Region Archives: US West

Wildfires are a natural part of the landscape in much of Central and Eastern Oregon. James “Jim Bob” Collins has seen the damage a wildfire can cause and the effects it has on the land after the smoke clears. His district had worked for months to receive a $21 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that would have gone to wildfire mitigation in forests and rangelands. But this summer, just as wildfire season was starting, the government walked back on its offer in Wheeler County and across the state. All told $90 million worth of conservation work is on hold across Oregon. That’s left ranchers like Collins and his neighbors, whose land bears the scars of last year’s fires, hoping the rest of this year’s wildfire season is uneventful, as he and the conservation district he serves explore new ways to pay for the work.

A budget crisis a century in the making is coming to a head as Oregon’s rural counties. The crisis originates with a compromise from the era of President Teddy Roosevelt and was prolonged by piecemeal solutions made during the Timber Wars of the 1990s. Now the president’s signature One Big Beautiful Bill removes a key funding source for Oregon’s timber counties. If nothing is done, rural counties could find themselves with no money to pay for sheriff’s departments or other essential needs. …Many rural Oregon counties once relied on a portion of revenue from trees logged on federal lands to cover the costs of essential services. That federal land doesn’t generate local property taxes… So the federal government started sharing a portion of its logging revenues with those counties. When those declined, federal lawmakers came up with the Secure Rural Schools program. …But Congress needs to regularly re-authorize the program.

On the two-year anniversary of the deadly wildfires in Lahaina, Hawaii, the Arbor Day Foundation launched its effort to help replant lost tree canopy. The Foundation distributed more than 580 trees alongside its local planting partner The Outdoor Circle, in collaboration with Treecovery Hawaii and The Royal Lahaina Resort & Bungalows.“Recovery from a wildfire of this scale can take years, but the Arbor Day Foundation is committed to being here for the long haul. We’re proud to work alongside the passionate advocates at The Outdoor Circle to help regrow a flourishing community canopy,” said Dan Lambe, chief executive of the Arbor Day Foundation. “We know trees won’t replace all of what’s been lost in Lahaina, but they can help grow new roots of resilience and nurture hope for the future.”

Despite attempts to save it, the longstanding Pixelle Specialty Solutions in Chillicothe closed its doors permanently on Sunday. The southern Ohio paper mill announced its planned closure in April after nearly 200 years of operating in Ross County. Local leaders and state representatives alike pushed to delay its shuttering, but ultimately the company ceased production this weekend. Not only did the paper mill employ more than 800 people, it fed a larger industry in the state. Executive director of the Ohio Forestry Association Jenna Reese said the mill’s closure will hurt Ohio loggers. “This is gonna have ripple effects throughout the state,” she said. “We’re unfortunately anticipating attrition.” With nearly 8 million acres of forest in Ohio, logging is a major industry. It contributes $1.1 billion to the state economy annually, according to Reese. Forest products, more broadly, make up more than a quarter of Ohio’s agricultural industry, which tops the state.

Every spring, Forest Service fire leaders meet to plan for the upcoming fire season. This year, some employees were shocked by the blunt remarks made during a meeting with forest supervisors and fire staff officers from across the Intermountain West. “We were told, ‘Help is not on the way,’” said one employee, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of losing their job. “I’ve never been told that before.” Agency leaders already knew it might be a bad wildfire season, made worse by having fewer hands available to help out. According to the employee High Country News spoke to, the Forest Service lost at least 1,800 fire-qualified, or “red-carded,” employees through layoffs, deferred resignation, and retirement offers. In total, 4,800 people left the agency. “We were told: Don’t commit to an attack thinking the cavalry is going to come,” the employee said. As fire activity continues to pick up across much of the West, that warning rings true. [a free subscription is required to read the original article, here, published in High Country News]

Western Apache fire management once reshaped Arizona’s forests — and tree rings prove it. A new study combining tree-ring evidence and historical data shows that for centuries, Western Apache communities systematically controlled fire activity across their homeland, reducing the role of climate in driving wildfires. Led by Southern Methodist University fire scientist Christopher Roos, the research analyzed 649 fire-scarred trees from 34 sites in central and eastern Arizona and compared them to several thousand samples from the broader Southwest. The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show that Apache burns were more frequent, smaller, and timed differently than fires elsewhere in the region. Scientists found that in Apache territory, fires often occurred in late April and May — months when community members were engaged in subsistence activities in pine forests.

