Spotfire!

Federal wildland firefighters aren’t just emergency responders; they are the frontline stewards of over 600 million acres of public land in the United States. Their work extends far beyond suppressing wildfires.

October 3rd, 2024 wasn’t just any day. In fact, for fire ecology experts and enthusiasts alike, it happened to be the perfect day. Just the evening before, my email pinged. It was the message I had been highly anticipating this fall, from Pisgah's Volunteer and Intern Coordinator, Jared Tarr. 

It was go-time: prescribed fire was to be implemented the morning of Oct. 3rd, on the east side of Howard Buford Recreation Area.

The Federal Advisory Committee (FAC) working on the USFS' Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP) amendment held their third in-person meeting in Eugene, Oregon in January. Comprised of 21 volunteers representing diverse interests and groups from across the Pacific Northwest, the FAC has done a remarkable job of producing policy recommendations for the upcoming Environmental Impact Statement. In fact, they delivered 81 single-spaced, double-sided pages full of recommendations divided among the six subcommittees they created (Climate, Fire resilience, Old-growth, Tribal inclusion, Communities, and Biodiversity).

With the initial round of public comments and meetings amongst the FAC coming to a close, the focus of the upcoming NWFP amendment will be honing in on protections for old-growth forests, tribal inclusion, and fire resilience. It is clear that current policies that aim to suppress fire have failed to protect native old-growth forest ecosystems, as fire suppression has resulted in uncontrollable wildfires. Old-growth forest ecosystems are one of the planet’s biggest carbon sinks and offer a natural solution to the climate crisis. Logging is one of the region's largest sources of carbon emissions. The NWFP amendment needs to protect forests from commercial logging that removes the most carbon-rich, fire-resilient trees.

We have a National Strategy for updating our response to ever-hotter wildfires. With years of learning, careful consultation, and consideration, the Cohesive Wildfire Strategy offers a chance to respond to climate change and its effect on wildfires. But will personnel problems in our federal agencies sabotage the National Strategy?

Driven by the FLAME Act of 2009, the National Strategy gives energy and coherence to fire management during climate change. Inherent in this national strategy is an assumption that governments on all levels can hire a skilled workforce to respond to fires in ever more creative ways over the next few decades.

On some snowy February days, I drove from my cabin, crossed the Rio Grande Valley north of Santa Fe, and joined other firefighters at sunrise in an icy, snowy place in the Jemez Mountains. I’m used to working on fires in the spring, summer or fall, but here we were with layers of warm gear under our fireproof clothing, blowing into our hands and standing in the sun when it finally came up. Then we set out to burn piles of slash on a snowy slope, deep in the Valles Caldera National Preserve.

The U.S. Forest Service convened the first meeting of a Federal Advisory Committee (FAC) in early September to work on an amendment of the Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP). Covering 17 national forests in 3 states, this is one of the most ambitious planning projects the agency has initiated in years. The agency wants to modernize the 30 year old NWFP by developing new strategies for dealing with climate change and wildfires, and engaging Tribal communities and Indigenous perspectives that were largely excluded from the original plan.

FUSEE's program director for the FireGeneration Collaborative, Ryan Reed, serves on the 21-person FAC as the sole designated "public" representative. Ryan is an Indigenous fire practitioner and wildland firefighter, and is the youngest member ever to serve on a FAC.