Reorganization FOIA II: FS Goals at Salt Lake City Meeting Address Concerns Expressed in 1993 National Performance Review

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Granted, not everyone is interested in blow-by-blow documentation of the reorg discussion. Still, I’m going to post pieces of this FOIA that I found interesting or informative.  I did my own redactions of folks’ names when I didn’t think they added anything.

One of the great things about elderly wisdom is the ability to detect long-term signals from short-term noise.  Many of us exposed to previous organizational improvement efforts will recognize concerns from the past in these reorganization documents.  Which is not to say that people didn’t address them then.  But organizations are like gardens, if you don’t cultivate them continuously, they will grown into a jungle of weeds.  Instead of continuous improvement, you might get continuous accretion of programs and rules, punctuated by intense focused efforts to streamline.  After all, in 1993, we remember various efforts at downsizing, streamlining, removing layers and all that:

The National Performance Review is about change–historic change–in the way the government works. The Clinton administration believes it is time for a new customer service contract with the American people, a new guarantee of effective, efficient, and responsive government. As our title makes clear, the National Performance Review is about moving from red tape to results to create a government that works better and costs less.

These are our twin missions: to make government work better and cost less. The President has already addressed the federal deficit with the largest deficit reduction package in history. The National Performance Review can reduce the deficit further, but it is not just about cutting spending. It is also about closing the trust deficit: proving to the American people that their tax dollars will be treated with respect for the hard work that earned them. We are taking action to put America’s house in order.

Note that trust, deficits, efficiency, costing less, and responsiveness were issues then…fortunately all those have been fixed (not)! Plus we have added concerns about transparency and accountability (related to trust).

Here’s the text of a letter email from Chris French to “All FS” called Thoughts and Updates.

Good morning,
I write to you this am from Salt Lake City where this week we had an agency leadership meeting at our SLC Geospatial Office. I want to take moment to thank all of the agency employees at our office for their hospitality and feedback as we descended on their workplace. It was good to see colleagues I haven’t seen in years and new folks that I met first time. I also saw first hand how our return to work has located folks together and what that means.

Our work session was focused on what we want our agency to BE as we work though our current staffing and future workforce. Chief Schultz asked us to create a shared vision for how we would become a more operationally focused agency – an agency that enables effective field work with decision making driven to lowest levels.

We met with agency leaders, forest supervisors, R&D representatives, and department leaders. We hosted open dialogues with District Rangers and agency Fire staff asking them – what needs to change and what is important to keep? In those calls we heard many operational issues including radio repeater failures, problems with our one device policy for fire fighters, and a wide set of issues from capacity and staffing losses, purchasing, or policies that just make work harder in the field. While we have taken immediate steps to address many of these concerns, the issues are wide and require us to rethink and change how we do business. This was the driver of our session and a foundation to the agency we will become.

Collectively we are committed to make your work easier to accomplish and that you have the tools, processes, and decisions to deliver our mission better than we do today. Frankly, so many of these issues, like the DR that has not been able to get a new printer for months, have been around for a long time and we have accepted that this is just the way the Forest Service works. We are committed to be a responsive agency leadership listening to you and our partners and making the changes that must be made. It will take time but we are committed.
Thank You – we so appreciate your dedication to our service –

Chris

As a long term FS veteran, the attention to a wide range of problems reminds me somewhat of Transformation, but also of the Pilots- where we worked on relatively small but annoying things, and had hope that we were able to make things better.. and did, at least in the Ochoco Pilot.  Thanks to the wonders of modern search engines, I found this classic “Transforming Organizational Structures’ from the Clinton Admin (1993)  which seemed relevant, I bolded a few.

Periodically, since the 1950’s, agencies have tried to reform their field structures. Some, such as the Social Security Administration, successfully transformed their field structures and trimmed staff while enhancing service. But most have not been as successful. For example, the Department of Veterans Affairs has tried and failed to close underused hospitals. Likewise, the Department of Agriculture has faced difficulties in closing offices where the administrative costs to run the office exceed the costs of the services delivered. In addition, the Department of Housing and Urban Development has been forced to maintain offices that it does not want. And the list goes on.

The predominant barriers to change include: congressional concerns about the adverse effects on local economies; agency concerns for maintaining services while trying to fulfill multiple missions; and the lack of a generally accepted process to identify offices for closure.

Fortunately, federal models exist where these barriers have been overcome. For example, the Department of Agriculture’s recently developed plan for closing selected field offices is well designed and participative and used objective measures as a basis for decisionmaking. The best federal models focus on both customer need and the mission of the agency, assess future needs in relation to existing structures, permit organizational boundaries within and between agencies to be crossed, and maintain service levels.

And the Forest Service is mentioned:

The three most commonly cited barriers to change are existing regulations, laws, and concern that “we haven’t done it that way before.”

First, federal entities often quote their own regulations as reasons not to try new ideas or “think outside the boxes.” Agencies often have discretion in how they implement laws, but are frequently restrictive in their interpretations. Regulations are then developed with an emphasis on reporting and policing, rather than accountability. The Forest Service, in a pilot project, found that 70 percent of its regulatory “barriers” were self-imposed, and not required by legislation. Other NPR reports (notably, Reinventing Human Resource Management; Mission-Driven, Results-Oriented Budgeting; and Reinventing Federal Procurement) have identified specific ways in which agencies have historically interpreted legislation in a more restrictive manner than necessary. As a result, new ideas and innovation are difficult to implement within this rigid framework and the regulations themselves become an excuse for abandoning more innovative management styles.

Second, legislation is cited by both employees and management as a justification for agencies not to cooperate across organizational lines. However, legislation usually does not prohibit but rather inhibits inter-organizational cooperation.

The third barrier, a fear of the unknown, is significant. But most of NPR’s recommendations are modeled after successful experiences that have occurred on a small scale in some agencies, or have been implemented in states, localities, the private sector, or other countries that have pursued culture changes analogous to those sought by NPR. The strategies highlighted in this report were chosen because they offer the most hope and best leverage for genuine change on a large scale.

