[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
Forest Fire Hoax
Distributed to TAP-RESOURCES, a free Internet Distribution List
(subscription requests to listproc@tap.org)
TAXPAYER ASSETS PROJECT - NATURAL RESOURCES POLICY ADVISORY
(please distribute freely)
TAP-RESOURCES
September 6, 1996
INTRODUCTION
The summer wild fire season has brought a renewed round of
propaganda from the forest products industry regarding the
alleged link between the present fires and supposedly insufficient
salvage logging on the national forests and Bureau of Land
Management lands in the past. All of this bluster is, of course,
being used to defend the need for and propriety of the Emergency
Salvage Timber Sale Program set up by the "salvage" or "lawless
logging" rider which was attached to the 1995 Recissions Act.
As the November election approaches, the controversial issues
surrounding the passage and implementation of the rider will likely
receive renewed attention from the candiates, media, and public.
The approaching expiration of the rider at the end of the calendar
year will doubtless see renewed congressional attention to the
efforts in the Senate to extend or institutionalize some or all of
the provisions of the rider as well. The use of salvage logging
to reduce the threat of fires will certainly remain a favorite
talking point of rider proponents.
The Congressional Research Service, or CRS, has completed
several reports concerning the issue of using salvage logging to
manage fuel load in forests. The conclusions reached in the CRS
reports, combined with the reputation of the CRS as solidly
non-partisan and professional, call into question the claims of
salvage logging proponents regarding fire control. Two of these
reports are included below.
Additional CRS reports can be found on the web at
<http://www.cnie.org/nle/>. Another excellent report on fire
and forest health can be found on the Southwest Center for
Biodiversity web page at
<http://www.envirolink.org/orgs/sw-center/papers.htm>.
_________________________________________________________________
Congressional Research Service
Reportfor Congress
_________________________________________________________________
Forest Fires and Forest Health
Ross W. Gorte
Specialist in Natural Resources Policy
Environmentand Natural Resources Policy Division
95-511 ENR
Updated July 14, 1995
SUMMARY
Interest in fuel management, to reduce fire control costs and damages,
has beenrenewed with the numerous, destructive wildfires spread across
the West duringthe summer of 1994. Fuel management is often linked to
forest health, sincemajor forest health concerns include excess
biomass (i.e., fuelloadings) and catastrophic fires. Several tools,
such as prescribed burning andsalvage timber sales, can address these
problems, but the extent of the problemand the cost of needed
treatments are genera lly unknown. Fuel management maywell reduce fire
control costs and damages, but the evidence is largelyanecdotal, with
few documented estimates of the decline in control costs and/ordamages
associated with fuel treatments. Finally, the roles and
responsibilitiesof the Federal and State governments in fire
protection may be subject tofurther debate.
INTRODUCTION
The 1994 fire season saw numerous large wildfires, with the deaths of
severalfirefighters and the destruction of many structures. Many
observers suggestedthat the extent and severity of the fires was
largely due to the poor health ofthe national forests of the West.(1)
These observers argue that activities toimprove forest health by
reducing fuel loadings will also reduce fire controlcosts and fire
damages. This report describes fuel management and its benefitsfor
controlling wildfires and for reducing fire damages, and discusses
therelative roles and responsibilities of the Federal and State
governments inwildfire protection.(2)
FUEL MANAGEMENT
The Forest Service began moving into fuel management in the 1960s, to
reduce thenet cost of wildfires to society. Although numerous
techniques can be used, oneof the most common is prescribed burning --
intentionally setting fires withinestablished control boundaries under
prescribed conditions to burn the existingfuels when and where the
fire can be contained. Occasionally, weather conditionschange, and
prescribed fires escape, causing unanticipated damages; for
example,the Mack Lake fire in Michigan in May 1980 was a prescribed
fire that escapedand killed one person and destroyed 44 homes and
buildings.(3) Despite theobvious risks, however, prescribed burning
can be an efficient tool for reducingsmall-diameter fuels at or near
ground level.
Salvage timber operations can also be used to reduce fuel loadings.
