Time to get serious with post-fire forest recovery
With our state facing historic drought, we are looking down the barrel of another devastating round of wildfires. Too many California families will have to pack bags and evacuate their homes fearing they may never see them again and much of California may be draped in a blanket of noxious smoke. The impacts don’t end there: if forestland that previously burned isn’t treated with recovery strategies expediently, we will expose ourselves to delay in re-establishing wildlife habitat, natural sources of water filtration, and carbon sequestration capacity, as well as a decline in wood production within the state.
Fortunately, there are clear plans of action that can be undertaken to materially reduce these risks and make our state more resilient for years to come. We simply have to rely on the experts—and get out of their way.
Post-fire recovery, including reforestation, is a critical pillar of natural resource management in California. Calforests member companies know how to implement this active post-fire recovery management. We just have to make sure the industry’s professionals have the resources they need, and clear their path.
We can’t stop thinking about fires when the last embers have burned out, and all aspects of the wildfire strategy, such as prevention, suppression and post fire recovery need to be treated as an emergency for the sake of all Calfornians. The stakes are too high. It’s time to streamline our permitting and work processes to conserve our forests—and to offer future generations the opportunity to retain connection with these lost resources.
California’s privately managed forestlands lost nearly 300,000 acres during the 2020 and 2021 wildfire seasons. Most of those areas suffered moderate to severe damage, which requires significant investment to fund a comprehensive post-fire recovery plan. We recognize and applaud the Newsom Administration for recognizing this critical need in the current budget proposal, but with our state benefiting from a historic $97 billion budget surplus, we can afford to do more—and with our environment under constant threat, we can’t afford not to.
The most sensible plan is to give the tools directly to the most efficient and effective post-fire recovery experts: the professionals in the forest industry and to ease the cumbersome administrative oversight to take action now. Every month that passes simply makes the problem worse, and the costs associated to conduct the work more costly. That’s why Calforests, the premier advocacy organization representing the forest industry in California, is asking for the state’s budget allocation to be increased to at least $150 million to perform post-fire recovery of all privately managed forestlands within the perimeters of the 2020 and 2021 wildfires. This strategy includes increasing nursery capacity for the production of seedlings, cone collection, seed storage and treating thousands upon thousands of acres. This request would not address the need completely, but would result in significant gains in getting our forests back on track to make our landscape safe and sustainable for all Californians.
This is a very specific mandate: we need to revitalize our forests now, need dedicated resources to do so now, and Calforests members are willing to partner on mission tasking to achieve an efficient and robust post fire recovery strategy. The only path forward is to treat the problem for what it is, an emergency, and get to work.
By getting money to private landowners more quickly, California will achieve its postfire recovery goals. If this does not happen, we will be waiting years, and Mother Nature doesn’t work on that timeline.
When the pandemic hit our state, it became an all-hands-ondeck effort where government, industry and private citizens all did their part to help us deal with the immediate threat, and manage the recovery. California’s forest industry is ready to help. It just needs the funding delivered efficiently and purposefully.