The attached sheet provides an overview of the week’s events and outcomes. You should share this information with your team/group members.

Your participation in the NWCG re-structuring activities is appreciated. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to contact any of the NWCG members.

Background

Through the years, various interagency organizations have sprouted at different levels within the federal and state governments to support areas of wildland fire and fuels management. In 1976, the National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) was created to develop interagency standards and guidelines for incident management. In 2002, the Wildland Fire Leadership Council (WFLC) was created to implement the National Fire Plan and oversee national fire policy. In 2007, The Fire Executive Council (FEC) was created to provide a conduit between WFLC and wildland fire field operations.

Previous
Wildland Fire Governance Structure

Wildland Fire leaders recognized that things needed to be simplified and embarked on a re-chartering and reorganizing of the governance structure. In October 2007, the following new Wildland Fire Governance Structure was accepted by the Wildland Fire Leadership Council (WFLC), the Federal Executive Council (FEC), and the NWCG.

Interagency Wildland Fire Governance Structure

Under the WFLC, the National Fire and Aviation Executive Board (NFAEB), the National Multi-Agency Coordination (NMAC) Group, and the NWCG, more than 50 teams existed. Overlap and confusion about roles crept into what had become a complicated organization.

To bring new efficiencies and to reduce this confusion, interagency fire leaders decided to combine and streamline the various interagency groups and teams under a single NWCG organization. Because the “NWCG” name is imbedded in many policies, practices, and procedures, they decided to retain the NWCG name and to combine the functions of the NFAEB and the NMAC Group into a single NWCG Charter.

Objectives of the new NWCG organization are to:

• Meet the needs of the wildland fire community, including federal and state partners
• Be more efficient, effective, and responsive
• Provide clarity of roles, responsibilities, functions, and relationships
• Provide improved coordination for:
  • Policy
  • Standards
  • Operations
• Improve communication among the parent group and the various sub-groups
• Eliminate confusion about roles and responsibilities
• Reduce duplication
• Simplify governance.

Group Involvement

At their January 2008 Meeting, the NWCG invited the chairs of the various sub-groups of the WFLC, NWCG, NFAEB, and NMAC to participate in the creation of a new organization structure for the re-chartered NWCG. Five break-out groups consisting of a total of 30 sub-group chairs and NWCG members were tasked with defining their activities and designing a proposed substructure for the NWCG. The groups were instructed to apply a new organization naming convention and hierarchy that includes “committees”, “sub-committees”, and “task teams”.

The next step is to evaluate the substructure proposals that were produced at the January Meeting and decide upon the new NWCG substructure. The NWCG has a goal of settling on a new substructure this spring, with the full implementation completed within the next two years.

cc: NWCG Members

 back to the top

back to NWCG home