WILDFIRES: Sens. Murray, Cantwell, Bipartisan Senators Urge Congress to Pass Wildfire Funding

Senators: “Please do not forget about wildfires – the natural disaster currently raging through the West”

(Washington, D.C.) – With large fires blazing across Washington state and throughout the West, Sens. Patty Murray (D-WA), Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and a bipartisan group of senators urged Senate Leaders Mitch McConnell and Charles E. Schumer this week to include a wildfire funding fix in any future disaster aid legislation that passes through Congress.

Led by Sens. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Mike Crapo (R-ID), the letter’s signers also include Sens. Jim Risch (R-ID), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Kamala Harris (D-CA), Jon Tester (D-MT), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), and Tom Udall (D-NM).

This week, Congress passed a bipartisan funding bill to help with the cost of fighting the wildfires in western states as part of the disaster and government funding bill. However, the funding included does not fix the long-term problem of consistently underfunding fire suppression, which currently forces federal agencies to steal resources from fire prevention activities to pay for fighting fires, so-called “fire borrowing.”

Wildfires have burned almost 8 million acres of land across the West this year, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. Thousands of residents have been forced to evacuate from their homes, and the U.S. Forest Service has already spent more than $1.7 billion this year to put out fires. In Washington state, recent wildfires this month near Jolly Mountain, Jack Creek, Uno Peak, Diamond Creek, Norse Peak and Archer Mountain have threatened residences, prompted evacuations and negatively impacted the local air quality.

“We stand ready to work with our colleagues in a bipartisan way in Congress to do everything we can to ensure the victims of Hurricane Harvey get the assistance they need,” the bipartisan group of senators wrote. “As we work to assist Texas and Louisiana on the road to recovery, please do not forget about wildfires – the natural disaster currently raging through the West.

“We ask that any disaster aid package or other must-pass legislation that passes through Congress include a wildfire funding fix. This fix is long overdue and people throughout the West desperately need our help,” the Senators added.

With the Forest Service’s fire suppression budget nearly depleted, the agency is likely to have to borrow from fire prevention money to tackle wildfires during the remainder of the fire season.

“Why does the Federal Government need to be involved?”

Fedgov claims they own the land and their mismanagement set the stage for all of these fires. The USFS is now in the business of preserving forests as wildfire fuel instead of utilizing them as a resource for wood products. Eco-nazis.

Today is the first day in 2 weeks that the air here in north Idaho has been classified as “Unhealthy” which is a little better than “Very Unhealthy” and “Hazardous” where it has been. Visibility is about 1/2 mile and there hasn’t been any rain in 70 days. I’d still take this over hurricanes though.

When you say “Idiot states that don’t maintain adequate fire breaks can eat the cost themselves.” Makes sense until you see the facts.

90% of the fires in the Northwest are in or started on Federal lands. Mismanagement by the US Forest Service is one of the main causes of these huge fires. Going back to the spotted owl fiasco in the 80s, logging was cut way back or completely stopped in all or most of the National Forest lands. In addition, grazing leases held by ranch families for years were cut, restricted or taken away. The combination of stopping logging and grazing has created a huge growth of fuels in the National forests. When a fire does go through, environmentalists stop salvage logging on burned timber which leaves the forest to beetle infestations. The beetles then move on to healthy timber making it a fire hazard.

The fires in 2014 and 2015 in Okanogan County, (the two largest in state history) showed how the mismanagement had an effect. While fire raged through the overgrown undergrowth and un-thinned National forest land, areas where grazing and forest management including logging had been practiced saw little damage by the fires. Also those who do have leases for grazing on the forest land are responsible for maintaining and rebuilding all fencing damaged in a fire, even if the fire was not their fault or started on their leased land. So yes, these aid packages are needed not only for the fighting of the fires but to help with rebuilding. Also to help with the floods that follow in subsequent years because all vegetation that would soak up rain and snow melt is gone. Two years after the fires, we dealt with massive flooding and highway washout all over Northcentral Washington.

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