.

3. In areas where fire would pose an unreasonable threat to property, human life or important biological communities, efforts should be made to reduce dangerous fuel accumulations through a program of planned ignitions. New human developments should be discouraged in areas of high fire risk.

4. When fires do occur that pose an unacceptable threat to property or human life, prompt efforts should be undertaken of fire control.

5. In areas included in or proposed for the National Wilderness Preservation System, fires should be managed primarily by the forces of nature. Minimal exceptions to this provision may occur where these areas contain ecosystems altered by previous fire suppression, or where they are too small or too close to human habitation to permit the ideal of natural fire regimes. Limited planned ignitions should be a management option only in those areas where there are dangerous fuel accumulations, with a resultant threat of catastrophic fires, or where they are needed to restore the natural ecosystem.

6. Land managers should prepare comprehensive fire management plans. These plans should consider the role of natural fire, balancing the ecological benefits of wildfire against its potential threats to natural resources, to watersheds, and to significant scenic and recreational values of wildlands.

7. Methods used to control or prevent fires are often more damaging to the land than fire. Fire control plans must implement minimum-impact fire suppression techniques appropriate to the specific area.

8. Steps should be taken to rehabilitate damage caused by fighting fires. Land managers should rely on natural revegetation in parks, designated or proposed wilderness areas, and other protected lands. Where artificial revegetation is needed, a mixture of appropriate native species suited to the site should be used.

9. The occurrence of a fire does not justify salvage logging or road building in areas that are otherwise inappropriate for timber harvesting. Salvage logging is not permitted in designated wilderness areas or National Park System units.

Adopted by the Board of Directors, March 17-19, 1989

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