Supporting active, multiple-use management of federal forest lands
Another difficult wildfire season is unfolding across the West, providing another reminder of the urgent need to improve conditions on America’s federal lands. More than 5.1 million acres have burned so far this year across the Northwest, California, Northern Rockies,
When a wildfire starts in our national forests, it is common sense to put out the fire while it is small. That is also what the American public expects from the agencies responsible for protecting our forests and nearby communities.
Congressman Tom Tiffany (WI-07) and Congresswoman Harriet Hageman (WY-At Large) introduced the Fixing Egregiously Expensive Suits Act, or FEES Act for short. The Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA) was enacted in 1980 to help ordinary Americans challenge federal overreach. It was
By Nick Smith Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities For years, foresters, firefighters, and rural communities have argued that active forest management can reduce wildfire impacts. New research is putting numbers behind that experience. Researchers examining hundreds of wildfires across the West
Karl Brauneis is a retired U.S. Forest Service forester, former smokejumper, and longtime student of federal forest policy and history. Over a decades long career in the woods, Karl witnessed firsthand how active forest management, rapid fire response, and sustained
Wildfire-driven deforestation rates in California are now among the highest in the world, according to new research highlighted by Phys.org. California’s wildfire crisis has become so severe that Governor Gavin Newsom waived portions of the California Environmental Quality Act, commonly
Some anti-forestry groups claim active forest management comes at the expense of outdoor recreation on public lands. Stop logging, they argue, and rural communities will transition toward more prosperous tourism-based economies. New research recently highlighted in The Conversation disputes those
The House of Representatives has passed the Save Our Sequoias Act with strong bipartisan support, advancing a focused effort to protect and restore giant sequoia groves in California. The legislation directs the U.S. Forest Service and National Park Service to
For decades, federal wilderness and forest policies have largely been guided by a preservation framework rooted in laws written 40 to 50 years ago. These policies were adopted in a different era, before prolonged drought, extreme wildfire behavior, insect outbreaks,
New research from the University of Washington shows that active forest management can strengthen water security. In a study published in Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, researchers examined how forest thinning affects snowpack in the eastern Cascade Mountains. Snowpack