Cole Lindsay, the Oregon Department of Forestry aviation coordinator, said firefighters would typically have to hike into the dark canyon to check for new fires — a time-consuming and potentially dangerous task on a wildfire that had already roared to 23,890 acres in Wheeler County. But technology has advanced. Instead of sending people, Lindsay sent a drone equipped with an infrared camera to sweep across the canyon. “The cameras and sensors are so good that it would have seen something way before the human eye,” Lindsay said. …The Oregon Department of Forestry has 29 pilots. In 2024, ODF and its contractors flew 482 drone missions, 364 of which were for fire purposes. Out of 136 hours of flight time, 98.5 hours were on fire missions. So far in 2025, ODF, excluding its contractors, have flown 41 missions totaling 14 hours. Out of those 14 hours, 7.9 hours were for fire purposes. 

WASHINGTON STATE — Washington’s rural counties and school districts are preparing to start the school year without millions of dollars from a program meant to offset reduced revenue from logging on federal lands. The Secure Rural Schools program expired at the end of 2023 after Congress failed to renew it. Democratic and Republican lawmakers, along with local officials, are pushing US House leadership to bring a bill renewing the program to the floor. The lapsed program helps pay for roads and schools, providing $7 billion in payments to more than 700 counties and 4,400 school districts across 40 states since it was enacted in 2000. …Counties and schools have received logging revenue from the federal government for roads and schools since 1906. Federal law currently mandates that all counties annually receive 25% of the seven-year average of revenue generated by that county’s forests. 

In May, the White House Office of Budget and Management sent Congress President Trump’s proposed budget for discretionary spending for upcoming fiscal year 2026. Among the budget’s many cuts is a proposal to eliminate all funding for the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program, designed to make timber projects run more smoothly. The Collaborative is a decades-long experiment to get conservationists, the timber industry and U.S. Forest Service back to the proverbial table after the timber wars of years past. Collaboratives have been widely credited with incorporating conservationist’s environmental concerns in the design of timber harvests and, consequently, reducing environmental litigation known to slow down harvests. The CFLRP has been lauded by some for helping implement forest thinning and restoration projects meant to both reduce wildfire risk and increase timber production and jobs in rural communities.

The Trump administration has announced plans to rescind the 2001 Roadless Rule, changing the political and timber industry landscape in the Tongass National Forest for the third time in five years. The Roadless Rule prevents logging, road building and mining on national forest lands. It was last repealed in 2020 and restored in 2023, and has been subject to decades of debate. Timber operators say the rescission could help a dying industry – if it passes through Congress. The U.S. Forest Service owns approximately 78% of the land in Southeast Alaska, meaning timber operators are dependent on the federal agency for a majority of their supply. Kirk Dahlstrom, co-owner of Viking Lumber Co. in Klawock, said the agency is nine years behind on offering timber supply for the Southeast industry. He said his business will not survive if land management remains under Forest Service control. “We got starved to almost nothing.”

The Trump administration has proposed drastically limiting the public’s say in how federal lands are used at a time when the president is pushing to fast-track logging, mining and oil extraction. That’s raising concerns amongst conservationists and environmental advocates, who worry that the changes could have a profound impact on Oregonians’ relationship with the lands around them. More than half the land in Oregon is federally owned, as is about 29% of land in Washington. …Under President Donald Trump, 16 federal agencies are now considering rule changes that could curtail or drastically limit this public input, which is required under the National Environmental Policy Act, known as NEPA. Those proposed changes were announced in early July. The public has until Monday to provide input on the changes for the U.S Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management. …Data shows that public comments can make a difference.