I guess we can add another barrier, negative attitude toward Administration that proposes changes.  And changes are being litigated, by some of the same groups which supported the same kinds of ideas in 1993.  Hard not to see the fickle finger of partisanship.  So maybe instead of reducing barriers, we are accumulating them.

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Silviculture, Ecology, Means and Ends, and Terminological Confusion

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Jon questioned whether the goals of the Round Star project were “ecological” or “silvicultural” and T responded (this is part of the response) that

All silviculture is applied ecology.
While the FHF’s public affairs shop didn’t clearly draw the line to their Forest Plan, that is definitely in the minds of their Silviculturists. Many of the considerations mentioned above (eg root disease, fire resilience, beetle resistance) are very likely laid out in the FHF’s Forest Plan.

On the other hand, I work under a forest plan that is 40 years old, and very divorced from ecology. The goals it lays out are largely driven by timber production, and the ecological considerations I include in management decisions are not laid out in the Plan at all.

This discussion reminds me of  when I worked in R&D (I know that some of you may find this scary, but for some time I was both the Silviculture and Genetics Program Manager, because we couldn’t get a “real” silviculture researcher to move to DC).  Anyway, part of that was helping organize the National Silviculture Workshop.  A local group handled all the arrangements and field trips, and it was a terrific experience to be there and learn from the researchers, the working silviculturists, and their interactions.  At the time I had two ideas, which turned out to be universally unpopular..

  1. The first was to change our name from silviculturist to “applied ecologist”.  I thought “hey, if ecologists are cool, and we are ecologists, why not ride in the slipstream of this popular trend?”

How does Wikipedia define ecology?

Ecology is the scientific study of how living organisms interact with each other and with their physical environment

Not to get all super-picky about language, but what biological science doesn’t involve “interacting with their environment” to some degree? Even cells on a petri dish do it.   So what we used to call forest biologists are all ecologists in that sense.  Wildlife biologists can be renamed wildlife ecologists and no one will really know the difference.  We even had a class in “genecology” in my master’s program, so conceptually I might have been a genecologist. Whatever.

Here’s Google AI’s take on the Dictionary of Forestry definition..

In The Dictionary of Forestry edited by John A. Helms (published by the Society of American Foresters), silviculture is defined as: [1]
“The art and science of controlling the establishment, growth, composition, health, and quality of forests and woodlands to meet the diverse needs and values of landowners and society on a sustainable basis.” [1, 2]

Key Elements of This Definition
  • Art and Science: It blends biological and ecological sciences with practical, hands-on management skills. [1]
  • Control of Attributes: It gives managers the tools to actively shape five critical forest elements: how a forest starts (establishment), how it develops (growth), what species live there (composition), how it resists diseases (health), and its overall economic or ecological worth (quality). [1, 2]
  • Diverse Needs and Values: It acknowledges that modern forestry is not just about logging for timber. It also prioritizes wildlife habitats, carbon storage, clean water, and recreation. [1, 2]
  • Sustainability: It requires managing resources responsibly so that the forest continues to thrive for future generations. [1, 2]

Thanks to the wonders of Google AI, I found this handy set of definitions compiled by Dr. Kristen Waring at NAU.

As Jerry Franklin once said of FS geneticists (at a biodiversity workshop?), (he was defending us against other FS employees who associated us with commercial timber production), we don’t set the goals, the landowner does.  We could be “conservation” geneticists or “exploitation” geneticists (as I was once called by an FS researcher)- the tools are the same, but the goals different.

2.  My other highly unpopular idea was to take our silvicultural definitions, with their hints of a timber-y past, and  develop a new set of definitions that could be more easily explained to the public- just for federal forests.   Then there is how things are reported in FACTS (and elsewhere?), which may have different definitions than the Harvest Report we discussed last week (or not?).

Remember Anonymous found out about those definitions:

There is a technical breakdown of the classification of activities on the last page of the report.

“Removal cut” is the final stage of seed tree or shelterwood harvest.

“Improvement Cut” is an intermediate treatment made in a stand, pole-sized or larger, primarily to improve composition and quality by removing less desirable trees of any species.

“Special cut” is harvest without restocking. Like a power line right-of-way.

Let’s go back to a discussion between Anonymous and T last week. Anonymous said:

Curious how a shelterwood with residuals is categorized on the Colville? Normally, a shelterwood harvest is considered even-aged management, but the Colville never does the second entry; therefore, the shelterwood is never removed. NTM, eastside screens includes a 21-inch dbh limit, so that also affects the result of a shelterwood. Given these caveats, is that really an even-aged harvest and how does the forest track this harvest method in FACTS? Seems more like a thinning from below, given the overstory retention and canopy cover target, and the result is a two-aged stand.

T replied:

I think that’s a good point. My understanding is there’s a specific FACTS Activity Code for Two-Aged Shelterwood With Reserves, where it is acknowledged that the shelter trees are to be retained with no intention of removal. Because the primary intent of the treatment is to regenerate the stand and establish a new cohort, it is a regeneration harvest not an intermediate treatment (ie thinning). Even if there are a lot of residual trees, it all comes down to whether the intent is to establish a new cohort or manage the existing cohort.

The Forest Service lumps single-age and two-age treatments into “even-age” systems, and anything with three or more age classes as “uneven-age” systems. This has implications for 40-acre openings: a two-age regeneration harvest over 40 acres requires public notice and approval, but an uneven-age regen harvest over 40 does not.

There is the treatment, there is what is left (some of us remember the old Ecosystem Management mantra, “more concerned with what we leave than what we take”), what the long-term intention is (reduce fuels, protect trees from …, increase species diversity). Site-specific attributes also enter the picture .. depending on the soil and wind patterns, will residuals blow down?

So folks can propose different treatments toward the same long-term goals, or the same treatment with different long-term goals. But you can’t tell the goals by driving by. You have to read the EA or talk to a silviculturist. Who knows much more about the site and what works towards the stated goals, and incorporates information from other experts (wildlife, soils, fuels etc.).  So a federal silviculturist is both an expert and a convenor of other local experts, plus does projects that move toward the DCs in the forest plan (if it is a recent one) or does things that otherwise make sense (if not).

