The Bitterroot National Forest, which the U.S. Forest Service considers America's most threatened national forest because of the population explosion in the Bitterroot Valley's “wildland-urban interface,” served as a backdrop for the state legislative committee's first public forum.
The committee, which was created last year, heard from many speakers who said reducing forest fuels and streamlining the approval process were top priorities.
The committee is hosting a series of meetings across the state to gather public reaction to its draft report, which is available on the committee's Web site at www.leg.mt.gov/fire.
The report predicts Montana's wildfires will destroy more homes and kill and injure more people unless better ways are found to fight wildland fires and to pay for wildfire suppression.
The committee's goals are to draft legislation that helps the state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation improve its firefighting capability, create a better interagency communication system and influence the federal fire suppression system, including fuels reduction.
Several speakers told the committee that federal, state, local and private wildland firefighters can do a better job of communicating, but that Montana's wildfires will continue to worsen until public and private landowners greatly reduce forest fuels and accept responsibility for building homes in fire-prone areas.
Much of Monday's discussion focused on using thinning and prescribed burns to reduce forest fuels, on firefighting agencies clarifying their objectives, and on generating logging and mill jobs to process woody debris.
Officials from the Forest Service and the DNRC agreed that all agencies could improve their coordination at a time when fire budgets are tight and fire seasons are becoming longer, hotter and drier.
Committee members expressed concern about responsibility for protecting the growing number of homes being built in the wildland-urban interface, or the border area between communities and forests.
About 97 percent of all wildfires were extinguished within a few hours in the Northern Rockies last year, meaning a few large fires caused most of the damage and took up most of the costs.
Tidwell said his agency focuses on wildland firefighting, but that it helps to protect private land and homes whenever possible.
He said the Forest Service, which once suppressed all fires, uses its limited supply of firefighters, equipment and funding more selectively than in the past, choosing the time, place and conditions where a fire can most likely be suppressed.
“We need to do a better job communicating” with other agencies and the public, he said.
The Forest Service uses an “appropriate management response,” which allows more fires to burn as a natural part of the ecosystem, while focusing on keeping others from threatening communities and infrastructure.
Bob Harrington, the state's top forester, said his agency's mission continued to be suppressing all fires.
Tidwell, Harrington and Dave Bull, forest supervisor for the Bitterroot National Forest, said fuel reduction projects have been unnecessarily delayed by appeals, lawsuits and time spent on completing environmental analyses.
Bull said 80 percent of his staff's time is spent on environmental analyses and 20 percent on actual fuel reduction work.
“We're setting ourselves up for more catastrophic fires,” he said. “It's only a matter of time before hundreds of houses burn.”
Bull said many new homeowners near the Bitterroot National Forest don't take precautions against wildfires, such as creating a defensible space around their homes.
“They don't have any clue on what it means to live in a fire-dependent ecosystem,” he said.
Kristiina Vogt, professor of ecosystem management at the University of Washington, made a presentation outlining the ecological and economic benefits of using biomass, or thinned forest fuels and other woody debris.
Steve Woodruff, deputy director of Western Progress, suggested the committee consider mandating an insurance premium fee on forest homes in fire-prone areas and levying a modest statewide firefighting property tax.
He said fuel reduction should focus on the wildland-urban interface, which would protect communities, improve forest health and generate jobs.
Sonny LaSalle of the Big Sky Coalition encouraged committee members to help streamline the process for approving fuel reduction projects.
Matthew Koehler, executive director of the nonprofit Wild West Institute, said environment groups agree that fuels have overloaded some forests.
But he criticized proposals to suspend federal environmental laws and to restrict the public's right to challenge overly large fuel reduction projects.
Conservation groups “are coming up with (targeted) fuel reduction projects right here on the Bitterroot and Lolo national forests, but people with a political agenda are just ignoring the common ground,” he said.
The committee will reconvene Tuesday to visit areas in the Bitterroot National Forest that have burned in wildfires or are targeted for fuel reduction.
The committee has been meeting in Helena for a year to discuss reducing the costs of fire suppression and the impacts on local communities. It plans to hold similar public hearings in Lewistown on May 16, Miles City on May 30, and Seeley Lake, Thompson Falls and Libby on June 19 and 20.
More than $100 million in federal and state funds were spent last year in Montana to fight 72 wildfires that burned more than 700,000 acres.
|
 |
 |
Add your comment now! Write your comment in the form below.
(Email address is for verification only. If you'd like to email a story, look for the link above)