Bush Officials Say Healthy Forests Law Has Cut Wildfire Threat

By J.R. Pegg

WASHINGTON, DC, August 12, 2004 (ENS) - The Bush administration released a report Tuesday touting the success of the President's "Healthy Forests Initiative," which aims to reduce the threat of catastrophic wildfires. The report says the federal government is on track to complete a record number of fuel reduction projects in 2004, but critics maintain the administration's policies are doing little to protect communities from wildfires.

Environmentalists have been wary of the Healthy Forests Initiative since the plan was first unveiled by President George W. Bush in August 2002, during the midst of a particularly bad fire season.

Some seven million acres went up in flames in 2002 - more than twice the annual 10 year average.

The President's plan included several administrative rules to streamline the removal of trees and underbrush from public lands by limiting environmental review of thinning projects.

In addition, it gives federal land managers greater authority to approve stewardship contracts, which allows companies to trade wildfire reductions services for trees, rather than dollars for trees.

Critics say the stewardship policy encourages encourage logging of large trees, not the underbrush most in need of clearing.

"The Bush administration's 'Healthy Forest Initiative' is anything but healthy because it threatens the clean drinking water and air that forests provide to millions of Americans," said Randi Spivak, executive director of American Lands Alliance. "Americans want to see their forests preserved and protected, not more fat subsidies being given out to oil and logging companies to destroy them."

The President signed the Healthy Forests Restoration Act last December. (Photo by Tina Hager courtesy The White House)

Severe fires in Southern California last fall helped fuel support for legislation enacting much of the plan - the Healthy Forests Restoration Act passed Congress with broad bipartisan support.

The law expedites forest thinning projects on some 20 million acres of federal land, in part by limiting environmental and judicial reviews of hazardous fuel reduction plans as requested by the White House.

The legislation included authorization of $760 million for forest thinning projects, with half earmarked for the communities considered most at risk.

Results on the ground show the President's plan is working, Bush administration officials say, because it is fostering closer coordination with state, local and federal authorities.

"We now have the tools needed to actively manage our public lands and reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires, while protecting property and restoring the health of our forests and rangeland," said Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Policy, Management and Budget Lynn Scarlett.

The report documents that in fiscal year 2004 the federal government has completed hazardous fuel reduction projects on 2.6 million acres - 97 percent of the interagency target, with nearly two months remaining in the fiscal year.

The total includes some 1.6 million acres of hazardous fuel reduction projects from the wildland-urban interface. This is a historic high, according to the Bush administration.

The report says federal agencies plan to sign about 80 stewardship contracts covering nearly 60,000 acres this year.

It finds some $300 million has been spent to help communities prepare community protection plans and $157 million has been given to communities in grants for fighting wildfires.

The federal government estimates some 190 million acres of public land need treatment for drought, insect infestation and potential catastrophic fire. More than 5 million acres have burned this year. (Photo by Bryan Day courtesy National Interagency Fire Center)

But environmentalists are far from convinced and some believe the Bush administration has used the fear of wildfire to push through regulations that primarily benefit the timber industry.

Spivak says the Healthy Forests Initiative is rolling back decades of environmental protections and the public's right to participate in decisions affecting public lands "under the guise of protecting communities."

Some 85 percent of the land near communities most considered at risk is in private hands, but the Healthy Forests Initiative does not address this part of the wildfire equation.

And critics note that the Healthy Forest Restoration Act does not mandate - rather recommends - allocating 50 percent of federal funds on fuel reduction projects in the wildland urban interface.

Environmentalists point to a timber project in the East Rim of the Grand Canyon as a clear example of their concerns with the President's policies.

The proposal, which has been temporarily blocked in federal court, would permit the logging of at least eight million board feet of timber - enough to fill 1,800 logging trucks.

Administration officials say mechanized removal of overgrown forests is vital to containing future fires. (Photo courtesy Interior Department)

"Communities do not benefit from these policies, corporations do," Spivak said.

The debate over the Healthy Forests Initiative is likely to flare up today and Friday during the presidential race, as both Bush and Democratic rival John Kerry campaign in Western states.

Kerry opposed the Healthy Forests Restoration Act and says 70 percent of federal funding for fuel reduction projects should be targeted at areas around communities at risk.