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Reflecting back, I think the “why” is very important and doesn’t show up except in EAs or if we ask the silviculturist involved.  It’s hard to argue with increasing species diversity..when it’s in the forest plan.. or is it (hard to argue with)?

My FS Reorganization FOIA Story: I. My Request – and FOIA vs. Litigation “Deliberative Process Privilege”

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I filed a FOIA on the documents that came out of the Salt Lake City meeting, prompted by The Hotshot Wakeup’s interview with Chris French. Here’s what I asked for:
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I heard about this meeting from Chris French’s interview with Tim of the Hotshot Wakeup from the transcript: https://thehotshotwakeup.substack.com/p/forest-service-announces-reorganization?utm_source=publication-search

starting at 15:49

“whether it’s their inability to effectively get a contract in place, hire people, or the decision-making where our local managers or district rangers and others feel like they can’t make decisions. We took all that and we convened a whole bunch of people in Salt Lake City mid-summer of last year. People represented from across the agency. For supervisors,

district rangers, people from research, people from our business operations, people from our regional offices. And we basically asked them the question, hey, what needs to change in this agency? And what do we need to make sure that we emphasize and maintain? What’s good and what are the things that we need to change?

We had 15 teams come out of that that provided us a set of recommendations of the type of shifts that we needed to make in this agency. We then convened another group of folks in the fall, again, representing the agency that took all those recommendations,

and they worked with a smaller team of folks made up of four supervisors and other representatives around the agency to present the chief and I a set of options to meet the secretary’s direction that she had given us to reorganize the agency. We took those options last fall, made some decisions.

They were approved by a broad set of folks that were on a representative recommending board, again, representing the agency. And we took those to the secretary. And so this has been over a year and a half of work. The things you see being proposed here are coming through us, from us, addressing the things we know about us.”

I would like to see the set of recommendations from the 15 teams.

I would like to see the set of options presented to the Chief.

If those sets of recommendations include not reorganizing, that’s fine, I just want to see them all.

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That’s what I asked for. Last week I got my first bunch of documents. There were many, many redactions. I asked the helpful FOIA person why. Here’s his answer.

“As described in the interim response letter, the majority of the information that has been withheld falls under FOIA Exemption Five (5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(5)), Deliberative Process Privilege, which protects from disclosure those “inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letters which would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency.” One of the frequently invoked FOIA Exemption 5 privileges is the deliberative process privilege. To fall within FOIA’s deliberative process privilege, the records must be both pre-decisional and deliberative; the records must precede the adoption of an agency policy and include the opinions, recommendations, or deliberations on a legal or policy matter.

In this instance, the OIA withheld, under the deliberative process privilege, pre-decisional, intra-agency proposals and recommendations regarding the reorganization of the FS, as well as analysis regarding potential facility actions and/or considerations. This information is pre-decisional in that it is antecedent to any final decision. It is also deliberative in that it reflects the evolving back-and-forth process between agency employees that is so integral to the Executive Branch decision-making process; more specifically, the development of potential recommendations made by agency advisors for use in making determinations and policy decisions.

If this pre-decisional, deliberative information were released to the public, USDA and other Executive Branch employees would be much more cautious in their discussions with each other, and in candidly discussing and providing all pertinent information and viewpoints in a timely manner to agency decision-makers. This lack of candor would also seriously impair the Department’s ability to engage in forthright, internal discussions necessary for efficient and proper agency decision-making.

This makes some sense (except perhaps it is too widely applied?) but one of the many tasks of a Planning Director is to agree with OGC about what should be withheld in litigation. Much of that information was pre-decisional, or maybe I don’t understand what pre-decisional means in legal terms.

Personally, I was pretty deferential to OGC, and their view was that we should hardly withhold anything. So it appears to me that people with lawyers get all kinds of info that Jane Q. Public cannot access about how their government works. This doesn’t necessarily seem like justice to me. But maybe I’m wrong and one of our TSW legal folks can explain how this really works or is supposed to work?

If I wanted to get these parts unredacted, I guess there are appeals, and then possibly lawsuits?  As you will see, the redacted parts seem fairly uninteresting except to those of us who are interested in organizational stuff (not as potential partisan fodder), which might be the few, and those without the financial means for lawsuits.

Why Do Folks Clearcut on the Flathead National Forest? For the Silviculturally Curious

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The Flathead National Forest’s Round Star Project includes many silvicultural prescriptions, including regeneration harvest which reset forest stands to trend the conditions to a more fire and disease-resistant species dominance. This photo illustrates two different regeneration prescriptions: on the left, clearcut with reserves leaves varying density of 5-10 trees per acre, depending on natural variability, to maintain a reserve of existing desirable species, and on the right, shelterwood harvest leaves varying density of 15-25 trees per acre and maintains existing trees that provide shading and microsite protection for the next generation of trees. (Note: you can click on this photo and make it larger).

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Last week I asked the question “what are the reasons for choosing clearcutting as a prescription” and got a quick and well-written answer from the Flathead, so shout-out to their silviculture and communications folks!

The Flathead National Forest spokesperson answered the questions as follows:

What are the forestry reasons for clearcutting?

We have a diversity of tree species on the Flathead National Forest. Some are fire and disease-resistant while others are susceptible to root rot, bark beetles, and some are less adapted to survive wildfire. Active forest management on the Flathead targets areas with high densities of species that are less resistant to both diseases and fire, like lodgepole, grand fir, and subalpine fir), and resets the forest stand by harvesting those trees and replacing them with tree species (western larch, ponderosa pine, Douglas-fir) that are more likely to stay healthy through disturbance events like fire and disease.

 

Why does the Forest Service plant trees following a harvest?