@US Forest Service

Four conservation groups — Native Ecosystems Council, Council on Wildlife and Fish, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, and the Yellowstone to Uintas Connection — have filed a lawsuit in federal court accusing the United States Forest Service and Flathead National Forest of ignoring its own scientists to push ahead on a logging project that would likely imperil grizzly bears, and cut old-growth forests. The lawsuit also claims federal forest officials have intentionally created two adjacent logging projects that would have likely violated federal laws if combined, and instead split them up into two smaller projects to avoid scrutiny. The Forest Service said it does not comment on pending litigation. The lawsuit claims that the Cyclone Bill Logging Project, 13 miles west of Whitefish, will cut and burn on more than 12,000 acres, which includes Canada lynx and grizzly bear habitat, both protected by the Endangered Species Act.

The Washington Forest Practices Board is proposing new legislation pushed by the Washington Department of Ecology that will affect all of us financially. The Washington Forest Practices Board (FPB) is supposedly an “independent” state agency responsible for establishing rules that govern forest practices in Washington state. It’s chaired by the Commissioner of Public Lands Dave Upthegrove. …The FPB is proposing streams that are perennial with no fish should have the existing no-harvest buffers changed from 50 feet each side of the stream to 75 feet (or more). The proposal affects not only the stream buffer width, but the length of stream buffer and volume of restricted trees. Why does it affect you? All timber harvests are taxed by the state of Washington — 4% of the net log value goes back to the county the trees were harvested in. …You are affected by this proposed change in law that does nothing for fish.

The Trump administration’s tumultuous relationship with China is proving to be a major issue for some companies in Alaska’s forest products industry. That includes in Haines, where a timber sale that was supposed to kick off this spring has stalled amid China’s ban on US log imports. China announced the ban in March, citing concerns over pests like bark and longhorn beetles in US shipments. The move came the same day that China imposed retaliatory tariffs on certain US agricultural products amid President Donald Trump’s global trade war. The decision has had sweeping effects on companies that harvest logs in Alaska and ship them overseas. …The trade disputes have also hit Canadian lumber company Transpac Group. The company in March largely shut down its site on Afognak Island, just north of Kodiak, citing the ban and failed efforts to divert its product to other markets.

Throughout her two decades working on forestry issues, Jasmine Minbashian has often found herself at odds with the US Forest Service and the timber industry. Her environmental activism started during the second wave of Pacific Northwest “Timber Wars”. …She joined the North Central Washington Forest Health Collaborative in 2019. …The group is one of 19 forest collaboratives focused on public lands in Washington and Oregon that emerged in the wake of the “Timber Wars” in an attempt to find agreement around contentious forestry issues. …These forest collaboratives, touted as a model of consensus-driven conservation, have quietly become influential engines for federal forest management decisions across the West. But critics worry the groups are too aligned with timber interests that prioritize commercial logging, and that they helped pave the way for the Trump administration’s latest effort to expand logging on public lands throughout the country by skirting environmental protection laws.

There are obvious benefits to logging, grazing, prescribed burns, and mechanical thinning of California’s forests. When you suppress wildfires for what is now over a century, then overregulate and suppress any other means to thin the forest, you get overcrowded and unhealthy forests. California’s trees now have 5 to 10 times more than a historically normal density. They’re competing for an insufficient share of light, water and nutrients, leading to disease, infestations, dehydration and death. Up through the 1980s, California harvested 6 billion board feet per year of timber; the annual harvest is now 25% of that. We have turned our forests into tinderboxes. …For the sake of California’s water supply, its energy security, the safety of people living in the forests, and the health of our trees and wildlife, Californian needs to revive its logging industry. …It will also enable something counterintuitive: precious and endangered wildlife can thrive in a responsibly managed forest.

Wildfires are getting more catastrophic and expensive. For the last decade, Oregon policymakers haven’t been able to agree on how to pay for them. And while lawmakers emerged from this year’s legislative session with a plan to fund wildfire prevention, there’s still no dedicated funding to fight large fires like the Cram Fire, which has burned nearly 100,000 acres in Central Oregon. The total wildfire budget for the next two years is less than the state spent last year alone. And in some cases, costs that used to be borne by insurance plans and private landowners are now the responsibility of all Oregonians. A similar phrase cropped up during multiple interviews with policymakers: The consensus lawmakers reached this year is a good “first step.” What’s less clear is if it’s enough. ….“Oregonians writ large, are going to be the ones to pay for it,” said Casey Kulla, with Oregon Wild.