With almost 9 million acres burned across the United States in 2018, U.S. Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) is on a mission to mitigate the risk of wildfires by clearing out hazardous trees from America’s national forests.
Sen. Daines, along with U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), is currently developing a bipartisan bill to hasten and expand the removal of dead, dying and unsafe trees in national forests.
“Our bipartisan bill will take concrete, meaningful steps to improve forest health and address the worsening threat that catastrophic wildfires pose to our communities,” the lawmakers said in an Aug. 1 joint statement.
The average acres burned in the United States now almost doubles the average in the 1990s, with more than half of the U.S. Forest Service’s budget dedicated to fighting wildfires compared to 16 percent in 1995, according to the statement released by Sen. Daines and his colleague.
“The 2017 and 2018 fire seasons brought unspeakable loss and grief to California and Montana communities,” the senators said. “Unfortunately, millions of acres of forests in our states and across the West remain at high risk of catastrophic wildfires, and there is strong consensus that fire seasons will only get worse.”
Sens. Daines and Feinstein said they “believe additional resources are urgently needed to protect our communities and tackle these emergency conditions.”
According to their statement, the forthcoming bill will improve forest management; establish processes for quickly removing woody biomass and dead and dying trees; speed up post-fire restoration and reforestation; and expedite targeted treatments of dense forested areas.
“We intend to introduce the bipartisan legislation after the Senate returns from the August work period and will work with members of both parties to pass it,” said Sen. Daines and his colleague.