When the forest managers reset a stand of grand fir and subalpine fir – shade tolerant species – with shade intolerant species like western larch, there are no naturally occurring seed sources so we plant seedlings of the species of tree that best aligns with the future desired condition of the forest. In other cases, we plant western white pine seedlings that have genetics for resistance to known diseases like blister rust.

 

Where does lodgepole pine fit into the picture? 

Lodgepole pine is a fast growing, naturally regenerating tree species and does well after a disturbance event. However, these trees have a tendency to get bark beetle outbreaks once they achieve a certain age.  Forest managers will identify areas with high levels of insect infestation and designate them for clearing to limit the infestation spread. Depending on the site conditions, some of the healthier lodgepole are left, but often times, in certain soils with certain wind patterns, lodgepole blow down after a treatment. Forest managers will plant western larch, ponderosa pine, western white pine, and Douglas-fir to add species diversity to the area.

 

How does the forest combat root disease with regeneration harvests?

Forest managers use “regeneration” harvest in areas with a high occurrence of root disease and plant tree species that are less susceptible to that disease. Sometimes, a previous treatment that released the midstory needs to be retreated with a regeneration due to the amount of disease that developed in that stand.

In other instances, forest managers use a “clearcut with reserves” that leaves individual trees or clumps of trees of western larch and doug fir scattered through the treatment area to meet objectives for both the future desired condition of the forest and for wildlife species that benefit from forest openings. These treatments usually leave 5-10 trees per acre.

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I will only add, as a person involved with the western white pine resistance program in the earlier days, that restoring WWP seems like a good idea, for ecological value, for Native Americans, for wildlife, because it is fire-adapted, and for biodiversity.

 

 

“The Dog in the Manger” School of Government Improvement and the Need For Bipartisan Work and Structures

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This story (thanks to Nick Smith) on USDA reorganization plans being litigated, plus looking into the Clinton-era Reinventing Government efforts which identified many of the same issues and concerns and acted upon them, without apparent litigation, makes me think that the current partisanization of everything has led to a “Dog in the Manger” approach to government improvement. “We don’t want to fix these things, but we don’t want you to either, and we will bark at you if you try.”

Friedman’s Law: No Public Policy, or Government Program is Improved or Clarified By Becoming a Partisan Issue. As I used to say about a project on the Rio Grande “reasonable access for unreasonable people,” reason tends to go out the window once tribal loyalties enter the picture.

I’ve told this story before, but there are new people here, so..  As a training assignment, I worked on Representative Carrie Meek’s staff  (D-17th District Florida, first African American  elected to Congress in Florida since Reconstruction) in the House. Being a small staff, I did science, women’s issues, the biological side of medicine, and the environment.   As the rep to the Democratic Environmental Caucus, I suggested that we work with the R’s on improvements to ESA. The head staff person on the Caucus told me “we don’t want to do that because it’s more important to attack R’s that want to change it.” OK, then.

Isn’t it reasonable that organizations would  figure out key measures, monitor those, and try to improve. Wildfire folks tend to be more structured and upfront about all this.  Like I often say, we get more lessons-learned from the Fire people on an ATV rollover than we got for Covid response, or closer to home, the NWFP or the 2012 Planning Rule.  Perhaps it’s because some can argue that there is nothing wrong, so why improve? But we know that some people think that there is something wrong, so why ignore them (or not even have a process to listen to them?)

Let’s use Forest Service policies as an example.  Some people have seen problems with the mapping of 2001 Roadless, with forest planning implementation, with travel management mapping and implementation, or a $740 million deficit?

Here’s how it seems to go:

1. Everything is fine.

2. Some people think things are not fine, but we can ignore them, or don’t have processes in place to listen to them.

3. The people who think things are not fine have spoken with politicians who agree with them.

4. The politicians are doing something or are asking the organization to change.

5.a. They are the wrong politicians (from the other party) so we can focus on how bad they are and they want to destroy everything. And/or

b. Ok, so there might be a problem, but they are going about fixing it the wrong way, because their intention is really bad and they have bad ideas to boot.

And never have a discussion directly addressing the concerns and potential alternative approaches.

6. When we get back in charge, we continue to ignore the problems.  Hurray!

This can work with 1-6 being worked by either party for different issues, but right now it seems to D’s and their allies focused on not changing organizational structures.

It seem to me that the fact is that folks will always disagree, about what should be decided, what scale it should be decided at, and what the decisions should be. In Spencer Cox’s book, he says that he thinks the best way to get good, long-lasting decisions is through the legislative process, because people with different views have to interact directly with each other.  Of course in a lopsided legislature, they don’t have to. And they might be more interested in performative displays that look good on social media, decrying the badness of the other party, or working on their elections rather than sitting down to work things out.

In my experience, what might  be helpful is to have standing groups with representatives of various interests to review, at regular intervals,  implementation of regulations or processes.  I would say FACA committees, but these tend to be overly regulated and hard to keep going due to all the paperwork.  Plus the current Admin often wants to put its thumb on the scale (or more than a thumb, in some cases).  Most of the groups that get started to work on something are disbanded by the time the flaws start showing, and the agency might not have the energy or political oomph to argue for fixing the problems (and factions within the agencies might not agree on what the problems are).   On the other hand, to be within an organization and know that something isn’t working often runs into what some partners call “antibodies to change.”

I would propose that in the same way that the Colorado legislature selected interests for the State Roadless Taskforce, that the federal legislature could select interests and require an agency to set up a review taskforce to examine implementation at 10 year intervals.  It would include open public listening sessions and documentation, and identify needs for change, both for agencies, partners and Congress. Because courts work off statutes and sometimes case law can develop over time that is not great for anyone.

For those who are interested in improving government implementation..check out Recoding America by Jennifer Pahlka, this is a Google AI summary..

  • Policy vs. Implementation: The book argues that government fails when lawmakers separate high-level policy from the messy details of how it is actually carried out. [1, 2]
  • Industrial-Era Culture: Government relies on rigid, outdated systems from the industrial age that make public services slow and cumbersome. [1, 2]
  • Focus on Outcomes: Instead of just buying new technology or adding more money, the government needs to change its operational culture to focus on real human outcomes. [1]
  • Test and Learn: Agencies should use flexible feedback loops and test-and-learn approaches rather than sticking to decades-long, top-down plans that fail in practice. [1]

Pahlka and Greenway at The Niskanen Center developed this thought paper for those who are interested in the broader topic of improving state capacity.