The TimberSalvage Sale Fund is a self-financing, permanently
appropriated special account,with receipts from designated salvage
sales deposited into the account for usein preparing and administering
future salvage sales (and for road constructionassociated with those
salvage sales).(4) To the extent that salvage sales removewoody
materials from the forest, they can be considered fuel
managementactivities. Furthermore, they can be legitimate tools for
achieving desiredforest health conditions.(5) However, because they
have to be sold, salvagesales must focus at least partially on
removing merchantable wood, and reducingfuel loadings or achieving
desired forest conditions could be compromised. At aminimum, salvage
sales are insufficient to fulfill the latter goals. Inaddition,
salvage sales can be costly to the U.S. Treasury; they often cost
morethan the revenues they can generate, because timber quality is
lower andoperating costs for the buyers are higher.
Other tools for reducing fuel loadings also exist. Pruning,
precommercialthinning, and mechanical or chemical release can reduce
live biomass and make itmore susceptible to elimination, naturally
(through decomposition or wildfire)or in prescribed fires. However,
these tools are less commonly used because oftheir relatively high
costs.
Finally, the possible extent of fuel management and forest health
activities islargely undefined. To date, the discussions of prescribed
burning, salvagesales, and other fuel management or forest health
activities have identifiedneither the acreage needing treatment nor
the likely treatment costs. Treatmentcosts probably range from less
than $100 to more than $1,000 per acre; "average"costs may be about
$250 per acre. If 10 percent of the National Forest Systemlands in the
coterminous western States -- about 14 million acres -- weretreated,
total treatment costs would be $3.5 billion, roughly equal to
theannual Forest Service budget. However, these "guesstimates" are
verycoarse; needed treatments might cost less than $1 billion or more
than $10billion, and could be spread over a decade or more.
FIRE CONTROL
In general, when wildfires occur, the fire organization swings into
full gear totry to stop them. For several years, beginning in the late
1970s, the ForestService and the National Park Service had "prescribed
natural fire''policies. In wilderness areas and Park System units with
fire management plans,wildfires burning within prescribed situations
were monitored, rather thanaggressively suppressed. (These policies
have been colloquially known as "let-burn"policies.) In recognition of
the financial and environmental costs of totalfire suppression, these
policies permitted the use of wildfires to achieve thegoals of
prescribed fires. Following the Yellowstone fires in 1988, however,
theuse of prescribed natural fire was halted. While one can question
whether theprescriptions were sufficiently responsive to burning
conditions (fuel moisture,precipitation, dry lightning, winds, etc.),
the termination of prescribednatural fire policies may have been an
overreaction to the public sentiment.
The public outcry over the fires in Yellowstone and during the summer
of 1994is, in part, a result of the belief that all wildfires can be
controlled. Thisbelief is widespread, internally as well as among the
public, because of ourgeneral success in controlling structural fires
in urban and suburban areas andbecause all wildfires eventually go
out. However, most fire experts agree that,because of fuel types and
loadings, topography, and temporary weather conditions(lasting a few
hours to several weeks), some fires simply cannot be stopped andsome
cannot even be influenced. Substantial funds are spent on efforts
tosuppress what are uncontrollable wildfires. Such efforts contribute
to thebelief in our ability to stop all wildfires, and lead the public
to believe thatdamages from wildfires only occur because of the
Government has been inefficientand ineffective .
The desire to control all wildfires has also led to a belief that
fast,aggressive control efforts are efficient, because fires that are
stopped whilesmall will not become the large, damaging, fearsome fires
that are so expensiveto control. The belief in efficiency of fast,
aggressive fire control wasembodied in the 10-acre and 10:00 a.m.
policies of the 1930s.(6) However, only afraction of fire ignitions
ever become catastrophic fires, even without firesuppression. These
10-acre and 10:00 a.m. policies were terminated in the late1970s,
because research documented that the policies led to organization
sizeand efforts that far outweighed the benefits of fire control.
