Some environmental groups are warning that a federal bill intended to prevent major wildfires could effectively increase logging, cattle grazing and mining on federal lands — which make up half of Oregon’s land base.
The bipartisan Fix Our Forests Act passed out of the U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee on Tuesday and now heads to the Senate floor for a final vote. It could overhaul how the nation prepares its land for wildfires, while also scaling back environmental oversight of land management projects.
The bill has conservationists divided. On one side, some advocates say it would bring long-needed changes by fast-tracking prescribed fires, which burn grasses and underbrush to prevent large-scale wildfires in the future.
“What it does is provide a more comprehensive approach to wildfire prevention, suppression, and resolution than what we’ve had in a long time in our country,” said Chet Wade, spokesperson with the Partners in Wildfire Prevention, a coalition of nonprofits and industry groups that promote wildfire resiliency.
On the other side, environmental groups say the bill significantly weakens environmental protections and public oversight. As written, the Fix Our Forests Act increases the size threshold for when projects — whether they are logging, mining or prescribed fire — need to undergo an environmental review.
These reviews analyze how a project could harm the land, wildlife habitat or historical sites, and give people an opportunity to weigh in. That process can result in limits or changes to how public lands are used.
Under this legislation, the government wouldn’t need to go through that environmental review and public input process for projects that are under 10,000 acres in size. The current threshold to forgo environmental reviews is 3,000 acres.
“The public’s not going to be involved,” said Susan Jane Brown, an Oregon environmental attorney who traveled to Washington, D.C., to attend the bill’s markup Tuesday. “Tribes aren’t going to be involved. Communities, the states, the counties will not be involved in the development and implementation of these projects.”
The Fix Our Forests Act also shortens the deadline for taking legal action against a project that violates federal law, from six years down to 150 days. Some conservationists say such policies are needed to get fire back on the land.
The bill has support from some Democratic lawmakers, but it has mostly garnered favor among Republicans, including U.S. Rep. Cliff Bentz, who represents much of Eastern and Southern Oregon. Bentz voted in favor of the bill when it was on the House floor earlier this year.
“This reform limits unnecessary litigation, enabling forest management projects to proceed without undue delay and ensures critical restoration and fire prevention efforts can actually occur,” Bentz said in January.
In terms of wildfire prevention, the bill focuses heavily on using logging and cattle grazing as ways to reduce underbrush and other wildfire fuel. While it calls on federal agencies to ramp up prescribed burning and multi-agency collaboration, it doesn’t provide funding for that work.
The Trump administration, meanwhile, has hobbled federal land agencies’ capacity through drastic staffing cuts.
“While reasonable forestry reforms are essential, we can’t ‘fix our forests’ without adequate staffing for our land management agencies, federal dollars to carry out these projects, and local mill and wood processing infrastructure,” U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat, said in a statement Wednesday.
Critics say the Fix Our Forest Act — along with the potential rescinding of the Roadless Rule — is another move by the Trump administration to increase resource extraction on federal lands in the name of wildfire prevention.
“I’m all in to work with anyone who wants to reduce wildfire risk by pursuing proven tools like prescribed fire, but the Fix Our Forests Act falls short of what’s needed to protect communities in Oregon and the West from fires that grow bigger, more dangerous, and harder to fight each year,” U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, said in a statement Wednesday. “In addition to failing to provide adequate resources to reduce hazardous fuels buildup, the bill also includes a laundry list of Republican demands that will sabotage existing forest management and wildfire prevention work.”