Rebuilding our state capacity — the how of our government — is an arduous task that requires a stomach for learning and fixing the rules and culture of the bureaucracy. But make no mistake: whether or not we do it is not a technocratic choice. It’s a political choice — a leadership choice. Previous administrations may not have actively set out to make dealing with public services a burden, or to cripple our nation’s military readiness with policy clutter amounting to hundreds of copies of War and Peace, or create a veto-cracy that limits our ability to build infrastructure. But neither have they made fixing it a priority. This one can, and should.

Our two parties (and even the factions within them) often speak about state capacity in very different languages and have differing priorities for where that muscle should be deployed. But the vast majority of elected leaders on both sides of the aisle would like the bureaucracy to be capable of achieving the missions it is assigned

 

Where is the Forest Service Clearcutting Today and Why?

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We’re going to dive down to the “why,” at least on one forest, to satisfy the silviculturally curious, but this handy table shows us where clearcutting is happening in terms of Region. I’d like to step back a minute and say that my perspective depends on my observations at a specific spatial and temporal scale, and also how I perceive them, for example driving through California post-wildfire is different from info derived from satellite photos.  Point being, everyone, including researchers, can be “right” in their own observations, but not give a complete story.  It’s only in engagement with each other, and with various kinds of data, that we can get closer to an overall picture of how things are and why people think as they do.

 

Anyway, the tables go back to 1984.

I asked Google AI to plot clearcut acres for me from 1984 to 2025.  Google AI even made up a narrative to go with it! I don’t know how true the narrative is. Or really even the plotting, but..

So it looks like if you were in R-3 or 6, you would think “there is no clearcutting” but if you were in Rs 1,2 and 9, you might think differently. Or if your career began in the 1970’s or 80’s, it might seem like there is little to no clearcutting comparatively.

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To get to Forest, I think I would have to dive into FACTS, which would be a handy thing to be able to do (and might be handy to compare fuel treatment acres over time), but here is what Google  AI said I would need to do. Maybe there’s still time to consider a Peoples’ Non-GIS Database for info people have proven to be interested in?

No, the publicly available summaries from the annual reports do not break down these totals by individual National Forest.
The standard published source for this data—Table 20 of the Annual Reforestation and Timber Stand Improvement Report—aggregates clearcutting acreage strictly at the Regional level. [1]
To obtain the 2024 clearcutting totals for individual forests within Region 1 (such as the Flathead, Bitterroot, or Kootenai National Forests), you must access the raw FACTS database layers directly using one of the following approaches:
    • Download the Geospatial Data: You can download the raw shapefiles from the USDA Forest Service Enterprise Data Portal. By uploading the Activity_TimberHarvest layer into GIS software (like QGIS or ArcGIS), you can filter the data by Fiscal Year (2024), Region (01), and FACTS Activity Codes (4110 through 4119)—which explicitly denote clearcutting—and group the results by the NATIONAL_FOREST_NAME attribute field. [1, 2]
    • Use the ArcGIS Online Portal: You can use the interactive ArcGIS FACTS Harvest and Silviculture Portal to visually filter for Region 1 projects, click on specific management boundaries, and view the attribute tables containing the exact acreage for that specific forest unit.

    • Submit a FOIA or Info Request: If you do not have GIS software, you can contact the Region 1 Regional Office in Missoula, Montana, or the specific forest’s silviculturist to request a copy of their localized FACTS tracking spreadsheet for FY 2024.

Would you like the exact list of FACTS activity codes used for clearcutting to help you filter the GIS database, or are you looking for details on a specific logging project in Region 1?

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Wildland Firefighters and Everyone Who Supports You.. You All Did Great This Year!!!

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The Caribou-Targhee Camp Crew Unloads Equipment coming back to ICP..

Well, fall is in the air. In our neck of the woods, the aspen leaves are turning and the morning air is cool.

We’ve gotten through another wildfire season. But basically most of the coverage we have seen  in the media during this year has stressed potential future problems, or blamed problems on the current Administration. From a piece by James Peron in Medium:

It’s not the journalists fault; they are selling the public what the public wants. And when they have a terrifying story, or can take a gruesome one and make it sound worse, they sell more papers and that means higher profits. Whatever their politics they are profit-seekers at heart.

I know plenty of journalists would be horrified at this — certainly many who attended the same journalism classes I did —and simply wouldn’t acknowledge it. I actually suspect they don’t see it this way. They are merely reporting the “most important” stories and that means the most horrific news they can find.

They wouldn’t even notice they look for the bad news. It’s just good journalism but it leads to faulty perceptions resulting in bad policies because unscrupulous politicians use fear to buy votes.

Of course there have been problems, including the high rate of burnovers. I don’t know the reasons and it’s possible that a variety of causes contributed to each one. I am against generating overall conclusions until the reports are out. To whom is it important to hurry to diagnose before the facts are in? And why?

But while news folks tend to focus on the latest bad, or predicted future bads, maybe there should be just one story on how well things generally worked in what we were warned would be a devastating fire year. Remember this Outside piece from May of this year?

Why 2026 Could Be One of the Worst Wildfire Seasons in Recent U.S. History

Extreme drought, overstretched crews, and a sweeping Forest Service restructuring are converging into what experts fear could be the most volatile fire year in U.S. history.

Doesn’t it seem odd that this article focuses on the Forest Service instead of the real wildfire reorganization at Interior?  I wonder why that is?

Some experts like Duncan disagree, saying that although these cuts and changes aren’t directly targeting firefighters on the ground, they erode the foundation that keeps those crews operating safely.