The preferred technique to evaluate the economics of fire control, and
of fuelmanagement, is known as "least-cost-plus-loss."(7) This
approach, inessence, asserts that fire control is only justified by
the damage prevented.Little or no fire control is economically
justified for wildfires that are doinglittle or no damage (the
underlying idea for the prescribed natural firepolicies) or for
wildfires that cannot be controlled (because no damage can
beprevented). Similarly, fuel management is justified only when the
treatmentcosts are less than the benefits, either in reduced control
expenditures or inreduced damages. (See below.) Proponents of forest
health activities oftenassert that reduced fuel loadings can reduce
fire control costs and damages.This assertion is logical, and is
supported by some anecdotal evidence. However,there appears to be very
little research documentation of widespread firecontrol savings from
fuel treatment, which is essential to demonstrate the meritof forest
health activities for fire control savings.
WILDFIRE EFFECTS
Wildfires can damage lands and resources. Timber is burned, although
some may besalvageable. Existing forage, for livestock and wildlife,
is destroyed. Thereduced vegetation can increase erosion; in severe
situations, such as southernCalifornia, the result can be mudslides
when the wet season returns. And burnedareas are not pretty.
The damages of wildfires on lands and resources are often overstated,
for tworeasons. First, fires are patchy, leaving unburned areas within
the fireperimeter. Thus, reports of acres burned, typically calculated
from theperimeter, overstate the actual acres burned by 10 to 50
percent, depending onthe local vegetative, weather, and other
conditions.
Damages are also usually overstated, because fires do not destroy
every livingthing within the burned areas. Mature conifers often
survive even when theirentire crowns are scorched; a few species,
notably lodgepole pine and jack pine,are serotinous -- their cones
will only open and spread their seeds when theyhave been exposed to
the heat of a wildfire. Grasses and other plants are oftenbenefitted
by wildfire, because fire quickly decomposes organic matter into
itsmineral components (a process that, in the arid West, may require
years ordecades without fire), and the flush of nutrients accelerates
plant growth for afew growing seasons. Few animals are killed by even
the most severe wildfires;rather, many animals seek out burned sites
for the newly available minerals andfor the flush of plant growth. And
erosion is typically far worse along the firecontrol lines than from
the broad burned areas. The recognition of theseecological benefits
from fire was a major factor in the end of the 10-acre and10:00 a.m.
policies and their replacement with fuel management and prescribedfire
(natural and otherwise).
Nonetheless, the net damages from wildfires are generally greater when
firesburn more intensely. Thus, lower fuel loadings may reduce the net
damages causedby wildfires. Proponents argue that forest health
activities to reduce fuelloadings also reduce wildfire damages. Again,
this assertion is logical, and issupported by some anecdotal evidence,
but there appears to be very littleresearch documenting widespread
reduction in wildfire damages from fueltreatment. Such evidence is
critical, however, to justify of forest healthactivities from lower
fire damages.
Finally, it should be noted that emergency rehabilitation occurs on
many of thelarge, severe wildfires. While emergency activities can
prove beneficial,especially for erosion control, they may inhibit the
restoration of naturalecological processes. In particular, grasses are
often seeded in severely burnedareas. However, the quick-growing
grasses typically used may not be native tothe area, and some grasses
suppress tree seedling establishment and growth.Thus, while solving
some environmental problems, emergency rehabilitation maycause other
problems.
ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
The Federal Government clearly has a responsibility for fire
protection on theFederal lands. The responsibility for protecting
homes and structures on privatelands in and around the Federal lands,
however, is less clear. In general, theStates are responsible for fire
protection on non-federal lands, althoughcooperative agreements may
shift those responsibilities (especially when arealignment is
efficient). It may be appropriate to maintain some separation,because
of structures on non-federal lands and the differences
betweenstructural fires and wildfires. (Structural firefighters use
differenttechniques and face different hazards from wildfire fighters,
but basic Federalfirefighting courses focus on fighting wildfires.)
