Here in Western Colorado, we don’t need another summer of smoke to remind us that wildfire season isn’t what it used to be. Communities across the Western Slope need scientifically sound, effective action that actually helps protect our forests and communities.
That’s why so many of us are paying attention to the Fix Our Forests Act, now moving through Congress. While this bill has many non-controversial provisions that all relevant parties acknowledge as helpful, some of its details are very troubling.
The Act leans heavily on boosting logging, and yes, thinning trees in the right places can improve forest health. The problem is that an agenda driven by timber harvesting often causes companies to cut the largest-diameter trees to meet timber quotas set by Washington, D.C.
Instead, restoration forestry is the science-backed solution that we really need. It focuses on thinning smaller-diameter trees in overgrown forests near communities. For example, in the Junction Creek area near Durango, small-diameter trees are rolling out of the forests, and creative local businesses like Timber Age have benefited from innovative federal grants to find ways to use them for lumber.
With careful planning, local input and a real understanding of our landscapes, these projects have thinned overgrown forests and significantly contributed to fire prevention. But big logging projects can miss the mark – skipping the low-value, overgrown stands that truly need thinning while focusing instead on places where the timber is worth more. That’s not fire prevention; that’s business as usual.
We’ve learned from experience that environmental review and public input aren’t the roadblocks some folks in Washington make them out to be. The real roadblocks are not having the people or funding to do this expensive work.
The premier federal agency meant to protect our forests, the United States Forest Service, has been hollowed out – critical staff members are gone, and firefighting crews are short-handed. And now, Congress wants to hand them a bigger job with fewer people, less oversight, less funding and less accountability. That makes no sense.
What’s worse, this bill would limit how much time citizens have to challenge a bad decision – cutting the window from six years to just 150 days. It would also allow massive projects – up to 10,000 acres to skip full environmental review. That’s about six times the amount of skiing acreage that Purgatory Resort offers. With the Trump administration pushing an arbitrary increase in logging numbers, we know some timber sales will be advanced to meet that goal.
The other challenge Congress needs to address is climate change – one of the root causes of the unhealthy forests in the first place. Climate change is making our forests hotter and drier and more susceptible to more frequent and severe fires.
There are real solutions to today’s forestry challenges. We’ve seen them work in Colorado. Programs like the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program or the Good Neighbor Authority have proved they can get real results. Here in Southwest Colorado, CFLRP projects are doing forestry the right way, with local input guiding federal agencies. We have the tools – they just need more funding and staff to do the job.
Our forests need well-funded, sustained engagement and investment in science-backed solutions. Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper have championed bills like the Protect the West Act, which would empower local communities by not only providing funds to federal forestry agencies but also allocating funds directly to local communities to conduct forestry work on non-federal land.
As the bill has already passed the House, I urge our senators to do all they can to improve it before final passage, keeping the public at the table, as it is the public that has the most to lose if we don’t get this right.
Scott Fetchenhier of Silverton is a San Juan County commissioner.