“Morale is terrible right now,” Duncan said. “We lost a lot of folks through DOGE cuts, and more through delayed resignations and early retirements. There’s a huge network of support behind the scenes to help the firefighters doing the actual work, and a lot of those folks have left. With the proposed reorganization, getting rid of offices and research stations, we’re losing even more of that support network.”

Of course, moving peoples’ offices doesn’t make them unavailable for fire assignments.  But it meets the “sounds vaguely plausible” and “fits the narrative” criteria.

But the good news story is that everyone pulled together- the folks in the brand-new USWFS, the Forest Service, States, counties, and crews of all kinds- even folks from other countries, and we got through a really bad fire year.

This is due to the effort of people, some working without proper housing, without communications capabilities that most of us take for granted in this day and age, and all the other difficulties that are could easily be enumerated.  Of course, some of us need to focus on what is not working and fix it.

My concern is that we don’t give appropriate attention, value, and gratitude to the people who are making this work- firefighters, support folks, those doing the Wrok while people are gone on fires, and the families of firefighters.  All are part of the whole who have made this season, scary going into it, work.

So thanks to all of you!!!!!

 

Follow-up to Other Stories and Questions

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Some miscellaneous tidbits, following up on other stories…

1. What is the linkage between bureaus and the USWFS and how is it supposed to work?

The Office of Communication at DOI got right back to me when I asked the question about how things are supposed to work between the land management agencies and the USWFS, so shout-out to them.

The transition guidance issued in April is current.

The increasingly complex wildland fire environment now requires a professional workforce that is positioned to meet wildfire response and mitigation needs year-round. The U.S. Wildland Fire Service works in close collaboration with the Interior Department’s land management agencies to ensure fuels treatments, wildfire prevention strategies, and post-fire recovery efforts are fully aligned with public land management goals. This integrated strategy is intended to meet wildfire response needs while also building long-term landscape resilience.

2. Do Piles of Logs Left Over From Wildfire Suppression Actions Go Toward FS Timber Targets? Thanks to Andy Geissler of AFRC for this one!

Most of the time the Forest Service will sell log decks associated with fire suppression in a competitive manner in the same way they sell green timber sales. You can take a look at the Willamette National Forest’s current timber sale page and find four deck sales over the past year: Willamette National Forest | Timber Sales | Forest Service.

The volume sold is part of the agency’s accomplishments. The Forest Service has a unique “salvage sale fund” that often pays for these sales. If those funds are unavailable, they will typically use “timber” dollars (i.e. National Forest Timber Management dollars (NFTM)). However, both the salvage funds and NFTM fall under the blanket “timber program funding” according the agency’s accounting. Bottom line, these deck sales are funded by timber dollars.

It’s also worth noting that, in most cases that I’m aware of, the fisheries program gets “access” to the logs in these decks for in-stream wood placement. In some cases I’ve seen the Forest Service haul logs to a location and then fly them into rivers and creeks via helicopter. That work can be funded with timber receipts too.

Conversations in Comments to Bring Forward to More People

3. Litigation is Used to Affect Policy. It’s really OK. People who have different views use legal means to achieve their ends. These organizations tend to also work in politics via their c4 wings,  and policy. That’s fine. Jon said, and not to pick on him, but I’ve heard this before,

Litigation is not an adversarial process for “determining policy.” It determines what the law requires.

In reality, there are entities that use legal means to pursue their ends. Folks like Earthjustice are pretty direct that that’s what they’re doing. I also get it that folks who use this method would want to create executive branch actions that have legal hooks that they can use. And they will resist changes that seem like common sense to many of us, that they argue could interfere with their access to the levers of decision-making.

For example, this letter about FOFA (my understanding is that the current Senate version is 150 days).

Section 121 also dramatically limits the time to seek judicial review to 120 days after the date of publication of a notice in the Federal Register of agency intent to carry out the fireshed management project. This abbreviated timeframe places an undue burden on interested parties and communities with limited resources and would likely have the unintended consequence of leading to more litigation, not less, as interested parties may be forced to file suit to protect their legal rights. This is especially true if a claim requires a pre-suit notice period, such as the 60-day notice period required by the ESA. Finally, Section 121 creates a new, restrictive standard for standing to sue by requiring a litigant to have participated in the rulemaking in a very specific way that goes beyond the standard required by federal courts for Article III standing. We therefore oppose this provision of the bill.

Note what groups signed this letter to the Senate.

Like I said, it’s really OK for them to have their views and pursue them in whatever ways the US governments systems allow. And it’s equally OK for others to push back in courts. Personally, in my lived experience, courtrooms are not the best place to settle federal lands disputes, and we should be more transparent and design policies that favor other means of dispute-settling, but that’s the way it is.

4. More on How the USWFS and Bureau Interface Will Work

As an FS retiree, I’m having trouble understanding Jesse’s comments, I think at least in part, because I don’t understand how the DOI operates without what we would call “charge as worked.” From my FS experience, it seems like budgets are limiting… if you have the budget and don’t have the people, you can contract or grant the work. If you don’t have the budget, you will just do less. Anyway, maybe someone with both FS and BLM experience can translate.

If it were the FS, for example, (and say the wildfire folk were stovepiped in a similar way) all the “Wildfire Folks Approved” projects would have employees doing monitoring, NEPA, etc. would charge to the Wildfire account. If the FS wanted to do prescribed fire for other reasons than fuels, they would have to fund it through the benefitting function. Of course there is a tendency, when many functions benefit, to assign the charges to the function with the most available bucks. So there will be fuels people deciding if fuels bucks should be used.  Wouldn’t we expect wildlife people to decide if wildlife bucks should be used on projects intended to help wildlife?

So when I look at the transition function list, I see the issue as “who is paying for it” and not so much “what is done.” Maybe the way people are paid in Interior makes the whole thing more difficult than it needs to be? And would that be a good argument for keeping the FS out of Interior (if they don’t use “charged as worked.”)?