Furthermore, the Forest Service has a cooperative fire protection
program withinits State and Private Forestry branch.. This includes:
[1] financial andtechnical assistance to State and other governmental
organizations; [2]equipment loans of excess Federal personal property;
and [3] cooperative firepreven-tion to provide a nationwide fire
prevention program through publicservice advertising, education,
partnerships, and other efforts. FY1994appropriations for cooperative
fire protection were $17.1 million, but thebudget request for FY1995
was only $3.7 million, because President Clinton hasproposed
eliminating the financial assistance program (as was proposed
severaltimes by Presidents Reagan and Bush).(8)
Another question is about the relative priorities in wildfire
suppression.Assuming that the fires can be controlled, should Federal
firefighting decisionsinclude values at risk on adjoining or
surrounded non-federal lands? If so, thisis effectively Federal fire
protection for certain private lands and structures.If not, the
Federal Government may be liable for damages to private lands
andstructures from wildfires originating on the Federal lands --
essentiallyfree Federal fire insurance. In either case, it raises the
question of whetherFederal responsibility warrants Federal regulation
-- if the Federal governmentis responsible for fire protection and/or
insurance, then regulating buildingmaterials, site clearing and
planting, road construction and access, etc. mightbe appropriate to
constrain Federal costs.
_________________________________________________________________
Endnotes
l. It is widely accepted that livestock grazing, timber harvesting,
and firesuppression over the past century have led to unnatural
conditions -- excessivebiomass (too many trees and dead woody
material) and altered species mix -- inthe pine forests of the West;
these condi-tions make the forests moresusceptible to drought, insect
and disease epidemics, and other forest-widecatastrophes (including
large wildfires).
2. For a brief history of Forest Service fire policy and of wildfire
economics,see: Julie K. Gorte and Ross W. Gorte. Application of
Economic Techniques toFire Management -- A Status Review and
Evaluation. Gen.Tech. Rept. INT-53. Ogden, UT: USDA Forest Service,
1979. (Hereafter referred toas Gorte and Gorte, Economics of Fire
Management.)
3. See: Albert J. Simard, Donald A. Haines, Richard W. Blank, and John
S.Frost. The Mach Lake Fire. Gen. Tech. Rept. NC-83. St. Paul, MN:
USDAForest Service, 1983.
4. Sillce 1988, the Forest Service has been directed by Congress to
share 25percent of its salvage sale receipts with the States. Since
100 percent ofreceipts are deposited in the Salvage Fund, the
receipt-sharing paymentseffectively require transfers from other
(non-salvage) timber sales. Thisreduces timber sale receipts deposited
in the U.S. Treasury, and thus coststaxpayers.
5. See: U.S. Library of Congress. Congressional Research Service.
SalvageTimber Sales and Forest Health. by Ross W. Gorte. CRS Report
for CongressNo. 95-364 ENR. Washington, DC: March 10, 1995. 6 pp.
6. The 10-acre policy was that all fires should be controlled before
theyreached 10 acres in size; the 10:00 a.m. policy was that, for
fires exceeding 10acres, efforts should focus on control before the
next burning period began (at10:00 a.m.).
7. See: Gorte and Gorte, Economics of Fire Management.
8. The FY1996 budget request for Cooperative Lands-Fire Management is
$17.6million, slightly greater than the FY1994 appropriations.
_________________________________________________________________
Congressional Research Service
Report for Congress
_________________________________________________________________
Forest Health: Overview
Ross W. Gorte
Specialist in Natural Resources Policy
Environment andNatural Resources Policy Division
April 28, 1995
95-548 ENR
SUMMARY
The pine ecosystems in the intermountain West are considered by many
to beunhealthy. While the data are inconclusive, studies show at least
localizedproblems of timber mortality and dense stands of small trees,
including a shiftaway from the fire- and drought-resistant pines in
mixed conifer stands. Theattention has been on the western national
forests, but not through thecomprehensive land management planning
processes of the Forest Service and theBureau of Land Management.
Rather, efforts have focused on authorizing andfunding forest health
activities -- salvage timber sales, prescribed burning,and other
timber stand activities -- in bills introduced and discussed in
thepast three Congresses.
