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Restoring California's Forests: An Ecologically Based Strategy for Reducing Severe Fires, Protecting Communities, and Restoring the National Forests of California

The record 2002 fire season in the Western states, provoked by years of drought and decades of hazardous fuels buildup due to fire suppression, has fanned the controversy over fire management and restoration of our National Forest ecosystems.

California's forest ecosystems have evolved with and adapted to periodic fire; many forest types cannot stay healthy without it. Yet the Forest Service and other agencies have worked to suppress California forest fires for more than a century. The more we suppress fires, the less healthy California's forests are, and the more small fuels build up, increasing the risk of severe fires that damage ecosystems and endanger the people of our state. In addition, human activities such as roadbuilding, clearcut logging and overgrazing by livestock in some areas, have further degraded our forest ecosystems and made them more vulnerable to severe fires.

Conservationists in California have done an excellent job of explaining how current practices make fire danger worse, and exposing the flaws of the fire management recommendations offered by the timber industry and other interests. However, we have rarely gone beyond these critiques to share our vision of appropriate fire and fuels management with the public. With this report, for the first time, CWC offers a blueprint -- a proactive, coherent strategy for appropriate fire management and overall ecological restoration in California's National Forests that will take us beyond divisive rhetoric and toward real, long-term solutions.

Key recommendations include:

• The Forest Service must clear hazardous fuels within 1/4-mile of communities, where people are at risk - not log remote wilderness. Science shows that logging large trees only make fire danger worse.
• Congress must direct fuels reduction into this "community zone" - and must pay for it. CWC supports a $10 billion appropriation currently being considered in Congress.
• The Forest Service should use its existing "fast-track authority" (known as "Categorical Exclusions") to immediately remove flammable brush and small trees up to 12" diameter within 1/4 mile of communities.
• Features of the Sierra Nevada Framework should be applied to California's other National Forests - namely, strict site-specific tree size limits on logging and thinning, and strictly defined "community zones" where fuels reduction work is focused.
• California's National Forests must complete Fire Management Plans required by the 1995 federal fire policy - currently the Mendocino, Sequoia, Cleveland, Angeles, Tahoe, San Bernardino, Lassen, Plumas, Modoc, and Lake Tahoe Basin forests lack these critical plans.
• Congress must greatly increase block grants to California state and local governments to reduce dangerous fuels - because most of the wildland-urban interface is not on federal lands.
• Congress and the Forest Service must conserve all roadless and wilderness areas - they have the highest ecological integrity and the lowest number of fires. People ignite the vast majority of fires, especially in areas with roads.

The U.S. Senate will soon consider the Bush Administration's logging plan, including a "fire logging rider" that would suspend environmental laws and declare a logging holiday for timber companies, similar to the disastrous 1995 "salvage rider" which led to two years of irresponsible logging and extreme acrimony over management of our National Forests.

The California Wilderness Coalition urges Congress to uphold our environmental laws and fund smart ways to restore our forests and protect towns from wildfire. This report helps show the way.

Download the report (1.67 MB in size) (requires Adobe Acrobat Reader)

Download the Executive Summary (requires Adobe Acrobat Reader)

News Release: Bush plan would make fires worse in California

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