U.S. Senator Ken Salazar

Member: Finance, Agriculture, Energy, Ethics and Aging Committees

 

2300 15th Street, Suite 450 Denver, CO 80202 | 702 Hart Senate Building, Washington, D.C. 20510

 

 

For Immediate Release

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

CONTACT:Michael Amodeo – 303-455-7600
Matt Lee-Ashley – 202-224-5852

 

Sen. Salazar Urges USFS Chief to Boost Colorado Funding for Bark Beetle Mitigation, Hazardous Fuels Reduction

Washington, DC – Today, in a letter to United States Forest Service (USFS) Chief Abigail Kimbell, United States Senator Ken Salazar urged the USFS to direct a significant share of $250 million in recently appropriated federal funds to forest restoration efforts and hazardous fuels mitigation activities in local communities across Colorado and USFS Region 2. These funds are essential to reducing short and long term wildfire risks that increasingly threaten local communities throughout the Rocky Mountain West.

“With the growing challenges Colorado and our partners in neighboring Western states are facing it is essential that the Forest Service allocate sufficient funds for Region 2,” wrote Senator Salazar. “The bark beetle epidemic is continuing to worsen, with projections showing that practically all of Colorado’s mature lodgepole pines- 5 million acres of forest- will be dead within five years. Furthermore, local and state governments in the region are working to restore health to forests that are out of balance after more than a century of management that focused almost exclusively on fire suppression. These forest restoration efforts, along with mitigation activities aimed at curbing the bark beetle epidemic, need to be adequately funded in order to reduce short-term and long-term fire risks.”

In his letter, Senator Salazar calls for the Forest Service to prioritize funding under the recently-passed Consolidated Security, Disaster Assistance, and Continuing Appropriations Act of 2009 for 1) projects awarded through competitive grants; 2) indirect activities that promote and facilitate fuels mitigation such as biomass programs, hazardous fuel utilization, and marketing, and 3) operational costs; and to work with the State of Colorado to determine how best to maximize the effectiveness of forest health funding.

In particular, the Consolidated Security, Disaster Assistance, and Continuing Appropriations Act of 2009 sets aside the following amounts:

  • $175 million for hazardous fuels reduction and hazard mitigation activities in areas at high risk of catastrophic wildfire due to population density and fuel loads, of which $125 million is available for work on State and private lands using all the authorities available to the Forest Service
  • $75 million for rehabilitation and restoration of Federal lands which may be transferred to other Forest Service accounts as necessary

Forest Service Region 2 includes Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, and most of South Dakota and Wyoming.

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