The massive Biscuit Fire raged through forests in Oregon and California for four months in 2002, turning a half-million acres of brush and timber into ash. By the end of the year, more than 7 million acres had burned.
Then came the Southern California wildfires, which scorched nearly 750,000 acres this fall, killing 22 people and destroying more than 3,600 homes.
President George Bush used the devastation to promote more logging in national forests as a way to prevent similar disasters and boost local economies. Two months after the Southern California fires, Bush signed the first forest-management law in decades, paving the way for tree-removal projects on 20 million acres of federal land.
The measure authorizes $760 million annually to prevent the kind of wildfires that have scorched the drought-plagued Western states. The new law speeds up environmental and judicial reviews to hasten removal of overgrown brush and diseased trees.
Critics say it also leaves ancient stands unprotected from logging.
The White House, environmental groups and loggers all agree that forest-management policy is a mess after a century of fire suppression. Where they differ is the central issue in the nation’s battle with wildfires and forests: how to thin millions of acres of public land to reduce the risk of fire.
Many fire experts say removing brush and trees from some forests can help control fires.
Other experts say fires are part of a forest’s natural cycle and that thinning is not a substitute.
“Thinning may help reduce a fire’s severity if the weather conditions are working for you,” retired Oregon firefighter David Calahan testified at a congressional hearing. “But when the climate and weather turns against you, thinned areas can suffer even more than untouched areas.”
Complicating the issue is that although people often assert that reducing tree density will reduce wildfires, science hasn’t shown that to be the case.
Decades of suppressing fires’ natural cycles have allowed an accumulation of undergrowth that is a key fuel for wildfires. The situation is compounded by areas that have been clear cut and replaced with closely spaced, valuable timber. The Forest Service has estimated that 190 million acres of forest in the United States is susceptible to fires.
Under the new law, called the Healthy Forest Restoration Act, at least half of the $760 million must be used near homes and communities.
Critics of the new law say that increased spending is needed, but that the plan plays on the public’s fear of wildfires and will do little to protect at-risk homes and communities. They say healthy old-growth trees would be cleared in the name of fire prevention, rather than smaller, more flammable trees near houses.
The law focuses on federal land, but a Forest Service analysis showed that 92 percent of the area presenting a risk to communities is non-federal land, according to Mike Englert of the American Lands Alliance.
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THE ISSUE: Decades of fire suppression have set the stage for major wildfires during the last several years.
RECENT ACTION: President Bush signed a law that allows increased thinning of federal forests.
‘Thinning the forest does not reliably solve fire problems.’
— Retired firefighter David Calahan, in congressional testimony
‘Good forest policy not only is important for the preservation of good forests for future generations, it’s good for our economy.’
— President George W. Bush, announcing the Healthy Forests Initiative
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THE AUTHORS OF THIS REPORT
Pete Souza is the Tribune’s national photographer, based in the Washington bureau. He traveled to 13 states during the last year to take the photographs in this report.
Julie Deardorff is a staff reporter who has written extensively about health and the environment.