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
Many of the forests in the intermountain West - from the Black Hills
of SouthDakota to the Cascades and the Sierra Nevadas, and from the
Canadian border toArizona and New Mexico - are dominated by pines,
especially Ponderosa, Westernwhite, and lodgepole pines. The pine
ecosystems of the West are considered bymany to be in unnatural and
unhealthy conditions, with excessive numbers oftrees and excessive
tree mortality, leading to insect and disease epidemics andto
increased risk of catastrophic fire.(l)
Timber mortality in the intermountain West has risen since 1976 -- in
total,per acre, and as a percent of inventory.(2) Timber mortality
(per acre and as apercent of inventory) is often higher on the
national forests than on othertimberlands. However, mortality on the
national forests of the intermountainWest appears to be no worse than
on other timberlands -- timber mortality in1991 was higher than in
1976 in nearly all regions for all landowner classes.Furthermore,
timber mortality per acre is higher in the Pacific Coast
States(Alaska, Washington, Oregon, and California), because the
remaining denseold-growth stands have high mortality rates; timber
mortality is a greaterpercentage of inventory in the Eastern regions
(Northeast, North Central,Southeast, and South Central), because
conifers have relatively short lifespansin the humid Eastern climates.
Despite the lack of comprehensive data showing abnormal timber
mortality in theintermountain West, the forests could still be
unhealthy. The Forest Servicedata are based on periodic inventories,
typically on a 10-year cycle; thus, the1991 data are, on average, at
least 5 years old. If timber mortality in theintermountain West has
risen because of the drought that began in the early1980s, the data
might not yet reflect that increase. There are two other foresthealth
problems that would probably not be reflected in the
comprehensivetimber data. One is excessive numbers of small trees,
with little or no netgrowth, due to stand stagnation without
mortality; this could be a particularproblem for the Ponderosa and
lodgepole pines, which are well adapted for dryand infertile
conditions. The other problem, fuel buildups, is more likely inthe
intermountain West, because the arid conditions slow the decomposition
ofthe wood.
The forest health problem of the intermountain region has been
developing overa long period, although the deterioration of the
forests may have beenaccelerated by the past decade of drought. The
problem began with livestockovergrazing in the Western pine forests in
the 1800s; this reduced vegetativecompetition for the trees,
especially from the grasses, some of which inhibittree regeneration
and growth. The problem has been exacerbated by logging,both before
and since the national forests were established, that has
emphasizedcutting the large-diameter old-growth pines, and leaving the
smaller trees andthe other species (particularly the true firs).
However, the most significantcause may have been fire suppression over
the past 75 years that virtuallyeliminated the natural cycle of
frequent fires. These anthropogenic factorshave altered the Western
pine forests. The pure pine forests (pure beingdefined by foresters as
more than 80 percent of the trees in one species) haveseen substantial
increases in fuels and in seedlings and saplings.Historically,
frequent, low-intensity fires in the Ponderosa pine forestsreduced the
fuels and killed many of the seedlings and saplings. According to
arecent study in northern Arizona, the Coconino National Forest
averaged 23trees per acre prior to settlement, but now has 851 trees
per acre.(3) Thefrequency of stand replacement fires in lodgepole pine
forests has alsodeclined, leading to more trees and more fuels per
acre than occurred prior to1900.
The mixed conifer forests have been similarly altered, with
substantialincreases in the number of small diameter trees and in the
quantity of woodyfuel. However, the species composition of these
forests has also changed, withmuch more Douglas-fir and true fir than
existed 150 years ago. This is theresult of logging the high value
species (the inland Douglas-fir subspecies isnot nearly as valuable as
the subspecies that grows along the coast and in theCascades) and of
suppressing the low intensity fires (because pines are lesssusceptible
to damage from fire). Furthermore, the Douglas-fir and true
firsrequire more water than the pines, and thus the stress of the
decade-longdrought has increased their susceptibility to insect and
disease attack, andpossibly set the stage for epidemics.
WHAT CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT?
Many people are interested in improving forest health - for immediate
and/orsustainable wood supplies, for reducing the risks of
catastrophic wildfires,and/or for sustaining and protecting other
outputs and values from the forests(e.g. water quality, recreation,
and "naturalness"). The principalgoal of forest health improvement is
to reduce biomass - small-diameter trees,dead or dying trees, and
existing woody fuels; in mixed conifer forests,shifting the species
mix back to pine dominance may also be a goal.
