Washington, D.C. – Despite Forest Service efforts to blame everyone but themselves for the western wildfire crisis, the leading fire problem is it’s own mismanagement of national fire plan funds, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a national budget watchdog organization.

The agency has failed to identify communities that face a high risk of wildfire, and has not reported on what was accomplished with appropriated wildfire funds, according to the General Accounting Office (GAO).

“Congress provided hundreds of millions of tax dollars to reduce fire risk on millions of acres of federal land,” said Jill Lancelot, President at Taxpayers for Common Sense, “the problem is that the agency is not directing the money to the most at-risk areas. The Forest Service is fiddling as the west burns. Instead of blaming environmentalists for its own failures, it is time for the Forest Service to take responsibility.”

Congress has encouraged the Forest Service and other agencies to focus their efforts in and around communities in the Interior West, yet much of the funding has paid for projects far away from the edges of town, and most of the communities identified were in the eastern United States. “If the fire problem is in the West, it makes sense for the money to be spent in the West, this is not rocket science,” continued Lancelot.

Of the 11,376 high-risk communities identified by the federal government last fall, only one-third are in the West. The list included communities far from the nearest wildfire threat, including New Orleans, LA, Queens, NY, as well as communities in Guam, the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. Further, 80 percent of all prescribed burning, one of the primary methods of reducing fire risk, took place in the southern and eastern regions, where severe wildland fires do not pose a significant threat.

“The federal government has a responsibility to spend fire plan funds where there is a risk of severe fire,” said Lancelot, “the last time I checked, there hadn’t been too many raging wildfires in Queens.”

The Forest Service also has not effectively determined the amount of fire-fighting personnel and equipment needed for responding to and suppressing wildfires, and are not as prepared as they could be to manage fires. Only half of the fire management plans, as required by the fire management policy of 1995, are finished for the national forests. These plans create the road map for the Forest Service on how to manage wildfire.

“American taxpayers will not stand by and watch billions of dollars go up in smoke, it’s time for Congress to take action to ensure that future funds go towards the areas that really need them,” concluded Lancelot.

Contact: Keith Ashdown
(202) 546-8500 x110