I Still Cry for the Mountains: Guest Post by Dave Daley

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I don’t usually post on Sundays, but was off Friday enjoying the National Forest fall aspen. Also I finished a helpful and hopeful recent book by Spencer Cox called Off Ramp: How to Be a Peacemaker in an Age of Contempt. It’s helpful for the work we do here, and reminds us of the importance of listening. Cox is a big fan of listening and the back and forth of the legislative process for resolving disputes and moving policy forward.

What strikes me about the ongoing discussion of wildfire strategies is that it doesn’t seem like anyone has convened a group to hash it out. We have people who say, “let’s not do it”, some that say “hey there have been problems, let’s fix them”, and those that say “everything was fine until the current Secs pulled out a full suppression strategy.” I wonder if they are ever in the same room, engaging. Convening this group- or identifying problems and fixes- might be a good task for a foundation somewhere.. Has someone already done it?

So let’s listen to one person’s experience.

I Still Cry for the Mountains Dave Daley

My family are cattle ranchers in the northern Sacramento valley. We have called Butte and Plumas County home since my ancestors came in the 1850’s searching for gold. We have a deep, almost reverent, connection to the land. We live and work in two different ecosystems — the oak woodlands of the foothills where our cattle graze from October to May, and the mountains of the northern Sierra Nevada where the cattle spend the summer on private and federal land.

Five years ago this week we received news that the Bear/North Complex fire had jumped the Middle Fork of the Feather River into our grazing permit and in twelve hours burnt almost 194,000 acres. It eventually burnt close to 350,000 acres, killed 16 people, and became the 8th largest fire in California history. The initial maelstrom was fueled by winds over 50 miles per hour in steep, rugged and heavily timbered country. Words cannot describe the scope and intensity of that blaze.

This was a “let burn” fire that had started in mid-August and had been burning for almost three weeks in rough terrain. The United States Forest Service (USFS) made a conscious decision not to extinguish the fire because of difficult access and risk to firefighter safety. And the pervasive assumption that “good fire” will reduce fuel loads. This wasn’t a “good fire!”

I understand the decision to prioritize firefighter safety, but aerial suppression might have protected personnel, and ultimately saved two towns, an entire ecosystem, the wildlife and my cattle. Instead, the USFS decided to expand the “let burn” area and drones were used to light more fire. The previously predicted deadly winds came soon after. I often wonder what would have happened if they had not purposely expanded the fire’s footprint. The outcome might have been the same, or perhaps some areas would have been spared leaving behind a patchwork of burned and unburned tracts, where wildlife, seedbanks, springs and the beauty of the mountains still existed. Instead, we only had complete death. As we searched for survivors while the fire was still burning, I watched as the few remaining green spaces were intentionally burnt. What wildlife lived, did so no longer.

When the smoke finally cleared in early December, sixteen lives, the towns of Berry Creek and Feather Falls, and hundreds of homes were lost. And an incredibly beautiful ecosystem destroyed. Almost 400 cows and their calves were burnt to death, along with all the wildlife. We lost beautiful landscapes that we had loved for generations. The federal government never accepted responsibility nor paid for damages to private property or restored public lands. You can’t pay enough to replace life or replace an ecosystem that was literally cooked. The fire burned so hot that in places the soil was sterilized.

After five years, I have realized that we always view fire from the ecosystem we know best. If we have witnessed fire in a mountain, sagebrush, desert, juniper or grassland ecosystem, then we assume that is how the fire will respond, and the land will recover exactly as it is imprinted in our memory. And, if you are from an urban setting, you may have no vision of the nature of forest fires. So many of my ranching friends from other biomes have said to me, “I bet the country has recovered and your cattle must be doing great.” They don’t understand the impact of catastrophic fire in the big timber country of the Sierra Nevada. It hasn’t recovered and it may not in my lifetime. What we are doing to manage fire isn’t working in all ecosystems.

Creating effective approaches to fire requires us to tailor our response to the ecosystem; mountain, foothill, desert, valley; wet or dry; hot or cold. And then there are so many variables when the fire is active– topography, wind, humidity, vegetation type, fuel load, moisture, temperature, season. The diversity of landscapes requires flexibility and an awareness of and responsiveness to local conditions. The current model seems to be a one size fits all where the USFS approach is to create a perimeter, often miles from the fire, and intentionally burn to the line. How many acres are needlessly burnt? Or the fire grows and escapes, as was the case with the Bear/North Complex.

To be clear, this is not criticism of firefighting personnel, as they work in dangerous conditions that most of us cannot imagine. I applaud their work. This is simply a critique of the federal approach to managing forest fires.

Roughly half of California is federal land that is not controlled by Sacramento, but managed by Washington D.C. Both parties have failed the environment and the people. We never seem to focus resources on pre-fire fuels reduction, nor post fire restoration. We spend billions on suppression in a failed model that the government has created.

Policies developed from afar and without any understanding of what happens on the ground rarely work. Who makes federal decisions regarding fire suppression? Is it someone with local expertise who understands both the human and ecological implications of their decisions? No.

After the fire was finally put out three months later, I have yet to see a plan for post fire recovery and restoration. I have watched the burn scar turn into a brush field. There are no conifer seedlings, almost no wildlife and five years have passed. Catastrophic burns in big timber will convert to a brushscape in two or three years. The absence of policy, resources, and political will, just lead to more fuel for the next fire. We are left with standing dead trees surrounded by dense brush four feet deep.

The federal government has abdicated responsibility for post fire management. In our grazing permit, there has been a token attempt at dead tree removal on a few acres along one road. There appears to be little action taken to address the effects of forest fires, which may be due to resource limitations or policy constraints. If they don’t move quickly (which the USFS is incapable of), it is too late to salvage the timber, repair the roads, and open the campgrounds. A myriad of hurdles cause delay until nothing is done.

There is another model. Our grazing allotment is mixed public and private land. The private timber company immediately began harvesting as quickly as they could, and shortly thereafter began replanting. There aren’t any new conifers growing on the federal land five years later—the seedbank for trees was destroyed. Completely. Contrast that with the private timber company land, where dead tree removal began immediately and nine million conifer seedlings were planted in three years! Sure, there may be an economic incentive to do so, but that effort is still essential for the health of the land.