Much of the attention on improving forest health has focused on the
nationalforests in the intermountain West, where they account for 60
percent of thetimber land.(4) At a forest or landscape level, this
could be addressed throughnational forest planning. The Forest and
Rangeland Renewable Resources Planning Act of 1974, as amended by the
National Forest Management Act of 1976 (NFMA),requires the Forest
Service to prepare integrated, coordinated land andresource management
plans for units of the National Forest System.(5) Theseplans are
prepared using an interdisciplinary approach, "to achieveintegrated
consideration of physical, biological, economic, and other
sciences,"and with the public's participation, to assure that relevant
concerns andissues are addressed. Furthermore, the plans are to be
revised "from timeto time when . . . conditions in a unit have
significantly changed, but atleast every 15 years." Many forests are
beginning the process of revisingtheir plans, thus providing an
opportunity to address forest health concerns inforest planning.
Some have criticized forest planning as being unresponsive to
currentproblems.(6) To date, efforts to direct the Forest Service to
improve foresthealth have generally been external to the planning
process. Proposals anddraft bills have either ignored national forest
planning under NFMA, ordirected forest health decisions to override
existing plans.
Several tools exist for improving forest health. One of the most
frequentlymentioned is salvage timber sales.(7) Salvage timber sales
can be used toremove dead, dying, and threatened trees from the
forest, and therefore can beuseful in reducing biomass and in
controlling insect and disease infestations.However, since commercial
interest reflects timber quality, salvage sales havelimited potential
for reducing small-diameter trees, and much woody material(limbs and
needles) is left on the site. Environmentalists are also
concernedabout salvage sales, because little is known about the
ecological consequencesof extensive salvage sale programs, and because
inappropriate logging hascontributed to the current problem.
Another common tool is prescribed burning. This is using fire
(setintentionally or occurring naturally) under prescribed weather and
fuelconditions to reduce the quantity of woody fuel on a site. It can
be aneffective tool for converting organic matter to minerals, water,
and carbondioxide (and other gases), but protecting air quality
(particularly fromairborne particulates) often limits the timing,
location, and amount ofprescribed burning that can occur. Prescribed
burning is also a poor tool foreliminating small-diameter trees,
because it is indiscriminate about which (ifany) trees remain, and can
be a dangerous tool when weather conditionschanged.(8)
Other forest management techniques can also be used to improve forest
healthand reduce the risk of catastrophe fire. One activity is
precommercialthinning, to cut down trees that are too small to have
any commercial value.Release -- killing competing vegetation
chemically or manually -- can reducetimber stand densities. Pruning
can eliminate low-growing branches, thusremoving a "ladder" for fires
to reach the crowns of the trees whileimproving the value of wood
growth. Fertilization can accelerate tree growth,possibly overcoming
stand stagnation. Planting mixed conifer sites with a mixof species
can help reestablish the natural variation of native forests, bothon
cleared sites and in stands with relatively low densities.
Oftentimes, these various tools and techniques need to be used in
combinationto achieve the desired goal -- salvage with mixed-species
planting orprescribed burning after precommercial thinning, for
example. Indeed, none ofthese approaches is sufficient to improve
forest health alone; rather, acoordinated program combining relevant
tools and techniques is probablynecessary to improve forest health in
the pine ecosystems of the intermountainWest.
CURRENT PROPOSALS
Congress has addressed forest health legislation several times over
the pastfew years. The first comprehensive bill, H.R. 4980 in the
102nd Congress, theNational Forest Health Act of 1992, was introduced
on April 9, 1992. After July1 hearings before the House Agriculture
Subcommittee on Forests, Family Farmsand Energy, the bill was marked
up and ordered reported, but a report wasnever filed, and Congress
adjourned without further action on the bill. Severalbills were
introduced in the 103rd Congress: H.R. 229, the National ForestHealth
Act; S. 459, the Federal Forests Health Recovery Act of 1993; and
S.2456, the Forest Health Act of 1994. However, no hearings were held
on any ofthese bills.
Following the severe wildfires in the intermountain West during the
summer of1994, the Administration proposed the Western Forest Health
Initiative.(9) Thisprogram is, essentially, an acceleration of current
planned, funded projectsand of planned, unfunded projects, together
with better coordination with theEnvironmental Protection Agency on
monitoring, with the Fish and WildlifeService and the National Marine
Fisheries Service on endangered and threatenedspecies consultations,
with the National Wildfire Coordinating Group, and withthe State
Foresters. However, this program has also been criticized as being
aweak response to the magnitude of the problem in the West.
