Officials from Nevada to New Jersey to Utah and beyond are scrambling to take stock of President Donald Trump’s cuts to the U.S. Forest Service — and deciding how to respond as the summer wildfire season looms. “Forest fires aren’t going to take four years off just because of who’s in the White House,” Colorado Gov. Jared Polis said in an interview following the announcement of $7 million in state wildfire mitigation grants. “So it’s really important that states up the bar on preparation.”
Trump has cut 10 percent of workers at the Forest Service, an agency that manages 193 million acres of national forests and grasslands, with more firings and a steep reorganization likely coming. About 75 percent of agency staff are trained in wildland firefighting. That means there are fewer workers around the country clearing brush and thinning trees to reduce the risk and intensity of wildfires. And when fires do break out, there will be fewer workers available to stop the spread.
The cuts have prompted alarm bells in state capitals as attention on wildfires and forestry policy has arguably never been higher in the wake of devastating fires that ripped through Los Angeles earlier this year. Record drought, heat waves and sluggish prevention work have exacerbated fires in recent decades: An average of 3 million acres burned nationwide each year in the 1990s, but the average is now nearly 7 million, according to data from the National Interagency Fire Center.
Now, with that critical prevention work at risk of slowing, states and cities are weighing drastic actions to safeguard against the threat of potentially more fire-prone national lands.
I suppose he figures that since he’s allowing clear cutting of the national forests it won’t be a problem much longer. There won’t be anything to burn.
I would normally point out that this will ravage red states too. South Carolina just had a terrible wildfire. But now that Trump has pretty much claimed a dictatorship what does he care? Elections no longer matter to him. He’s getting revenge against his enemies and on a crusade to prove that he has always been right about everything. Except, of course, he’s always been wrong.