Bill advances to devote more money to wildland firefighting

As the High Desert braces for the possibility of a brutal wildfire season, Congress is sparking what Oregon lawmakers hope will generate badly needed new wildfire funding.

Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, both D-Ore., announced Thursday that the Appropriations Committee passed legislation including allocations for additional wildfire fighting funding, and rules allowing FEMA to cover wildfire costs in some situations.

“We would provide funding necessary to treat the expected level of forest fires, and anything over that level would be funded through FEMA,” Merkley said in a phone conference call.

The provisions in the bill would budget 100 percent of the 10-year average of firefighting costs around the nation. If additional money is needed, it would come out of FEMA’s emergency natural disaster fund.

Currently, tragedies like flooding and hurricanes get that special disaster-relief funding, but wildfires do not.

Lawmakers said they believe the designation could provide relief to Forest Service and BLM budgets stretched thin as fires grow bigger and more costly.

Forest officials say fewer dollars for prescribed burns and forest management leads to bigger wildfires, and that leads to even more spending.

“What that does is not just affect fuels projects, ” said Jim Whittington, public information office for the Forest Service’s Alaska and Pacific Northwest Region. “It affects everything the agencies do, from recreation projects to habitat restoration and mutual aid.”

Merkley believes that doesn’t make sense.

“It truly illustrates the absurdity of interrupting fire prevention programs,” he said. “It perpetuates a cycle of disaster.”

While Oregon and Washington took the brunt of all wildfires across the nation last year, there’s worry more states will be hit hard this year.

“When we get in that situation, we’re going to probably get beyond that suppression money we have in the bank right now,” Whittington said.

Earlier this month, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said the Forest Service and Interior (BLM) expect this wildfire season will be well above average.

She estimated the Forest Service will have to spend between $810 million and $1.62 billion to fight fires. The budget is only about $1 billion.

Having less firefighting funding than firefighting costs is nothing new.

“Regionally, we did not have to borrow much money last year,” Whittington said, noting that although Oregon and Washington had extreme fire years, other states did not — allowing the Northwest region to spend more. “The year before, we did have to borrow more, and also the year before that.”

Whittington said Central Oregon did not burn through much funding — the fire season was relatively mild last year.

“There were two larges fires on the Deschutes (National Forest) and one complex on the Ochoco (National Forest,)” he said. “A bad fire year would have substantially more fires than that.”

Whittington said the Deschutes National Forest spent about $18.8 million fighting larger fires last year and the Ochoco National Forest spent about $5.5 million.

In Washington and Oregon, over $461 million was spent fighting the biggest fires.

The Interior Appropriations bill now heads to the Senate floor for debate. If it passes, the new funding formula would go into effect next year.