Two bills in the 104th Congress address forest health. One is the
Federal LandsForest Health Protection and Restoration Act, S. 391. The
bill would direct theSecretaries of Agriculture and of the Interior
to:
(1) review forest health conditions annually;
(2) designate emergency and high risk areas, within defined standards;
(3) select and publish a schedule of activities: (a) to arrest the
decline andrestore forest health; (b) to safeguard human life and
property; (c) to protectnatural resources; (d) to restore ecosystem
integrity; and (e) to protectFederal investments and future revenues;
and
(4) notify the public and respond to comments and challenges under
expeditedprocedures.
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on Parks,
Recreation, andRenewable Resources held a hearing on the bill on March
1, 1995.
The other bill is the Emergency Two-Year Salvage Timber Sale Program
includedin the 1995 Emergency Supplemental Appropriations and
Rescissions, H.R. 1158.This program would direct an increase in
salvage timber sales, with expeditedprocedures for sale planning and
analysis and for challenges to salvage sales.Versions have passed both
the House and the Senate, with differences to beresolved in
conference.
_________________________________________________________________
Footnotes
1. For a further discussion of this relationship, see: CRS Report No.
95-511ENR, Forest Fires and Forest Health.
2. Data on timber mortality, timber inventory, and timberland area are
from:Douglas S. Powell, Joanne L. Faulkner, David R. Darr, Zhiliang
Zhu, and DouglasMacCleery. Forest Resources of the United States,
1992. Gen. Tech.Rept. RM-234. Ft. Collins, CO: U.S.D.A.Forest Service,
Sept. 1993. 132 p.(Hereafter referred to as Forest Resources, 1992.)
3. W.W. Covington and M.M. Moore. "Postsettlement Changes in Natural
FireRegimes and Forest Structure: Ecological Restoration of Old-Growth
PonderosaPine Forests." In: Assessing Forest Ecosystem Health in the
InlandWest. [R. Neil Sampson and David L. Adams, eds.] New York, NY:
FoodProducts Press, 1994. pp. 153-181.
4. Forest Resources, 1992, p. 43.
5 . Respectively: Act of Aug. 17, 1974, Pub.L. 93-378, 88 Stat. 476;
and Actof Oct. 22, 1976, Pub.L. 94-588, 90 Stat. 2949. 16 U.S.C.
1600-1614.
6. See: U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment. Forest
ServicePlanning: Accommodating Uses, Producing Outputs, and
Sustaining Ecosystems.OTA-F-505. Washington, DC: U.S. Govt. Print.
Off., Feb. 1992. 206 pp.
7. For more information on this tool, see: CRS Report No. 95-364
ENR,Salvage Timber Sales and Forest Health.
8. A prescribed fire in Michigan in 1980 escaped when weather
conditionschanged, killing one person and destroying 44 homes and
buildings. See: AlbertJ. Simard, Donald A. Haines, Richard W. Blank,
and John S. Frost. The MackLake Fire. Gen. Tech. Rept. NC-83. St.
Paul, M N; U.S.D.A. Forest Service,Sept. 1983. 36 p.
9. U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, Forest Service, State and Private
Forestry. WesternForest Health Initiative. Washington, DC: Oct. 31,
1994. 66 pp.
--------------------------------------------------------------
TAP-RESOURCES is an Internet Distribution List provided by the
Taxpayer Assets Project (TAP). TAP was founded by Ralph Nader
to monitor the management of government property, including
information systems and data, government funded R&D, spectrum,
allocation, public lands and mineral resources, and other
government assets. TAP-RESOURCES reports on TAP activities
relating to natural resources policy. To obtain further
information about TAP send a note to tap@tap.org.
Subscription requests to: listproc@tap.org with the
message: subscribe tap-resources yourfirstname yourlastname
---------------------------------------------------------------
Taxpayer Assets Project; P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036
v. 202/387-8030; f. 202/234-5176; internet: tap@tap.org