There are alternatives to the current federal approach. The cost of megafires to taxpayers is astronomical. The Dixie fire in five northern California counties in 2021, a massive fire of 963,000 acres, also fueled by backfires, cost $637 million to suppress. What if those federal funds were directed to fuels reduction? Forest management could include fire prevention strategies such as thinning, timber harvest, grazing and the use of prescribed fire, designed for the specific ecosystem. I envision a time when fuel loads have been reduced to the point that a lightning strike would not be a major concern because our National Forests are healthy and natural fire has returned to the landscape. I know. I’m a dreamer.

Some would suggest that climate change has resulted in the increasing severity of catastrophic wildfires. If that is the case, then fuel load reduction becomes even more essential. We can’t simply keep adding “fuel to the fire”, as we have for so many decades.

Post-fire management is just as critical to the health of our federal lands. Removing dead timber, replanting, stabilizing the soil, protecting waterways, repairing roads are all essential and should be prioritized in federal lands management. If we don’t do some of these basic steps, we will simply spend more money on the next fire and destroy the forest again.
Fire destruction and recovery is not just a California issue, nor a red state/blue state problem. This is federally owned land and has been managed the same under both Democratic and Republican administrations. I truly believe that the remote forest is “out of sight, out of mind”, and there are not enough of us in rural areas who witness the destruction to even have a voice.

When there aren’t enough votes to get you elected, what politician really cares? And, if the public doesn’t understand how this devastation affects all citizens, there is even less political will for change. The effect on air quality, water quality, soil stability, wildlife habitat and so many other long term ecological impacts are quickly forgotten if you don’t see the destruction. I see it every day and can’t easily forget.

Are there simple answers. No. But we need all available options to reduce catastrophic fire. It seems we are developing small contingents that only advocate for their solution…. “Grazing sheep and goats is good, cattle are bad”, “thinning is good, logging is bad”, “prescribed fire is the only practical solution, everything else is not natural”, “leave it all alone, humans should never intervene.” Isn’t it possible that we need all tools available for forest health, and what works in one biome may not work in another? And the best way to deploy those tools is to listen to the people who live there. Listen to the land itself. Please.

The recovery is painfully slow in the Bear/North Complex fire. I realize the intensity of that fire is more severe than many others. It may require different solutions. My hope is that we can work as hard at reducing fuel loads pre-fire and at post fire restoration, as we do at suppression. Suppression requires crisis management when all hell breaks loose. Planned, thoughtful fuels reduction using all available strategies would benefit the land and the communities. And we cannot forget the critical importance of restoration. It would be far more cost effective for taxpayers, better for the economy and so much better for the landscape and forest health. I can only hope.

How Is the Wildfire/Land Management Nexus Going to Work at Interior?

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BLM staff member assesses vegetation debris in a forested area of King Mountain from horseback.
A BLM Colorado staff member assesses the amount of fallen tree limbs and vegetation debris in a forested area of King Mountain from horseback. Dead and overgrown vegetation can increase the risk of wildfire spread and damage. BLM fire managers and range specialists routinely scout areas to consider for future fuels management or reduction projects. Implementing these projects offers many benefits to include improving firefighter and public safety and reducing wildfire risk to infrastructure and public and private lands. (BLM photo by Kristy Wallner)

Some folks have a talking point with regard to the fire folks in USDA moving to Interior (I don’t want them to move either but..) “you can’t separate wildfire from land management”. This even is used as a reason for line officers to give up power to fire managers within the FS. Still, Interior is apparently trying this. As usual, the devil is in the details. I’ve sent questions to several BLM communication folks, and I don’t get any answers. Maybe they haven’t figured it out yet. still, I did run across this.. So what happens in a few years when Interior figures it out.. will these folks need to change those talking points? Why not pick more resilient talking points now?

I also wonder whether this project would be litigated if it happened in Montana.. do the legal hooks of certain T&E species provide a critical habitat for litigators?

SILT, Colo. – The Bureau of Land Management’s Colorado River Valley Field Office is moving forward with a plan to reduce wildfire risk, improve forest health, and offer suitable timber for sale. The work will cover nearly 5,500 acres near King Mountain and may begin in summer or fall 2026.

“As we get ready to put this project into action, we’re looking forward to creating conditions to help slow future wildfires,” said U.S. Wildland Fire Service Fuels Specialist Chad Sewell. “The work we’re doing out here will make a noticeable difference on the ground and help keep this ecosystem strong for years to come.”

Expected Benefits:

Improved safety for firefighters and the public
Reduced wildfire risk to recreation areas, infrastructure, and nearby communities
Healthier habitat for wildlife and better recreation experiences
Safer and easier-to-use foot and horse trails after clearing away fallen branches and dead trees
Better livestock distribution, easing pressure on nearby Greater Sage‑Grouse habitat
The BLM will partner with the Colorado State Forest Service under the Good Neighbor Authority to sell appropriate timber as commercial products. This collaboration will help BLM reduce wildfire risk while supporting local industries and strengthening local economies. The authority, approved by Congress, allows BLM to enter an agreement with the state to perform forest, rangeland and watershed restoration work. The state will retain any funds from timber sales under the agreement for use on additional GNA projects.

“We’re excited to team up with our partners on a project that benefits the community and the landscape,” said CRVFO Field Manager Lisa Dawson. “Selling the timber we remove reduces waste and helps support local mills and the people who work there.”

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So the fuels specialist (seems to be) still there (in the same office), and works for USWFS, and seems to still be involved in project design and communication. Is that how it’s going to work in the future? Is the USWFS just a question of readjusting so that wildfire folks have more control over wildfire-related (and funded) local projects, and continue to be available for national suppression efforts?

Look, no one expects USWFS to have it all figured out, as if it will be forever. Fire folks are famous for doing lessons learned and improving the way they work. But still, what they are currently thinking, and the expected trajectory of where they’re going would be nice to know. But perhaps I should be asking the USWFS and not BLM.